Yesterday on "The Fix", a politics blog of the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake wrote "Five Members to watch in the House debt ceiling vote."  One of the five is Rep. Jim Matheson (D-UT).  He's described as a potential "yes" vote for Speaker John Boehner's (R-OH) debt ceiling bill:

Matheson, a Democrat, has managed to keep his Republican-leaning Utah seat by voting very conservatively since being elected in 2000.

So let's see what The Fix considers voting not just conservatively, but very conservatively.  Project Vote Smart collects ratings given by a wide variety of special-interest organizations.  Matheson's record shows that for 2010 the American Conservative Union gave him a grade of 17 percent.  The National Taxpayers Union assigned him a 39 percent and Citizens Against Government Waste awarded him an 11 percent.  He did substantially better with the American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees, which gave him an 80 percent rating.  The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People determined he voted in their interests 75 percent of the time for the period 2009-2010, and the American Civil Liberties Union rated him at 56 percent for the same period.

The National Education Association gave him an A for his votes in 2009 through 2010 while the Human Rights Campaign ranked the Democrat at 78 percent.  And for 2007-2008, the National Organization for Women evaluated Matheson at 94 percent.

That doesn't look to me like the record of of congressman who votes very conservatively.  It does, however, provide yet another glimpse into the liberal mindset at The Washington Post.       

The mainstream media are having a field day with the Republican National Committee spending contributor dollars for "meals" at a risqué Hollywood night spot. Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank joins in the fun with today's "RNC spends nearly $2,000 at sex-themed Voyeur nightclub."  He provides titillating details of what transpires in that joint, and then attempts a quick rewrite of history with, "And Al Gore got in trouble for going to a Buddhist temple?"

That's seriously misleading.  It wasn't going to a Buddhist temple in April of 1996 that got Gore into trouble.  It was lying about illegally raising money there that raised questions and generated skepticism about Gore's truthfulness.  And, in the end, he didn't really get into any serious trouble at all.  As reported by the New York Times in August, 2000:

For the third time, Attorney General Janet Reno brushed off the advice of senior advisers and declined to intensify an investigation into Vice President Al Gore's fundraising activities in 1996.

She said she would not appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Mr. Gore's sworn statements that neither his appearance at a Buddhist temple in California in 1986 nor his attendance at several White House coffee sessions were fundraisers.

Sure, Gore was subjected to some ridicule.  According to Time Magazine in November, 1996:

Vice President Al Gore claims to have been entirely unaware that an April luncheon he attended at a Buddhist temple in California was an illegal fund raiser. With a face as straight as only his can be, Gore said in a radio interview last week that he thought the function, organized by Huang and the D.N.C., was a "community-outreach" event. More observant guests, however, have said it was plain to them that what was reaching out was an open palm. Attendees included deep-pocketed members of the local Asian-American community. The D.N.C. says it collected $140,000.

In 1998, Milbank's own Washington Post carried the executive summary of  the final report of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee's "Investigation on Illegal or Improper Activities in Connection With The 1996 Federal Election Campaigns."  That included this:

Despite his repeated, albeit inconsistent, denials, it is reasonable to conclude that the Vice President was well aware that the Temple event was for the purpose of raising money. The event was organized by Huang and Hsia, who had longstanding relationships with Vice President Gore that revolved almost entirely around campaign fundraising. More specifically, in the weeks prior to his Temple visit, Vice President Gore was repeatedly reminded that the April 29 luncheon was a fundraiser and was even meticulously informed by Ickes of the DNC's "projected revenue" for the event. The Vice President received the last of these notifications of the April 29 lunch's "projected revenue" only 24 hours before he received his briefing notes for the Temple lunch

The Vice President's staff also knew that the Temple event was a fundraiser. In March 1996, Deputy Chief of Staff David Strauss had helped arrange a meeting in the White House with the head of the Temple, Master Hsing Yun – a meeting which Strauss believed would "lead to a lot of $." The White House staff repeatedly referred to the event as a "fundraiser" in internal correspondence, and assigned to it a "ticket price" of "1000-5000 [dollars per] head."

Despite the evidence, Gore escaped prosecution with a little help from his friends. Merely "going to a Buddhist temple" doesn't begin to cover what he actually did.      
 

In her Washington Post column today, Sally Quinn frets that White House security breaches divert attention from Barack Obama's accomplishments.  In "Time for accountability at the White House," she writes:

Obama has had some real successes this fall. He did a masterful job of bringing together incredibly disparate positions to craft a strategy for Afghanistan. He put himself on the line and will probably come up with a reasonable health-care plan. He left Copenhagen with at least promises of cooperation from other world powers regarding climate change. But he is not getting credit that he deserves because he is being ill served by those around him who will not step up as needed and take the fall for him.

Real successes, heh?  Obama's dithering on Afghanistan justifiably earned him criticism both here and abroad, where England's defense minister and others voiced their concerns.  It's impossible to know if Obama's health-care plan, cobbled in backroom deals, is reasonable because so many specifics are still obscure.  One thing we do know is negotiations weren't, as promised by Obama, aired on C-SPAN.  Moreover, Obama failed to go over it line by line with members of Congress, another promise made and broken.  Only in the mainstream media could Obama getting "at least promises of cooperation from other world powers regarding climate change" count as a success.

Then again, what could Quinn have pointed to?  Unprecedented spending and debt, nonexistent shovel ready jobs, persistent high rates of unemployment, and setbacks on terrorism hardly qualify as achievements.  Perhaps she could have pointed with pride to Obama's decision to end a 22-year-old immigration ban preventing those with HIV/AIDS from entering the United States.  Or his naming of the first transgendered woman to be an advisor to the Commerce Department.  Or bringing people like Van Jones into government. 

Quinn's solution to the purported problem of Obama not receiving adequate credit is for Secret Service director Mark Sullivan and White House social secretary Desirée Rogers to resign.  Millions of Americans would agree that White House resignations are called for, but at a much higher level.        

Washington Post television critic Tom Shales conducts an online discussion on Tuesdays.  Today's session featured this exchange:

Dunn Loring, Va.: Re your column disparaging Liz Cheney's style, what was the last column you wrote so harshly criticizing a liberal pundit?

Tom Shales: Ah yes, it's our dear old Dunn Loringite. Dunn Loringer. Whatever. You have an ideological axe to grind and it's awfully predictable. Where do you get the idea that if someone criticizes a conservative they must also criticize a liberal? Is there some kind of "equal time" law or "fairness doctrine" that applies to everybody who says anything that is broadcast or cablecast? That's absurd. CONSERVATIVES DOMINATE THE BROADCAST AND CABLE MEDIA IN THIS COUNTRY. They have very little to complain about in terms of access to an audience. When was the last time you criticized a conservative? It's a meaningless question whichever way it is asked.

Shales disparages the questioner for having an ideological axe to grind, something he no doubt has never been accused of himself .  Later, there's a follow up question:

Reston, Va.: Tom, I'll give you that conservatives have got the radio all sewn up (mostly because nobody listens to liberal radio shows so they die), but how do conservatives dominate cable media? FOX is only one channel, up against CNN, MSNBC, and don't forget ABC, NBC, CBS, and PBS. Sure FOX's ratings beat MSNBC and CNN and PBS put together, but that's about viewer choice. Clearly on TV, liberals have more voices, but like radio, less people watch them. . ..

Tom Shales: MSNBC as a "liberal" soap box is a somewhat recent development. Frankly I don't like ideology-based channels no matter what they're selling. They're mostly preach-to-the-choir things anyway, so I shouldn't let them bother me. Maybe there are more liberal voices on TV but that didn't stop America from electing Ronald Reagan and not by a Bush mini-margin either.

So in a matter of minutes, Shales goes from all caps certainty to "Maybe there are more liberal voices on TV. . ."  His certitude is challenged by another participant:

Atlanta, Ga.: Tom, I'm a big fan, but can you explain this sentence?
CONSERVATIVES DOMINATE THE BROADCAST AND CABLE MEDIA IN THIS COUNTRY
I think you meant to write that Liberals dominate the broadcast and cable media in the country. True, Fox News has the highest cable ratings, but other left-leaning outlets on cable and, certainly, network television are more numerous than right-leaning.
Do you have examples of the conservative dominance?

Tom Shales: Well now let me see. The networks are all owned by Big Business and Big Businessmen certainly tend to be conservatives. The Fox News Channel isn't a minor detail to be lumped in with other networks; it is a 24-hour-a-day conservative propaganda machine; MSNBC is liberal only during prime-time and late-night, don't you think? Phil Donahue is off the air and has been for years; he was too "liberal." Perhaps with a liberal in the White House, the pendulum WILL swing the other way for a while. . .

So then he's reverting to his first assertion, with a mild slap at those businessmen, like George Soros and Jeffrey Immelt probably, who tend to be conservative.

Shales appears to be confused.  That condition likely is a great credential in the mainstream media.