Oprah and Sarah: Anatomy of a Non-troversy

I never thought I'd live to see a faux-controversy stupider than the one over Barack Obama's failure to wear a flag pin on his lapel at all times. But here it is: Oprah Snubgate!

Matt Drudge kicked it off on Friday by reporting that Oprah Winfrey, who "is not rushing to embrace the first woman on a Republican presidential ticket," had not invited Alaska governor Sarah Palin on her show, despite a feeling by some of her staffers that she ought to.

Drudge's thin item was a transparent attempt to de-legitimize Winfrey, whose endorsement of Obama may have brought him as many as 1 million votes in the primaries.

But that was no problem for the New York Post, which splashed the news on its front page yesterday. "PALIN CLUBBED BY OPRAH SNUB" screamed the headline.

Just to be totally clear: Winfrey didn't invite Palin on her show and then withdraw the invitation; no one is saying she did. She didn't invite Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden on her show while failing to invite Palin; no one is saying she did. Nor is anyone claiming that Palin asked to be a guest. The entire "snub" here consists of Matt Drudge's view that Oprah really ought to invite Palin. And, in fact, Winfrey says she will have Palin on her show, just not before the election, because she's not interviewing any of the candidates before then.

Yet this wisp of a shred of an non-event nevertheless is getting wide play as a "controversy" -- and not just by the Post, which is utterly shameless about advancing the Republican agenda, but by reputable news organizations like ABC News, whose headline asked, "Is Oprah Biased? Host Won't Interview Palin."

This chain of events neatly illustrates how non-ideological outlets will follow up on an obvious smear job by the Drudge Report for no other reason than that they expect their competitors to do the same. Drudge posts his headline; some dim-bulb producer at ABC sees it and decides it must be news because it was on the Drudge Report, right? ABC's writer, Emily Friedman, scares up a warm body to quote -- "a pediatrician and Oprah fan" -- who thinks Oprah's being unfair. After weighing all the non-evidence, Friedman concludes that "Winfrey's decision to blacklist Palin could backfire."

The idiocies here are too many to enumerate, but let's start with the headline. "Is Oprah Biased?" Well, yes. Seeing as she frigging endorsed Obama for president, I'd say that's a fair deduction. But the question isn't whether she's biased but whether she's handling that bias in a reasonable way -- being transparent about it, not shoving her opinions down the throats of viewers who aren't interested in her politics, etc. -- and the answer is unequivocally that she is.

Also: "Blacklist"? Really? So now failing to affirmatively extend an invitation to someone counts as blacklisting that person? In that case, why, Emily Friedman, have you been blacklisting me from your birthday parties? Wait, I know why? Bias!

Here's a slightly less preposterous question: Is the media biased? We've been hearing more than usual this week from people who think it is (or at least perceive a political advantage in pretending they do), but they're wrong. Oprah Snubgate proves that the media's primary bias isn't liberalism. It's laziness.

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