The Raleigh News & Observer leaves out a lot about Reid and Abramoff

A post yesterday, The Raleigh News & Observer covers Sen. Reid’s links to Abramoff, noted that the liberal trending left N&O, a McClatchy Co. paper, had finally told readers something about a major Associated Press story other newspapers across the country had been treating as a page one story with headlines such The Houston Chronicle's, Reid Aided Abramoff Clients, Records Show.

The AP’s story detailed Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid and his staff’s deep involvement in the Abramoff scandal.

But the story The N&O’s finally ran left out a lot of the AP’s story. Microsoft Word Count found only 237 words in The N&O story; it found 1,740 plus words in the AP's story.

What’s more, The N&O “placed” the story not on page one, but back on pg. 8A with the soft headline, Democratic leader had contact with Abramoff.

Because the pepole who filter the news at The N&O ran the story on a Saturday and “placed” it inside the paper, many N&O readers missed the story entirely.

Because The N&O filter journalists cut so much out of the AP’s story, even readers who found the story missed all of what The N&O left out.

Below are important parts of the AP story which The N&O left out. You can find these parts and more at ABC News’ web site here.

If you have friends who count on The N&O for news of both parties involvement in the Abramoff scandal, you may want to tell them where to locate the AP story. Or just send them a link to this post.

Most of the first paragraph that follows appears in The N&O’s story. All of the remaining paragraphs were left out of The N&O's small story.
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From the AP excerpts:

Reid also intervened on government matters at least five times in ways helpful to Abramoff's tribal clients, once opposing legislation on the Senate floor and four times sending letters pressing the Bush administration on tribal issues. Reid collected donations around the time of each action.

Ethics rules require senators to avoid even the appearance of a conflict of interest in collecting contributions around the times they take official acts benefiting donors.

Abramoff's firm also hired one of Reid's top legislative aides as a lobbyist. The aide later helped throw a fundraiser for Reid at Abramoff's firm that raised donations from several of his lobbying partners. (bold added by JinC)
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And Reid's longtime chief of staff accepted a free trip to Malaysia arranged by a consulting firm connected to Abramoff that recently has gained attention in the influence-peddling investigation that has gripped the Capitol.
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One of the Marianas contacts, listed for May 30, 2001, was with Edward Ayoob, Reid's legislative counsel. Within a year, Ayoob had left Reid's office to work for Abramoff's firm, registering specifically to lobby for the islands as well as several tribes. Manley confirmed Ayoob had subsequent lobbying contacts with Reid's office.

Manley cast doubt on some of the contacts recorded in the billing records, saying McCue was out of Washington for a couple of the dates. But he acknowledged the contacts could have occurred by cell phone.
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Abramoff's firm threw a fundraiser for Reid at its Washington office that netted the Nevada senator several more donations from Greenberg Traurig lobbyists and their spouses. Ayoob was instrumental in staging the event, Reid's office said. (bold added by JinC)

Later this evening I’ll post again on how The N&O is covering Sen. Reid's involvement in the Abramoff scandal.