Our craven media.....

So a few weeks ago I touched on a subject that just kind of bothered me. Both campaigns, have adopted a strategy, more so by the McCain camp, in which the release their ads as press releases. Basically getting free play from the national press with out paying to roll out the various ads. On the upside a few old print media types have began to notice that the press is being used as patsies, and is at least making mention of it. Aaron Rutkoff over at the Wall Street Journal Online, has a good piece up on it.

To follow up on that Steve Benen over at The Washington Monthly had this to say:

But why would major news outlets repeatedly fall for the same trick, even when they realize the ads are created for the sole purpose of free media attention? There are competing explanations, but my hunch is a lot of outlets are just lazy, and video press releases make their jobs easier.

This seems about right to me. When these ads are played in this fashion, it forces a response, no matter how spurious the claims may be, they will require a some sort of retort. And in todays media parlance, if you are responding then you are losing. Sort of the technological version of, "Have you stopped beating your wife?".

-Cheers