August 17, 2008

Libby Copeland/WaPo's incredibly stupid Bob Barr profile

Libby Copeland of the Washington Post offers "Bob Barr, the Master of a Curious Universe" (link), and it's both incredibly lightweight and incredibly stupid. First, a preface: while they have a few worthy ideas, libertarians and (especially) Libertarians are generally divorced from the reality that the rest of us share. Despite that, one might expect someone who's doing a profile on a candidate to have some passing acquaintance with their party and its issues. Instead, we're featured to a "libertarians in the mist"-style treatment, and she even misses Barr bringing up one of the things that some libertarians hold against him, his erstwhile opposition to Wiccans joining the military:

"I have a question for you," [his wife Jeri Barr] says. "I have an opportunity to get reasonably priced tickets to 'Wicked.' "

"To what?" Bob asks.

" 'Wicked.' "

"Oh, I thought you said 'Wicca,' " Barr says, chuckling. Look! Bob Barr's dimples.

That's it: she doesn't realize that he left himself open to being asked about that topic.

The rest of it is equally lightweight, as her attempts to discuss policy run aground on the shoals of inaccuracy:

And, because the United States is not a "charity," Bob Barr as president would attempt to stop the practices of hospitals offering medical care to illegal immigrants and schools educating illegal immigrants' children. Most of all, he'd shrink government and taxes.

In fact, he only supports ending non-emergency medical care to illegal aliens. And, as has been seen before, the MSM just doesn't realize that that parents and children might have different statuses. Barr wants to end K-12 education for illegal aliens who are children, irrespective of the status(es) of their parents.

All five pages could have used Barr's immigration position to show that he's simply a fake, but doing real reporting is beyond the Washington Post's grasp.

Posted to Politics at August 17, 2008 10:09 PM