Preparations for the defense

Getting in their digs before the election results, according the Editor & Publisher (the reliably left of Lenin "journal covering the newspaper industry") gleefully reports a New York Times report planned for Sunday on Howard Dean.

What is interesting about this is that the newspaper industry seems to be setting the stage to shift the blame for any election failures from the MSM to Howling Howard for their message, their tactics, their hit pieces, and their anti-Bush animus that has led them to disclose classified information over and over with no other purpose than to score against the war and president Bush.   Something that just might not sit well with voters.

Major miscalculations with the Plame Blame Game, a failed campaign to derail military tribunals, and an ineffective effort to prevent effective monitoring of communications with known terrorists have been public relations disasters for the newspaper industry. Add to that with open speculation about whether the publisher of the New York Times is not up to the job even from insiders and you have to wonder if their focus groups are telling them they need to prepare a defense of shifting the blame.