The strange case of the question that didn't bark in the night.

This is such a weird nontroversy.

Fine. Pitney is there on behalf of Huffington Post. But he's there and is picked by Obama because his question is actually coming from an Iranian. Obama makes a point of saying so. Whether Huffington Post is left-leaning, or whether Pitney is a liberal actually don't influence where the question is coming from. And Obama did kind of duck the question because it wasn't a softball.

The question of U.S. relations with Iran if the situation resolves itself in Ahmadinejad's favor is more interesting from a news analysis point of view than whether or not Obama picked a given journalist with an "agenda" in mind. The ongoing ideological controversy regarding talks with "unfriendlies" is kind of the defining issue of this administration's foreign policy. Ahmadinejad is a hard-liner, and it surely does look like this election-rigging and crackdown might have more to do with his support in that nation's military--in other words, a coup. Obama's reticence to answer when this is still a developing situation is understandable, but it opens up a window to serious political pundits to look at what his options are.

Instead of that conversation, we get this jealous "villager" old media/new media, poutrage wankery.

It's kind of sad.

UPDATE: For "No he di-int!" type bitchery. Apparently Milbank followed up his allegations of "collusion" with calling Pitney a "dick."

Classy.