Zito And The Trib, Helping Out When They Can

Take a look at Salena Zito's first two paragraphs from this morning.  This isn't a column of hers, by the way.  If its URL is to be believed, it's in the Trib's "News" division.  So it's un-opinionated news:

FreedomWorks, a Tea Party organization, is expected today to endorse a former Senate staffer and researcher with the conservative Heritage Foundation in the 18th District congressional race.

Evan Feinberg, 27, of Upper St. Clair is challenging Rep. Tim Murphy in the GOP primary on April 24.

There are two names you should notice in that first paragraph; FreedomWorks and Heritage Foundation.  Couple that with the Braintrust's editorial stance on Murphy and you'll see two things;

• The Trib's not a fan of Murphy (neither am I, but that's beside the point)
• Their Trib's editorial policy is oh-so-conveniently reflected in their "news" coverage.  Again

As any dutiful reader of this blog already knows, Scaife's up to his Yale-rejected eyeballs in Heritage foundation support ($23 million+ - I even said so yesterday).  But did you know he's also supported the "grassroots" FreedomWorks with more than $3 million of Scaife Foundation money?

But what do they think of Congressman Murphy and this election?  Well, there's this from February 3:

Laurel: To Evan Feinberg. He's challenging liberaled-up Republican Tim Murphy in the 18th Congressional District primary in April. And he's hitting head-on a Murphy campaign smear that characterizes him as a carpetbagging "kid." As Mr. Feinberg notes, he's a native of Peters Township. Mr. Murphy? He's a native of Cleveland.

Then there's this from January 29:

MURPHY PAYING DOOR-KNOCKERS. It appears U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy is having difficulty attracting volunteers to his re-election campaign.

The Upper St. Clair Republican offered to pay and feed college students to knock on doors on his behalf this weekend, according to an e-mail circulated among the University of Pittsburgh College Republicans.

The menu was not disclosed in the communique. But the campaign was offering to pay frat boys and sorority sisters $50 to help spread Murphy's left-leaning message.

He couldn't round up enough supporters who'd do that for free?

And so on.  I could keep going but you get the picture - Murphy shouldn't expect any support from the Scaife-owned Tribune-Review.

So isn't it a good thing that The (Scaife-owned) Tribune-Review is reporting that the (Scaife-funded) Heritage and the (Scaife-funded) FreedomWorks will be supporting Feinberg?  Especially since, as Zito reports:

Feinberg, a former aide to Republican Sens. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and Rand Paul of Kentucky, has not raised much money for his campaign -- $50,005 in the last quarter, records show. Murphy, a psychologist and former state senator, reported $1.04 million cash on hand that quarter.

Ah, how convenient.

What a piece of work is the right wing noise machine.