February 26, 2007

Sauce For the Gander

Taranto responds to the AP's silly new scandal story, disclosing that Mitt Romney's great-grandfather, and his great-great-grandfather were polygamists.

...Romney's church long ago renounced polygamy. He himself not only isn't a polygamist; he doesn't even practice "serial monogamy." He married his high school sweetheart, Ann, and they've been together, just the two of them and their kids, for 37 years.

If the marital lives of a presidential candidate's great- and great-great-grandparents are a legitimate topic of journalistic inquiry, what about the marital lives of presidential candidates themselves? We have in mind a particular candidate, who, without naming any names, is now the junior senator from New York and the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Nine years ago we learned that the future senator's husband, who then held a high position in the federal government, was carrying on an extramarital sexual affair with an employee who was only a few years older than the age of consent. This came to light when the husband lied under oath about it in a lawsuit in which another woman alleged that he had made unwanted sexual advances toward her. Several other women also claimed that the husband either had affairs with or forced his affections upon them. The husband was not indicted for perjury, but he was impeached, though not convicted.

The senator-to-be did not divorce her husband; indeed, in her public statements at least, she not only stood by her man but made him out to be the victim of what she called "the vast right-wing conspiracy." Now, according to the Washington Post, she wants the whole topic to be off-limits.

No doubt she will also want to set "off limits" the Travel Office firings, the bimbo smear squad ("drag a hundred dollar bill through a trailer park") and the law-breaking healthcare task force, to pick a random three items from a long list. To insist that her actions the last time she occupied the White House should be off limits, simply because she was operating with zero public accountability, official appointment or electoral mandate, is no different than suggesting that McCain's voting record, or Giuliani's policies as Mayor aren't legitimate fodder for questioning and debate. You can't promote and celebrate "two-for-one", and then refuse to acknowledge that you were one of the two.

She might start by holding a legitimate open press conference. The free ride has to end eventually.

I have written before of my contention that if the mature blogosphere of 2006 had existed in 1996, the Clinton presidency could not have survived. The pliant press simply embargoed stories that were damaging to the White House. That level of information control would be impossible today. Instead, we see the Democratic practice of labeling any talk of the criminality and other scandals of the Clinton White House as 'swift-boating'.

Whoa. If that doesn't scare off any self-respecting journalist, I don't know what would.

Posted by dan at February 26, 2007 11:16 PM