time to head for the porcelain, folx

 Being the time of year it is, an' all, everywhere you look there are Best of Year roundups -- books, movies, you name it. (The Best Books of 2007 roundups are the most embarrassing for me, because often I find I have heard of -- let alone seen, handled or read -- not one of the critics' list of dahlings.) Since my attitude toward the Festive Season is such as to make Ebenezer Scrooge seem like Oprah Winfrey, all of this celebratory mutual back-patting generally makes me want to dig out the Drano for a long, satisfying pull. This year, like every other year, has not been one extended carnival of excellence, and most if not all of the "Bests" we're so busy lauding now will soon be rendered visible in a more sensible perspective thanks to the passage of time -- in this context, see http://scottedelman.livejournal.com/8691.html for a salutary Ozymandian lesson.

Luckily, Media Matters for America -- that excellent organization which day in and day out fingers the US right-wing media and punditry for their numerous lies, distortions, corruptions, imbalances and general fascistic, craven vileness -- redresses the balance a bit with its annual Worst of the Year Roundup:

Misinformation of the Year

It's still not just Imus

Media Matters for America usually takes the opportunity at the end of the year to name a Misinformer of the Year, an individual or media entity who in that year has made a noteworthy "contribution" to the advancement of conservative misinformation. This year -- a year in which Don Imus was removed from his decades-long radio program following a reference to the Rutgers women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos" (Imus returned to the air in December) -- Media Matters has decided to change the focus of the year-end item. The Imus controversy resulted in intense media attention to the subject of speech concerning race and gender. At the time, Media Matters thought it necessary to remind the media that "It's not just Imus" -- that speech targeting, among other characteristics, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and ethnicity permeates the airwaves, through personalities including Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, and Michael Savage. But offensive and degrading speech is not limited to conservative media personalities and "shock jocks," although they are, of course, well-represented on any such list. As Media Matters has documented throughout this year, speech that targets or casts in a negative light race, gender, religion, ethnicity, national origin, and sexual orientation can be found throughout the media, and it often bears directly on politics and policy. That speech has earned the title of Misinformation of the Year 2007.

You can read the rest of this very long article at http://mediamatters.org/items/200712220006?src=eoy2k7-7&l=1, and it's an experience I'd strongly recommend . . . though be prepared, if resident in the US, to find yourself writing to every news media outlet in sight to ask them why they dare to pour such ignorant, inaccurate, misogynistic shit down our throats on an hourly basis. As the Republic swiftly collapses into the effluvium of history and its Enlightenment dreams of democracy drown with it, spare a thought for all these enablers of the fall.