Some People Discern Bimbo Journalism and Call It Out

Of course, The New York Times would give Jodi Kantor glowing reviews of her book about the Obamas. After all, she's part of their journalistic (cough, cough) family.

And to give their review proper "credence," they appropriated someone who is not only an editor of a newspaper, herself, but also the wife of serving Senator Sherrod Brown to pen the positive article.

You'll recall that Sherrod Brown was one of the Democratic Senators, who, in December 2010, just couldn't seem to fathom that by compromising on the Bush tax cuts, a lot of beneficial extras were acquired for the working class and the working poor - you know, the people whom the Democrats are naturally supposed to champion.

Anyway, The Guardian, who seem absolutely fascinated, darling, by Jodi Kantor, and so they interviewed her. You can read the interview here and marvel at the shallowness of the person conducting this.

But the best part of all are the comments left online, a smidgeon of which I enclose below.

From aliemac:

perhaps the nytimes reporter as she repeatedly states in all interviews should spend more time considering how the Obamas are so loathed that we are fed meals of the "Republican candidates". Who cares about how many pairs of shoes Michelle Obama? It does not take a reporter with such opportunity to "report" from the inside to tell us that he is an introvert and she is the warmer. Spare us

From jayant:

This is a typical Washington insider book focusing on personal and trivial rather than what is important at this point during economic crises, unemployment, returning veterans and their families, improving relations with other nations, and so on. What does it matter what the President or the First Lady wear? It may be important to inside the beltway reporters, not to someone who is looking for job, facing economic insecurity, or mortgage default.
This one of the scams in Washing media circle. Write a book about sitting President full of gossip and make a fast buck. Think about it this way, will we hold on to this book five or ten years from now? I don't think so. It will be in the news cycle this week and then will be remaindered

From LostintheUS:

I think that it is unethical for a reporter to use her/his professional privileges, i.e., access to the White House and its staff to write a highly extrapolated book about a sitting President and his family. New York Times reporters seem to be intent on this sort of thing. Their contracts should exclude this.

Sounds like most of the material in the book is hearsay. (The $515 trainers for example. Personally, I prefer our First Lady caring about her running shoes because she is serious about keeping fit.)

Sidling up to staffers to get the inside gossip on the First Family is creepy.

Note the increasing presence of vicious, racist trolls as we get closer to the election. That's creepy, too.

From Jackblu:

It's sad the author of a hatchet job is being lauded and her career being built by a work based on her own preconceived notions. Kantor has an outsized ego and is out of touch with reality and even seems borderline discriminatory. Simply put, this is a gossip book.

And the best from raffine:

An unfulfilled white woman writes imaginatively about an angry black woman and her emotionally distant husband. Jodi Kantor's The Obamas is the best American parajournalism from a New York Times reporter since Judith Miller's definitive work on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

Nuff said. Word.