The Emperor’s New Clothes, 2008 edition?
When will Ron Fournier of AP and Michael Crowley of TNR get interviews with Senator Clinton? The answer just might be “when hell freezes over.” These two were recently mildly critical of America’s royal family, who do not tolerate such behavior. The press — the liberal press — has been told in no uncertain terms that they are dogs, and they ought to learn to like it. Howard Kurtz explains in the Washington Post:
– ABC correspondent Kate Snow was ready to push through the crowd and ask Hillary Clinton a question until an aide blocked the path of Snow’s sound man as he aimed his boom mike in the senator’s direction. “Sorry, we’ve gotta go,” the woman said, though it was clear that Clinton would be shaking hands for some time…
– Snow ignored the speed limit as she chased Clinton from a Manchester diner to a Concord state office where the candidate was filing to run in the primary. “I parked seven blocks away,” Snow says. “I ran up the street in my high-heel boots. I got there out of breath, and the Secret Service stopped me and said, ‘You can’t come in.’ “…
– Boston television reporter Joe Battenfeld managed to shout a question…about whether she needed to win both Iowa and New Hampshire…”Oh, I don’t think about it like that. I’m just thrilled to be competing in Iowa and New Hampshire…There’s something very special about the New Hampshire primary…I take nothing for granted…We have wonderful candidates running.”…
– Clinton accepted the endorsement…When Clinton stepped away from the microphones, Bruce Springsteen’s “The Rising” began blaring from the speakers, which effectively drowned out any attempted queries from the journalists sprinkled throughout the room. Battenfeld, the Boston reporter, launched his horse-race question during a brief lull between songs. “It’s kind of an art form,” he said afterward. “I would have asked her about Obama, but I figured she would have turned and run.”
– Newsweek’s Andrew Romano says the press didn’t even get to take the tour when Clinton visited a Las Vegas sheet-metal factory. “The way we were herded into a small area to watch her walk into a room and meet with union officials just seemed slightly absurd,” he says. When a colleague asked the staff for a chance to question Clinton, “they just kind of laughed it off.”…
– Judy Lanza, a nurse, and her husband, Joe, a retired police officer, hosted Clinton in a small kitchen adorned with pumpkins…For more than an hour, 30 journalists watched from the small, darkened living room as Clinton chatted, awkwardly at first, with the five preselected guests. Her rhetoric against health insurance companies was harsher than might have been expected. They give patients the “runaround,” deny care, “slow-walk” the payment of bills, she declared. “This is all part of their business model. This is how they make money…The small-business health-care market is really rigged.”…Clinton drifted into special education, meetings she had as first lady on religious tolerance, how she was “deeply involved” in the Northern Ireland peace process, and her plans for a “post-Kyoto agreement” on global warming. But although the meeting was staged for the assembled journalists, there was no chance for follow-up…
– National correspondents are increasingly frustrated by a lack of access to Clinton. They spend much of their time in rental cars chasing her from one event to the next, because the campaign usually provides no press bus or van.
We have no sympathy for the dogs of the media. If they are going to let themselves be treated like mangy curs, so be it. Of course in all probability not all media will be treated this badly. Some dogs have learned to do nice tricks for their masters. They have learned to roll over and play dead, as well as to sit up and beg.
It would appear from this imperious and paranoid behavior on the part of the Clintons and their entourage that Senator Clinton is out of her depth when having to deal with anything that is not carefully scripted on the campaign trail. And the dogs of the media dare not directly ask if the emperor has no clothes, at least so far. But if that day should arise, Senator Clinton will be in for some very nasty treatment.
November 30th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
Thanks for all you do.
Here’s a tip that may help explain Hillie’s ethical lapses (not really, but that would be a good lead-in to the following). It may also explain why she won’t let anyone near her who might want to ask an impromptu, non-preapproved question. I am hoping you could somehow release this information to the rest of the media and let the electorate at least know about it and let them see how Hillie would react to it. She could write it off as “no big thing,” but that is not in her character. Bottom line, this item calls into question her “experience” and “competence.” In this instance, she’s had experience with be suspended from the practice of law due to her incompetence.
Seems Hillie is not the only member of the Clinton household be have been disciplined by the Arkansas Bar Assn.
It’s all on their web site.
And it’s not a trifling matter. She was suspended by the Arkansas bar in 2002 for failing to complete her minimum continuing legal education requirements. According the professional responsibility rules on the Bar’s site, the suspension requires a written response from the suspended member and can lead to disbarment (especially if the member continues to practice law while suspended, which must also be disclosed if it happened). Her failure to meet the requirements lead to suspension in March of 2002 while she was a sitting U.S. senator. That’s probably another first: she’s the first sitting female senator who was too arrogant, lazy or inattentive to be suspended from the practice of law. The record of her suspension is on the web page for all the world to see. Funny, no CNN, MSNBC or other dinosaur media company has seen fit to check this or ask her about it. I am hoping you might be able to change that.
Here’s the info:
It took me about five minutes to learn that a public record of
discipline for Hillary D. Rodham Clinton appears on the Arkansas Bar
Assn. web site:
http://courts.state.ar.us/attorneys/attorney_info.cfm?number=0073104
Or go to http://www.arkbar.org.
Scroll all the way down to the bottom and click on the Attorney
Discipline link on the left.
Click on the Office of the Arkansas Supreme Court Committee on
Professional Conduct link.
Click on the Searches link on the left.
Click on the Arkansas Licensed Attorney Search link.
Type Clinton into the last name pane.
Up will pop two familiar names.
As for the one with the first name of Hillary who resides in
Chappaqua, it appears she may have been suspended for failing to meet
her Continuing Legal Education requirements, as it says “CLESUSPENS”.
I called the Arkansas Bar Assn. Committee/Office on Professional
Conduct at 1-800-506-6631 and they told me CLESUSPENS means an
attorney has failed to meet their continuing legal education
requirements within the time allotted and are, therefore, suspended
from the practice of law. Maybe Hillie no longer cares whether she
can practice law as now she’s a millionaire. Maybe she was sloppy and
careless and therefore didn’t realize she needed to meet the
requirements. Whatever the excuse, it’s another chink in her false
front of competence.
Gee, and to think that hard hitting investigative reporter Katie
Couric didn’t ask Slick Hillie about this?!
January 6th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Erm, and maybe the CLE report got lost in the mail, like mine did once.
But then, I’m not the smartest woman in the world ™.