Example #9 Billion How Are Media Are Failing Us
Marianne Gingrich has said she could end her ex-husband’s career with a single interview.Earlier this week, she sat before ABCNEWS cameras, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.
She spoke to ABCNEWS reporter Brian Ross for two hours, and her explosive revelations are set to rock the trail.
But now a “civil war” has erupted inside of the network, an insider claims, on exactly when the confession will air!
ABCNEWS suits determined it would be “unethical” to run the Marianne Gingrich interview so close to the South Carolina Primary, a curious decision, one insider argued, since the network has aggressively been reporting on other candidates.
A decision was tentatively made to air the interview next Monday, after all votes have been counted.
Got that- the ethical thing for a news organization to do is sit on information about a candidate, because god forbid voters go to the poll informed. It’s mind-numbing that there was even a debate about this within ABC News. Of course you air the god damned thing. The only reason not to is you are afraid of being called biased. There is no other job for a news organization that to provide news and allow readers to inform themselves, yet here we have ABC “debating” whether or not they should do that job. This is almost as bad as the NY Times debating whether they should correct lies and dispute falsehoods.
WTF do these people think their job is? Why do they get up and go to work? What is going on in their heads?
January 18, 2012 9:37 pm
Posted in: Assholes, DC Press Corpse, Election 2012, Our Failed Media Experiment
91 Comments
91 Responses
brettvk - January 18, 2012 | 9:39 pm · Link
So, is Drudge reliable enough that we can get all medieval on ABC on his evidence? Not that I don’t want to see Newt get everything he has coming to him.
Angry DougJ - January 18, 2012 | 9:40 pm · Link
Meh, if it will really end his candidacy, it will end it if it airs after the primary too. I don’t love the idea of something like this coming out just a few days before a big primary, with no time to rebut, etc.
gbear - January 18, 2012 | 9:42 pm · Link
They’re job is to attract advertising at top dollar.
edit: Well, that and catering to every need of their corporate owners.
Maude - January 18, 2012 | 9:42 pm · Link
Now ABC may be airing it Thursday.
ABC may be trying to drum up viewers.
A lot of the media lives in it’s own little world. They are insular and they talk to each other.
They make their own reality where they are more important than anything else.
dmsilev - January 18, 2012 | 9:45 pm · Link
Hang on a sec. You believe Drudge doesn’t have an axe of some sort to grind? Besides, it’s already being reported that ABC will air the interview tomorrow after the debate.
salvage - January 18, 2012 | 9:46 pm · Link
>What is going on in their heads?
$
ChrisNYC - January 18, 2012 | 9:46 pm · Link
Well, it’s a tough call because it’s hugely inflammatory and, arguably, doesn’t give voters new information. People know he had a long affair and ditched his wife while getting all stentorian about family values. All it does is make a huge splashy splash—all heat and not a lot of light. Super fitting that Drudge broke the story.
Brandon - January 18, 2012 | 9:46 pm · Link
Did it ever occur to you John that this could be classic Drudge ‘Whitey tape’ level ratf*cking? That’s what crossed my mind the first time I saw this was a ‘Drudge Exclusive’.
Raven - January 18, 2012 | 9:47 pm · Link
Maybe they will take a survey and see what people think.
danimal - January 18, 2012 | 9:47 pm · Link
Can’t see this making a splash either way. If Newt Gingrich was a serial child rapist, his partisans would defend child rape at this point in the election cycle. Old news about Newt’s philandering or other moral failings just won’t be a big deal in today’s GOP contest. That Newt is a scumbag (or a reformed scumbag) is baked in the cake already.
brettvk - January 18, 2012 | 9:47 pm · Link
@Angry DougJ: Well, there may be nothing new to refute, considering that Marianne gave a pretty comprehensive account to Esquire in August.
lamh35 - January 18, 2012 | 9:47 pm · Link
looks like ABC will air the interview of Newt’s ex-wife Thursday night AFTER the debate and before the Saturday primary. So expect Newt to either really try to hammer Romney so much in the debate, that whatever’s been said in the interview doesn’t become the “biggest” story before the primary Saturday.
I expect Santorum to be the most combative to Newt since Newt is his biggest competition for the “not-mittens” vote.
Whatever was said, it was enough that Newt’s daughters actually “released a statement” (i.e. campaign released a press release) to pre-empt the interview I guess.
Hmmm. I wonder how much Romney or the Establishment influenced the ex coming forward (ala Cain’s women) . At the very least, they did enough to get Drudge to post a siren call on his website and as we know, “Drudge rules the world” of many of the MSM (vis a vis Dick Halperin!)
TPM also noted how Drudge has had little to no posts against Romney, even for minor disagreements.
I predict that this makes Gingrich even angrier and he’s gonna go all Incredible Hulk on Romney and blow up the whole damn GOP race.
MacKenna - January 18, 2012 | 9:47 pm · Link
The NY Times doesn’t know whether to clarify whether the lies they print are lies and ABCNEWS won’t air information voters need to know. MSMedia, who does it serve?
Raven - January 18, 2012 | 9:48 pm · Link
@brettvk: Shit in Esquire and shit on the tube are not the same even if it’s the same shit.
Mark S. - January 18, 2012 | 9:48 pm · Link
But:
DEVELOPING . . .
Can I trademark “Newtober Surprise”?
MonkeyBoy - January 18, 2012 | 9:48 pm · Link
If the interview really is a Gingrich killer it should be aired before the SC primary. It would probably collapse all the not-Mit voters to Santorum and maybe make the race competitive again.
MikeBoyScout - January 18, 2012 | 9:51 pm · Link
Reporting information in a timely manner is nothing more than vigilante hooliganism.
Whatever happened to right thinking bloggers?
jl - January 18, 2012 | 9:51 pm · Link
Hello Mr. Cole,
I have heard you are a confused blogger, wondering about the function of our corporate media. They have a legal duty to maximize the value of their corporation to the shareholders. Being US Corporations, they interpret that legal mandate literally, categorically and absolutely, with no exceptions (at all, nothing at all in return for all the favorable treatment bestowed on them by various governments).
So, after they work out what is to their corporate benefit, they will decide what to do, and you will be glad, for social welfare is optimized thereby.
Also, what gbear said.
I hope that helps, and I hope you feel free to ask anymore questions about our free enterprise paradise that you find confusing.
You are welcome.
Edit: and look, Cole, don’t bother me about competition. There are only four or five of these mega corporations, and they have found legal ways to collude. It is optimal. Shut up, the economist explained. Hope that clears things up. You are, again, quite welcome.
Benjamin Franklin - January 18, 2012 | 9:52 pm · Link
George Carlin once speculated about ‘civil’ war. “how is that done” he said.
“Excuse me, kind sir: KA POW ! Sorry about that”
Omnes Omnibus - January 18, 2012 | 9:52 pm · Link
@MonkeyBoy:
Let me be the first to say, aren’t they already?
Brandon - January 18, 2012 | 9:53 pm · Link
@Mark S.: So basically, there is no news value to this interview. The only gain for airing it then would be to help Mitt, particularly if it features Barbara Walters style manipulative visuals, where they used that weird fuzzy cloud lighting effect and she repeatedly breaks down in tears.
DanielX - January 18, 2012 | 9:53 pm · Link
Well, someone might be offended if that interview was released before the SC primary. God forbid that the mass media publish or broadcast anything that might offend someone, particularly someone as connected as Newt.
My, we certainly have come a long way from ‘comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable’, haven’t we? And they wonder why nobody trusts them any more. Publisher, heal thyself.
Egg Berry - January 18, 2012 | 9:54 pm · Link
@Mark S.: Howie Kurtz really is a little beltway shit, isn’t he?
ChrisNYC - January 18, 2012 | 9:56 pm · Link
How lucky for Mitt that this will push aside those nasty money questions for a couple of days. It’s kismet! Who cares about tax returns when we can hear about s-e-x!
Delia - January 18, 2012 | 9:58 pm · Link
@jl:
You forgot to add that corporations are people. And their feelings might be hurt by Mr. Cole’s unseemly display. Also. Too.
General Stuck - January 18, 2012 | 9:58 pm · Link
Newt ended his own political career years ago. He just happened to look up at this cycle’s GOP hopefuls, and figured he’d join the circus and maybe come out the farther from the business end of the clown cannon. He’s a wonder of a primary, and a legend in his own mind.
But by gawd, like a demented Phoenix Bird, he ain’t finished yet with the sideways bullshit, and is making a last stand with own kind—the southern wingnut. Sometimes shit is so fucked up, the stinkiest turd floats to the top of the punch bowl and becomes a star.
jayboat - January 18, 2012 | 9:59 pm · Link
Regardless of what the interview reveals, it will be worth watching. One thing it will do is remind people (again) what a walking bag of shit ol newty patooty is. Coming from an ex, with this timing, should sink the friggin battleship once and for all.
Some of those folks are a bit thick-headed and need to hear things a couple of times before the light goes on.
And damn… it ain’t even February yet.
jl - January 18, 2012 | 9:59 pm · Link
@Mark S.: To be serious for a moment (though that disclaimer usually leads to embarrassment for me), that was my thought too. What would be really news about this interview. This particular wife has already spilled the beans. She provided testimony that verified that fact that Newt regards himself as an Ubermensch, a hyperborean, and overman, a world historical figure who was destined to lead us. So he needs to pig out, drink, engage in sinful activities, and it is all OK.
Some revelations about public figures should not be forgotten. Seems like her previous statements qualify.
Edit: Should it be ‘a hyperborean’ or ‘an hyperborean’? I can never remember how that rule works with h. But regardless I will never say or type ‘an history’ it sounds like an insufferably pedantic and priggish Brit professor.
jl - January 18, 2012 | 10:01 pm · Link
@Delia: Thanks. But I was waiting for Cole to realize that himself and issue an apology. It was going to be a pop quiz. You wrecked my lesson plan.
But Cole is almost surely a hopeless student, so no harm no foul.
General Stuck - January 18, 2012 | 10:06 pm · Link
ABC would be publishing an allegation with no time for it to be adjudicated in the court of public opinion. The DOJ has the same policy for announcing indictments of pols just before an election.
Egg Berry - January 18, 2012 | 10:06 pm · Link
Does anyone think Republicans read Esquire? The medium is the message.
MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson - January 18, 2012 | 10:06 pm · Link
It’s hard to see why this should really change anything, given that Newticle’s horndoggery has been a matter of public laughter for years now. What sordid revelations could possibly top the cancer ward divorce papers?
JGabriel - January 18, 2012 | 10:09 pm · Link
John Cole @ Top:
Okay, I’ll play Devil’s Advocate here:
SC is one state out of 50. If ABC airs the Marianne Gingrich interview the day after the SC primary, there will still be time for viewers to take in and analyze the charges before the FL primary.
So what’s the difference? Simple — if aired on Thursday night, that gives the Gingrich campaign one day to rebut her charges, on their dime vs. Marianne’s free national airing, which will make them look desperate during a period when they are wrapping up their campaign in SC.
If aired on Sunday or Monday, then Newt has a few days to answer whatever charges Marianne brings against him before the FL primary.
That seems a little fairer and more ethical than airing the charges (or advertising them, but too late for that) at the last minute before the SC primary. It’s the same reasoning the DOJ uses when it decides not to indict political figures right before an election, but to wait until after the election to announce charges.
So, yes, ABC has a good argument based on ethics to delay airing Marianne Gingrich’s interview until after the SC primary, since it can’t be aired with enough time for the Gingrich campaign to respond before the primary.
One can, of course, argue that the news media has an obligation to bring timely news to its audience as soon as it can. I won’t dispute that, except to note that news organizations routinely withhold news that may, for instance, endanger military actions in the field. My main point however, is that ABC’s ethical argument, whether or not you agree with it, has a sound ethical basis and is not completely spurious.
.
Donut - January 18, 2012 | 10:09 pm · Link
For TV news orgs? That’s pretty easy.
1. Self-aggrandizement; 2. Sell more advertising
Everything else falls in line behind those two things.
Next.
Heliopause - January 18, 2012 | 10:11 pm · Link
Not sure you’re reading this right, John. That Newt Gingrich is the world’s biggest fucking asshole is already the worst kept secret in politics, including amongst South Carolina’s electorate. If it turns out that he beat her around the head with a Bible and fucked the babysitter in front of her it not only wouldn’t hurt him, it would probably boost his poll numbers, so long as he blamed it on liberals.
Sammy - January 18, 2012 | 10:12 pm · Link
And republican right-wing wack-a-tudes, teabaggers and so-called christians.
Sammy - January 18, 2012 | 10:13 pm · Link
And republican right-wing wack-a-tudes, teabaggers and so-called christians.
Frankensteinbeck - January 18, 2012 | 10:14 pm · Link
@jl:
Not nearly enough people know about the interview, and of those that ever did, many have forgotten. Newt’s abominable sins and personality are the distant past to the American electorate. This would put them all fresh and on display.
slag - January 18, 2012 | 10:16 pm · Link
Did I enter bizarro land?
You’re linking to Drudge, taking what is written by Drudge at face value, AND bitching about the fact that we actually have to wait for a he-said-she-said pie fight? Really?
Sammy - January 18, 2012 | 10:18 pm · Link
@DanielX: You can just be sure that they would not hesitatie even for a second, if it were a Democrat. And if it related to President Obama, they would shut down every show on the whole network to air their scoop von all of the shows.
MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson - January 18, 2012 | 10:19 pm · Link
@slag:
The enemy of my enemy is my 11 dimensional friend.
Villago Delenda Est - January 18, 2012 | 10:19 pm · Link
@Benjamin Franklin:
Well, as naval officers used to say just before a broadside was fired into their ships, “May we be thankful to the Lord for what we are about to receive.”
Sammy - January 18, 2012 | 10:20 pm · Link
@Egg Berry: He** yes.
xian - January 18, 2012 | 10:21 pm · Link
remember how the times didn’t air the FISA story before the 2004 election to avoid influencing it?
Benjamin Franklin - January 18, 2012 | 10:23 pm · Link
@xian:
‘Cause you don’t discuss those things in polite society.
mk3872 - January 18, 2012 | 10:24 pm · Link
Cole: Did you SERIOUSLY just use MATT DRUDGE as a source??? ROFL!!
jl - January 18, 2012 | 10:25 pm · Link
Well, OK, if ABC is dithering over whether to release it right before an early primary election, versus a few days later, that is not so bad,
I read the post, and an article I saw earlier today to mean that ABC might not release it at all.
But in general, my comments on corporate media stand. Newt is no longer an A lister, anyway, so my commie diatribe might not apply to a corporate decision whether to hurt poor misunderstood Newtie, or not.
cmorenc - January 18, 2012 | 10:25 pm · Link
Marianne’s interview is a new shiny thing being laid out for the media to chase after to distract them from their damaging spotlight on Romney’s Bain-fueled finances, nondisclosure of tax returns, and what may be hidden there, at least until sometime after Romney has both: a) irreversibly captured the GOP nomination; and b) bought some time and breathing space to come up with an effective counter-offensive against the vulture capitalism and tax issues.
Omnes Omnibus - January 18, 2012 | 10:26 pm · Link
@Villago Delenda Est: See, this is what is wrong with the Navy. And, of course, the cannibalism.
jl - January 18, 2012 | 10:27 pm · Link
@xian: But I remember the FISA thing was an obvious corporate excuse. It was not a last minute thing before an election. They made excuses for delaying, that that excuse was what they could sell the best.
Am I remembering it wrong?
slag - January 18, 2012 | 10:28 pm · Link
@MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson: Are you saying John Cole is in the CIA?
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q) - January 18, 2012 | 10:28 pm · Link
@Angry DougJ: But he’s had since the Esquire article to rebut this stuff, no? I can’t imagine she’s gonna bring bigger guns than she brandished for Esquire.
@Raven: Fair enough, sir. Much broader reach on the air. I keep forgetting that sort of thing. This will actually be news to several million people. Thanks for reminding me.
Omnes Omnibus - January 18, 2012 | 10:32 pm · Link
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
Maybe she has been lifting? Or did I misinterpret?
MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson - January 18, 2012 | 10:35 pm · Link
@slag:
That whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must think rebelliously.
SiubhanDuinne - January 18, 2012 | 10:44 pm · Link
@Raven:
Diarrhea vs. The Runs?
Donut - January 18, 2012 | 10:47 pm · Link
@Heliopause:
Fixed that fer ya.
Hawes - January 18, 2012 | 10:48 pm · Link
Please don’t air it until after Gingrich wins SC. In fact, I think it would be unethical to air it all. Bury it in the vault.
Oh, wait. God doesn’t love me enough to make Newt the GOP nominee.
jl - January 18, 2012 | 10:49 pm · Link
@slag: Some one needs to take care of this guy, slag. He snoops around too much. I think he knows, you know, what there might or might not be there to know.
Cassidy - January 18, 2012 | 10:51 pm · Link
Why be hasty? Let the conservatives go to the polls uninformed. It’s not like they’re high onformation voters anyway. If we take Newt out too quickly, we lose the scorched earth “not Romney” tone of his campaign. I’d rather spend the next 6 months letting them continue to destroy one another.
Martin - January 18, 2012 | 10:52 pm · Link
@Heliopause:
I think it’s illegal to be a fucking asshole in South Carolina. Leviticus and that shit.
Joel - January 18, 2012 | 10:52 pm · Link
Drudge is useless, irrelevant, etc.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN) - January 18, 2012 | 10:53 pm · Link
I would guess that a part of the question over when to air the interview is just how accurate the people inside ABC think the interview is. I’m prepared to believe just about the worst things imaginable about Newt Gingrich, but I don’t take his ex-wife as an unbiased source. Granted, she’s got a hell of a lot of understandable reasons to want to shove the knife in as far as possible, but that doesn’t mean that the rest of us should pretend that there isn’t a significant sourcing problem here.
WeeBey - January 18, 2012 | 10:54 pm · Link
This is all old information.
It’s a non-story when they choose to run it. But that’s Drudge for you.
MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson - January 18, 2012 | 11:00 pm · Link
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
Have you ever encountered an unbiased source? Of course everyone has a reason for the stories they tell and the way they tell them. What matters is the evidence they produce and the corroboration or lack thereof from others.
JasonF - January 18, 2012 | 11:01 pm · Link
@danimal:
Oh shit—not this again.
Zach - January 18, 2012 | 11:06 pm · Link
ABC News was given first crack at the Jeremiah Wright tapes by whoever’s opposition researcher found them. Brian Ross jumped at the opportunity and got the green light for the story on March 13, 2008. Right in time for the month-long campaign in Pennsylvania in which Clinton needed Obama’s campaign to totally collapse for the delegate math to work in her favor. ABC’s George Stephanopolous twice asked Obama in a debate that month, “Does Reverend Wright love America as much as you do?”
If they’re worried about a double standard, they aren’t doing a good job. However, this story itself is probably planted by a Romney supporter… it’s a panicked reaction to Gingrich’s success in the debate the other night. Why Romney’s flipping out and doing this and shoving money into voters’ hands at rope lines is beyond me, though.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN) - January 18, 2012 | 11:18 pm · Link
@MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson: True, but some sources are more biased than others. And in this case, I don’t see much of that corroboration that you say is so important. Yes, Gingrich is a complete jackass, but most of the specific charges that I’ve seen Marianne Gingrich make don’t have any other witnesses.
If I’m ABC News, I want to think hard about dropping that kind of bomb right before an election. If there were corroboration, it would be different, but there isn’t.
AA+ Bonds - January 18, 2012 | 11:30 pm · Link
It’s pretty effective for Gingrich, as RWAP men will only pay attention to a woman’s critique if forced to do so
Romney has SC and has the nomination sewn up, so what really matters is that Gingrich stays in the race after this so that she will make the Republicans look like assholes before Gingrich submerges beneath the surface of the loch again
That’s what we’re rooting for, remember, to keep Gingrich in, not out
MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson - January 18, 2012 | 11:33 pm · Link
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
Have you actually watched the ABC segment in question? If not, how would you expect to see any corroboration?
Misha - January 18, 2012 | 11:33 pm · Link
Situations like this always remind me of Gina Gershon’s speech in The Insider about tortious interference [q.v.]. The truer the damning information is, the greater damages for which the speaker (or publisher) of such information will be liable.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN) - January 18, 2012 | 11:56 pm · Link
@MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson: I’m working from the Esquire interview.
kuvasz - January 19, 2012 | 12:00 am · Link
The major media companies are akin to the Olympian gods debating the fates of Hector and Achilles before the walls of Troy.
elisathon - January 19, 2012 | 12:04 am · Link
Sorry if someone already posted it – Brian Ross, Nightline ABC just promoed the Marianne Gingrich interview for tomorrow night, Thursday, and showed a clip of Marianne saying that Gingrich told her that ‘Calista doesn’t care what i do…’
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal - January 19, 2012 | 12:08 am · Link
“marianne in the can” is actually how she began her career as the next mrs gingrich once upon a time in newt’s old rolodex.
run it, your job is to shank people. you aren’t the referee you’re in the game.
Citizen_X - January 19, 2012 | 12:13 am · Link
@dmsilev:
Of course he does. So? The old (American) model of the media—er, medium, because there was only print—was a war of partisan papers and pamphleteers, many of them printing all kinds of calumny and outright lies. The citizenry had to figure out what was true, or not. That model served American democracy better than the present, “objective,” one.
The “objective” model only worked as long as there was broad consensus about our politics. Those days are gone now. So let’s get used to having partisan media grinding axes all over the place.
God, I’m hoping for appallingly high casualties.
Thymezone - January 19, 2012 | 12:45 am · Link
Beats me. What do bloggers think their job is?
MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson - January 19, 2012 | 12:46 am · Link
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
But Marianne Gingrich doesn’t say much of substance in the quoted portions, and the historical record of actions and things said by Newt is fairly well-documented elsewhere. I am not seeing much in the profile that requires corroboration, even on the surface. Half the time she sounds as if she still cares deeply about Gingrich!
Joel - January 19, 2012 | 12:47 am · Link
Sounds like Cole got played by 1) Drudge 2) ABC.
Seriously, this is a classic “leak” designed to drum up interest/ratings.
Gust Avrakotos - January 19, 2012 | 12:52 am · Link
Ha, FINALLY…..Cole has found his niche. Quoting the internet equivalent of the National Enquirer as if they are the NYT. I think Cole has finally realized that wallowing down in the muck with the rest of the fools is where he belongs…..or not.
Hope he stays there and keeps out of trouble. That way we don’t have to hear about how the fucking drones are coming to take away our puppies and kittens. Then have him point to a dip in the stock market that day to prove his point.
Midwest Meg - January 19, 2012 | 1:28 am · Link
As I recall, the New York Times also chose not to print the news that the Bush Administration and telecoms had been doing a massive amount of domestic spying—-because—get this—this didn’t want to influence the 2004 election. God forbid that the riff-raff would find out that their constitutional rights had been violated on a mass scale.
The NYT only printed the story after one of its reporters was about to publish it—-18 months later—in a book and Bill Keller first went to the White House to apologize to George W. that they couldn’t hold back the story any longer.
This is yet another reason why I no longer subscribe to the NYT. All the News That They Think Is Fit To Print just isn’t good enough.
LongHairedWeirdo - January 19, 2012 | 1:39 am · Link
Dude… if they reveal it now and the SC primary is boring, they’ve just lost their Top News Story for a while. If they reveal it after the primary, they
1) look “nonpartisan” if Gingrich loses, or
2) get to drop a huge bombshell if he wins, but would have lost if this were in play.
You don’t think they’re in the business of serving the public, do you?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN) - January 19, 2012 | 1:42 am · Link
@MildlyAmusedRainbowPerson: The historical record of things that Newt has said publicly is already out there. Marianne Gingrich can’t add to that. The news content of her interview is going to rest entirely upon what she says, unless it prompts someone else to come forward who has not done so in the past, or unless she has documentation that she did not provide for previous interviews. In fact, your comment that she doesn’t say much of substance suggests that there isn’t really anything newsworthy about this interview at all.
Everything that constitutes new information that she can provide requires corroboration that, as yet, we have absolutely none of. Zero. Nada. Zilch. Whether she sounds as if she still cares for him is entirely irrelevant to the question of whether there is corroboration. I would also be extremely skeptical of such an appearance from someone who has gone around telling people for years that she can give an interview that would end Newt’s career all by itself. That is an action completely at odds with such a characterization.
Waynski - January 19, 2012 | 1:43 am · Link
@lamh35: I think you’re right. They’re trying to lure him into a full on meltdown. It would be ironic, since Newt knows so much about baiting.
Schlemizel - January 19, 2012 | 7:18 am · Link
Maybe I am in the minority but it seems to me (not having any idea what is in the interview or what evidence she brings) that airing this before the vote is a huge opportunity for rat fucking. If all I need is someone with a grudge & a TV camera to make charges against a candidate & I can time the drop so well that the charges are hanging out there with little time to examine and refute them There is a whole new avenue for slimeing someone. If they had this a week or so ago that would be different.
We used to have a law here that forbade political adverts the day before the election. Not only was it a reprieve from the incessant nattering it prevented exactly this type of thing. I hate to be on the side of todays media because they have not shown they deserve it but in this case I’d prefer they go slow.
sherparick - January 19, 2012 | 7:41 am · Link
@gbear: Rightto. These guys long ago became part of the infotainment industry. Also, they quake in their boots about getting nasty phone calls from Newt, his friends in Congress, Brett Bozell & his crew, and the corporate swells that back the Newtster.
They have a very different idea of how to respond to criticism at Fox, which is basically to declare all out war on the critic. http://byliner.com/david-carr/.....-the-story
Lojasmo - January 19, 2012 | 7:42 am · Link
@danimal:
If they squint real hard it might look like the child could be enjoying it. Then it isn’t rape!
Mino - January 19, 2012 | 8:12 am · Link
I really hope Dems are making note of how ready national news orgs are to facilitate Republican ratfuckery. Expect the same in the races next year.
Tom - January 19, 2012 | 9:11 am · Link
I’ll tell you exactly what is in their heads:
They don’t want the timing to end Newt’s campaign. He’s likely to get attacked on very personal grounds. As Newt and others have said, a lot of this stuff has come out in an Esquire magazine from ‘10. So it’s not new. This stuff have been out there. Dredging up the worst of a candidates personal history RIGHT before the election might be a bit unfair.
I can definitely see why there was a debate. It’s a tough call.
Frankly, I’m amazed you think this is such an easy decision, John… oh, wait, I’m not because everyone on this blog is a knee-jerk reactionary when it comes to MSM.
Hewer of Wood, Drawer of Water - January 19, 2012 | 10:04 am · Link
Somewhat OT but at least some journalists are doing their jobs
http://100r.org/2012/01/romney-on-board/
MSNBC did a summary of the article, so there might be a little traction from this. The site itself looks interesting, though I have not gone through all of the articles
kay - January 19, 2012 | 10:07 am · Link
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
But that’s a different question. If it isn’t reliable and corroborated they shouldn’t be airing it at any time.
They should put it out when they have it, whatever “have it” means to them. If it’s useful and reliable the day after the primary, it’s useful and reliable the day before the primary.
They’re introducing a subjective element that doesn’t have to be there. They’re putting their judgment in place of the voters’ judgment, because they’re guessing at what it might mean to the potential voter or viewer.
They go down a bad road with this, and they don’t have to go there at all.
bcinaz - January 19, 2012 | 10:19 am · Link
Don’t you remember that gut wrenching dilemma whether or not to air the Jeremiah Wright tape before the election?