SOMEONE TELL DANA MILBANK THAT SARCASM AND STUPIDITY DON’T MIX
The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank is the master of the comment that is simultaneously smart-alecky and utterly clueless. Since Milbank evidently ain’t too bright, perhaps the proper term for him is “dumb-alecky.” Or, instead of “sarcastic,” Milbank is “dumb-asstic.” I have previously given you a good example of a dumb-aleck comment by Milbank, here.
Well, Milbank is at it again. Today, in an exceptionally silly story about John Kerry eating cheesesteak, Milbank makes the following dumb-asstic statement: “Appearing out of touch with the common man can be deadly for a candidate. Recall George H.W. Bush’s wonderment in the 1992 campaign upon coming across a supermarket scanner.”
What I recall is that the “Bush was amazed by a supermarket scanner” story has long been known to be an urban legend. As snopes.com explains: “Andrew Rosenthal of The New York Times hadn’t even been present at the grocers’ convention. [A New York Times reporter filing a story about an event he didn't even witness? Say it ain't so! -- ed.] He based his article on a two-paragraph report filed by the lone pool newspaperman allowed to cover the event, Gregg McDonald of the Houston Chronicle, who merely wrote that Bush had a ‘look of wonder’ on his face and didn’t find the event significant enough to mention in his own story. Moreover, Bush had good reason to express wonder: He wasn’t being shown then-standard scanner technology, but a new type of scanner that could weigh groceries and read mangled and torn bar codes.“
So, in the fine tradition of the New York Times, a reporter files a story he knows nothing about. And in the fine tradition of Dana Milbank, the long-discredited canard is repeated more than a decade after the story was first revealed to be bogus.
Another fine job by Dana Milbank.
Dana Milbank never gets anything right. He has perfected the east-coast sneer and the liberal lie, but no one takes him seriously.
Comment by Walter Funk — 9/5/2004 @ 7:51 pm
In order to understand why H.W. was amazed, wouldn’t Dana have to understand the technology and the step forward it took?
Let’s not be too hard on him, he can’t understand everything. And science isn’t required in J-school, is it? Or math?
No, no, I’m sure there’s something he understands.
Comment by Dan S — 9/6/2004 @ 6:38 am
If pork can be both sweet and sour, why can’t an ass be both smart and dumb?
Comment by Xrlq — 9/6/2004 @ 7:35 pm
[...] Judge Alito’s sense of humor has been described as "quiet and sly." It’s not as flashy as that of Justice Antonin Scalia, nor as snarky as that of the young John Roberts, but it’s definitely there (notwithstanding Dana Milbank’s somewhat juvenile attempt to portray Judge Alito as a humorless nerd). [...]
Pingback by Confirm Them » Alito: Beards and Lawn Flamingos are Okay, But Statues of Felines Aren’t — 11/14/2005 @ 9:10 pm
[...] As Patterico noted a couple years back when coining the phrase “dumb aleck” to describe Dana Milbank, someone needs to explain to Tim Cavanaugh of Reason that sarcasm only works when you know what you are talking about. Cavanaugh, you may recall, is the Reason luminary who banned me from commenting at “Reason’s” aptly-named “Hit and Run” blog, for pointing out the fact that lawyer / Reason contributor Michael McMenamin was lying when he claimed Judith Miller was sentenced to a prison sentence (the term of which Miller herself mysteriously managed to short a few months later simply by promising to start obeying the law that had gotten her in there to begin with), pulls another doozy on Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden, whom he accuses of “giv[ing] a less-than-strict constructionist reading” of the Fourth Amendment. Hayden’s crime? Apparently, it was having had the audacity to actually read the damned thing: QUESTION: Jonathan Landay with Knight Ridder. I’d like to stay on the same issue, and that had to do with the standard by which you use to target your wiretaps. I’m no lawyer, but my understanding is that the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution specifies that you must have probable cause to be able to do a search that does not violate an American’s right against unlawful searches and seizures. Do you use— [...]
Pingback by damnum absque injuria » Memo to Cavanaugh: Ignorance and Sarcasm Don’t Mix — 5/8/2006 @ 6:17 am