Dan McLaughlin of National Review Online documents a recent example of media malfeasance.
Getting some jobs requires a more elite level of talent than others. For example, it appears that a post as an op-ed contributor to USA Today these days demands a talent for awfulness that would far exceed the grasp of most Americans. Witness left-wing columnist Mike Freeman, whose job description is “Race and Inequality Editor-Sports.” His column entitled “Ron DeSantis pushes racist tropes in latest comments about basketball and baseball players” must be read to be believed. For a symptom of how much partisan dreck this column is, Freeman asserts that “DeSantis is one of the most prominent anti-Black politicians alive,” citing with a straight face the ridiculous NAACP “travel advisory” against Florida and linking to an article quoting notorious bigot Al Sharpton.
So, what are the comments that Freeman describes as “not a dog whistle actually, a bullhorn … wait, not a bullhorn, stadium speakers”? …
… “DeSantis did an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network and one of the topics was baseball. … ‘So I think that there’s kind of a place for everybody on a baseball team if you’re willing to work hard, if you’re willing to practice, and if you’re willing to hone your skills,’ DeSantis said. ‘I kind of thought it was always a very democratic game, a very meritocratic game. Whereas I kind of viewed like basketball as like these guys are just freaks of nature. They’re just incredible athletes.’” …
… That’s right: It’s now racist to notice that basketball platers are really tall.
Now, of course, DeSantis was a serious baseball player — he played in the Little League World Series and was captain of the Yale baseball team — so we can forgive him for being something of a partisan of the national pastime over all other sports, especially when he’s talking up his own biography. But the point he’s making is thunderingly obvious to anyone who has watched both sports.
