CNN’s Jake Tapper, probably one of the least biased journalists in the media today, was put in a bit of a pickle recently thanks to a Clinton Foundation clerical error.
The foundation listed Tapper as a speaker for an upcoming event put on by the foundation. Given all the scandal ABC’s George Stephanopoulos caused with his donations to the foundation, CNN was quick to make known that nothing other than an interview with former president Bill Clinton will take place, and in that interview, no question will be considered off-limits.
What remains to be seen is if Tapper will moderate a panel on business investment, which is a Clinton Foundation event, but there's no reason to believe Tapper to be another Stephanopoulos. As Breitbart’s John Nolte points out:
There are a number of important distinctions between Tapper and Stephanopoulos. 1) Tapper has not donated any money to the Clinton Foundation. 2) Clinton Foundation events involving Stephanopoulos were exclusive Clinton Foundation events. 3) CNN and Tapper are looking to arrange a no-holds-barred interview with a former-president whose wife is running for president. Stephanopoulos, on the other hand,was using his celebrity and status to benefit the Clinton Foundation. 4) Stephanopoulos hid his involvement with the Foundation.
What's more, Tapper never worked for the Clinton camp, unlike Stephanopoulos.
On Washington’s WMAL radio show, Mornings on the Mall, asked his thoughts on the Stephanopoulos scandal Tapper argued that:
Journalism is in a bad place right now…and I think that we in journalism need to come to a place and realize that when you make mistakes you need to own up to them immediately and apologize…people expect our stories, whether they’re on Letterman or on behind an anchor desk, they expect them to be correct and accurate. And when we mess up we need to accept it, apologize and own it…it distresses me that …it’s a lot easier not to apologize and a lot easier not to disclose 100 percent.
But if you are involved in something, that could affect the way you are covering an issue, you need to disclose it. I think there needs to be a day of reckoning for all of us in journalism where all of us kind of say, ok we’re not above the issues, and we need to be honest and up front with the viewers, because we are hurting the craft, we are hurting what I believe is an honorable and noble profession.
