Which is worse: BushCo or the compliant media?

Eric Alterman pulls no punches where the Swift Boat Liars (and their beneficiary in the White House) are concerned:

The people in the Bush administration are competent in only one thing: smearing their opponents and intimidating the media into passing along their falsehoods unedited.

And speaking of the media, Josh Marshall has a point to make:

Really, though, this comes back to the press, whether they'll allow the president to play the silent accomplice in this character assassination and pay no price for his actions.

As [Jacob] Weisberg puts it, "The ad is a carefully crafted lie ... beyond vile."

Unfortunately, lies like this, once uttered, are impossible to counter in their entirety, just as mud thrown against a wall makes a terrible mess even though it doesn't stick. The only way to counter such misdeeds is to shine a light on those cynical and deceitful enough to seek to gain from them. That would be the president and his supporters. But on this front most of the media are content to act as indifferent bystanders to the offense.