Over the last few days there has been an explosion of stories regarding a Fox News report that claimed Fox was, initially, deliberately snubbed by the Treasury Department. Only after other networks in the press pool objected to the exclusion was Fox added to the list of participants, with Major Garrett eventually conducting the interview in question. From Fox:

The Obama administration on Thursday failed in its attempt to exclude Fox News from participating in an interview of an administration official, as Republicans on Capitol Hill stepped up their criticism of the hardball tactics employed by the White House.

Pushback on the story was immediate. The contrary narrative was that in no way was Fox ever deliberately excluded from anything, and by no means did the “real” networks ever defend Fox. From Talking Points Memo:

The network pool crew noticed Fox wasn’t on the list, was told that they hadn’t asked and the crew said they needed to be included. Treasury called the White House and asked top Obama adviser Anita Dunn. Dunn said yes and Fox’s Major Garrett was among the correspondents to interview Feinberg last night.

The story included a statement from the Treasury department that said there was “no plot to exclude Fox News, and they had the same interview that their competitors did. Much ado about absolutely nothing.”

After Talking Points Memo and other outlets began to question the details of Fox News’ initial report, the online left in blogs and on Twitter seized on this as an example of dishonesty on the part of Fox. Salon.com editor Joan Walsh went so far as to refer to it as a “hoax” on her twitter feed, a sentiment in common with some at DailyKos. Washington Monthly’s Political Animal blog declared “Fox News surely knows that this ‘controversy’ is not what it appears to be, but the network pushed it anyway, hoping to score some cheap points and desperate to position itself as a victim.”

The most popular quote, though, was from White House spokesman Josh Earnest, who told TPM that “this White House has demonstrated our willingness to exclude Fox News from newsmaking interviews, but yesterday we did not.”

“Simple as that,” said Talking Points Memo. Only it turns out, not quite.

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Earlier this year I outlined the phases of the evolution of the Obama “message.” Here they are again, with another update.

Throughout the campaign and on into January of this year:

February’s phase II:

March and April “World Apology Tour” theme:

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So now we come to the latest stage in the evolution …

October’s “Fox isn’t news” love us or else media assault:

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Consider this an OPEN THREAD.

Throughout the campaign and on into January of this year:

February’s phase II:

March and April “World Apology Tour” theme:

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Consider this an OPEN THREAD.

Dear Frank Schaeffer’s Open Letters: Hi, I’m Caleb Howe’s blog entries (hereafter referred to as “a blog”). Thanks for listening. I used to be an open letter (hereafter referred to as “the hacky crutch”) much like you. Eventually I had to change. Too many bad things happened over the years, and the hacky crutch was increasingly used for purposes I didn’t want to be a part of. Streams of senseless invective and uncommonly nasty hatred would coalesce across the internet, and in newspapers and magazines under the constant banner of the hacky crutch.

It seemed, in fact, that the hacky crutch was often cover for little more than “look at me,” self-important diatribes, wherein the author would make wild accusations at the object of their hatred. There was so much vanity, so much vitriol, so little to say. Eventually I had to become a blog.

People would do despicable things, Frank Schaeffer’s Open Letters. They might even demonize an entire segment of the population as worthless villains unworthy of the President’s consideration or reputation based, essentially, on their religious affiliation!

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It of course goes without saying that the war on Rush Limbaugh is continuing apace. Democrats are nothing if not committed to untenable positions. The more untenable the better, in fact. As we’ve endeavored to point out here at Redstate, this is all a White House distraction tactic, and it’s being executed by friendly media taking directions. The left online, naturally, jumped on board faster than a Democrat on a filmmaker. It’s simple to understand, really. They don’t want you to think about Obama’s broken campaign promises and inept first month. So they need a distraction. They have replaced the B with an R in their favorite distraction action: hobgoblinery. (Well it sounds like a real word!)

So it should come as no surprise that they would be anxious to dismiss as false the news that Limbaugh is benefiting greatly from their assault. Their narrative only has teeth as long they believe that they are marginalizing Rush and, therefore, Republicans and conservatives everywhere, as cartoonish and grotesque creatures. As soon as Rush says he is gaining audience the petulance sets in. The “nuh uh” impulse, particularly in the blogs and the Oval office, is strong.

So, leave it to Tommy Christopher to give the liberal blogs just what they were salivating for: a story in which he accuses Howard Kurtz of making the whole thing up.

Here is what Kurtz originally said:

By one measure, Rush Limbaugh is a clear winner this week: His ratings have nearly doubled since his feud with the White House burst into the media limelight.

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I don’t know if she’s casting about for attention or just one messed up [bad word], but Janeane’s “psychoanalysis” of Limbaugh and racial profiling of Steele, to the cheerleading of the Worst Analyst In The World is disgusting. Click on Read More below to see Fox News’ Red Eye take Olbermann and Garofalo apart.

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“Without a doubt, people are stepping more gingerly. People are tiptoeing their way through this.”- Ted Rall, liberal editorial cartoonist.

Last week’s firestorm over an editorial cartoon at the New York Post is still burning it’s way through the media and the blogosphere, and in the wake of Eric Holder’s declaration that Americans (read: white Americans) are cowards and James Clyburn’s claim that rejection of stimulus funds is motivated by racism, the reactions are naturally mixed and sometimes contentious. Reverend Al Sharpton, for example, is demanding investigations and protests. MSNBC is having shouting matches. Some cartoonists are simply preparing to self-censor and nevertheless suffer unintended consequences. The controversy is not soon to die down.

In light of the cartoon war, the Associated Press ran a story Saturday, from which the above quoted material was pulled, examining the overall shift to caution by that normally incautious breed of political commentator, the editorial cartoonist. Because Barack Obama is black, to summarize the article, political cartoonists now operate under the duress of fear. In America, there is no worse stigma than that of being called “racist,” especially in the age of Obama. The armies of political correctness and so-called progressivism feel free to act more boldly, now that a man who owes his political career to the forces of the far left holds the highest office in the world. The left is, therefore, if even possible within physics, more likely than ever to throw the “racist” gauntlet.

There is a difference, though, between a thing that can be taken a certain way, and which may or may not offend the person who so takes it, and a thing that is overtly racist: racist in tone, racist in intent. It is clear, to the objective observer, that at most the Post cartoon is the former, and in no way is there any reason to think it the latter. I have ample evidence, click through to keep reading.

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Much was made, during storied campaign 2008, of the notion that we are all one people, needlessly divided. That from the many would come the one. There is not a liberal America, and a conservative America, there is the United States of America, after all. Heal this nation, we heard. Make us one, they pleaded. A lovely sentimentality, that. And an utterly false affectation, of course, as we’ve come to see over the last few weeks.

Despite left-wing bloggers’ Ministry of Truth efforts at rewriting history, to even the most casual observer it should be clear that the vaunted promise of achieving common goals through compromise or "reaching out" was discarded by the new Democrat regime just as quickly as their suit coats and the "The President’s Own" Marine Band. "I Won," says the One. "So say we all," say his attendant masses.

What replaced the fiction was what was underneath it all along. The Democrat idea of becoming one nation is the Democrat idea of becoming one party, one mind. When they claim to want to heal the nation, the cure they fix their sights upon is neither stitch nor coagulant, but amputation. In campaign rhetoric this was always hidden behind the media-made veil of the Obama mythos, but in the wake of the stimulus tragedy that veil is lifted. Through with hiding, the totalitarian impulses of the Obama faithful are free to scurry into full view as they raise their voices to declare what is just and what is not, to determine which life is valuable and which is not; an entirely familiar calculus for Democrats, one might add.

From among the scurrilous, one particularly odious overture is enjoying acclaim on the front page of the Huffington Post this weekend. Frank Schaeffer, once an evangelical he’ll be sure to remind you every few seconds, has penned an open letter to the President urging him to drop his nonexistent overtures to the Republicans. Not, mind you, in terms regarding the cynicism any of us may have regarding politicians, particularly of the opposite party. No, in a much more sinister and chilling assault on the Republican voter, or "rabid core constituents" as Schaeffer, once an evangelical, puts it.

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The left is trying their utmost, of late, to make Limbaugh the symbol of all Republicans, and then tear down Limbaugh to tear us all down. They are trying their hardest, with Obama fecklessly “leading” the charge, to paint a picture of Republican members of Congress groveling and scraping before Limbaugh (if only!) because they apparently, and absurdly, think that this is some strategy for getting (R) votes on (D) legislation.

The trickle-down of this so-called strategy has the left’s propaganda organs nearly daily touting new evidence of how irrelevant Rush is becoming in the age of Obama. See how clever they are? If Rush is the power of the party, and he is irrelevant, so too must be the party, and therefore you are an outsider if you agree with Limbaugh or Republicans.

One of the recent tactics is touting polling data regarding how popular El Rushbo is. Last week, Max Blumenthal took top prize in this category by assessing a poll from October, conducted by Democratic research firm Greenberg-Quinlan-Rosner, to conclude that Limbaugh is less popular than Bill Ayers or Jeremiah Wright. Can’t you just feel the left-wing glee? (If not, search Google or Technorati for the Blumenthal conclusion and witness the poll-gasms first-hand.) Titles like “Americans Prefer Terrorist to Limbaugh,” “Rush Limbaugh Less Popular Than Radical Ayers or Reverend Wright” and so on screamed across the left online.

Blumenthal’s article, titled “Rush Limbaugh Loses a Popularity Contest” (originally titled, as you can see from the URL, “America To Rush, Drop Dead”), is so much of an overreach it overreaches overreaching. As a matter of fact, despite the frenzied parroting of this now KnownFact™ across the left-o-sphere, it’s just flat false.

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