The allegation would normally be dismissed by political observers as the random musings of a supermarket tabloid -- indeed, the McCain campaign said as much in its statements on Wednesday -- except that the paper has built up a reservoir of legitimacy following its earlier reporting on the John Edwards affair.
In a statement to the Huffington Post, a spokesman for the paper, who promised a larger report next week, tapped into that pool of quasi-respect.
"The National Enquirer's coverage of a vicious war within Sarah Palin's extended family includes several newsworthy revelations, including the resulting incredible charge of an affair plus details of family strife when the Governor's daughter revealed her pregnancy. Following our John Edwards' exclusives, our political reporting has obviously proven to be more detail-oriented than the McCain campaign's vetting process. Despite the McCain camp's attempts to control press coverage they find unfavorable, The Enquirer will continue to pursue news on both sides of the political spectrum."
Clearly, this is a touchy matter. Already, rumors that Palin's youngest son was actually the son of her daughter were batted down. And the McCain campaign has strenuously insisted that the current crop of insinuations is not only false but also potentially libelous.
"The smearing of the Palin family must end. The allegations contained on the cover of the National Enquirer insinuating that Gov. Palin had an extramarital affair are categorically false. It is a vicious lie," said McCain senior adviser Steve Schmidt. "The efforts of the media and tabloids to destroy this fine and accomplished public servant are a disgrace. The American people will reject it."
But the Edwards reporting complicates matters. Just one month ago, conservatives were bemoaning the fact that no major media outlets had the temerity to follow the politically and personally sensitive rumors about the former North Carolina senator's infidelities. Jonah Goldberg, for example, <a href="http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=M2I5MmNhYjVjMzQ1ZGZiYWNmZGNiMzRlNWU5NjMyMzU=";>wrote on the National Review's the Corner in later July that:
"Whatever the merits of the whole Edwards love child story, are we really supposed to believe that one of America's most famous trial lawyers wouldn't sue a publication that printed defamatory and slanderous lies about him? Also, it's worth pointing out that while the Enquirer may or may not be scrupulous in its choice of stories -- that's in the eye of the beholder -- it is pretty scrupulous about its facts. They win lawsuits. They've broken a host of stories the MSM guys couldn't."
Does the MSM now have an obligation to pursue this rumor, however touchy, or at least ask questions?
"The "success" with Edwards no doubt will give them some more credibility, although we should remember that some of the allegations in their "lovechild" stories have been far from proven (although also far from disproven)," wrote Greg Mitchell, editor of Editor and Publisher Magazine.
"Some of their Palin revelations may be quickly firmed up, prove bogus or more likely rest somewhere in-between for awhile. But what will be interesting is whether the Republicans and conservatives and MSM critics who jumped on the MSM and liberals for not quickly embracing the Enquirer's Edwards work will now pooh-pooh the Enquirer when it comes to THIS candidate....:"
And yet, at the same time, the Enquirer's story may be something of a break for the McCain campaign, which has come under siege for the Palin pick. If the Arizona Senator and his aides are able to effectively portray attacks on the Palin as the product of smear, sleaze and innuendo, it clouds those that are more legitimate. And with new attack lines opening up against Palin seemingly every hour, Democrats may be even more hesitant about straying into the tawdry.
The hot mic phenomenon continues to yield fruit. Here Peggy Noonan and former McCain strategist Mike Murphy lament the Palin pick, while they think no one is listening. As Taegan Goddard points out, Noonan contradicts her own column with the statement, “it’s over.”
Last night, CBS News reviewed President Bush’s legacy and noted that it will largely be defined by his misguided invasion of Iraq. During its report, Iraq war apologist Michael O’Hanlon recalled that Bush went to war in a “deliberately cavalier way,” but added that Americans should “be fair” and give Bush credit for their being no WMD in Iraq:
O’HANLON: But let’s also be fair. Iraq now seems to be a quasi-functioning democracy, without weapons of mass destruction, without genocides against its own citizens or attacks against its neighbors. So, to some extent, we’ve got to give the president his due.
Watch it:
Note to O’Hanlon: The fact that Iraq didn’t have WMD is what made Bush’s invasion of Iraq “deliberately cavalier.”
One of the foremost members of that group took the Connecticut Senator to task on Wednesday for his speech at the GOP convention, proclaiming that history would prove this moment to "not be Joe Lieberman's finest hour."
"I think what hit me strongest, was the irony," said Ira Forman, executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council. "How ironic that Joe Lieberman was talking about reaching across the aisle and bipartisanship. Yet, if we are to believe the McCain spin machine Lieberman would be the vice presidential pick and yet there was no way the delegates would have accepted that because he's a Democrat. There was no bipartisanship there."
Forman went on. "At one point he said colleagues like Sen. Obama have cut off funds for our troops while on the battlefield. This attack is not the most honorable. He has said he has wants to go positive and that's what his persona has always been. 'I don't play negative politics.' That's who he professes to be and for a long time we believed it. As we look back upon this in the future this will not be Joe Lieberman's finest hour."
The comments are the first publicly aired criticism of Lieberman to come from the NJDC, ending what had been for over a year a noticeable silence on the Senator's advocacy for John McCain and drift towards Republican politics. Other prominent Jewish figures have not been so willing to bite their tongues. In an interview with the Huffington Post several weeks ago, Steve Rabinowitz, a prominent Jewish political consultant, discussed the personal and professional disenchantment he had felt with the rightward course Lieberman had taken.
"It was a dilemma for me when Joe lost his primary for Senate and I am a big partisan Democrat. And I'm mostly for Democrats. But I sucked it up and pretended to support him in the general election and he promised a million times that he would caucus with the Democrats that he would stay a Democrat. This thing that he is supporting McCain because he is friends, there are a million Senators who are good best friends and drinking buddies with folks from the other side of the aisle: they never endorse them for president, campaign for them, and trash their opponents. He really lost me with the McCain endorsement... I am phenomenally sad that he has done this."
Reached by phone the morning after Lieberman addressed the Republican convention in Minneapolis, Forman hinted at a similarly personal strain he felt towards his former ally.
"I don't know if this is the final straw," he said. "There is a certain reservoir of loyalty and respect that has been drawn upon. I do think that people might understand if not agree with your support of a friend. But the negative stuff, the spouting of the most twisted of partisan of line. I think people are going to say: hey, we disagree with this."
In his speech to the GOP throngs, Lieberman presented himself as a disenchanted Democrat with deep concerns over Barack Obama's foreign policy and lack of experience.
"Senator Obama is a gifted and eloquent young man who can do great things for our country in the years ahead. But eloquence is no substitute for a record -- not in these tough times," said the 2000 Democratic vice presidential nominee. "In the Senate he has not reached across party lines to get anything significant done, nor has he been willing to take on powerful interest groups in the Democratic Party."
The lines were not particularly sharp in the context of other attacks Lieberman has launched at Obama during the campaign. But because they were delivered before the Republican convention, they were particularly hard for Democrats to swallow. And when Lieberman subsequently went on to defend Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's experience and credentials -- a politician with whom, unlike McCain, he does not share close ties -- Forman took objection.
"The phrases that must have stuck in his throat were those when he criticized Obama's lack of experience," said the NJDC head. "'Gov Palin like McCain is a reformer we can believe in and count on.' He knows as well as the rest of us, the reform faÁade is a Potemkin Village. She was for the bridge to nowhere until it was politically untenable. She has lobbied for pork... If I were him that would be a hard line to force out."
Since news broke that Gov. Sarah Palin’s (R-AK) 17-year old daughter, Bristol, is pregnant, it has been widely reported that both Palin and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) oppose comprehensive sex education.
Today, the Washington Post now reports that Palin has actually gone a step further and cut funding for programs to help teen mothers:
After the legislature passed a spending bill in April, Palin went through the measure reducing and eliminating funds for programs she opposed. Writing her initials on the legislation, Palin reduced funding for Covenant House Alaska by more than 20 percent, cutting funds from $5 million to $3.9 million. Covenant House provides programs and shelters for troubled youths, including Passage House, which is a transitional home for teenage mothers.
On its website, Passage House describes itself as a place for young mothers “to live with their babies for up to eighteen months while they gain the necessary skills and resources to change their lives.”
McCain has also supported the Family Support Act in 1988, “required teen mothers who receive public assistance to remain in high school and, in some cases, to live with their parents.” There’s no word yet on whether Bristol will still be attending school during her pregnancy.
Lieberman In 06: I Will Help Obama Reach For The Stars When watching Joeseph Lieberman's Republican National Convention speech, one should remember that not so long ago the Connecticut Senator was touting himself as Barack Obama's mentor, political enabler, and firm advocate. Nowadays, of course, Lieberman's prerogative is to question his colleague's fitness to serve as commander in chief. His backing of John McCain takes precedent over past alliances.
With that in mind, a reader sends over this video from 2006, when the Connecticut Independent-Democrat promised to help Obama "reach to the stars" and "realize not just the dreams he has for himself but the dreams we all have for him and our blessed country."
Some help. How times and politics have changed.
"As far as I am concerned he is a Baruk, which means a blessing, he is a blessing to the United States Senate to America and to our shared hopes for a better safer tomorrow for all our families. The gifts that God has given to Barack Obama are as enormous as his future is unlimited. As his mentor, as his colleague, as his friend, I look forward to helping him reach to the stars and realize not just the dreams he has for himself but the dreams we all have for him and our blessed country."
