We've certainly had our share of typos and the like over here at NC Policy Watch, but one has to ask: Who's editing the copy over on right-wing avenue? Check out this Locke Foundation promo for the upcoming appearance of neo-con blowhard, Fred Barnes:
Barnes is considered a hard-hitting, no-holds-barred journalist who delves into key issues to uncover the real story. When speaking to audiences or answering their questions, Barnes delivers the same insightful commentary with the wit and the no-holds-barred style that has made him a respected journalist.
The Locke people obviously weren't reading the late, great Hunter S. Thompson during their formative years as "opinion journalists." If they had, they'd never have forgotten this keen observation/timeless piece of advice from "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72":
Sports writers are a kind of rude and brainless sub-culture of fascist drunks whose only real function is to publicize & sell whatever the sports editor sends them out to cover. . . Which is a nice way to make a living, because it keeps a man busy and requires no thought at all. The two keys to success as a sports writer are: (1) A blind willingness to believe anything you're told by the coaches, flaks, hustlers, and other "official spokesman" for the team-owners who provide the free booze . . . and: (2) A Roget's Thesaurus, in order to avoid using the same verbs and adjectives twice in the same paragraph. Even a sports editor, for instance, might notice something wrong with a lead that said, "The precision-jackhammer attack of the Miami Dolphins stomped the balls off the Washington Redskins today by stomping and hammering with one precise jack-thrust after another up the middle, mixed with pinpoint-precision passes into the flat and numerous hammer-jack stomps around both ends…(emphasis supplied).
Ya' gotta hand it to the Gonzo king. His words are just as apt for today's political bloggers as they were for the ink-stained wretches of the 1970's.
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