IRS Probe Politics

"House Vote on Former I.R.S. Official Signals Element of G.O.P. Election Strategy" is the headline of a Times news article about the vote to hold Lois Lerner in contempt of Congress. This is an attempt at interpretive reporting. It seems to me that it is applied more often to Republicans, who are assumed to be politically motivated, than to Democrats, who are assumed to be selfless. But the nice thing about it is that it is an interpretive lens that can be applied to any story. Imagine: "Obama Effort on Minimum Wage Increase Signals Element of Democratic Election Strategy." "Obama Effort on Expanded Health Care Coverage Signals Element of Democratic Election Strategy.' We are in a democracy, so pretty much everything politicians do signals an element of their election strategy. Most readers understand that already without having it spelled out; some readers, including this one, would probably prefer if the Times would just report on the news from Washington without attributing political motives to every development. The least we can ask is that if the Times is going to do this attribution of political motives, the newspaper be evenhanded about it.