Another Look

How lazy is the press?

We already know from the run-up to Iraq that the media aren't likely to bite the hands that feed them leaked tidbits by actually questioning anything shoveled to them. But one would think that given the interest in the Connecticut Senate race and the big deal being made by the Me-Berman camp over a letter from Ned Lamont, the Democrat running for US Senate, supposedly praising Holy Joe for his sanctimonious public lashing of Bill Clinton, AP or the Times would actually have taken the time to examine the source material.

But we know Joe is their favorite right-winger, soundly rejected by Democrats though he was in his last two campaigns, one for President and the other the last senatorial primary. And we know that neither criticism nor questioning of Me-Berman is something either Joe or the MSM would tolerate.

Perhaps when they're done worshipping at the altar of Joe, the MSM might want to address this letter by Scott Kimmich of Wilton in the Sept. 15 issue of The Hour in Norwalk. It puts a whole new spin on Joe's cheap political trick, but as with Iraq, exposing that would require the MSMs exposing its own complicity in the all-spin zone.


Lamont chastised, not praised, Lieberman in letter

To the Editor:

The Associated Press headline in The Sunday Hour misrepresents what Ned Lamont actually wrote to Joe Lieberman eight years ago during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Ned didn't "laud" Joe's moral outrage, instead he chastised Joe's selecting Bill Clinton for censure.

Was the Lieberman campaign trying to set Ned up? At a press luncheon with Ned in Washington last week, reporters concentrated on his reaction to the Lewinsky affair. Within days, The New York Times published a story about the eight-year-old letter that the Lieberman campaign just happened to have at its fingertips. Yet, what Ned actually wrote was far different from the reporters' rhetoric.

Ned's letter begins, "I reluctantly supported the moral outrage you expressed ... I was reluctant because I thought it might make matters worse; I was reluctant because nobody expressed moral outrage over how Reagan treated his kids or Gingrich lied about supporting term limits (in other words, it was selective outrage); I was reluctant because the Starr inquisition is much more threatening to our civil liberties and national interest than Clinton's behavior."

Instead of being laudatory, Ned's letter actually chides Joe for singling out Clinton instead of Reagan or Gingrich.

The letter also deplores how Starr's exposure of the sordid affair "streamed into my home via every medium available, saying that "mature adults would have handled this privately, not turned it into a political crusade and legal entanglement with no end in sight."

Ned ends his letter by asking Joe to "stand up and use your moral authority to put an end to this snowballing mess ... and let's move on. It's time for you to make up your mind and speak your mind as you did so eloquently last Thursday."

Clearly, Ned was urging Joe to halt the political circus, not praising him. Ned was using the same words then as he uses in his current campaign.

Scott Kimmich
Wilton

posted by Andy Mais @ 10:36 AM