John Carlson of the Des Moines Register has this op/ed piece about the lack of media attention paid to democratic Senator Dodd's praise of Senator Robert Byrd - "'Robert C. Byrd in my view . . . would have been right at anytime. You would have been right at the founding of this country. You would have been in the leadership of crafting this Constitution. You would have been right during the great conflict of Civil War in this nation.'"



It is noteworthy because it echos the Trent Lott praise of Strom Thurmond a few years ago. As the article points out about Byrd: "The 86-year-old senior member of the Senate was in the Ku Klux Klan back in the 1940s - a "kleagle," in fact, which means he held a position of authority in that bunch of racist kooks. Then he was elected to the Senate, where he got a chance to do some real damage. Such as in 1964, when he filibustered in a futile effort to kill the Civil Rights Act."



Carlson asks why there was so much hubub over Lott's praise of Strom Thurmond, yet dead silence when Byrd is praised by Dodd: " One might think the invisibility of the Dodd story was an oversight, something that just happened to slip past newspapers and television networks. Or that Lott was his party's leader in the Senate when he fouled up and Dodd is a nobody, making his remarks unworthy of coverage. Or that there's a double standard here, that Democrats get off while Republicans get the media shiv deep in the gut. The only clinker is that irritating bunch at Fox, who ran a tape of Dodd on the Senate floor, gushing to a smiling, nodding Byrd. Liberals gripe that Fox - America's most popular cable-news outlet - is the chief mouthpiece of the right-wing conspiracy. They make fun of Fox's "fair and balanced" motto and its anchors who say, "We report, you decide." On the Dodd story, the people who run America's media outlets decided to not report. You didn't have the chance to decide."



Of course, the media may have been silent, but the blogosphere has been buzzing with the story for days now. I haven't blogged on it, but here's just some of what I've read:



Instapundit

Junkyard Blog

Andrew Sullivan

Matthew Yglesias

Rooftop Report

Outside the Beltway

PoliBlog

Crow Blog

Insults Unpunished



Etc. Etc. Etc.



Thank you for joining us Mr. Carlson. Let us know when the rest of the journalists wake up, will you? We'd hate to disturb their naps.