Our liberal media - the Anti-Motel 6

"We'll turn the light out for you."

You polloi don't need to worry your little, empty heads over what your betters in DC are up to - you'uns wouldn't understand all that highfalutin politics talk anyway. Best we folks in the know - those of us who have risen to the rank of Pundit Punditorum through the superior sycophancy of our cocktail party chatter and our ability to uncork wine bottles with our bare lips - turn off the lights so you poor dears don't get all confused over what the grownups are doing behind closed doors.

Glenn Greenwald - Salon

One could write media criticisms for the next several years and not come close to capturing the essence of our Beltway media the way Cohen did in this single paragraph:

With the sentencing of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Fitzgerald has apparently finished his work, which was, not to put too fine a point on it, to make a mountain out of a molehill. At the urging of the liberal press (especially the New York Times), he was appointed to look into a run-of-the-mill leak and wound up prosecuting not the leaker -- Richard Armitage of the State Department -- but Libby, convicted in the end of lying. This is not an entirely trivial matter since government officials should not lie to grand juries, but neither should they be called to account for practicing the dark art of politics. As with sex or real estate, it is often best to keep the lights off.

That really is the central belief of our Beltway press, captured so brilliantly by Cohen in this perfect nutshell. When it comes to the behavior of our highest and most powerful government officials, our Beltway media preaches, "it is often best to keep the lights off." If that isn't the perfect motto for our bold, intrepid, hard-nosed political press, then nothing is.