Posted on 01/12/2010 6:06:24 AM PST by kristinn
Huffington Post reporter Mayhill Fowler reveals today that she intentionally ignored reporting former President Bill Clinton's adulterous relationship with an unnamed mistress during his wife Hillary's campaign for the 2008 Democratic party presidential nomonation.
Fowler writes she knew the state of the Clintons' marriage had national security implications as she notes that Democratic voters were falsely comforted thinking the former two-term president would be by Hillary's side in bed at the White House when the "3 a.m." phone call came. But that was not enough for her to report the truth so the voters could decide for themselves. Huffington Post, the liberal, supposed alternative to the gatekeepers in the mainstream media became the same gatekeepers that they allegedly detested.
Fowler published the story today at the Huffington Post based on excerpts of her book, Notes from a Clueless Journalist: Media, Bias and the Great Election of 2008, available tomorrow as an E-Book on Amazon.
At the time I covered the rally in Victoria, I had decided not to follow up on another story about Bill Clinton that had come my way--one involving his longtime mistress. I mention the nature of the Clinton story with some specificity now only because months later, after the Democratic primaries, the National Enquirer wrote about the relationship. In Texas, staring this story in the face, immediately I turned aside. If I know all about this woman, then surely every national reporter does and is as wary of the story as I am. Nevertheless, I was careful never to mention anything to anybody at OffTheBus. I rationalized the refusal to follow through by telling myself that Clinton's private life was peripheral to the race. But then there came a moment in the Texas primary when the nature of the Clinton marriage suddenly appeared front and center.
A difference between Election 2008 and preceding presidential races is that only one political ad for TV had as much impact as any of half-a-dozen YouTube videos. The brilliant television ad was the "3 A.M. crisis phone call at the White House" that the Clinton Campaign ran in Texas before the primary. The Clinton team knew Texans--folks obsessed with all things big, including such big prospects as national security. So the red phone ad, as it was sometimes called, was powerful persuasion. If I heard a Texan say it once, I heard it a hundred times: thank goodness Hillary will have Bill next to her at 3 A.M. By late February, a piece that gave depth to this naïve view of the Clintons' relationship was suddenly something to think about. But in fact I never really considered it. Executing such a story could have had consequences for the mistress's children, who were still minors. There was no way I would write something that I knew in advance would mortify a high school student in front of his peers. My mother's outrage and pain at the political sex scandal that had blighted her adolescence was just too vivid a presence.
So I continued to rationalize. I told myself various truths: many different kinds of loving experiences make a good world; no one except partners themselves know what goes on behind the bedroom door. As a woman who has been married for thirty-six years, I appreciate the complicated and forgiving nature of long attachments. Nuance about the dynamic of a successful marriage had been one of the things lacking in the widely-criticized New York Times piece on John McCain's supposed infatuation with a lobbyist. Therefore, I told myself, the presence of a mistress really does not tell us all that much about the rich relationship between Bill and Hillary Clinton. But, in the end, I passed on the story for personal reasons. And I came to see that family history, which had always been a penumbra belonging to the dead, was shaping my own storytelling.
I'm calling BS (Barbra Streisand) on her rationalizations. She and the Huffington Post wanted to protect the Democrats and did not want to give conservatives the satisfaction of having been proved right yet again about the Clintons and the Democrat party.
I think maybe you over-fixed it?
Why bother covering it up at this point? That’s like trying to hide the fact that Hitler didn’t like Jews.
It would be a story if he WASN’T sleeping around.
Mr. Tauber is chairman of Southfield’s Tauber Enterprises LLC, as well as Kewell Corporation, Carolina Precision Plastics and C Enterprises. Mr. Tauber’s companies process scrap materials for the stainless steel industry and supply plastics. Mr. Tauber also set up a plastic water container manufacturing joint venture with Kibbutz Yakum and has an interest in various hi-tech enterprises through venture capital funds in Israel.
Ugh! Me too.
I never thought I would have come to that conclusion.
I just can’t imagine anyone having a fling with Hillary. But then, I’m a woman.
And she gets her cancer surgery done in the US...not in the socialized Canada “health” system
Pretty good description of the MSM.
Free Willy.
On a related note, is the LA Times ever going to release the video of Obama bashing Israel at a pro-Hamas rally?
Too Late.
LOL!! Nice try. ..She was denied the nomination because the honchos in the Democrap Party thought she had too much baggage. She was toast no matter what Zipperboy did.
Yeah, but that is a sort of a “Democrats are known bed hoppers, so they all get a free pass” defense. But let a Republican or a conservative get caught in an indiscretion, and our friends on the Left whoop it up. Whatever the standard is, it should apply to all like situations, regardless of the politics of the person involved.
Bill’s sexcapades aren’t very relevant to Hillary’s qualifications, because she’d make a lousy President or Secretary of State anyway.
Really? Like we didn’t know he was screwing around? It’s what he does. It’s ALL he does. All the time and he always will. Liberals are so stupid.
I disagree. There would have been no way for Obama to counter public sympathy. Trashing Bill would have meant more sympathy for Hillary.
Ah-Ha! I was pretty sure this is the same woman and was wondering if anyone was going to mention it. I was just about to do the Google on her.
Cover up it’s not what the media reports it’s what they don’t report,see cnnabcnbccbsmsnbc.
She will when a strange rash appears. I can only imagine the germs this man must carry. Yuck.
“Free Willy”
Ha, ha! The perfect nickname for Bill.
My sister-in-law plans on attaching a little pair of paper boxer shorts at half mast on her car’s antenna when Bill goes to meet his maker. A fitting tribute, don’t you think?
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