WashPost Shows Dramatic Double Standard Rushing Into Newt 'Open Marriage' Story
On Thursday, the Washington Post website posted an article at about 1 pm from reporter James Grimaldi based on a Post interview with Newt Gingrich’s second wife Marianne making claims that Gingrich asked for an “open marriage.” The standard was wham, bam, print it, ma'am.
The Post had a very different standard for Bill Clinton. Paula Jones held a press conference at CPAC on February 11, 1994. Three days later, Jones came up only briefly about 25 paragraphs into the piece with Post reporter Lloyd Grove lamenting, “David Keene seemed delighted to let his confab be turned into a staging area for yet another ascension of Mount Bimbo.” Investigative reporter Michael Isikoff later was suspended for two weeks after the Post delayed and delayed on Jones:
Michael Isikoff was suspended from The Washington Post "for two weeks for insubordination after a heated confrontation with editors over the newspaper's handling of a story about sexual harassment accusations against President Clinton," according to Rod Dreher of The Washington Times. The March 25 WashTimes story reported: "Two sources at the paper said Mr. Isikoff was upset because he thinks the Post is burying his findings about sexual harassment charges leveled at Mr. Clinton by Paula Corbin Jones, an Arkansas state employee, at a Feb. 11 news conference."
They finally published Isikoff's story on May 4 -- about three months later. Get a load of what Post managing editor Robert Kaiser said, that these things take great care! "Our role in a case like this is to examine an allegation made by a private citizen against a public official with some care...We have an obligation to the Post's readers to do our best to establish the truth and not simply to print damaging accusations the moment they are made."
Grimaldi's story aimed to underline Marianne's claims of what Newt said with what was on the record about Newt the next day. (The Post didn't exactly rush to match a Paula Jones story with Clinton's declarations about sexual harassment.) The day after Gingrich asked for a divorce, Grimaldi emphasized:
The next day, Newt Gingrich gave a speech at a conference titled “The Demise of American Culture” to the Republican Women Leaders Forum in Erie, Pa., extolling the virtues of the founding fathers and criticizing liberal politicians for supporting tax increases, which he said hurt families and children. In the speech, which was televised on C-SPAN, he spoke often of God, families and values...
Marianne Gingrich said she was surprised at the timing. “How could he ask me for a divorce on Monday and within 48 hours give a speech on family values and talk about how people treat people?” she said.
If the second Mrs. Gingrich is telling the truth, Newt is a tremendous hypocrite. That's certainly the image Grimaldi wanted to achieve. But why must the Post seem to excuse the Democrat hypocrites like Clinton?
Grimaldi really punched below the belt in suggesting that Newt's daughters (from marriage #1) came to their dad's defense not out of love or loyalty, but because he paid them!
For more than a decade, [Kathy] Lubbers served as president and chief executive of Gingrich Communications, which promoted her father’s speeches and activities. It was disbanded last year when he decided to run for president. Her sister, Jackie Gingrich Cushman, has earned more than $56,000 working for her father’s campaign committees in the past two years, records show.
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Comments
. . and the contrast to the Edward's cover-up by the MSM
Submitted by Gary Hall on Fri, 01/20/2012 - 12:50pm.
NB readers might recall one of the rare confessions by former Los Angeles Times staff opinion writer, Tim Rutten - indeed, a leftie himself. He apparently found that he had access to a real conscience when on Aug. 9, 2008, he spilled the beans on not only the LAT's want to protect the Democrats, but the entire national MSM, in his column titled, Old Media Dethroned.
A few choice excerpts:
What's really significant here is the cone of silence the nation's major newspapers -- including The Times -- and the cable and broadcast networks dropped over this story when it first appeared in the tabloid during the presidential primary campaign. Next, the Enquirer reported that the unmarried Hunter was pregnant. Still no mainstream media interest. Indeed, never in recent journalistic history have so many tough reporters so closely resembled sheep as those members of the campaign press corps who meekly accepted Edwards' categorical dismissal of the Enquirer's allegations. [..]
. . . the illusion that traditional print and broadcast news organizations can establish the limits of acceptable political journalism joined the passenger pigeon on the roster of extinct Americana.
Rutten goes on to offer this inside view of how the liberal process in the MSM functons:
As pressure mounted on major newspapers to take some aspect of the unfolding scandal into account, editors and ombudsmen issued statements saying it would be unfair to publish anything until the Enquirer's stories had been "confirmed."
Well, there's confirming and then there's confirming. One sort occurs when an editor mutters, "Find somebody and have them make a few calls." Then there's the sort that comes when that editor summons an investigative reporter with a heart like ice and a mind like Torquemada's and says, "Follow this wherever it goes and peel this guy like an onion."
Suffice to say that the follow-up of the Enquirer's story fell into the former category in too many newsrooms, including that of The Times.
From the liberal MSM's point of view there are no onions to be found with a "D" after their name.
NB's Tom Blumer covered it well, here.
Personally, I felt that Rutten should have received a Pulitzer, for his coming out story of truth.
(;~/ gary
PS - Ah, the infamous Los Angeles Times internal email Times bloggers told not to mention Edwards story
I sense it was a given that the investigative "news reporters" of the LAT's weren't to touch the story, but the potentially loose-canon leftie bloggers needed to have the reigns tightened.