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With this, it’s official: the act of complaining about media bias has officially jumped the shark.

A decade ago, Rush Limbaugh helped point out the most egregious examples of liberal media bias. Ten years, the Internet, and Fox News later, our vastly expanded options for information mean we don’t have as much of a reason to complain as we used to.

There’s a difference between documenting specific examples of national media bias, like the good folks at Media Research Center do, and constantly blaming the media for reporting our mistakes, like too many Missouri Republicans do.

Hopefully, the next six weeks (and the next two years) will see groups like the Dunklin County Democratic Women complain about the vast right-wing media conspiracy over their games of canasta, and see Republican leaders stop whining about the “liberal spin” and start using other outlets — namely, the Internet — to deliver their message directly to opinion leaders and voters.

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A few quick hits:

1.) If you haven’t read Tony Messenger’s post about his paper’s Labor Day coverage, read it now (scroll down the page to find the post). Have you ever heard of an editorial page editor saying that his paper should work harder to be more fair? Me neither.

2.) While you’re there, check out Tony’s “The level of discourse…” post as well. I’m sure the debate over acknowledging/not acknowledging extreme viewpoints is one that has raged in newsrooms since the invention of movable type, and this post gives us an editor’s perspective. As far as the topic at hand (immigration), some of the most restrictive/punitive immigration policies are pushed by xenophobes and racists; that doesn’t mean, though, that everyone who agrees with those ideological positions is a bigot, and it certainly doesn’t mean that those positions are invalid.

3.) Is it just me, or is “Legislation Attacking Illegal Immigrants Proposed” the type of headline you’d find on a partisan blog? I’m certainly not used to seeing that type of loaded language on Missourinet.

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