As we have stated here on numerous previous occasions, the Austin Press Corps (APC) is merely a bunch of Dan Rathers, who are not as good at it as was Dan, so they became mired at the state level.
The one, true Mister Rather was deemployed nearly two years ago after his five annum Ahab-esque search for the material proof that would square his theory circle of President George W. Bush as Air National Guard draft dodger led him to rush to the airwaves with what he thought was, at long last, his White Whale, the Bill Burkett-delivered documentary forgeries.
Nothing sells portside quite like going down with the ship. |
(Editor's Note: No such similar diligence was exhibited by Mister Rather during the eight years of Administrative malfeasance that was headed by the in-totality-and-actuality draft-dodging, Soviet Moscow-protesting Bill Clinton. We simply can not imagine why not.)
Rather's ideologically-driven wrongness was undone by the Web Press Watch (WPW) and their passing familiarity with 1970s typewriters.
The Old Media despises and dismisses this new gaggle in its entirety in part because the WPW insists on doing things such as this to them.
Rather has since been reborn as a traveling Press Expert, hypocritically yet bombastically pontificating on the import of accuracy in reporting, but solely citing for reprimand and condescentive harangue the very blogosphere whose insistence on veracity created the need for his late in life career change.
Never mentioned in his ongoing dreck trek is the New York Times, the font from which all national journalism springs, and its series of serial takers of liberties with veridicality (See [amongst many others]: Blair, Jayson). Nor are the myriad other Old Media outlets and their very many factually challenged foibles referenced.
And most certainly not even hinted at are his very own coups des faux grace, either MemoGate or his 1988 fairytale filing (with the Left's Anti-Shibboleth, President Richard Nixon, posited as the Big Bad Wolf [which would make Rather, it would seem, Little Red Riding Hood]) featuring Post Traumatic Stress Disordered and drug and alcohol riddled Vietnam veterans who turned out to not be any of the above.
Then, there was no Internet to immediately undo what Rather had wrought, so it largely stood as isn't until the 1999 publication of Stolen Valor righted all of these Rather Grimm wrongs.
In the interminable interim, the only ones who knew better were the actual Vietnam veterans, slandered beyond recognition by this piece of journalistic piffle, but possessed of too much integrity to call to public attention Rather's decided lack thereof, and dispossessed of any Media means by which to have done so had they chosen to bring light to the blackout that was then the monopolistic Press.
This leads one to ponder how many other fables Mister Rather foisted upon us, unchecked either by Reality or unbiased editorial analysis, which he simply dropped in our laps and then skated off unscathed to the next non-story.
In keeping with Leftist tradition, Rather's blatant adherence to ideology at the expense and in outright defiance of the truth has only further endeared him to and raised his stock with his Fellow Travelers. There is nothing that is held in higher liberal regard than rigid adherence to failure (See: Carter, President Jimmy, See Also: Mondale, Vice President Walter and Shrum, Bob).
Nothing sells portside quite like going down with the ship.
Today, and all this week, we have had the New York Times behaving like, well, the New York Times, which is to say not at all as we anticipate a legitimate newspaper would comport itself, but in the exact manner that we have come to expect from the (Old) Gray Lady.
The Times has spent the better part of a fortnight obsessing upon connecting their alleged dots between the President and downed lobbyist Jack Abramoff, and they now believe they have found their Pale Whale, a photograph of President Bush meeting with legislators in the White House, and in attendance (and very far removed to the grainy background) is (GASP) Abramoff.
Imagine, a lobbyist in attendance at a meeting involving elected officials and the President. What next, liberal professors on college campi?
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Arthur Schulzberger, Jr., as a Young Man, Leaning Left Even Then |
(One is drawn to ponder the Times' snapshot search endeavor. How many interns were set to the time-consumptive, mind-numbing task of pouring over tens of thousands of official White House photos in the hopes of stumbling across one the likes of which they so zealously published today? The effort will undoubtedly be of tremendous assistance to the participants, one and all, in their prospective journalistic careers.)
The editorial slant in their pseudo-news presentation is that President Bush has been denying that a relationship with Abramoff exists, and that this photograph proves otherwise.
But as the President has rightly and repeatedly pointed out when incessantly queried hereon, he meets, and meets with, many, many people, and Abramoff may very well have been, and in fact probably was, one of them.
That he has lost Abramoff in the multi-meeting memory shuffle is hardly an implausible notion.
(Abramoff's recollections of the specificity of President Bush's comments to him whence they spoke are the result of a parlor trick in which all elected officials engage; an aide is charged with providing personal particulars of everyone with whom the President is to meet prior to so doing, thereby personalizing the encounter for those engaged and ingratiating the President therewith.)
This Abramoff far-from-front-and-center photograph, of which the Times breathlessly proffers that the White House "confirmed the authenticity" (as if denial would have even been contemplated; the President is clearly center stage therein), hardly disproves this Presidential confluence and recollective analysis.
Regardless, the rag in question posits that
... it provides a window, albeit an opaque one, into Mr. Abramoff's efforts to sell himself to Indian tribes as a man of influence who could open the most secure doors in Washington to them.
Opaque? It is positively impenetrable.
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Note the Two Faces on the "Heads" |
The other side of this coin of the journalistic Realm is the decided lack of attention paid by the Times to the ongoing unearthing of the far more extensive relationship between Abramoff and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (Democrat - Searchlight).
Minority Leader Reid has repeatedly and vociferously insisted, more so than anyone save (the Media and) Democrat National Committee Chairman, and noted reserved statesman, Howard Dean, that this is an exclusively Republican "scandal".
(Editor's Note: We have previously expounded on how unscandalous, for Congress, the Abramoff issue actually is. It is the Times that has led the Media charge off San Juan Hill trumpeting the importance of the tale of Abramoff, whilst selectively choosing the targets of said assault so as to best frame it as solely Elephantary, all the while ignoring copious reams of evidence to the contrary. )
Lo and behold, this turns out not to be the case for Minority Leader Reid. One of 40 Senate Donkeys (out of the 45 total) to have received coin from Abramoff and/or Associates, he did much more than simply take his relationship therewith to the bank.
It has come to (Search)light that the $68,000 Abramoff invested in the perpetual Minority Leader Reid reelection effort earned him
... Reid interven(ing) on government matters in ways that Abramoff's tribal clients might have deemed helpful, once opposing legislation on the Senate floor and four times sending letters pressing the Bush administration on tribal issues.
And the timing of the Minority Leader Reid Abramoff efforts was decidedly less than coincidental.
Reid collected donations around the time of each action.
None of the tribes that received the very weighty assistance of the Minority Leader's scribic and Senate floor endeavors resides within the friendly confines of Reid's Nevada.
Said efforts would be decidedly unnecessary for any of Reid's constituents, of course, because gambling by people of all melanin counts is completely legal in his, the Silver State.
But do not let that stop you, Senator, not whilst the Abramoff checks are clearing.
Perhaps the Minority Leader was simply interested in exporting the glories of gambling, so enjoyed in Viva and beyond, to the other forty-nine states that do not revel in so thorough a gaming Nirvana.
Oh, and
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 money from several of Abramoff's lobbying partners.
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The Harry Reid Memorial Casino and R.V. Park |
But were Minority Leader Reid's multiple efforts on behalf of out-of state Indian tribes rolling the dice on being able to roll the dice contribution driven? Of course not.
A Reid spokesman said none of the senator's actions were affected by donations or done for Abramoff.
"All the actions that Senator Reid took were consistent with his long-held beliefs, such as not letting tribal casinos expand beyond reservations, and were taken to defend the interests of Nevada constituents," spokesman Jim Manley said.
All to "defend the interests of Nevada constituents", all of whom can already open a gambling establishment, and who would be, in fact, hurt by the further dissemination of their increasingly diminishing cottage industry.
And here lies the Phrase of the Day, which only serves to bolster our argument that the Abramoff fiasco bears directly on Congress little or not at all:
Reid's office yesterday acknowledged having "routine contacts" with Abramoff's lobbying partners.
"Routine contacts". Exactly.
Again, the answer to all of this is to reduce the power Washington weilds, so that this sort of costly up close and personal contact with those in electoral attendance would be markedly less necessary.
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What is the Nature of Your Relationship With Your Shingle Provider? |
As we have said, Abramoff was but a contractor who proffered his services to clients. The wares being plied were his speaking with legislators on their behalf, which he did.
That he was robbing these clients blind was unbeknownst to most and probably all of the elected officials with whom he came into contact. Nor should they have been expected to seek out this information.
When one, for example, hires a contractor to repair the crown of his abode, should he be expected to know that said roofer is fleecing his cement man? Is he responsible to research said builder's every relationship to identify any criminal potentiality prior to retaining him?
Of course not; all he wants is for the guy in question to ensure that his home will keep out the rain whence next it falls.
So, too, with Abramoff. He was a lobbyist, he lobbied, get over it (from a Congressional perspective; Abramoff himself should go way down).
The point of all of this New York Times analysis is, here we have a clear, distinct and ongoing substantive relationship between Minority Leader Reid and Abramoff, and the Times can not bring itself to even mention it in its august publication.
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Rethinking His Assertions? (Probably Not) |
Perhaps because it is too busy emanating political penumbras from a grainy, black and white, blown-up, wide-angle photograph that manages to capture President Bush and Abramoff (barely) in the same frame. Which still proves absolutely nothing.
But onward we go, as per usual. For the rest of the Old Media, including the Austin Press Corps, your cue.
And ... Action.
