The End of an Error
By I’m sure you’ll be sad to learn that the Post has mercifully killed The Poochie and Poochie Show The Three Minute News Hour Mouthpiece Theater:
Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli killed the satirical video series Wednesday after harsh criticism of a joke about Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, which had prompted him to pull the latest episode from the paper’s Web site Friday night. The Post staffers who appeared in the videos, Dana Milbank and Chris Cillizza, agreed with the decision and apologized in separate interviews.
“I don’t think the series worked as they intended,” Brauchli said. “It was meant to be funny and insightful and translate the superb journalism Chris and Dana do in print and online into a new format.”
Odd. Sure, the “funny” and “insightful” didn’t happen. But I’d say that in terms of translating Milbank’s journalism — i.e. not-nearly-as-funny-as-it-thinks-it-is snark about trivia — it was a roaring success. (I still think what really set him off on Pitney was the latter’s point that Milbank wasted a scarce opportunity to ask a question of a major presidential candidate by asking Obama multiple questions about how he looked in a bathing suit.)