Posted on 03/28/2016 4:11:45 PM PDT by conservativejoy
NBC anchor Chuck Todd isn’t buying the National Enquirer hit piece on Ted Cruz. On the March 27 edition of Meet the Press, Todd commented that “there’s more evidence that ties Trump to planting the story, than there is to the story itself tying anything to Cruz.”
Todd also accused Trump of taking a page out of the “LBJ playbook.” Discussing the story with NBC chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell, Todd retorted that “Trump is almost trying to borrow a page from the LBJ playbook, when he put out a statement on the National Enquirer – let me put it up here. He basically said, ‘I hope that story's not true,’ but also trying to fan the flames. Hey, look, the National Enquirer got it right on Edwards, got it right on O.J. Simpson, I hope they’re wrong about – and then he throws in ‘lyin’ Ted Cruz’. This is – this is a sort of ‘make him deny it’ type of LBJ thing.”
NBC has consistently done a superior job of pointing out the many reasons to doubt the Enquirer story. In her reporting on Friday's NBC Nightly News and Saturday's Today show, NBC correspondent Hallie Jackson went further than her ABC and CBS colleagues in alerting viewers to the tabloid’s utter lack of evidence, its past boosting of Trump, and the categorical denials of two of the women linked to Cruz in the story.
On ABC's This Week, fill-in moderator Jonathan Karl did not match Todd's explicit skepticism of the Enquirer piece, but twice pressed Trump himself on the story:
JONATHAN KARL: Do you categorically guarantee that nobody on your campaign, nobody tied to your campaign, had anything to do with this National Enquirer story?
TRUMP: Totally. I had nothing to do with it....
KARL: But let me ask you, this story, this that we see in the National Enquirer, this kind of rumor mongering, should this kind of thing just be off limits? Do you condemn this story?
TRUMP: I don't care. I mean really I don't care. The National Enquirer did a story. It was their story. It wasn't my story. It was about Ted Cruz. I have no idea whether it was right or not.
Overall, ABC's This Week gave the sleazy tabloid story 2 minutes, 47 seconds of airtime, compared with 1 minute, 36 seconds on Meet the Press.
CBS’s Face the Nation didn’t touch on the controversy at all, which is consistent with CBS News’s recent history of giving much less air time (2 minutes) to this story on the morning and evening new shows over the weekend than either ABC or NBC did (7 and 6 minutes, respectively).
Transcript from Meet the Press on March 27:
CHUCK TODD: Hallie, this all came in Cruz world a little bit – you know – my this escalated quickly.
HALLIE JACKSON: Yeah.
TODD: But I guess, sort of, what happened here? And how did this go from this, I guess, a Super PAC's digital ad get turned into what it got turned into.
JACKSON: Right. And to look at the progression, as you noted, of what we've seen this week, Tuesday we're talking about this terror attack and candidates' responses to it, Saturday we're talking about the National Enquirer and the tabloid cover story that's out there. I think that this shows Donald Trump is able to shift the conversation with a single tweet. And the tweet that came out retweeting this image of Heidi Cruz next to Melania trump was stunning to, I think, the Cruz campaign. I think Ted Cruz was stunned and very emotional about this even before you started talking about the Enquirer story. And, I think that one of the things that Ted Cruz has been hit on he seems a little bit rehearsed, sometimes, a little bit inauthentic, that's a knock against him. Right now, he is emotional, he’s mad, and he’s showing it.
...
TODD: But it is, and Andrea, final thing, what was amazing, Trump is almost trying to borrow a page from the LBJ playbook, when he put out a statement on the National Enquirer – let me put it up here. He basically said, I hope that story's not true, but also trying to fan the flames. Hey, look, the National Enquirer got it right on Edwards, got it right on OJ Simpson, I hope they’re wrong about – and then he throws in ‘lyin’ Ted Cruz’. This is – this is a sort of ‘make him deny it’ type of LBJ thing.
ANDREA MITCHELL: Exactly. And, of course, as Hallie’s been reporting, and as Katy's been reporting he’s got a very close relationship with the people of National Enquirer. They are really – and they’ve endorsed him, so –
TODD: There's more evidence that ties Trump to planting the story than there is to the story itself tying anything to Cruz.
MITCHELL: Like, I hope this is not true, and then tell me everything about it. It has been a remarkable, extraordinary period and, as I say, at a time when he should be vulnerable on foreign policy.
Get used to it kiddies, this stuff is going to continue until well after the election and into Trump’s first term.
Ted Cruz going on about all the fights he has led in Washington. Never mentions the number of fights he won. The answer is none.— Brit Hume (@brithume) October 29, 2015
Wait. Who can't let this crap go?
How many stories are posted here daily, hell, hourly by Trump supporters trying to keep this story alive and GIVE it some sort of legs?
I noticed that a lot of Trump's supporters also bagged on Cruz because they felt he didn't denounce the Melania trump ad, from an anti-Trump PAC loudly enough, even though he did denounce that kind of sleazy tactic.
What the hell is this now? Trump saying basically "whatever....it's not my story it's NE's story. none of my business."
Shouldn't Trump also be denouncing this type of sleazy, unsourced, uncorroborated crap?
The stories may have been peddled by Rubio. They have been digging for months and come up with no evidence. The fact is that AFTER Rubio is out of the race, has no dog in the hunt, Donald’s BFF< Pecker, publishes this in his rag. Of course, he had the good sense to only publish it as a rumor.
When the election is over, I hope Cruz sues Roger Stone for every cent he has.
https://twitter.com/PatrickSvitek/status/714580977570476032
Cruz to reporter who asked him to “more definitively” deny the National Enquirer story: “I recognize that you love going into the gutter.”
It’s not that Todd has no evidence, it is the seriousness of Chuck Todd’s charge.
Has Trump still beating is wife?
So what “evidence” does Todd have to suggest Trump planted the story? I don’t see any mentioned here.
1. Filing a lawsuit keeps it in the news as a prominent story, dragging his wife and daughters through the mud for months.
2. Outside of the Enquirer no one else is actually carrying the story.
3. Wording, the wording of the article gives the NE as much coverage from lawsuit as possible. You see the say things like “Sources say that Donald Trump, has slept with 300 men over a period of 10 years.” This leaves the reader to pull the conclusion, without having to say he did it. This leaves him with recourse in court.
4. Micheal Landon lived with these types of stories for years so I am told, and there was nothing that he could do about it unless they messed up and actually made a claim that was untrue.
Why isn’t Cruz suing NOW if it’s not true????
The fact that Todd stands behind Cruz tells me just one thing, they would prefer Hillary face Cruz instead of Trump.
More of Cruzers trying to paint him as victim to detract from his news.
After months of this story being out there, the Enquirer who endorsed Trump and is owned by Trump’s BFF, Pecker, decides to publish this as a rumor. This is at a time that Cruz was pulling ahead of Trump in Wisconsin. Further, the only named source for the rumor is Roger Stone, again a close friend and advocate for Donald Trump. How many dots do you need?
They are both being played. GOPe probably is behind all this. The sooner they shut up about it, the better off they will both be.
#CruzSexScandal has been around for months. If Trump wanted to leak it, he would have done it BEFORE Utah. https://t.co/7ycAw7Epcb— Avvocata(@lindagrog) March 25, 2016
If I had in my past a single affair. I would plant a crazy exagerated story of multi affairs to muddy up the waters too.
Politics is pure blood sport, fascinating, just plain fascinating!
“there’s more evidence that ties Trump to planting the story, than there is to the story itself tying anything to Cruz.”
Trump needs to get on top of this real quick. He needs to tell the truth and clear this matter up.
If Trump has lied to his supporters he will lose several of them.
The other little problem is why would Trump throw his own campaign spokeswoman under the bus???
Filing a Lawsuit would show the world he truly was innocent, mad, and not going to take it. He won’t file, for one simple reason, the women identified would be subpoenaed, and depositioned Under Oath.
I think Cruz was more angry at Trump’s stubby finger prints being all over this. He isn’t worried because there is no evidence. He didn’t do it and he made that very clear.
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