I was going to do another post today briefly summarizing the Pigford numbers, but Mark Thompson already did. So I'll just cite his conclusion:
What is appalling here is the ease with which the information I've noted above is readily available, and the utter failure of both Breitbart and Conor (and, I assume, Foster) to cite any of it. Increasingly, it seems that the role of more high-brow political journalism is simply to, consciously or not, provide intellectual cover for the base's ill-supported memes rather than seeking truth or attempting to challenge the base. Instead of talking to the base, they merely parrot it.
I think Conor Friedersdorf was asking some of the right questions in his initial post. I can't speak to Daniel Foster's piece since it's behind a paywall, but considering the conversation it started, National Review should really consider sharing it with the world.
Andrew Breitbart's Pigford "reporting" is of the same nature as the video stings that have garnered him so much notoriety. All of his "scoops" have the same basic plot: An organization working to rectify some aspect of economic, racial, or gender inequality is guilty not merely of being liberal, but of complicity in some grand criminal enterprise. Having decided this is the case, Breitbart or someone associated with him assembles evidence to support that conclusion, ignoring any and all information that might otherwise refute it. If need be, the evidence is manipulated to portray the opposite of what actually occurred, because the guilt of the subject is assumed. The story always contains some element of twisted fantasy about how women, the poor, or black people actually live.
It's practically paint by the numbers. The only shocking thing about his Pigford report is that there wasn't a pimp involved.
