SNL Runs a Mildly Critical Sketch About Obama, and the Washington Post Rushes In to Fact-Check It

The sketch itself is okay, but it is critical of Obama's lawlessness, which makes it absolutely remarkable for SNL.

The Washington Post has actually endeavored to "Fact Check" the sketch.

Newsbusters comments:

Demonstrating that serving as the Palace Guard for Dear Leader is a 24-7-365 enterprise, Zachary A. Goldfarb, policy editor at The Washington Post, somehow felt the need on Sunday morning to critique the Saturday Night Live opening skit which appeared the previous evening.

Twelve hours after the skit was first broadcast, Goldfarb, whose whose full archive going back to August indicates that he has not written a WaPo item for Sunday publication in the past four months, nitpicked a comedy skit for — oh the humanity! — failing to distinguish between an "Executive Order" and "executive action"....

The guess here is that the SNL skit -- and especially its three pushes [of "The Bill" down the Capitol Hill steps] -- really got under the White House's skin, perhaps even to the point where they felt like they had to lean on someone at the Post to play some defense on their behalf. Whether or not any communication actually occurred, it seems clear that the Post's apparently equally thin-skinned Goldfarb felt it necessary to get up on a Sunday morning to critique a fundamentally accurate ... (still having a hard time believing it) ... comedy skit.

Goldfarb's piece isn't particularly hacky. Oh, I think it's pretty ticky-tack in making a distinction between an "executive order" and an "executive action," but it doesn't zealously defend Obama from the charge of unconstitutional action the way that, say, Vox would.

So I wonder: Why publish this embarrassment at all?

All I can figure is that Tom Blumer's guess is right, and that the White House did indeed call them asking for a "Fact Check," so the Washington Post obliged.

If this scenario sounds familiar, your memory is not deceiving you: Back in 2010, Wolf Blitzer presumed to fact-check an SNL sketch that made the point that Obama had no real accomplishments to his name.

Why are only sketches critical of Obama subject to this ridiculous, partisan exercise of "fact" checking? Obviously neither the WaPo nor CNN has ever "fact" checked SNL's dozens of Republican-bashing sketches.

Why?

The exercise itself is partisan-- putting people on notice that there is one subject (Barack Hussein Obama) about which there can be no joking whatsoever.

Update: Holy F***ballz: Here's the hacktastic, zealous "fact" checking defense of Obama, courtesy of the Daily Beast.

posted by Ace at 04:32 PM

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