If anyone ever asks you why newspapers are dying, point them to this. In a web chat yesterday WaPo reporter Ben Pershing was asked about his newspaper’s coverage of the birthers:
But instead of denouncing the birther nonsense, Pershing appeared to justify the mainstream media’s attention on this (non)issue:
Ben Pershing: Perhaps because there is an actual videotape of the planes hitting the World Trade Center that billions of people around the world have seen, while there is no videotape of Obama being born in Hawaii or Vince Foster committing suicide.
Also, for what this is worth, there is no bill in Congress declaring 9/11 to have been a giant conspiracy. But there is a bill in the House calling for presidential candidates to provide proof of citizenship. And there was a congressional investigation of Foster’s death.
I guess everything that happened before video cameras were invented maybe didn’t happen. Actually, I’ve never seen a video of my own birth – do I exist?