Our good friends at the Houston Chronicle have earned considerable scorn over the years from more conservative readers and commentators. There has been ample material to feed this criticism, and it even launched Lone Star Times under the ChronicallyBiased name.

Since those early days we have continued to comment on everything that that “world-class newspaper” has brought the nation’s fourth largest city; namely a lot of sloppy writing, biased news, and outright stupidity. That last is my subject today.

If you listen to radio’s Rush Limbaugh, you are aware that his parody song “Barack the Magic Negro” has created a very belated mini-flap among elitist liberal journalists.

Since they do not listen to his show, they simply take what they have heard from other liberals, couple it with the title of the song, and conclude that Rush is a racist as they write scolding articles wondering how he gets away with it.

This divorce from the truth is obvious to anyone who listens to Mr. Limbaugh’s show, but the facts have never gotten in the way of a liberal media story.

Today’s tally of Chronicle bias begins with the paper’s headline writer, who indulged his fancy for inflammatory hyperbole last week out of dislike for the radio host. The result was a headline that bears no relevance to the article it tops.

Is Limbaugh above the law?

A potent question, suggesting that our elite journalists have uncovered evidence that Limbaugh has committed crimes and gotten way with them.

Just one question– what law?

We never learn. The idea is not explored anywhere in the article, and the Chronicle eventually saw fit to change the headline last Friday afternoon.

Is Limbaugh getting a free pass?

Fine. Let’s turn to Chronicle reporter Andrew Guy Jr.’s very-late-to-the-party take on the “Magic Negro” affair.

The music is loaded with racial stereotypes. [Frequent parody-performer on Limbaugh’s show Paul] Shanklin sings in a dialect that, we’re guessing, is supposed to be ebonics, saying “dat” instead of “that” and implying that Obama wasn’t from “da ‘hood.”

Actually, Mr. Guy, that dialect would be an impression of the Reverend Sharpton, and a pretty good one at that.

Perhaps Guy believes that a political figure like Sharpton is not open to parody because he is black… but a review of the Chronicle reporter’s previous work indicates that he himself has no qualms about engaging in similar types of ethnic/linguistic stereotypes when discussing Italians.

The Bada Bing girls strut into the room wearing slinky red outfits and scarves. They work the tables, chatting up the men.

The mob family comes next - some wearing bad suits and hats - pointing their (cap) guns at everyone in sight.

Everyone speaks in exaggerated New Jersey accents, yelling like banshees and talking about the faults of America’s favorite mob capo.

“Well, they’re really working the audience,” said Houstonian Sharon Taylor.

This is dinner theater.

U got a problem wid dat?

[Emphasis in bold added by LST]

“U got a problem wid dat?”! We thought this sort of brazen anti-Italian “humor” had been banished from polite society decades ago. Shame on you, Mr. Guy.

Perhaps he’s simply opposed to all hard-hitting satire because he cares more about not hurting other people’s feelings above making a point?

Apparently not, as Guy makes clear in an interview with the controversial (African-American) creator of the highly race-conscious comic strip “Boondocks”.

“No,” [McGruder] said, “it’s satire, and satire is not fair. It’s an unfair game. That’s the definition of satire.”

For now, McGruder will continue to draw his strip and hope it gets people to think critically.

Even if they don’t agree.

“The people who write hate mail write week after week,” he said. “And that’s kind of comforting in a way. I really think anger can be a good thing.”

Spoken like a true hell-raiser.

That’s fine with us. But can’t Limbaugh employ satire to raise a little hell too, to help get people to think critically about liberal media fawning over Obama?

The truth is, the “Magic Negro” parody is not even about Obama, it is directed at the media that questioned his “blackness” in several published articles, including Ehrenstein’s.

That is the real reason for the Drive-By Media hit on Limbaugh. The “moral outrage” in liberal circles is simply a belated reaction to the accuracy of the parody.

Finally, we can’t help but chuckle at the hypocrisy on display in this 70-second long YouTube clip of Chronicle reporter Andrew Guy Jr. making sexist comments about the size of women’s breasts.

The camerawoman is Guy’s Chronicle colleague, Syd Kearney (a woman). We are given a brief, behind the scenes look at the editorial deliberations that go into the creation of the Chronicle’s much-beloved “TMI” infotainment section (and based on this brief glimpse, it isn’t hard to understand why the final product is what it is).

Guy and a co-worker are asked if this edition has any “ta-tas“[i.e, "woman's breasts"] prominently displayed. In the course of his banter, Guy comment’s on Courtney [Love's] flat-chestedness, saying that “she’s not Colorado, she’s Houston” [i.e, she doesn't have breasts like the Might Rocky Mountains, but is instead flat like the rice-fields of Sugar Land].

We don’t have to guess what would happen to Rush Limbaugh if a tape appeared on the Internet of him making jokes that objectified a woman and mocked her for “failing” to meet the impossible standards of beauty that have been set by the patriarchy.

But no worries, Mr. Guy. Unlike mainstream media liberals, conservatives have maintained our sense of humor… and are even willing to respect the freedom to tell edgy, pointed jokes to people who don’t share our political beliefs.

In all probability, in years past the Old Media monopoly might have been able to destroy Rush Limbaugh with manufactured outrage.

But those days of dominance are long gone.

Parody on, Rush.