The case for covering the Edwards scandal. - By Mickey Kaus - Slate Magazine
Slate is pretty far to the left, but even they are starting to get embarrassed by the covering for John Edwards long term affair with recent documented dalliances while his wife battles cancer. Some conservative scandal mongers have covered it a bit, but like most things of this type where the person in question has a "D" behind their name, the objective of the MSM is to keep it as quiet as possible, and they have done a pretty good job of that here.
Do I personally see it as news? A little, for much the same reasons as Kaus lists below--if Edwards ever had any qualifications to suggest he might be presidential material, it MUST have had something to do with his "character/ability to sway audiences with rhetoric". Since he CERTAINLY had no other skills or experience to suggest that "president" was a reasonable aspiration for him (much like Obama), the importance of his character would seem to rise.
Kaus talks about Bill Bennett as an example whose gambling addiction the media LOVED "outing". I'd say the list is long--very hard to beat their coverage of authorities finding a vial of Viagra in Rush Limbaugh's personal belongings as he re-entered the country. I think one COULD question if the issue of Rush using Viagra is worthy of national news attention--but then we know that people with views like Rush OUGHT to be punished! That is what "free speech" is about if you are from the left.
They also at least adequately covered the Gingrich affairs, including the cheating on his first wife that had cancer as if that kind of behavior was objectionable and very worthy of coverage-again, if you are the kind of person that would put an R next to your name. Edwards is a D, but maybe some of the lefties are starting to see that it is POSSIBLE for ones biases to go too far? Nah, wishful thinking.
Slate is pretty far to the left, but even they are starting to get embarrassed by the covering for John Edwards long term affair with recent documented dalliances while his wife battles cancer. Some conservative scandal mongers have covered it a bit, but like most things of this type where the person in question has a "D" behind their name, the objective of the MSM is to keep it as quiet as possible, and they have done a pretty good job of that here.
Do I personally see it as news? A little, for much the same reasons as Kaus lists below--if Edwards ever had any qualifications to suggest he might be presidential material, it MUST have had something to do with his "character/ability to sway audiences with rhetoric". Since he CERTAINLY had no other skills or experience to suggest that "president" was a reasonable aspiration for him (much like Obama), the importance of his character would seem to rise.
Kaus talks about Bill Bennett as an example whose gambling addiction the media LOVED "outing". I'd say the list is long--very hard to beat their coverage of authorities finding a vial of Viagra in Rush Limbaugh's personal belongings as he re-entered the country. I think one COULD question if the issue of Rush using Viagra is worthy of national news attention--but then we know that people with views like Rush OUGHT to be punished! That is what "free speech" is about if you are from the left.
They also at least adequately covered the Gingrich affairs, including the cheating on his first wife that had cancer as if that kind of behavior was objectionable and very worthy of coverage-again, if you are the kind of person that would put an R next to your name. Edwards is a D, but maybe some of the lefties are starting to see that it is POSSIBLE for ones biases to go too far? Nah, wishful thinking.
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