A journalist’s take on Edwards’ tryst, MSM’s reluctance to report & more

Following publication of Raleigh N&O silent on Edwards affair story and NE's Edwards - Hunter tryst story's verifiable , I heard offline from a journalist friend who provided this link to a column by National Review’s White House correspondent Byron York published in The Hill.

York makes the same points I made in NE's Edwards - Hunter tryst post: there’s plenty in the story MSM can verify; and the matters in reports on are important in any circumstances (a polititician with ambition for high national office putting himself in a situation where he could be blackmailed), but which are particulay important in Edwards’ case since he’s built his career on asking us to judge him by, among other things, his devotion to his wife Elizebeth and their marriage.

Now the journalist's email after which I make a few comments below the star line:

John, have you seen the Edwards escapade as reported in The Hill?

I think you're right: Edwards has been caught with his pants down, at least enough to lend credence to the story.

Note that Edwards hasn't threatened to sue the Enquirer for libel. To me, that means (1) he doesn't want to raise the profile of the story, whether it's right or wrong; (2) the story is true. I believe it's the latter.

But will the story get national legs? I wouldn't count on it. For one thing, the MSM abhor being scooped by a tabloid. So if the story doesn't appear in the MSM, it isn't legitimate. Moreover, the MSM will go to extraordinary lengths to protect Edwards, one of their own.

Edwards, as you have pointed out so well, is an empty suit. Now it appears he is also a hypocrite, a liar and an adulterer cheating on his dying spouse.

After the 2004 election debacle, Edwards' pal Gene Nichol gave him safe harbor and an imposing title as an anti-poverty messiah at the UNC Law School, but all that was as transparent as Edwards himself. What a joke. Meanwhile, Nichols decamps to Williamsburg to head William and Mary, falls on his face and, thanks to Law Dean Jack Boger, is returning to UNC for a safe harbor of his own. (Including his wife, of course -- package deals are expected in such cases. North Carolina taxpayers once more have the honor of supporting these vapid, tiresome people.)

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Comments:

Those of you not from North Carolina may not know that after the 2004 election Edwards announced he’d devote his life to “poverty fighting.” His friend, liberal Democratic activist and UNC Chapel Hill Law School Dean Gene Nichol announced that Edwards had agreed to locate his “poverty fighting center” in the Law School building.

There was never any announcement that I recall about rent. It was all pitched as a great opportunity for students to work with Edwards and learn “poverty fighting.”

There’s more to the story but I’m running out of time.

I’ll return to the Law School matter soon.

I’ll stay on the tryst part of this important story with another post late this afternoon.

Between now and then I’ll be talking to two other journalists whose takes I’ll share with you.