The Associated Press's report yesterday on the law license suspension of indicted Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane, a Democrat, apparently bore too much resemblance to how the wire service typically reports on troubled Republicans and conservatives. The Monday afternoon report by Marc Levy and Mark Scolforo identified her position in its headline ("Court suspends Pennsylvania attorney general's law license"), named her in its opening sentence, and tagged her as a "first-term Democrat" in its second.
As will be seen after the jump, today's AP report on how Kane's office is trying to cope with not having someone allowed to practice law at the helm reverted to predictable form: running an incredibly vague and almost incoherent headline, saving Kane's name for Paragraph 2, and holding the identification of her Democratic Party affiliation until Paragraph 9 (even then, referring only to a "fellow Democrat").
Marc Levy's Tuesday afternoon dispatch also gave far more space than warranted to Kane's sophomoric scorched-earth attempt to keep her job by releasing thousands of "pornographic" emails passed around by state and local public officials in the Keystone State (bolds are mine):
PENNSYLVANIA PROSECUTORS CONSIDER BOSS' SUSPENSION ORDER
The office of Pennsylvania's attorney general began Tuesday trying to figure out how to comply with a state Supreme Court order to suspend her law license as it prepares to widen a pornographic email scandal that has already spurred firings and resignations.
The court notified Kathleen Kane on Tuesday that her suspension will take effect Oct. 21, creating the unprecedented situation of leaving the state's top law enforcement official without the ability to act as a lawyer, but still in charge of the 750-employee office.
The office's senior lawyers were examining which duties she would still be able to perform and which ones she would not, spokesman Chuck Ardo said.
The decision Monday by the five high court justices came barely a month after Montgomery County authorities charged Kane with perjury, obstruction and other counts for allegedly leaking investigative information to a reporter to embarrass two former state prosecutors and then lying about it.
(skipping to Paragraph 9)
... Kane, who won the office in 2012 in a landslide, maintains her innocence. She has vowed to complete her term, which ends in January 2017, and has resisted calls to resign, including by her fellow Democrat, Gov. Tom Wolf.
In the meantime, Kane has ordered the release of thousands more pornographic emails discovered by her office to involve current and former employees there, Ardo said. The release of emails will not be limited to her perceived critics or redacted to shield the names of allies, he added.
"She will release them all," Ardo said.
It seems clear that Kane wouldn't be on her "pornography" crusade if she wasn't in serious trouble.
It's pretty clear that news about a large-state Republican in this kind of trouble would be far more widely covered than the current level of Kane scrutiny we are currently seeing. There would also be a great deal of criticism of her tactics, which have included having her twin sister pose as her to facilitate unimpeded entrance into a justice center, and telling the court, in an attempt to prevent her license suspension, that people hired to speak on her behalf, including ubiquitous Democrat partisan Lanny Davis, were "incorrect" in what they said.
Additionally, the press would be sure to let us know who a Republican in such circumstances has favored as a presidential candidate. Oh, did I forget to tell you that Kathleen Kane "was an active supporter of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in 2008"?
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
