Char. Observer's Hunter's baby's birth certificate reporting

The Raleigh N&O didn't lead on the locating and publication of the birth certificate of the baby born to Rielle Hunter's and a father so far unnamed on the birth certificate. The Charlotte Observer did that.

Yesterday I posted Raleigh N&O and Charlotte Observer Edwards coverage in which I said that and linked to a number of sources where that could all be confirmed.

Never the less, I'm hearing from people insisting N&O reporter Lorenzo Perez is responsible for locating the birth certificate; and that the N&O lead in publishing it.

Here's an example:

[Raleigh N&O reporter] Lorenzo Perez has a byline on the birth certificate story. He works for the N&O. You keep saying the charlotte o wrote that story. Clearly you have an error. I look forward to seeing your correction and apology on this blog.

My response:

At Charlotte Observer.com with a date of 7/31 Commenter and others will find:

"Birth certificate for Rielle Hunter's child lists no father
Former aide to John Edwards had claimed paternity in December"

By Lisa Zagaroli
McClatchy Newspapers
Posted: Thursday, Jul. 31, 2008

The birth certificate of a child who a tabloid newspaper claims is linked to former Sen. John Edwards doesn't identify a father.

The certificate, obtained by The Charlotte Observer today, shows Frances Quinn Hunter was born Feb. 27, more than two months after an Edwards aide claimed to be the father. Andrew Young, a former Edwards campaign finance director, claimed paternity in a statement from his lawyer posted at the political blog mydd.com. (emphasis added) …

The rest of Zagaroli's Observer story’s here. It's accompanied by a photocopy of the birth certificate.


The Columbia Journalism Review’s Clint Hendler credits the Observer’s Zagaroli with reporting on the birth certificate. He doesn’t even mention Perez.

And Drescher himself, in his Aug. 13 column touting what he called the N&O’s “aggressive” Edwards scandal coverage, doesn’t claim Perez had anything to do with locating and reporting on the birth certificate.

Drescher knew the McClatchy wire had carried a story headed, bylined, dated and beginning, all as follows:

No dad listed for child in tab reports

News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC)
News B4
Lisa Zagaroli
Lorenzo Perez Mcclatchy Newspapers

Published: August 1, 2008

The birth certificate of a child whom a tabloid newspaper has linked to former Sen. John Edwards doesn't identify a father.

The certificate, obtained by The Charlotte Observer on Thursday, shows that Frances Quinn Hunter was born Feb. 27, more than two months after an Edwards aide claimed to be the father. Andrew Young, a former Edwards campaign finance director, claimed paternity in a statement from his lawyer posted at the political blog mydd.com. (emphasis added)

The girl was born at Cottage Hospital in Santa Barbara, Calif., to Rielle Jaya James Druck, also known as Rielle Hunter. Hunter, 44, was a videographer on Edwards' presidential campaign last year. …

The rest of the story from the McClatchy wire is here.

Bylines are extremely important in journalism. Reporters fight to have their names bylined because it indicates the story reflects their work. Individual newspapers and wire services add their names to bylines to let each other and readers know they are responsible for a story’s content and publication.

In the Observer story, Zagaroli got an individual byline because she and the Observer had located and published the birth certificate.

In the McClatchy wire service story, Zagaroli is listed ahead of Perez. The wire story leads with text straight from Zagaroli’s story and clearly states the Observer located and published the birth certificate.

Perez is bylined second on the McClatchy wire story but no claim is made he or the N&O had anything to do with locating it or first publishing the birth certificate.

If you remove from the wire service story the text that appeared in Zagaroli’s Observer story concerning the birth certificate, what's left is what journalists sometimes call background filler.

I don’t doubt the N&O’s Perez contributed to the filler.

Well there you are, folks.

I’m confident the documentation and discussion I’ve provided here will assure the fair-mined among you that I work to document the facts I present.

I do sometimes make factual mistakes but I'm quick to acknowledge and correct them as Regulars saw when ABC News’ Martha Raddatz called my MCain-54 mistake to my attention.

The commenter, likely a troll, who prompted this post can have the last word here, although I’ll use the comment again later today in another post:

[Raleigh N&O reporter] Lorenzo Perez has a byline on the birth certificate story. He works for the N&O. You keep saying the charlotte o wrote that story. Clearly you have an error. I look forward to seeing your correction and apology on this blog.

Georgia, & Campaign '08 including Obama's response to Corsi

Here’s Mike Williams letter today. The whole thing is first-rate right down to the “teensy little detail” Mike mentions at the end.

Mike begins - - -

Ed Morrissey has the dope on the latest truce agreement between Russia and Georgia (which Secretary of State Rice sponsored) here. It replaces what Ed calls “the Sarkozy cease-fire, which turned out to be little more than a surrender foisted on [Georgia President] Saakashvili.”

Over at American Thinker, Patrick Casey believes the backlash against Russia has already begun:

As Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said yesterday in his press conference (video can be found here, transcript can be found here), Russia's actions in Georgia will result in our allies, especially those in the Russian power sphere that Putin is trying to re-establish, quickly moving towards closer relations with us on all levels, including militarily.

The first manifestation of that occurred last night. USA Today reported that Poland has finally agreed to a missile defense compact with the United States, something that Putin furiously opposed….

Victor Davis Hanson elaborates:

We are a little more than a week into the crisis, and already Russia has already gotten itself more than just fights with Georgia—but also issued creepy threats to Poland over missiles, and to the Ukraine over naval bases. Putin has galvanized into panic most of Eastern Europe and the Baltic states, prompted a radical change of policy in the United States, and embarrassed its once sure support from the appeasement bloc of the European Union. What will next week bring? A Georgian insurgency, replete with stingers, anti-tank guns, and ieds? Increased arms sales to the former republics? Tougher talk from Obama….

You can read about the “creepy threats to Poland” here. As Hanson says, patience. Getting inside Putin’s gambit, maneuvering him into “unforced” errors, and then putting the hammer down on things like Russia’s membership in the G-8 will pay dividends in the long run.

In Campaign 2008 news, Jerome Corsi has a new book out -- The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality. You may remember Corsi as co-author of Unfit for Command, which was also a NYT best-seller. Professor Ann Althouse discusses The Obama Nation here.

Meanwhile, Obama’s local MSM enabler, The N&O, is decidedly worried:

It makes sense for Sen. Barack Obama to slug it out with Jerome Corsi, whose new book paints the presumptive Democratic nominee as a dangerous radical, analysts said Friday.

But Obama's strategy also carries some risks.

"The old saying is that when you get in the gutter, everybody gets dirty," said Kevin Wagner, an assistant professor of political science at Florida Atlantic University, particularly with information flying across the Internet….

What The N&O neglects to tell its readers is that some charges in Unfit for Command were demonstrably true (e.g., Christmas in Cambodia), and that John Kerry never did the one thing completely within his power to lay to rest the less clear-cut allegations – release all his military records to the public as he promised he would.

So Obama’s got real problems here. His long associations with Jeremiah Wright and unrepentant Weather Undergrounders Bernadine Dhorn and William Ayers, plus his wife Michelle’s well-documented America-bashing, demand a solidly factual rebuttal that – just like John Kerry before him – he probably can’t or won’t deliver.

Let’s give Jeff Emanuel at RedState the last word for today:

As my friend and colleague Streiff detailed Friday morning, the Obama campaign was apparently so spooked by the case Jerome Corsi makes against The One in his book "Obama Nation" that they released a 40 page rebuttal to the work.

Streiff wrote:

Even if everything in Corsi's book is correct, it certainly isn't something that a politician who sees himself as less than a deity, if not The Deity, should concern himself with. His 40-page rebuttal provides a good reminder of the immensely flawed character of Obama, himself, rather than addressing any substantive issue.

That a major newspaper would take up the cudgel on Obama's behalf, especially given its shameful cooperation with various smear books directed against President Bush, indicates that Corsi has found a chink in Obama's carefully crafted persona and if they don't silence Corsi, Obama is finished.

In fact, the Obama Nation was in such a hurry to issue their rebuttal to Corsi's book that they appear to have employed their characteristic bypassing of any detail-or-fact-checking in the process (or, perhaps equally likely, they simply thought reality would shift to match whatever they published in their shoolyard retort-level response to the book).

As Jake Tapper points out:

[T]he Obama campaign got a little greedy in their refutations.

First of all, on the front of the response, is a labeled stamped “Brought to you by Bush/Cheney Attack Machine.”

Corsi has actually called for the impeachment of President Bush. Corsi’s a 9/11 Truther who thinks the Bush administration is covering up what “really” happened at the World Trade Center. It’s not fair to blame this nasty screed on the President.

Never mind that teensy little detail, though. After all, it interferes with the Obamans' Reality™ -- and we all know how desperately they want to believe they control that.

Reader rebukes Saunders, N&O

Raleigh News & Observer news columnist Barry Saunders' Aug. 5 column asked: “ Hey, Chief. Was it something I said?”

Saunders began - - -

For the past several months, Durham Police Chief Jose Lopez has treated me as countless exes have -- refusing to acknowledge my calls and in general treating me as though I'd tracked something nasty in on his new carpet.

What gives, yo?

Oh yeah: Chief Lopez apparently took issue with a nickname I tagged him with in January when he refused to talk to The N&O's reporters or give information about crimes in a timely manner.

In retrospect, the nickname was a low blow -- but funny. But being the man that I am, I called, invited him to a tete-a-tete and left numerous apologetic messages at his office and his home. (At a decent hour I left messages, mind you, since the chief famously scolded one of our reporters for calling him at home at 8 p.m. after police had shot and killed a fleeing home-invader downtown.)

Crime, I informed him then, is not a 9-to-5 vocation, and criminals aren't likely to time their activities to his convenience. …

There’s more before Saunders closes with:

Chief Lopez and his public no-information officer need to understand one thing: When we call or try to contact them, it's not because of their scintillating wit or charm. We're calling for information to share with citizens, their employers.

Me? I'd rather drink muddy water and sleep in a hollow log -- or listen to Kenny G at my dentist's office while receiving a root canal without anesthesia -- than chase after them for comment. It's part of our job to ask, though, and part of their job to inform the public about which dangerous dudes are lurking about.

If y'all would turn the page now, I'd like to say a few words in private to the chief, since this is apparently the closest I'll get to a private chat with him (unless I can accidentally run into him on purpose tonight during the annual National Night Out against crime):

Chief, let's put this little misunderstanding behind us and act professionally. Your petulance is unbecoming. It dishonors the fine officers in your department, and it doesn't help Bull City residents.

Call a brother; let's chat. I promise I won't call you anything but Chief.

Saunders' entire column's here.

Saunders' self-excusing and invocation of the “I speak for the people” trope drew the following letter published in the Aug. 15 N&O:

Regarding Barry Saunders' Aug. 5 column "Chief, call me; let's talk":
I could not help writing to comment on Saunders' snarky column about his problems obtaining information from the Durham Police Department. As a former law enforcement officer and government public affairs representative, my considered opinion is that Saunders' problems are self-inflicted.

How could anyone with the serious responsibility of protecting the public take seriously Saunders' query about how the clothing adolescents are wearing affects police officers? It's a waste of the valuable taxpayer-funded time of a public employee to respond to that kind of silliness.

Saunders needs to come down off his ego-inflated cloud. A good reporter would know how to get information without attempting to bully people in print, as Saunders has attempted.

A good reporter would not ask silly questions that would waste the time of people who have serious public business to carry out, or in this case, try to create news where there is none. A good editor would tell him that.

Robert Porreca

A big hat tip to Robert Porreca.

I left the following comment on the thread of Saunders’ column:

Barry,

You were a cheerleader for the Duke hoax and DPD's libeling of the lacrosse players.

You supported Dep. Chief Hodge, who supervised the "investigation" for the Chief's job.

You threatened to go to city hall and slap people if the city settled with the students who were the targets of the frame-up attempt.

Do you think, Barry, the Chief might think his time is better spent with serious journalists?

John in Carolina

The Churchill Series – Aug. 15, 2008

(One of a series of weekday posts about the life of Winston S. Churchill)

Let’s end the week with something to smile about.

We find it in Frank Smyth’s 1988/9 International Churchill Society introduction of Churchill’s youngest daughter, Lady Mary Soames, who spoke at a Society dinner in Vancouver, B. C.

Our Toastmaster this evening is Mr. Derek Lukin Johnston, who if I may add has, with his wife Diana, just celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. Derek was kind enough to provide me with an excerpt from a new book, Memories and Adventures, by Winston S. Churchill, M.P., Sir Winston's grandson and Lady Soames' nephew.

Describing his thrill at visiting Hyde Park and viewing the ruins of buildings and the fire engines, he writes: ". . . but best of all were the visits I paid to my Aunt Mary (later Lady Soames) at the heavy anti-aircraft battery in the park near Marble Arch, where, aged twenty-one, she was one of the ATS officers commanding the guns.

To a three year old, having a grandfather who was Prime Minister and running the entire war was a concept difficult to grasp, though I knew he was very important by the way he bossed about all those Generals who were constantly in attendance in their smart uniforms. But to have an aunt who had four huge guns of her very own - that was something. "

If you’re following the Olympics, I hope you’re enjoying them.

Whatever the case, I hope you have a very nice weekend.

John
_______________________________________________________________
You’ll find Smyth’s entire introduction here hosted by the Churchill Centre, which also provides on the same page as Smyth's introduction a link to Lady Soames speech.

Remember those Reagan ads in '84?

If you do, this McCain ad will strike a memory chord. But it's also fresh.

That's my opinion. What's yours?



Hat tip: AC

Raleigh N&O and Charlotte Observer Edwards coverage

Yesterday I posted An Edwards Story Lesson: Use the Elephant. It contained journalist Bob Wilson’s column examining the different approaches the Raleigh News & Observer and the Charlotte Observer took to the National Enquirer’s expose of John Edwards’ long-running affair with his former campaign videographer Rielle Hunter.

The short of Bob’s column: N&O executive editor John Drescher's out of hand dismissal of the NE's expose helps explain why the N&O was so late and anemic reporting a major political story it should have owned. On the other hand, Observer editor Rick Thames decided to check out what the NE reported. His decision led to a number of major Observer stories which pushed the scandal beyond the new media and on to the front pages of America’s newspapers.

Be sure to read Bob’s column if you haven’t already.

Every fact stated in the column checks out. But not minding that, an Anon@6:31 made the following comment:

The N&O political team and the Charlotte Observer's political team sit in the exact same room. You're drawing distinctions between the two newspapers that simply no longer exist. John, I thought you made a commitment to fact check items posted on your blog.

Shortly thereafter, another Anon responded directly to Anon@6:31:

Iran and the U.S. sit in the exact same room at the U.N.

Did you ever hear of sharing an office?

The Observer reporters did what they did; the N&O reporters didn't do much.

Drescher says he sent a reporter to Santa Barbara, but the reporter got chased off by deputies as he approached one of the houses Edwards' "party members" were staying in.

NC to Cal is a long way to go to ring a bell.

The N&O just got beat as Bob says on a story they should have owned.

Journalists know that.

I thank the second Anon for providing a very good example of “the corrective power of the Net.”

I encourage anyone doubting whether the Charlotte Observer beat the pants off the Raleigh N&O on the Edwards Scandal story to do the following:

1) Read Clint Hendler’s American Journalism Review online article,” North Carolina Paper Covers the John Edwards Allegations – Carefully.” It’s a detailed, link-rich account of the Charlotte Observer's actions to report on the John Edwards-Rielle Hunter affair story while, as Bob document, the N&O’s public editor Ted Vaden was praising his papers restrained approach to the Edwards story and fretting over an invasion of Edwards privacy.

I'm not kidding about what Vaden said. It's all in his Aug. 3 column I've just linked to.

2) Read Observer reporter Jim Morrill’s 7/24 post hosted at Observer.com and Observer reporter Mark Johnson’s 8/7 story. Both reporters checked out the NE report and then advanced the story.

Meanwhile, what did you read at the N&O Under the Dome political blog about the N&O’s “hometown” candidate and when did the N&O first post it?

3) By all means read N&O executive editor John Drescher's rare mid-week column which IMO just excused and fogged over the N&O's Edwards reporting failures. Example from the column:

...We sent an N&O reporter to California to confirm the confrontation and to interview Young and Hunter, who were living separately in Santa Barbara. We were unable to confirm the confrontation or to interview Hunter or Young. At one point, our Lorenzo Perez was chased out of Young's neighborhood by sheriff's deputies....

That what the second Anon was talking about when h/she said the reporter had been sent a long way to ring a bell.

4) Take a look at this post - The N&O finally touches the Edwards affair story - sorta - if after reading the items cited in 1, 2, and 3 you are still not convinced the N&O's Edwards Scandal reporting was late and anemic.

Congratulations and thanks are due Observer editor Rick Thames and his reporters and editors who worked on the story.

It's a shame Drescher and the N&O can't bring themselves to say that.

But does anyone who knows the N&O think they would?

Pelosi favors roll-call vote

The San Francisco Chronicle reports:

...[Speaker Nancy Pelosi] said she supports a roll-call vote at the Democratic National Convention in Denver this month. Supporters of former presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton had been pressing to have her name put into nomination to recognize the millions of votes she received during the primaries.

Clinton and presumed nominee Barack Obama agreed to do that Thursday, but the mechanics of a roll-call vote are still to be worked out. Pelosi argued that the roll call is a tradition and would be good for the party.

The entire SFC article's here.

The devil's often in the details, in this case what the Chronicle calls "the mechanics of a roll-call."

Will each state on its own select who'll announce the state's vote? That's usually what happens. At this convention most state's will be splitting their votes. Such states in the past have often had more than one person announce the vote. Will that be permitted?

I ask that because one thing Team Obama will struggle to do at the convention is present "a moderate face" to the nation. Comparing our military managing Gitmo to Nazis and Pol Pots thugs as Ill. Sen. Dick Durbin did may generate applause at some Dem meetings, but Obama's people are not going to want anything like that said at the convention.

But someone during the roll-call with the mike and camera on h/her may not be able to resist letting fly with remarks from the Dem's far-left field.

The more people who get a chance to announce delegate votes, the more chance there is of that happening.

Final roll-call thought for now: I'm betting Team Obama is working with the networks now to try to get them to do as much interviewing and analysis as possible during the roll-call.

Have the Clinton’s Hijacked the Convention?

At Fox News Dick Morris and Eileen McGann say - - -

Hillary and Bill have hijacked the Denver convention, making it into a carbon copy of what it would have looked like had she won until the last possible moment. By the time Obama gets up to speak and put his stamp on the convention,
Hillary will have had one prime time night all to herself. Bill will have pre-empted a second night. Hillary will have had all the nominating and seconding speeches she wants. And the roll call of the states would record, in graphic detail, how the voters of state after state rejected Obama's candidacy in the primaries.

Only then, after three and a half days of all Clinton all the time will the convention then, finally, turn to its nominee and allow him to have an hour in the sun!

And what leverage did the Clintons have to achieve all of this? None! Hillary could not have taken the convention by storm and any show of party disunity would marginalize her forever in the Democratic Party.

Had she or her supporters tried to pull off distracting demonstrations or to recreate Lafayette Park in Chicago in 1968, she would have paid a permanent price among the party faithful for sabotaging Obama's candidacy.

This Clintonian tour de force raises a key question about Barack Obama: Is he strong enough to be president or can he be pushed around? His failure to stand up to the Clintons makes one wonder how effective he will be against bin Laden, Iran, Chavez, or Putin. …

The rest of the Morris-McGann column’s here.

Comments:

Gee, the Clinton’s muscling in on Obama and trying to steal the convention. Who would have thought they’d do that?

Morris and McGann don’t mention Michelle Obama is listed as the prime speaker for Monday night.

Michelle on Monday; Hillary on Tuesday. It will be interesting to see how enthusiastically the convention receives each woman.

And I’m not thinking only of how their speeches will be received although that’s obviously very important.

I’m also thinking of how enthusiastically they’ll each be received as they walk up to the podium. Those could be telling moments.

Granting that the Obama people had to give Hillary her night, how did Hillary get to go second?

With Hillary going on Tuesday, she and her supporters will have a good idea of what they need to do to top anything Michelle Obama did. And Hillary’s supporters on the floor and elsewhere in the hall will know how long and loud they need to cheer to top the reception Michelle Obama received.

Surely Obama’s people knew all of that.

I’m sure you agree Morris and McGann raise an important and troubling matter when they note: “His failure to stand up to the Clintons makes one wonder how effective he will be against bin Laden, Iran, Chavez, or Putin.”

You have to wonder whether Obama’s status within the party is more “celebrity” than “hands on the levers.”

Exposing the Raleigh N&O’s liberal bias

Mike Williams does that today. My comments follow below the end line

Mike begins - - -

Professor Glenn Reynolds tells me that U.S. Representative Heath Shuler (D-NC) has a possible conflict of interest between a House committee he sits on and some land he owns in Tennessee. A Knoxville newspaper picked up on the story here. So did the Asheville Citizen-Times. Ed Morrissey derides “Another Democrat with a government land deal!”

I missed this story in The N&O, so I did a search on newsobserver.com. Nada.

Shuler, you may recall, was one of many Dems elected in 2006 in the so-called backlash against corrupt Republicans. The 110^th Congress claims to be the most open, honest and ethical in our history. So you’d think The N&O might be interested in yet another Congressman slopping at the trough, and if Shuler were a Republican incumbent who could be unseated in 2008 you’d undoubtedly be right.

Which brings me to the real point of this email. I did my best to ridicule Executive Editor John Drescher’s pathetic defense of The N&O’s coverage of John Edwards’ fall from grace. But my efforts pale into insignificance compared to this skewering by a retired NC journalist posting at John in Carolina’s blog. An excerpt:

The N&O should have owned the John Edwards story.

Raleigh was Edwards' political launch pad in 1998 when he first ran for the Senate. He lives three miles west of the N&O's Chapel Hill office. His presidential campaign headquarters was about the same distance away in Southern Village. And the N&O, for more than a century the guidon of the North Carolina Democratic Party, was widely regarded as one of Edwards' most loyal acolytes….

The N&O has come up woefully short on both Edwards and Duke Lacrosse, two stories with national scope that happened right in its own bailiwick. Why? Extreme liberal bias, and “guidon of the North Carolina Democratic Party” are my answers, but maybe that’s just me.

Thank you, Mike.

IMO – the N&O has not only a liberal bias, but also an increasingly Leftist bias.

Leftists don’t much care that the N&O mislead them on the Duke hoax and they supported Nifong when it was obvious he was leading a frame-up attempt. Leftist journalists are agenda driven and mean to be.

Liberals, on the other hand, were more inclined to see and dislike the N&O’s misleading them and many of them, but by no means all, were opposed to the frame-up attempt. Liberal journalists mean to present the truth and, in my experience, often don’t see their biases.

As for bias playing a role in the N&O’s Edwards and Duke Hoax coverage consider all the protestations we’ve gotten from editors Drescher and Vaden about the Enquirer not being a reliable source and the need to confirm what’s said versus the N&O’s rushing onto page one Mangum’s charges and false bio.

And don’t forget the “Priors” story. The N&O placed on page one on March 28, 2006 the names, misdemeanor charges and their outcomes for about 16 members of the lacrosse team, including one who had been found not guilty of the charge. The charges included underage drinking, and riding in a car with an open beer can.

But when Edwards, whom Vaden described as the N&O’s “hometown” candidate with a good shot at the presidency publicly denied an affair the N&O didn’t publish it. Drescher said “it didn’t make the cut.”

It seems there wasn’t strong enough substantiation in Edwards’ case.

With the lacrosse players, of course, there was substantiation which satisfied the N&O: Crystal Mangum said it.

The Churchill Series - Aug. 14, 2008

(One of a series of weekday posts about the life of Winston S. Churchill.)

Below are the first sentences of a BBC radio address Churchill delivered on April 27, 1941. Russia and America were not yet in the war. Britain had endured eight months of heavy bombing. Bombing casualty estimates to that time included 30,000 killed. No one knew when the bombing would cease.

Churchill began - - -

I was asked last week whether I was aware of some uneasiness which it was said existed in the country on account of the gravity, as it was described, of the war situation.

So I thought it would be a good thing to go and see for myself what this “uneasiness” amounted to, and I went to some of our great cities and seaports which had been most heavily bombed, and to some of the places where the poorest people had got it worst.
I have come back not only reassured, but refreshed.

To leave the offices in Whitehall with their ceaseless hum of activity and stress, and to go out to the front, by which I mean the streets and wharves of London or Liverpool, Manchester, Cardiff, Swansea or Bristol, is like going out of a hothouse on to the bridge of a fighting ship.

It is a tonic which I should recommend any who are suffering from fretfulness to take in strong doses when they have need of it. …
_________________________________________

What we’ve just read won't find its way into a collection of Churchill’s most magisterial speeches. But the beginning of that April 1941 radio address surely belongs in a collection of his most psychologically effective statements.

Faced with needing to brace the morale of the British people through a long ordeal the end of which many could not see, Churchill in a few sentences does the following:

He tells the people he’s heard of “some uneasiness” (really theirs but he doesn’t say that) and lets them know he checked it out.

They needn’t worry. Based on what he saw – he details some of it – the Prime Minister assures the country he returned to Whitehall “not only reassured, but refreshed.”

The people understand his perfectly chosen “bridge of a fighting ship” figure of speech refers to them.

For those suffering from “fretfulness” Churchill recommends the “tonic “ you get on the “bridge of a fighting ship.”

Little wonder the British people carried on when the way to victory was still uncertain.
__________________________________________________________
The text cited here is found of pg. 97 of His Finest Hours: The War Speeches of Winston Churchill. Introduction by Graham Stewart. (Querus, 2007)

“Clear conscience” Reid gets prime speaker’s slot

Politico reports:

Barack Obama has chosen Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to carry the Democratic party's message on energy policy, giving Reid a prime Wednesday speaking slot at the Democratic National Convention.

Reid will join a heavy-hitting lineup that night that includes Bill Clinton, whomever Obama chooses as his vice president, Bill Richardson and Sen. Joseph R. Biden (D-Del.). …

Reid's speech is sure to disappoint many Democrats who are still eager to hear the message Reid delivered in April 2007. From Fox News:

... "Now I believe, myself, that the secretary of state, the secretary of defense and you have to make your own decision as to what the president knows: that this war is lost, that the surge is not accomplishing anything," Reid, D-Nev., told reporters.

Repeating remarks he made to President Bush during a meeting of congressional leaders at the White House, Reid said the president is hearing only from people who are backing up his view of the war.

"I know I was the odd guy out yesterday at the White House, but I at least told him what he needs to hear. … I told George Bush what he needs to hear, not what he wants to hear, I did that and my conscience is great," said Reid, who was one of several lawmakers who met with the president on Wednesday at the White House. Reid added that more people need to tell Bush the same….

Folks, can you agree Reid will tell the Dems what Obama wants them to hear, not what the Nevada Senator would like to say? All with a clear conscience, of course.

Politico’s story’s here; Fox News’ is here.

An Edwards Story Lesson: Use the Elephant

Bob Wilson is a retired North Carolina journalist. His column follows:


"I do not view The National Enquirer as a credible source of news." John Drescher, executive editor of The News & Observer

“The truth of the matter is journalists take tips from all sorts of sources, and some of them are unsavory. That's not so important as what you do with the tip." Rick Thames, executive editor of The Charlotte Observer

The N&O should have owned the John Edwards story.

Raleigh was Edwards' political launch pad in 1998 when he first ran for the Senate. He lives three miles west of the N&O's Chapel Hill office. His presidential campaign headquarters was about the same distance away in Southern Village. And the N&O, for more than a century the guidon of the North Carolina Democratic Party, was widely regarded as one of Edwards' most loyal acolytes.

Yet it was The Charlotte Observer, once the N&O's arch rival and now an uneasy partner in a shotgun marriage imposed by their owner, McClatchy Newspapers, which did what the N&O would not: Anoint the Edwards story with mainstream respectability and get it on the front pages of America’s newspapers.

The contrast between how the two papers approached the story speaks volumes about their newsroom philosophies.

In a rare weekday column Drescher yesterday attempted to excuse his paper's anemic reports on the emerging scandal (the N&O first mentioned it July 31 in a brief “B” section item based on Observer reporting. But the hard truth is the N&O was a nonstarter on one of the biggest political stories in recent memory.

And it was right there in the N&O's front yard. (Full disclosure: Drescher insists the N&O’s coverage was “aggressive but fair.” His column’s here.)

Drescher’s “aggressive but fair” assertion will puzzle N&O readers who recall its public editor Ted Vaden’s Aug. 3 column closer:

I worry about where the coverage goes from here. In chasing information like birth certificate listings, it becomes easy to get caught up in the salacious details and drop the restraint that has marked The N&O's responsible approach to the story.

Yes, Edwards has been mentioned as a vice presidential candidate, although this controversy makes that less likely. But he is now, after all, a private figure, and there's a point where examining his sex life doesn't serve a public interest and risks turning a respectable newspaper into "The News and Enquirer."

Not until Edwards' Aug. 8 mea culpa on ABC's Nightline did the N&O appear to wake up to the importance of what people with an Internet connections had been reading about for weeks.

Rick Thames, realizing as Drescher didn't that facts exist independently of their sources, didn’t dismiss the Enquirer’s July 22 story reporting the Edwards-Hunter tryst. He had the Observer check it out.

By July 24 political reporter Jim Morrill posted on an Observer blog a summary of the Enquirer story and his interview with its editor David Perel.

Morrill also reported contacting the Beverly Hilton which gave him a “non-disclosure policy” response but no denial of the events, including lobby, stairways and Men’s room commotions the Enquirer reported.

Most important of all as events turned out, Morrill got former DNC chair Dan Fowler on the record explaining why the Enquirer's allegations, if not put to rest by Edwards, would wreck his political future.

In the days that followed the Observer broke story after story. On July 30 when a Washington-based Observer reporter staked Edwards out and confronted him with specific questions based on the Enquirer’s story, he literally ran away.

By the next day the Observer had located Hunter’s baby’s birth certificate and published Lisa Zagaroli's story reporting it listed no father and providing Observer readers with an excellent summary of the story starting with the Enquirer disclosures.

The Observer's breakthrough story appeared Aug. 7. Reporter Mark Johnson quoted three top Democratic operatives saying Edwards had better explain the Enquirer's allegations or forget speaking at the Democratic Convention. Tellingly, one of the operatives was Gary Pearce, a former N&O political reporter turned Democratic strategist. Pearce masterminded Edwards' 1998 election to the U.S. Senate.

A day later, Edwards was on Nightline.

When Edwards flew too close to the sun, as such self-absorbed, ambitious types always do, the wax melted. Edwards dropped like McClatchy stock, searing both his Mr. Clean image and a newspaper that seemed as oblivious to reality as its favorite son.

The old “gatekeeper” news paradigm crashed with Edwards. In 2008, a parallel pipeline of news and opinion –Internet, talk radio and cable TV -- disgorges enormous amounts of information and misinformation round-the-clock. On the Edwards story, the N&O haughtily ignored it all; the Observer looked for what it could use.

White gloves still have their place in today's news environment, but watch out for the new elephant in town. He can break your china and hurt your credibility. But treat him right and he can help you get the story.

Rick Thames will tell you that.

“race cuts both ways in this election”

Irwin Stelzer in the Telegraph today lays out reasons why Sen. Obama should be leading Sen. McCain.

He continues:

But the polls suggest that the candidates are in a dead heat.

Some put this down to race. But race cuts both ways in this election.

Ignore the fact that only five per cent of Americans say they would not vote for a black presidential candidate. More important is the 19 per cent who say that most of the people they know - not including themselves, of course - would not vote for such a candidate.

On the other side of the ledger is the massive increase in registration and participation of black and pro-Obama Hispanic voters, white voters eager to demonstrate their lack of prejudice by voting for a black candidate, and folks who believe that the mere fact that Obama is black means that the world will think better of America if its electorate relocates Obama from the Senate to the Oval Office.
In sum, it is difficult to tell just how much race might be affecting the polls, or would affect them if respondents felt unembarrassed to tell the truth, and in which direction. …

What Stelzer says about race as an election factor is reasonable right now, but there are a few things I'd add.

I'd put emphasis on “now.” We may very well hear statements and witness events before November which will heighten race as a campaign factor.

Something else: most MSM are more gah-gah for the Dem presidential candidate than usual and less inclined than usual to ask him tough questions.

I think Obama’s race explains that.

It’s been 5 months since Obama was forced to make his Philadelphia speech which Team Obama billed as “on race.”

In fact, the speech was a so far largely successful effort to: 1) fog over Obama’s 20 year close relationship with the racist, America-bashing Rev. Jeremiah Wright; and 2) avoid answering tough questions about it.

Obama’s “I didn’t hear any of that stuff” excuse should have lead MSM to ask: Well then, didn’t Michelle ever tell you? Didn’t anyone else in the congregation tell you? How could anyone, Sen. Obama, belong to a church for 20 years and not know its pastor said and believed things like “KKK –America?”

But those questions haven’t been asked and reported by MSM.

However, as we get closer to the election the pressure will build for MSM to ask them and for the Obama’s to answer them.

As that happens it’s likely race will grow in importance as a campaign factor, if only because decent people who are rightfully concerned about the Obama’s failure to satisfactorily answer those questions will be slimed by many Dems and their MSM flacks as racists.

It’s a long way to November.

Stelzer’s entire column’s here.

Editor praises N&O's Edwards Scandal coverage

From Mike Williams letter today - - -

So I open the N&O with my morning cup of coffee and am assured by Executive Editor John Drescher that the “Edwards coverage [was] aggressive but fair”:

…we quickly sent a reporter to New York, where Hunter then lived, to report on the allegations…but were unable to interview Hunter or to confirm the affair. So we did not publish a story…

The Enquirer reported that Hunter was pregnant and had moved to a gated community in Chapel Hill. It also reported that Andrew Young, an Edwards aide, and Hunter said Young was the father…But we still were unable to establish that Edwards had an affair with Hunter, and we did not publish a story….

We sent an N&O reporter to California to confirm the [Beverly Hills] confrontation and to interview Young and Hunter, who were living separately in Santa Barbara. We were unable to confirm the confrontation or to interview Hunter or Young. At one point, our Lorenzo Perez was chased out of Young's neighborhood by sheriff's deputies. [So Drescher's N&O decided not publish a story.]

We wanted to give Edwards a chance to respond to the allegations, but we could not reach him. That wasn't unusual. We've had a poor relationship with Edwards and his top staffers for years. [Now that’s news to me.] ….

____________________________________________________

Thanks, Mike. Were you able to avoid dropping your coffee cup as you read Deascher's column?

Folks, N&O executive editor for news John Drescher can huff and puff all he wants about the N&O “aggressive but fair” Edwards Scandal coverage.

The fact is the N&O never mentioned Edwards' affair with Hunter until July 31; and then only in a small item buried in the “B” section that reported Edwards refusal to answer a reporter’s questions the previous day in Washington.

The reporter who chased Edwards down works for the Charlotte Observer which reported the story the N&O based its item on.

The following day, Aug. 1, the N&O published, again in the “B” section, a story reporting Hunter’s baby’s birth certificate had been located and listed no father.

The Charlotte Observer located the birth certificate and reported the story which the N&O, like many other papers, picked up and published.

It was Charlotte Observer reporter Mark Johnson’s Aug. 7 story, picked up by MSM news orgs nationwide, which quoted by name top Dem operatives urging Edwards to speak publicly about the Enquirer’s story or risk losing a speaker’s spot at the Dem’s convention that forced Edwards to finally make at least a partial disclosure the next day on ABC’s Nightline.

The Charlotte Observer, more than any other mainstream newspaper, is responsible for moving the Edwards Scandal story beyond a “new media” audience and bringing it to a broader public’s attention.

At every turn the Observer beat the pants of the N&O.

Editor Drescher would better serve his readers and his profession by admitting that.

But instead he writes a self-justifying column that should have been titled, “Excuses, excuses.”

The Churchill Series - Aug. 12, 2008

(One of a series of weekday posts about the life of Winston S. Churchill.)

Readers Note: London's Carlton Club, of which Churchill was for some years a member, recently voted to admit woman. In "honour" of the club's decision I'm reposting the following post from last August.

John
_____________________________
I hope the following story makes you smile. While I can’t cite a source confirming Churchill heard it, but I feel sure he did. It’s an old story that’s floated around London for a very long time; and it’s just the kind of story Churchill loved.

The Carlton Club was in his lifetime as it is now one of London’s most exclusive private clubs. It has a strong Conservative Party connections going back to the 19th century. From the club’s website :

Today the Club continues to support the Party in many ways but the hub of the Party is now based in Victoria Street. The Carlton Club remains, however, the Conservative Club. (emphasis Carlton’s)

Well the story goes that during one session of Parliament, a Labour MP from the Midlands took rooms a few miles from Westminster Palace. In nice weather, he’d walk there.

One day as he passed the Carlton Club he had an urgent need to use the bathroom. So in he went.

Afterwards, he freshened up using the club's soaps and towels; and then was on his way.

He took to doing this just about every day.

Soon members noticed. They complained to the club’s governors.

The governors instructed the doorman to tell the Labour member he wasn't welcome to use the club’s bathroom.

So the next day as the MP was about to enter the club the doorman did as instructed.

“I’m sorry, Sir, but the governors of this private club say you can't use their gents room.”

“Really? This is also a club?”

I hope you’re smiling.

Fact-checking Market Watch’s Plame suit dismissal report

On Aug. 12 @ 3 PM ET Market Watch is hosting the following report which I plan to fact-check

WASHINGTON, Aug 12, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Today, in a split decision, Chief Judge David Sentelle, writing for the majority of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal of Joe and Valerie Wilson's civil suit against Vice President Cheney, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby and Richard Armitage. The court agreed with the opinion of District Court Judge John Bates that top White House officials cannot be sued for deliberately leaking the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Wilson to retaliate against Joe Wilson for publishing an op-ed that undermined the Bush administration's rationale for going to war with Iraq. The court of appeals found that the only remedy available to the Wilsons is the Privacy Act, even though it does not apply to White House officials. Judge Judith Rogers dissented, finding that a constitutional remedy should be available when there is no other alternative. (emphasis added)

Melanie Sloan, counsel to the Wilsons, said "we are disappointed with today's ruling and are considering all of our appellate options. It is simply unacceptable for top government officials to be unaccountable for such a gross abuse of their power. Here, not only did these officials cause untold harm to two individuals who honorably served their country, they also jeopardized our national security for short term political gain. Courts must be available to remedy precisely this kind of harm to ensure such conduct is neither condoned nor repeated."

The opinion can be found on CREW's website.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) is a non-profit legal watchdog group dedicated to holding public officials accountable for their actions. For more information, please visit www.citizensforethics.org or contact Naomi Seligman at 202.408.5565/nseligman@citizensforethics.org.

********************************************************

To: Naomi Seligman
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW)

Re: CREW’s Business Wire report at Market Watch concerning the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals’ dismissal of Joe and Valerie Wilson's civil suit.

I blog as John in Carolina and post often on media bias.

You say the appellate “court agreed with the opinion of District Court Judge John Bates that top White House officials cannot be sued for deliberately leaking the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Wilson to retaliate against Joe Wilson for publishing an op-ed that undermined the Bush administration's rationale for going to war with Iraq.”

The White House didn’t leak Valerie Plame Wilson’s name to the press.

The leaker was Richard Armitage, Deputy Secretary of State to Secretary of State Colin Powell.

Do you know of any credible source that’s accused Armitage of leaking Valerie Wilson’s identity at the behest of anyone at the White House?

Valerie Wilson was not a “covert CIA operative” at the time Armitage outed her; and the CIA has never said she was.

I don’t see in Judge Bates’ opinion or the appellate court’s opinion any finding that any government official “deliberately leak[ed] the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Wilson to retaliate against Joe Wilson for publishing an op-ed.”

If Judge Bates or the appellate court made such a finding, please cite it.

I’ll publish your response in full at my blog.

Thank you for your attention to my queries.

Sincerely,

John in Carolina

Brodhead & Steel's shrinking credibility (a repost)

Readers Note: The following post was published May 12, 2007, fifteen months ago today. I think most of you will find it interesting for many reasons.

I'm eager to read your comments. There's been some link-rot (Liestoppers, Durham H-S and Newsday), but the other links work.

John
______________________________________________

Regarding Duke University's refusal to face problems revealed by it's bungled and in some instances shameful responses to the witch hunt and frame-up, citizen journalist Locomotive Breath, a Duke alum, recently observed at Liestoppers Forum:

One strategy Duke is using is to pretend to each mad alum that that person is a malcontent and all alone in his/her [upset at Brodhead’s caving to the “88” and throwing the players under the bus.]

He’s got that right.

Another strategy Duke's been using involves keeping people ignorant of what’s been going on.

Duke Magazine has yet to say one word about Professor James Coleman’s June 2006 letter calling for Nifong to recuse himself from the case; something Brodhead at the time insisted he couldn’t do, but then did eagerly and loudly in December, only a few weeks before events forced Nifong himself to finally request recusal.

What about the disgusting media attacks last spring on the Women’s lacrosse team whose “offense” was to assert the innocence of Evans, Finnerty and Seligmann? What about the death threats shouted at Reade Seligmann last May 18 in a Durham courtroom?

Nothing’s been mentioned about those events in Duke Magazine or in the “sunshine” emails and letters President Brodhead and Board of Trustees Chair Robert Steel keep sending “the Duke community.”

People of goodwill who don’t know what’s been going on are inclined to believe Steel and Brodhead’s emails and letters assuring them all is well at "dear old Duke."

Oh sure, there may have been a tiny flub or two last spring, but that was to be expected. After all, as Brodhead told the late Ed Bradley on CBS’s 60 Minutes “the facts kept changing.”

Yes, David Evans recently insisted “facts don’t change.” But are you going to believe a young, recent grad when President Brodhead himself tells you they do change?

But enough about "changing facts."

Steel and Brodhead want us to understand we’re “all united for Duke” and “looking to the future.”

However, despite Steel and Brodhead's strenuous efforts, it's obvious to intelligent people that their “sunshine and unity at Duke” pitch is very misleading.

This March the Raleligh N&O reported [excerpts]:

… "The one thing that I wish we would have done is just out, publicly say, 'Look, those are our kids. And we're gonna support 'em, because they're still our kids.' That's what I wish we would have done," [Coach Mike] Krzyzewski told Bob Costas, a sports commentator who has a television show on HBO. "And I'm not sure that we did -- I don't think we did a good job of that." …

Krzyzewski, who also bears the title of special assistant to the Duke president, told Costas he did not speak out last spring because Brodhead did not ask him to do so.

"I met with my college president. I told Dick Brodhead, 'If you need me ... you tell me, and then put me in a position where I'm not the basketball coach. But I am that special assistant to you,' " Krzyzewski said.

"Dick Brodhead did not bring me in."

Recently 1,000 Duke students signed a statement that appeared as an ad in The Chronicle.

The students condemned Duke faculty’s Group of 88’s “social disaster” statement which appeared as a full-page ad last April in The Chronicle. To date, no one has admitted placing the ad, and Steel and Brodhead haven't asked where the funds for the ad came from.

The students' statement said in part:

In a time of intense emotions and enormous stakes, when our community dearly needed a call for calm, for patience, for rational and careful thinking, these professors instead took a course of action which escalated tensions, spurred divisions along lines of race and class and brought our community into greater turmoil.

Their actions also further undermined the legal process and most likely emboldened a rogue district attorney.

The students demanded an apology from the Group of 88. They ended their statement with an appeal to Brodhead:

WE CALL UPON PRESIDENT BRODHEAD TO FINALLY STAND UP FOR HIS STUDENTS

Brodhead, widely regarded as sympathetic to the Group of 88, has not responded to the students, just as he did not respond last March and April when “activists,” including some Duke staffers and students, distributed on campus within sight of his office windows “Vigilante” posters boldly targeting the white members of the lacrosse team and adding to the danger those students were already facing.

This past Thursday, former Duke Athletic Director Tom Butters was quoted in Newsday:

"I know I am probably stepping on toes when I say this, but it was absurd," Butters says. "I wanted someone to step up for Mike [Pressler, the former lacrosse coach forced to resign last April] and those kids."

Today we read in the Durham Herald Sun:

Duke University has to reassess how it treats students accused of crimes and make sure it doesn't contribute to unequal treatment of them by Durham authorities, the school's departing student government president told trustees Friday.

The lacrosse case showed "that we cannot have blind faith in the Durham police and the Durham district attorney to administer justice," said Elliott Wolf, who added that Duke also "must now shake the perception, whether legitimate or not, that it simply washes its hands of its students when they are in legal trouble."

Wolf's comments came during a morning meeting of the school's board of trustees, the last of the 2006-07 school year.

The junior singled out for criticism, in addition to the Durham Police Department's handling of the lacrosse case, its "zero-tolerance" crackdown two years ago on the Trinity Park party house scene.

He said comments police Capt. Ed Sarvis made to The Herald-Sun last year show that it was "stated DPD policy to punish Duke students more severely than other members of the community," and that authorities have frequently issued citations knowing they were "based on evidence that would not stand up in court." …

The entire H-S article’s here.

It ends with a statement from Brodhead saying Duke will be looking to “see what lessons we have to learn.” Does that surprise anyone?

A big hat tip goes to Student Government President Elliott Wolf for saying to the trustees what University President Dick Brodhead should have said to them many months ago.

I don’t know how Brodhead and Steel will spin Wolf’s presentation, but I know this: based on the communications I’ve been getting recently and what I’ve been hearing the last few days from members of “the Duke community” in Durham for commencement, the number of people who believe Steel and Brodhead's emails and letters is shrinking fast.

Guess who says Michelle Obama's "a fellow traveler"

I know Sen. Barack Obama has a lot of leftist friends - even some who are unrepentant terrorists (Bill Ayers says he didn't go far enough.) - but who knew Ms. Michelle Obama was "a fellow traveler?"

From JammieWearingFool - - -

According to Bartleby, a fellow traveler is "One who supports the aims or philosophies of a political group without joining it. A “fellow traveler” is usually one who sympathizes with communist doctrines but is not a member of the Communist party. The term was used disparagingly in the 1950s to describe people accused of being communists."

So why is Barack Obama disparaging his own wife? We constantly hear him whining how people are being unfair to her, so was this just another gaffe, Barry?

She's just a wonderfully normal, levelheaded person. Any American woman who meets her would immediately identify her as a fellow traveler.

Hmmm.

A rather inartful choice of words.

Funny, but we keep hearing from the Obamas how they don't want to exploit their kids, yet they just continue to keep them in the spotlight.

You can't have it both ways, folks.

Meanwhile, Obama's pathetic obsession with Fox News continues. He refuses to go on cable's highest-rated network, but disparages them whenever he can.

Very unbecoming of a candidate to single out a network, in my opinion.

MC: Do you think she's misunderstood?

BO: Not by people who've been paying attention. I think that if you've been watching Fox News then probably she's misunderstood, because I do think there's been a fairly systematic attempt by the conservative press to paint her in a completely false way. They latched onto the one gaffe or statement she made about being proud of her country for the first time, which, as Laura Bush acknowledged, was not something that Michelle had meant — that she had not been proud of her country before. And her very legitimate criticisms of how families are being treated and the difficulty for so many women of balancing family and work was painted as her being this caricature of an angry person. Anybody who knows her well knows she's got the best sense of humor of anyone you'd ever want to meet. She's the most quintessentially American person I know.

Sorry, but when you call the United States a downright mean country, expect criticism, and not just from Fox News. And there are a lot more than one gaffe.

The Churchill Series - Aug. 11, 2008

(One of a series of weekday posts about the life of Winston S. Churchill.)

I said I'd wrap the Abdication Crisis "series within the series" today.

What better way to begin the wrap than with the commenter's post which "started it all" by responding to my question as to what you would ask Churchill if you could ask him only one question and what you thought he'd say?

Here's the comment:

My question would be as follows: Mr Churchill, do you think that the abdication of Edward VIII not only saved the institution of the monarchy in Britain but also, with the ascension of the stalwart George VI and his wife Elizabeth, provided the public face to the stalwart speeches you gave during the Blitz?

While I am not sure of the answer to the first half of the question, I am certain that he would maintain that the example of the King and Queen sticking it out in Buckingham palace with the two princesses served as a piece of public assurance that the British people were made of the stiff upper lip that would enable them to defeat Hitler and his allies.

If Edward had not abdicated, but gone ahead and married Wallis Simpson, he would've taken Britain and the Commonwealth past the point of crisis into a condition of chaos, one outcome of which would certainly have been a great weakening among British and Commonwealth of their loyalty to the Crown and their sense that the Monarchy guarded their rights.

When, a few years later, Churchill said "we shall defend out island home whatever the cost may be," he was confident the people would respond, in significant measure because of their sense of themselves as a unique and worthy people bound together by a great history and precious common rights, all of that symbolized the monarchy.

I don't know about you but the Abdication Crisis series, for all its shortcomings, has given me a much greater appreciation for what a significant event it was; something not just about a King's wish to marry and the Government's objection to that, but a matter that, had it not been resolved in a way that preserved the constitutional monarchy, would have significantly diminished the chances of Britain and the Commonwealth successfully standing up to the Axis powers.

I think the NYT airbrushed reporter Seelye’s Edwards story

Readers Note: If you're not familiar with my post, "Did the NY Times scam for Edwards and some Dems?", I encourage you to read it before reading the one below which is an email I’ve sent NYT public editor Clark Hoyt based on the content and links you’ll find in "Did the NY Times scam for Edwards and some Dems?"

John
_________________________________________________

To: Clark Hoyt
Public Editor
New York Times

Re: Reporter Katharine Q. Seelye’s story, “Edwards Admits to Affair in 2006,” as now posted online (Aug. 11, @ 7:30 PM ET) has been airbrushed since it first appeared online Aug. 8 and on pg. 1A of the NYT’s Aug. 9 print edition.

As first published, Seelye’s story included the following three paragraphs:

When The Enquirer first reported the affair, a group of Edwards associates, including from past campaigns, assembled at his headquarters to try to stop the story from moving from the tabloid into major newspapers. They declined to respond to questions or issue any statements that might produce news reports, according to those involved in the effort. It was led by Jennifer Palmieri, a longtime associate of both Mr. and Mrs. Edwards. At the time, two of Mr. Edwards’s associates said, some of his aides did not believe the reports, but others were suspicious.

But by this summer, the team had shrunk. Ms. Palmieri managed the crisis again, working mainly with Mrs. Edwards and Harrison Hickman, Mr. Edwards’s longtime pollster. Initially Mr. Edwards argued that he could ride out the latest report, but several associates said that if the reports were not true, he should denounce them.

Mr. Edwards said in his statement Friday that he had denounced the tabloid reports earlier because most of the details were not true. “But,” he added, “being 99 percent honest is no longer enough.”

When you go now to Seelye's story on the Net, the three paragraphs have been reduced to just two, with part of the first and all of the second one gone.

As altered, Seelye's story now reads:

When The Enquirer first reported the affair, a group of Edwards associates, including from past campaigns, assembled at his headquarters to try to stop the story from moving from the tabloid into major newspapers. They declined to respond to questions or issue statements that might produce news reports, according to those involved in the effort.

Mr. Edwards said in his statement Friday that he had denounced the tabloid reports earlier because most of the details were not true. “But,” he added, “being 99 percent honest is no longer enough.”

I'm sure we agree news stories are quite rightly updated as new facts emerge but airbrushing is another matter.

With that in mind, please reread the three paragraphs of Seelye's story as first posted on the net and published in the print edition with the parts of her story airbrushed set here in bold:

When The Enquirer first reported the affair, a group of Edwards associates, including from past campaigns, assembled at his headquarters to try to stop the story from moving from the tabloid into major newspapers. They declined to respond to questions or issue any statements that might produce news reports, according to those involved in the effort. It was led by Jennifer Palmieri, a longtime associate of both Mr. and Mrs. Edwards. At the time, two of Mr. Edwards’s associates said, some of his aides did not believe the reports, but others were suspicious.

But by this summer, the team had shrunk. Ms. Palmieri managed the crisis again, working mainly with Mrs. Edwards and Harrison Hickman, Mr. Edwards’s longtime pollster. Initially Mr. Edwards argued that he could ride out the latest report, but several associates said that if the reports were not true, he should denounce them.

Mr. Edwards said in his statement Friday that he had denounced the tabloid reports earlier because most of the details were not true. “But,” he added, “being 99 percent honest is no longer enough.”

What happened, editor Hoyt? Why were such significant changes made in Seelye's story?

As originally Net posted and print published Seelye and the NYT told us Edwards himself was active in trying to suppress disclosure of his affair by MSM news organizations. As she put it: "Initially Mr. Edwards argued that he could ride out the latest [tabloid] report."

Airbrushing that information doesn't advance the story. It significantly distorts what Seelye first wrote and the Times published. If Seelye was wrong, then a correction is called for; not airbrushing.

Removing from Seelye's original report any mention of Ms. Edwards' role working with top Edwards aides to suppress disclosure of her husband's affair once again significantly distorts the story as originally reported by Katharine Q. Seelye.

There's more I could note, but I'm sure you can see it all yourself.

I hope you go to the bottom of the Times' page hosting the latest version of Seelye’s story where there’s this notice in light gray, extremely small font:

A version of this article appeared in print on August 9, 2008, on page A1 of the New York edition.

I understand updating a story but airbrushing it is something very different.

I look forward to your response which I'll publish in full at my blog.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

John in Carolina

Hat tip: AMac