Howard Kurtz Gets Clock Cleaned, But Who's the Dirty Old Perv Now?

I'm getting tired of this. Yet I'm also fascinated. Another day, another round of punches for Fox News' media correspondent Howard Kurtz. "Howard Kurtz is a Cad, Part IV" screams a post published Sunday by "Ken" on the site All things Democrat. (Sunday tends to be a holy day in which people tend to avoid lying, cheating and being overall perverts, but maybe Ken has been taking a long nap.) "Ken" recaps their interest with Kurtz, which he says began with the Boston Marathon bombing and Kurtz' despicable coverage of praising CNN owning up to its mistakes but bashing Fox News for following CNN. They stroll through a number of Kurtz' screw ups, including the Jason Collins debacle, in which Kurtz said the gay athlete hadn't revealed his engagement to a woman when, in fact, he had. Eventually "Ken" makes it around to Part IV of their exhaustive "series" of Kurtz bashing in which he says he wasn't surprised Kurtz was hired by Fox News, as if it's a bad thing to be fired by Daily Beast's Tina Brown and then snagged by the nation's highest rated cable news network. "Some folks were surprised when Kurtz was picked up by Fox, but not me," Ken wrote. "Fox, with their situational ethics and blatantly partisan outlook and Kurtz, being a cad, seem like a natural fit from my perspective." "Ken," seems to have forgotten that he's coming from nationally "blatantly partisan" perspective, in this case, Democratic. The site, founded in 2006 by progressive Wisconsin Dem Doug Marquartd, claims to have bloggers who provide (cough cough) "smart analysis and opinion on the latest political news, issues and hot topics of interest to Dems." Which leads them to Part IV of their series: "Ken" nails Kurtz for being a "dirty old man" and for "leering at at pictures of someone who is related to someone that is in his field of expertise." For the purposes of his story, he explains, he will use Kurtz' own tactics to write about his family members. Holy sh-t is this about to get good. Ken begins, "Howard Kurtz has three daughters: Judy [ak.a. Howiella], Bonnie and a nine year old I'll leave out of this because I have more decency than Kurtz does." Decently, Ken goes on to reveal that Judy is a stripper. Yikes. A stripper? We thought she was a gossip columnist for The Hill. "Any dirty old pervs who want to ogle the naked body of Kurtz' daughter, and maybe write a column about the event, just need to head to the right club and bring a fistful of dollar bills." The story says Judy worked at Archibalds since 1969. An interesting twist of fact, especially since Judy wasn't even born yet. "Ken" goes on to talk about Bonnie and says since his is a "family blog" he'll forgo posting any pictures of her. Eventually the author admits he's lying (seriously, does this site have a special consultant and is it Wonkette's Rebecca Schoenkopf, who doesn't think twice about fabricating stories?). "Ok...actually I feel like I need to take a shower now. None of the stuff I wrote about Howard's daughters is true. Well, Judy is a reporter and did report from the strip club, but she is not a stripper," he writes. (Thank God.) And those dirty pics of Bonnie? They're not really Bonnie, Howard's daughter. If you are to believe media writers, with the minor exception of the above imbecile, all of this beating up on Howie appears to be warranted. If you're going to call out journalists for their mistakes, you must be cognizant of your own. Hypocrisy. Check. Outlandish mistakes. That time he thought he was talking to a congressman but–whoops!–he was really talking to an eager press aide. Check. Last week's bumble was the funniest yet, that post on Pari Bradley, daughter of WaPo's Ben Bradlee and the woman in the "Swiss cheese bra," that managed to gall prim and proper Washington, simultaneously reveal his mid-life crisis and highlight his unique relationship with Fox News and Daily Download Editor Lauren Ashburn. Check, check and more checks. Now that Kurtz works at Fox News, what the hell? Is it open season on Kurtz? Can not even the formidable Fox News PR stop the bleeding?

Fishbowl

Howard Kurtz Gets Clock Cleaned, But Who's the Dirty Old Perv Now?

Betsy Rothstein

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Betsy Rothstein