- I wouldn’t have pegged Steve Jobs as quasi-besties with Rupert Murdoch, but I didn’t think he was anti-union, either.

- When the White House isn’t investigating reporters for asking questions the Vice-President doesn’t like, it’s pushing around the Washington Post for daring to write an objective, not adulatory, piece on Obama.

- Any press not hand-selected by the White House is shut out of Obama’s fancy fundraiser in San Francisco:

President Obama is scheduled to appear before hundreds of donors at a $7,500-a-plate noontime fundraiser today at San Francisco’s W Hotel – but not a single local reporter will be allowed inside to cover his only stop in the area, the White House said Monday.

Coverage instead is being restricted to a small pool of Washington-based reporters – a move that is a sharp departure from the practices of past administrations, political observers said.

Three former top White House press aides called the move insular and politically short-sighted. And some press watchers said it is hypocritical for an administration that Obama promised would be “the most transparent in history.”

- Romney attempts to recreate the MyMitt version of MyBarackObama:

Called MyMitt, the platform is tucked away on MittRomney.com, accessible only if you choose to register on the Action page and unadvertised in any proactive way. There’s no button pointing to it from the homepage, and the MyMitt Action Center looks like it’s only partially finished.

Nevertheless, close to 100,000 Romney supporters have created an account on MyMitt, a substantial number at this stage in the race. Here’s why this could be a big deal.

In 2008, Barack Obama’s campaign built its own social network at My.BarackObama.com. Known as myBO for short, the platform made it easy for Obama supporters to create their own profiles on the campaign website, to write their own blog posts, start or join interest groups, organize their own house parties and, most important, initiate and track their own fundraisers.

Two million people eventually joined, and 35,000 generated more than $70 million in campaign contributions from their own personal networks. Enabling your supporters to visible share their enthusiasm with each other is a powerful way to grow a political network. Even more useful: The myBO platform also allowed the campaign to figure out which supporters were the most passionate activists and to concentrate attention on these “super-volunteers” for a variety of vital tasks.

While Obama’s re-election campaign brags about getting its millionth individual donor, basks in its 23 million-strong Facebook following and spends millions on building a sophisticated online campaign operation, it might be tempting to write off the Republican presidential candidates as hopelessly behind in the chase for support on the Web.

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From Accuracy in Media’s Cliff Kincaid:

The Washington Post noted that House Speaker John Boehner’s commencement speech at the Catholic University of America (CUA) was non-political. But the Post story about the speech was entirely political. The story slammed Boehner’s conservative Catholic views by using a student at the event—one of about 30 liberal “social justice” advocates—to argue that the Republican from Ohio isn’t compassionate enough toward the poor.

Here’s how the Post story by Katherine Shaver began:

“Katy Jamison strode toward her graduation from Catholic University on Saturday wearing the requisite black robe and mortar board—plus a neon green message to House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio). ‘Where’s the compassion, Mr. Boehner?’ said the 8-by-10-inch sign pinned to her chest.”

Jamison, it turns out, was one of “about 30” involved in this “protest,” out of 1,500 students receiving bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral graduates. And this is what the Post decided to emphasize. It is a case study of liberal media bias through deliberate distortion. The purpose was to portray Boehner as not only heartless but out of step with the teaching of the Catholic Church. But the ploy failed, based on the paltry numbers of protesters, according to the paper’s own account.

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From Accuracy in Media’s Don Irvine:

The Washington Post Company continues to be battered by a generally weak advertising market and continued troubles at its Kaplan Higher Education Unit, as they reported that profits slid 67% from a year ago.

The Post reported first-quarter net income of $15.2 million, or $1.87 per share.  Revenue fell 6.9 percent to $1.06 billion.

Kaplan, which has been the main profit engine of the Post for years, saw operating income fall 73 percent on a 10 percent reduction in revenue. New student enrollment plunged 48 percent and overall enrollment was down 23 percent from the same period a year ago.

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Trillions of dollars are at stake in the man-made global warming debate.  The Climategate scandal – where leaked emails and computer programs involve dozens of prominent scientists worldwide – has almost everything one would want in a good scandal: conspiracies, fraud, possible destruction of documents, and lots of heated exchanges.  But the media has been reluctant to look into the problems and even when the controversy has been acknowledged it has been quickly dismissed as unimportant.

Newsweek poo-poohed Climategate as just showing “a few scientists in a bad light” and that “there’s still plenty of evidence that the earth is getting warmer and that humans are largely responsible.”  The New York Times editorialized that “no one should be misled by all the noise” and that global warming was just too important “to let one set of purloined e-mail messages undermine the science and the clear case for action.”  Former Vice President Al Gore has been in full swing doing interviews the last few weeks, and the media has rarely challenged any of his claims.  Gore told Slate: “What we’re seeing is a set of changes worldwide that just make this discussion over 10-year-old e-mails kind of silly.”  He made the same comment unchallenged on MSNBC.  Yet, the thousand emails were written over thirteen years, and went right up through this year. (more…)

I couldn’t believe I was having this conversation. It felt like a scene from a movie that conveniently ties plot points together when two critical characters in the storyline share a moment of implausible significance – where the intrepid reporter finally runs his target to ground.

So at first I had trouble getting my words out. “I’m Andrew Breitbart,” I exhaled. Instead of hanging up, Bertha Lewis laughed like someone I would probably like in a different setting – but certainly not in this lifetime now that we are permanently and publicly tied to one another as media-based adversaries.

I knew the awkwardness of the moment would turn into trouble when I started asking her pointed questions and, sure enough, we soon we found ourselves in trouble.

“Did you go to the White House last year?” I asked.

Bertha Laughed heartily.  ”No,” she said.

“Really?” I pushed.

“No. One hundred percent not. Not this year. Not last year. Not ever,” she stated firmly, all the while maintaining an awkward and ironic joviality that was likely born of the weirdness of our impromptu exchange. (more…)