enough mediocrity for all
DK uses the announcment that Polly Toynbee has won Columnist of the Year at the British Press Awards to lambast the mediocrity of the mainstream press and their dire "Leftist sympathies." A quick look back over the last few years of the British Press Awards tells a slightly different story:
Columnist of the Year
2007 Polly Toynbee (Guardian)
2006 Lucy Kellaway (Financial Times)
2005 Peter Hitchens (Mail)
2004 Boris Johnson (Yes, that one)
2003 Robert Harris (Sunday times, Telegraph, Observer)
Or rather more explicitly:
National Newspaper of the Year
2007 The Observer
2006 The Guardian
2005 News of the World
2004 The Independent
2003 Daily Mail
2002 The Daily Mirror
2001 Daily Mail
2000 The Sunday Telegraph
1999 The Guardian
1998 Daily Mail
1997 The Daily Telegraph
1996 Daily Mail
1995 Daily Mail
1994 The Daily Telegraph
Truly, the left holds so much sway over the mainstream media that the Daily Mail has won paper of the year no less than five times in the last fourteen years, with other right-leaning papers winning on another five occasions.
To characterise Toynbee's win this year as simple proof of the mainstream media's alleged widespread sympathies for the "Left" is, at best, misleadingly simplistic (which is not to say that I think she should have won).
If there's one thing that bloggers who cover the media agree on, it's that there's plenty of mediocrity and outright hackery for the entire political spectrum.
4 comments:
Hackery abounds! Talking of which, just found an old gem of yours here.
Kindred spirits ahoy!
Do drop by and say hi.
Yes, the Lefty comment was probably a mistake, to be honest...
DK
Care to make that statement on your own site, DK?
I think he has - as a footnote to his original post.
You know, this would be an actual example of civil blogging discourse. :)
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