ABC News has a photo montage of political sex scandals, featuring both Republicans and Democrats. But a few bloggers have noted that the captions for these photos often ignore the Democratic Party affiliation of Democrats while highlighting the GOP affiliation of Republican.
Out of 13 pols featured, there were five Democrats, four of whom (80 percent) were unidentified by party. Of the eight Republicans, only two (25 percent) were unidentified by party. Jay Tea at Wizbang has the breakdown here:
Here's a rundown of the disgraced pols, with party affiliations as ABC notes:
- Governor of New York State Eliot Spitzer(party unknown)
- Former Representative Mark Foley (R-FL)
- Former Representative Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-CA)
- Senator David Vitter (R-LA)
- Former Bush Administration Secretary of State Randall Tobias (party unknown)
- President Bill Clinton (party unknown)
- Former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey (party unknown)
- Senator Larry Craig (R-ID)
- Spokane, WA Mayor James West (party unknown)
- Representative Bob Livingston (R-LA)
- Representative Dan Crane (R-IL)
- Representative Gerry Studds (D-MA)
- Representative Wilbur Mills of Arkansas (party unknown)
(Note: I used the term "former" to denote those who resigned from office over the scandal.)
So, let's look at the numbers:
Identified Democrats: 1
Identified Republicans: 6
Unidentified Democrats: 4 (Spitzer, Clinton, McGreevey, Mills)
Unidentified Republicans: 1 (West)
Unclear: 1 (Tobias is probably a Republican, but not definitively)Try as I might, I can't come up with a consistent, impartial rationale for why certain people got their affiliation listed, while others did not. Prominence -- i.e., "everyone knows what party they are with" -- doesn't fit, as I'd never heard of James West and had to double-check on Wilbur Mills, who's been out of the public spotlight far longer than Gerry Studds.
—Ken Shepherd is Managing Editor of NewsBusters
Editor at Large
Comments Policy
This just in from Yahoo / Rueters:
March 11, 2008 - 10:57 ET by YahooWatcherThe word "democrat" not found anywhere:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080311/ts_nm/newyork_spitzer_dc
N.Y. Republicans may seek to impeach Gov. Spitzer
30 minutes ago
New York Republicans will seek to impeach Gov. Eliot Spitzer if he does not resign within 48 hours after a report linking him to a prostitution ring, a spokesman for a leading assemblyman in the minority said on Tuesday.
"The governor has 48 hours to resign or articles of impeachment would be introduced," Josh Fitzpatrick, spokesman for Assembly Republican Minority Leader James Tedisco, told Reuters.
A New York Times report said the man who made his name fighting corruption hired a $1,000-an-hour prostitute and was caught on a federal wiretap at least six times on February 12 and 13 arranging to meet with her at a Washington hotel. Spitzer has neither confirmed nor denied the report.
It ain't only ABC
March 11, 2008 - 12:09 ET by ahusserI flipped to the story about Spitzer on AOL this morning. They had the condensed version in their usual fashion with 12 "panels" which one clicks to proceed through the story. The byline was Political Scandals. There was absolutely no mention in the "Panel" news about his political affiliationn in the page version there was a mention of his party but near the bottom of the article. However they also mentioned three Republican scandals and the R next to their name was prominent. They mentioned the McGreevey scandal and there was no party affilitation next to his name. Very blatant bias and shameless propagandizing. AOL also mentioned that the only ones calling for his resignation were Republicans. AOL has since changed the story about his wife standing by her man. I hope they changed the story because of the email I sent them about their bias. But I am dreaming.