N.Y. Times continues tradition of inept California coverage

Oct. 30, 2012

By Chris Reed

The New York Times’ history of poor coverage of California is extreme. It always blames Prop. 13 for the state’s problems. It offers 8,000-word analyses of California’s government dysfunction that never mention the power of unions. And now, in an analysis of the San Diego mayor’s race, it offers a lazy but dishonest thesis:

“SAN DIEGO — A victory for Carl DeMaio, who is locked in a tight mayoral race, would make San Diego the second-largest city in the country to elect an openly gay mayor and by far the largest to elect a gay Republican.

“Yet, perhaps no group has opposed DeMaio as loudly as this city’s sizable gay and lesbian population.”

This is malarkey, as our logorrheic vice president would say.

It wasn’t gays who are strongly suspected of vandalizing DeMaio’s car last year as he gathered signatures for a landmark pension-reform measure. It wasn’t gays who mocked DeMaio for being gay in an online posting. It isn’t gays who are funding Bob Filner, his opponent.

It is union members, who fear DeMaio could start a privatization trend in San Diego that could be copied nationwide.

But that doesn’t fit the NYT agenda, so fuhgeddaboutit.