What is that annoying sound? Well, it’s the death rattle of the Washington Post. Again. And again. And again. And again. The latest, and perhaps most pathetic gurgle is entitled Support grows for tackling nation’s debt, written by Elaine S. Povich and Eric Pianin, who work, not for the Post but rather the “Fiscal Times,” which the Post describes laughably as an “independent digital news publication reporting on fiscal, budgetary, health-care and international economics issues.”
In fact, as the Columbia Journalism Review reports, the Fiscal Times looks to be a creature of right-winger Peter G. Peterson and his entitlement-bashing buddies over at the Concord Coalition. PGP was once Commerce Secretary under Richard Nixon (yeah, that Richard Nixon), who must be laughing his pitchfork-bedeviled butt off at the thought of the Wash Post carrying water for him.
As the CJR unsportingly points out, the Povich/Pianin piece quotes Robert Bixby, executive director of the Coalition, without mentioning the fact that the Coalition and the Fiscal Times form a sort of ideological pair of Siamese twins, or rather triplets, because Povich and Pianin also cite data from a third Peterson-connected front, the “Peterson-Pew Commission on Budget Reform.”
Afterwords
Embarrassingly, the CJR has to admit that they’re sticking their hand in the PGP cookie jar as well, saying that CJR “will soon announce the hiring of a part-time fellow funded by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation,” yet another ugly head of the PGP hydra. Literature R Us, I’m glad to say, is getting exactly nothing from Pete, and it’s going to damn well stay that way.
