If you’re frustrated that the mainstream press throws tantrums whenever blogs question their accuracy and motives, don’t sweat it. Some of them apparently can’t take criticism from their own, either.

St. Paul Pioneer Press editorial editor Mark Yost took a leak on the proverbial anthill with this column asking the media why its coverage of Iraq is not balanced with more accomplishments rather than a daily death toll. An excerpt from his column (which requires a subscription):

I’m reminded of why I became a journalist by the horribly slanted reporting coming out of Iraq. Not much has changed since the mid-1980s. Substitute “insurgent” for “Sandinista,” “Iraq” for “Soviet Union,” “Bush” for “Reagan” and “war on terror” for “Cold War,” and the stories need little editing. The U.S. is “bad,” our enemies “understandable” if not downright “good.”

I know the reporting’s bad because I know people in Iraq. A Marine colonel buddy just finished a stint overseeing the power grid. When’s the last time you read a story about the progress being made on the power grid? Or the new desalination plant that just came on-line, or the school that just opened, or the Iraqi policeman who died doing something heroic? No, to judge by the dispatches, all the Iraqis do is stand outside markets and government buildings waiting to be blown up.

Let the long knives be drawn and the mouth frothing begin. Co-worker Charles Laszewski all but disowned him in a letter to Romenesko at Poynter:

You have insulted them and demeaned them, and to a much lesser degree, demeaned the reporters everywhere who have been threatened with bodily harm, who have been screamed at, or denied public records, just because they wanted to present the closest approximation to the truth they could.

I am embarrassed to call you my colleague.

How did the message of “the media could cover the positive in Iraq better” become “you have demeaned everybody, up to and including a buck reporter whose FOIA got turned down”?

But no time for dissecting Laszewski’s logic, because Columbia Journalism Review on-line managing editor Steve Lovelady is stepping into the ring. Never one to miss a golden opportinity to make an ass out of himself in the public arena — he called bloggers who took down Eason Jordan a bunch of “salivating morons who make up the lynch mob” — has savaged Yost to the point of recommending that he be fired.

From Romenesko to several unhinged e-mails to Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine, Lovelady is flying his freak flag loud and proud:

Amazing. Mark Yost, an [editorial page] editor at Knight Ridder, the ONE news outlet which has consistently exposed the lies at the heart of the Iraq invasion and the grim reality of the current occupation, turns on his colleagues.

I can’t wait to see how the KR Washington bureau and the KR Iraq contingent reponds to this one!

There he is, guys. Go get him. You owe your readers no less.

“Turns on his colleagues”?! So Yost is Benedict Arnold for pointing out inadequacies in Iraq coverage in a civil manner, I guess. “There he is, guys, go get him”? This is coming from the same joker who called us “salivating morons” for getting Jordan for passing off lies that U.S. troops intentionally target journalists.

Jarvis makes a good point about the surrealism of the Columbia Journalism Review, “America’s Premier (cough, hack) Media Monitor,” trying to stifle intelligent debate about war coverage:

You’d think that he would welcome intelligent, reasoned, two-sided discussion about media’s coverage of this controverial story. Instead, he acts like the fat kid on the playground egging on the bullies in a fight.

Jarvis and Lovelady exchanged a few e-mails over the subject. Jarvis would like to see an actual debate on the subject rather than the hurling of invective. A snippet of one of my Lovelady favorites to Jarvis:

My guess is that by Monday Mr. Yost will be too busy standing in line outside the St. Paul unemployment office to engage in
leisurely Internet debates.

Which, frankly, is as it should be. He’s a right-wing shill who belittled and betrayed the hundreds of reporters who go into harm’s way every day to tell us what the hell is really going on.

Don’t get me wrong here — if you can’t take criticism, don’t write opinion columns (or blog, for that matter). Yost wrote a compelling argument, and he has to fight for it against both intelligent and inane criticism. But Lovelady — an editor of CJR and left-wing shill who has no right to go after anyone for their newsroom politics — is now saying that this column should cost Yost his job?!

Lovelady says in the e-mail that journalists in Iraq are lining up to savage Yost’s column with first-hand knowledge to the contrary. Fine. But I can counter with the buddies I have in Iraq, and I have many, who say that the media is painting a hopeless picture that is far from reality. If you don’t want to take my word for it, visit Blackfive, Mudville Gazette and other milblogs.

(Speaking of underreported news and Blackfive, why haven’t I seen any MSM coverage of this anti-terror rally held by Iraqi citizens? The naional news media descended on Augusta National to watch Martha Burk and a dozen others protest an all-male golf course, but this doesn’t get an ink? I wonder why.)

Let’s be realistic for a moment — how many Iraq veterans (soldiers, not journalists) has Lovelady ever talked to in depth?

However, by the final round of e-mails, Lovelady’s medication wears off and he calls Jarvis “an intellectually dishonest schmuck.” Nothing shows your intellectual debate capabilities better than busting out Yiddish derogatory slang for penis.

Lovelady, and I’m sure the others participating in this beatdown, are among the arrogant MSM elites who scream at the public every day that newsrooms are not held captive by an oppressive, liberal, politically correct orthodoxy. But their conduct speaks truth to the public’s belief of media arrogance. Yost’s column should spark debate — what is it about the dearth of positive stories that is untrue? — rather than “shut up,” “you’re a disgrace,” “let’s get him,” and “you should be fired.”

Columbia Journalism Review’s mission includes “… as a media monitor, CJR is also a resource for all Americans who want the best possible version of their free press.” I guess it’s only free at CJR if you toe the American Mainstream Media Party line.

If Lovelady and the rest of his MSM cohorts are so interested in ensuring that Iraq reporting is “the truth,” then why haven’t they said one word about Newspaper Guild President Linda Foley’s repeated and incorrect remarks that U.S. troops are intentionally targeting journalists in Iraq for death?

I suppose that would be “turning on your colleagues,” wouldn’t it, Steve?

And the MSM’s Great Downward Spiral continues …