Journalists who love Obama

Republicans long accused journalists of being in the tank for Barack Obama, said Jim Rutenberg in The New York Times. Now “the accusation has a new twist”—several prominent reporters have taken jobs in the Obama administration. It’s not unprecedented for journalists to make such a switch, but the “unusual number” joining Obama’s team is bound to fuel the cries of favoritism.

You think? asked Jonah Goldberg in USA Today. Mainstream journalists have been “clapping on the inside” since Obama won the election. And like Franklin D. Roosevelt—another popular Democrat who followed an unpopular Republican—Obama can count on an “obsequious press corps” to make his job easier, and make his critics miserable.

Let’s see how long Obama’s honeymoon lasts, said David Cay Johnston in the Columbia Journalism Review. The White House press corps has found that “the Obama press operation tends to embrace friendly questions, while treating skeptical questions as not worth their time or, worse, as coming from an enemy.” If that keeps up, the relationship could turn adversarial, fast.

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