Note to the White House

I think I'll start what is sure to be a much-anticipated daily feature: Note to the White House.

In the inaugural installment, the White House hears some difficult truths.

Note to the White House:

Stop crying about Fox News. We all get it, they're bogus. But, A) you're playing right into their hands, mostly because B) just about all of the comments about Fox I've heard made by the WH have come off highly impetuous, indignant and, yes, whiny. You're not succeeding in really calling them out. Does it suck to watch your friends be slandered by a bunch of hacks? I would bet so. But, come on, you're the White House for fuck's sake; you're the most powerful entity in the world. Let Glenn Beck and friends dig their own grave.

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White House/Fox addendum: As usual, Thomas Frank nails it.

But no journalistic operation is better prepared to sing the tragedy of its own martyrdom than Fox News. To all the usual journalistic instincts it adds its grand narrative of Middle America's disrespectful treatment by the liberal elite. Persecution fantasy is Fox News's lifeblood; give it the faintest whiff of the real thing and look out for a gale-force hissy fit.

As the Obama administration has discovered by now. A few weeks ago, after Fox had scored a number of points against administration figures and policies, administration spokesmen decided it was time to start fighting back. Communications Director Anita Dunn called the network "a wing of the Republican Party," while Obama himself reportedly dismissed it for following "a talk radio format."

The network's moaners swung instantly into self-pitying action likening the administration's combative attitude to Richard Nixon's famous "enemies list."

He goes on to document some of the prime double standards at play here, including G. Gordon Liddy's insidiousness, Fox chairman Roger Ailes' hit jobs and, worst of all, Fox's silence on the Pentagon Pundits program courtesy of the Bushies. Nice. And even nicer considering Frank writes his weekly column in the Wall Street Journal, which is owned, along with Fox, by Rupert Murdoch.