National Journal.com

nationaljournal.com > Hotline On Call

Shame On Us

Sure, Hillary Clinton delayed the release of her White House scheds, only agreeing to make them public yesterday, to distract, it seemed, from Barack Obama's brave speech about race in America.

But as reporters begin to weed through the more than 11K documents made available today by the National Archives, several have taken the low road, examining the fmr first lady's schedules around the time the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke or when Vince Foster died. It's cheap. A lousy shameful shortcut.

Why not take a closer look at Clinton's work in the Northern Ireland peace process (which she's claimed on the trail of late without much support)? Or examine her work around the president's failed health care plan? She's said she was instrumental in crafting SCHIP? Yeah, well, prove it.

Here are two examples: TIME, and an ABC News report, headlined: Clinton Was in White House on 'Stained Blue Dress' Day.

Pitiful.

(JENNIFER SKALKA)

7 Comments

Those were the most seriously newsworthy days. It's more likely than not you're going to find newsworthy items around those dates. Is Hotline proposing that they just go through it from beginning to end? I'm sure your editors will be thrilled to be scooped 8 days before you find anything interesting. Please...phony outrage makes me thirsty.

Oh, hooey, Seth. Those weren't newsworthy days -- those were made up scandals that have played out.

She didn't kill Vince Foster.

She didn't have sex with Monica Lewinsky.

The media is a bunch of vultures.
So what else is new?

Anyway, sorry, but this is just out-and-out baloney, Jennifer: "Why not take a closer look at her work in the Northern Ireland peace process, which she's claimed on the trail of late without much support."

"without much support"?

Seriously, do you NOT know that Mr. Ahern was in America for St. Patrick's Day (you know, the guy with the gift of shamrocks for Bush) and he said that anyone who denied her role in N. Ireland was flat wrong.

p.s. HE EVEN SAID HE TALKED ON THE PHONE TO BARACK OBAMA ABOUT IT AND TOLD HIM THAT!

Hillary Clinton's pivotal role in N. Ireland is only slammed by the negative and divisive Barack Obama campaign. And that's just because the negative and divisive Barack Obama had NO ROLE in the N. Ireland peace process.

Gosh, Jennifer, what has happened to your sense of basic fairness?
(Are you too busy chanting "O-bam-a" into the wee hours of the night and don't have enough time to get your basic FACTS straight?)

psst! Just because David Axelrod says it, doesn't mean it's true.

It's hard to get the point of your blog. Are you mad that Hilldog was somewhere while Bill was - how does it go? - ridin' dirty? Are you mad that through the Wright stuff we've gotten a miniscule insight into Sen. Hussein? Or are you just mad?

Ms. Skalka, whatever happened to journalistic objectivity? "Prove it"?

Sigh. Guys, guys. You have to read Jennifer's work in the spirit with which it was written. She has a razor-sharp pen (err, fingers these days, I guess).

1) It's really pretty funny. Don't take it so seriously.

2) There is some good "dirt" to be mined in those schedules. See, e.g., NAFTA support then, opposition now (in some states). How does this square with Obama's private Canadian disclosures? It all goes to hypocrisy and seeing if it's all just politics.

3) But most important: THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YOUR CANDIDATE. There's nothing wrong with a professional in a business criticizing others in the business for being less than competent, especially if some of them are broadcast nets and the like. After all, if you have a few seconds of precious airtime, do you spend it on explaining something complicated like how many meetings it takes to show support for a treaty? Or do you go for the quick ratings "surge" by pointing out that Bill took Monica into a bathroom in the early evening while Hill was one floor above? If you're Fox Entertainment, the question is easy. If you're Fox News, a bit harder. But ABC News? Sigh.

There's a good message here, and it doesn't involve your favorite candidates. It involves the media. Since the media is, bar none, the most important factor in politics today, criticizing media coverage is important.

The real juicy stuff will come when Al F. Gore releases his schedules and we can see what he was doing the day he invented the internet.