Thanks for your work and for your follow up.
Posted on 01/26/2006 10:22:20 PM PST by Congressman Billybob
On 12 January, 2006, the New York Times ran an article entitled “Thrust into the Limelight, and for Some A Symbol of Washington’s Bite.” It was a mini-biography of Mrs. Martha-Ann Alito, and it purported to explain the reasons for Mrs. Alito’s tears during her husband Samuel’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. It blamed them on a follow-up question by Senator Lindsay Graham, rather than on the verbal savaging of Judge Alito by the Democrats on the Committee, led by Senator Ted Kennedy.
The Times should have gotten the story right, because one of the three reporters on the story was in their New Jersey Bureau, and based in Caldwell. But they didn’t. Here are the operative paragraphs from that article on the cause of her tears:
She has sat behind him [her husband] all week, a pleasant-looking woman in sensible clothes, peering through rimless glasses as Democrats grilled Judge Alito about his investments and his affiliation with a conservative Princeton alumni group and Republicans tried to provide him some relief.
On Wednesday, one of those Republicans, Mr. Graham, tried to mock the Democrats with a question about the alumni group, which opposed affirmative action.
"Are you really a closet bigot?" Mr. Graham asked, at which point Mrs. Alito drew her hands to her face and left the hearing room weeping.
Source: http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F20C14FD3C5B0C708DDDA80894DE404482
As the article explained, Mrs. Alito is “fiercely protective” of her husband. And she was upset by the attacks on him as if he were dishonest, or a bigot, or a poor judge. But there was an additional reason, much older and much darker than what happened at that hearing. It concerns the fact that Senator Kennedy led the attack against Judge Alito.
Mrs, Alito was born Martha-Ann Bomgardner in Ft. Knox, Kentucky. The family moved with her father’s profession as an air traffic controller to New Jersey, where she attended Rancocas Valley Regional High School in Mount Holly. After earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Kentucky, she returned to New Jersey and became a librarian in the US Attorney’s office, where she met her husband.
Through her husband’s family, she learned of their personal friendship with another young woman who was also an only child. This other woman and her family were staunch Catholics. On occasion, they attended the same church in Roseland, New Jersey, as the Alitos, Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament, one of only two churches in that town of 5,298. The Alitos live in Caldwell, population 7,584, where this other woman graduated from Caldwell College, probably as a commuter student from her home, rather than a resident student.
From the personal memories of this woman that Mrs. Alito got from her husband’s family, and from her own understanding of what it means to be an only child, Mrs. Alito knew of the worst thing that any human being could do to another. She also heard of its impact on the family.
That other woman’s name was Mary Jo Kopeckne. She was killed by Senator Ted Kennedy, in an auto accident on Chappaquiddick Island, Massachusetts, on 18 July, 1969. That was the other reason for Mrs. Alito’s tears.
[Author’s notes: The author did not bother any of the three families referred to here in writing this. All the information was gathered from reputable Internet sources. If the Times puts a competent reporter on the story, it can find the same information. It should also then apologize for its original article, in which the three reporters presented their personal assumptions as facts on the cause of Mrs. Alito’s upset at the hearing.]
John_Armor@aya.yale.edu
How do I know what? I'm not sure what it is you're asking about.
I don't understand your anger here. To me, the writer merely has to do a little editing--maybe just say that this COULD have been going through her mind.
Knowing what she was thinking is the only BS--the rest is fine.
Unless the writer can say he heard from a source that this was the reason she was crying. If not, I do think a little editing is in line, because that's dangerously close to doing what he accuses other writers of doing, substituting his ideas for the facts.
But with just that element removed, the story isn't BS. What's BS other than saying we know what was in her mind at that moment? Looks to me like Mr. Alito's family knew Kopechne. That revelation is far, far more important than the error of imagining what was going through Mrs. Alito's mind...unless a source confirms that part, also.
It WILL put Mrs Alito in a horrible position!
Wow ...I agree that Mrs. Alito's tears were for the despicable pounding the Swimmer was giving her husband .. but you don't catch the brutal irony of the same creep asassinating her husband's honor and character possibly being the same monster whose spinelessness and selfish ego allowed the only daughter of family friends to drown?
The sooner Kennedy is removed from office, the better.
What's your source?
If you have a quote from Mrs. Alito saying that was why she was crying, that would put the claim that she was crying over Kopechne to bed.
She was crying because her husband was being belittled and attacked by the dims
Did Mrs. Alito confirm this? If not, then you can't just assume that.
If she did, this article is false.
Thansk for the info anyway. Although it probably won't take down Toad or even a single DEMon, it is a vital tool in the battle for hearts and minds. We can't let the DSM spin this as "mean Repub makes wife of fascist cry".
Abomination - Pronunciation Key (ah-bom-mi-nay-shun)
n.
1) Abhorrence; disgust.
2) A cause of abhorrence or disgust
[see the Democrat National Party]
Thanks for your work and for your follow up.
It's the same anger that goes against ANY "reality/fiction" writer. It's the same anger that went against that idiot Reagan biographer who wasted his time with the President and wrote fictionalized accounts of what Reagan "thought."
What's not to understand??
Van Cliburn was born in 1934. "
They did have high schools then, my mother told me so.
Years........
I've flown out of McGuire many times, and driven through Mt.Holly. It is a big deal for someone as famous as Kopechne to have been from so small a place. There is a personal connection with that person. It intensifies what people hear about Kennedy. Add to that the Air Force connection. Service people and people with military connections are much more aware than ordinary small town people about the "outside world."
It's generally assumed that she was crying over the Democrats' treatment of her husband. I don't know of any other reason she would be. But if you really want a quote, I remember Orrin Hatch saying that was the case. It was on Drudge just after the incident.
I thought you said your wife left you to run a restaurant in Fiji?
Hey, come on, give The Swimmer a break, he just came out with a children's book......like Tookie Williams.
http://www.ytedk.com/
This may answer some of your questions.
God...none of you people get it!! We ALL understood the creep!! This stupid article says that Mrs. Alito was CRYING over the creep's victim. She was not...as any reasonable person will deduce.
This stupid article puts Mrs. Alito in a horrible postition to have to answer stupid questions in the press. I think it's despicable!!!
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