KRISTOL AND THE TIMES.
Rather predictably, the McCain campaign is responding to the New York Times story on his possible affair with an all-out attack on the New York Times. If I were him I'd do the same thing. But it's worth pointing out here that the Times isn't getting any balance points from the right for having hired Bill Kristol, the world's biggest McCain-booster, onto their op-ed page a couple months ago. Indeed, Bill Kristol's magazine, The Weekly Standard, is part of the anti-Times chorus. When Kristol's next column comes out, I imagine he, too, will be part of the anti-Times chorus. And rightly so. He hates the Times and everything it stands for, except insofar as it stands for paying him money and publishing his articles.
Hiring a banal writer and an unimaginative ideologue like Kristol might have made some sense if his presence really would have legitimized the paper's reporting in the eyes of conservatives, but it's done nothing of the kind. Conservatives still hate The Times, and now, every Monday, the Times op-ed page features a poorly written, basically hackish column from Kristol. It's lose-lose.
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COMMENTS (13)
I never understood the agenda-addled thought-process behind hiring Kristol. They lost one reader because of this move(that's me). I have been reading 'the Nation' and 'Washington Post'(strange combination, isn't it??) since then. I wonder how many more of their core readers they have lost because of this.
Posted by: Soms | February 21, 2008 3:48 PM
According to reports, the NYT withheld the McCain story because they didn't want to influence the election. But if it's true that voters' decisions would have been influenced by the article, then doesn't a decision to withhold also influence the election? The press should not be arbiters of what the public may and may not know, or when they may know it. When there are motives other than giving people the best and most accurate information, and doing so as quickly as quality allows, the train is very far off the tracks.
Posted by: TKD | February 21, 2008 4:01 PM
Since the first drafts of the McCain story started circulating in the Times's newsroom shortly before Kristol was hired, does this raise the question of the possibility that the Times intentionally hired a vocal McCain partisan in a (misguided) hope of defusing backlash when the article was eventually published?
Posted by: J | February 21, 2008 4:04 PM
Hiring a banal writer and an unimaginative ideologue like Kristol might have made some sense if his presence really would have legitimized the paper's reporting in the eyes of conservatives
Hiring a paid up member of the Village legitimizes the paper in the eyes of the Village.
Which is Bill Keller's only goal.
The purpose of OpEds is to get the paper talked about in the rest of the media. Keller doesn't really care what's being discussed over the office water cooler. Hiring someone like Kristol, who's a regular on the gabfest circuit, is guaranteed to get the paper talked about on the gabfest circuit.
It's a win-win.
Posted by: flory | February 21, 2008 4:14 PM
So the Times entire point and their entire pile of evidence is two unnamed and unranked former staffers from 8 years ago THOUGHT that MCCain and this women were romantically involved.
If they had any actual evidence or it, the two staffers had any actual evidence wouldn't it have been nice to actually report it?
If I find two disgruntled former staffers at the Times that think Keller is a Nazi and secretly attends Nazi rallies on the weekends because he hated his Mother and his Dad molested him, don't you think he would ask for SOME evidence to back up their beliefs?
This isn't even bad journalism, this wouldn't make it into most tabloids.
Posted by: Anonymous | February 21, 2008 4:25 PM
Re: backlash. If the article had been published when it could have had an impact on the Republican primaries, conservatives would have cheered it, because it would have weakened McCain, the bete noire, and given more running room to some further-right alternative. But now, because they are stuck with McCain as nominee, they have no choice but to attack the messenger.
Posted by: TKD | February 21, 2008 4:28 PM
MCCAIN BLOCKBUSTER:
"In 2000 he began showing up so frequently at McCain campaign events that staff members took notice. One recalled asking, 'Why is he always around?'"
CHRIS MATHEWS MUST HAVE HAD AN AFFAIR WITH JOHN MCCAIN.
He started showing up at campaign events, he seemed to always be around. MCCain was spending time with him. They were buddies, telling jokes, slap sticking. Riding on his bus, etc. etc.
Obviously Mathews must have been sleeping with McCain. What else could it be?
Olbermann to report tonight Mathews must have been romanticaly involved with McCain based on this hard evidence...
Posted by: Anonymous | February 21, 2008 5:09 PM
Has anything been more sexist this campaign then the NYT reporting that because a 32 year old women shows up at multiple campaign events she is obviously looking to have sex with a 63 year old senior citizen?
Would the NYT claim that every women who shows up at more then one Obama rally obviously plans to sleep with the Senator?
Posted by: Anonymous | February 21, 2008 5:30 PM
worst of all, if they fire him, they get all kinds of shit raining down again from the right-wing-o-sphere. it's a lose-lose-lose
Posted by: Max B. | February 21, 2008 6:44 PM
But the adultery allegations sure make great cover for the much more serious issues of lobbyist influence involved in this story
Posted by: BillCinSD | February 21, 2008 8:29 PM
FWIW, I saw Kristol on one of the cable news shows earlier today, I think it was Fox News. The host was practically begging him to slam the Times for printing the story, but he declined to do so - explicitly saying that he didn't think they were wrong to run the story.
His spin was that there was nothing to the story anyway, and that McCain was probably glad to have it out there!
Posted by: Jason C. | February 21, 2008 9:20 PM
Hey, I hate the NY Times, too and I'm not a wingnut.
Posted by: merlallen | February 22, 2008 8:52 AM
But an really obscenely pathetic pitiful pundit spewing utter right wing prattle..persistently
And the world...even more of it then...is exposed to all of that and-when/if they pay attention-see this character and his line of shite for what it is.
Maybe a win-tie, at least?
Posted by: has_te | February 22, 2008 5:05 PM