Op-Ed: Big News Outlets MIA On Van Jones

The controversy over Obama's Green jobs czar, Van Jones, has been big news for over a week now. A dozen posts on Digital Journal alone since August 25th. Yet a search of five major media outlets as of September 4th returned zero hits on Lexis-Nexis.

A CLARIFICATION: Not long after posting this report, I received an email from a reader with a link to a CBS News report from last night covering Mr. Van Jones. Although I do understand that some news outlets listed here are now covering the story, the search results as of 11:30AM on September 4th are still no less surprising, given the story's prominence and duration in the media and on the web. You also have to wonder, given the timing of York's report yesterday afternoon, followed by CBS' sudden interest and subsequent in-depth news coverage, if it wasn't a tail-wagging-the-dog thing. On with the non-story. A Google search of "Van Jones" for the past 24 hours, as of 12:51AM EST Saturday, returned a total of exactly 2,620,000 hits. By the time you click on that search link, it may be more. A lot more. Mr. Van Jones, President Obama's "Green jobs" czar, has been making near-Jeremiah Wright-sized waves for the President as of late. And FOX conservative pundit Glenn Beck has been Mr. Jones' ugly and angry Neptune, stoking their fury into Andrea Gail-like proportions. But it wasn't just Mr. Jones' controversial past statements, which are now going viral on YouTube and throughout the conservative blogosphere, that is the story here. Although they are becoming the story more and more. The real story is that Mr. Jones himself may have been the catalyst to it all, and is now reaping a political and media whirlwind for attacking Beck. The organization Mr. Jones founded, Color For Change, an African-American advocacy group which enjoys close ties to the White House, organized a boycott of Glenn's show after Beck hinted Obama might be a racist after siding with Dr. Gates over Sgt. Crowley. Then Beck went sniffing around Mr. Jones' background. The rest, as they say, is history. But it is an active, ongoing and headline-making history. All that seems to remain is the ending: given that even Congressmen are now calling for hearings and Mr. Jones' resignation, is Van going to be looking at the Obama bus from the inside or the undercarriage in a week? There will be plenty of upcoming coverage on that developing news story. Even HuffPo pundits are now in on it, generating their own Perfect Storm of opposition to what they perceive is the slandering of Mr. Jones' character and good name. They're running into some opposition even by Lefties in the comments columns, but HuffPo pundits are on the Jones war front and shooting back. And Newsbusters is shooting at them. Yet some of the biggest names in media are most curiously absent from a news story which now enjoys six major prominent links at Drudge and is raging across the Internet. The Washington Examiner's Byron York did a Beltway Confidential piece titled "The Van Jones (non) Feeding Frenzy," highlighting Lexis-Nexis searches from 11:30AM on Friday, September 4th: Here are Mr. York's basic term searches and eye-opening results:

From a Nexis search a few moments ago:

Total words about the Van Jones controversy in the New York Times: 0.

Total words about the Van Jones controversy in the Washington Post: 0.

Total words about the Van Jones controversy on NBC Nightly News: 0.

Total words about the Van Jones controversy on ABC World News: 0.

Total words about the Van Jones controversy on CBS Evening News: 0.

Hard to believe, on a story of this magnitude that has been front and center for over a week now. Reminds me of their disappearing Roxana Saberi coverage in late March. Van Who? Why no mention of Van Jones in all this time? Is it big news or not? Are they covering for Obama? You have to ask yourself. Pick a question. Oh, and as a bonus to you story-hungry DJs, here's the Van Jones page at Huffington Post. Just found it. Lots of recent blog entries. Who knows what you might find? Bon Appetit!