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Posted on 10/30/2009 4:53:25 PM PDT by JRochelle
So tell me, how do you write a “news” story about an organization paying for a speaker when you don’t even know if the organization is paying for the speaker?
Ask “journalist” Jonathan Martin. He knows all about it.
You see, Jonny wrote a piss poor story the other day about how the Iowa Family Policy Center will be paying a large speaker fee if Sarah Palin comes to Iowa to keynote the IFPC’s fall funderaiser. The only problem is that Jonny has no sources confirming that any exorbitant fee is being charged or paid.
In fact, he had just the opposite. Bryan English, a spokesman for IFPC told Jonny that he did not know yet if Palin was requesting any fee.
Yet, that didn’t stop Jonny from running with the headline, “Iowa Republicans wince at Sarah Palin’s $100K speaking fee.”
And, Jonny had lots of completely impartial sources who were happy to comment and help him “cobble together” an eleven-hundred word story.
Oh, those sources… they were so shocked at this (unconfirmed) unprecedented occurrence. How dare political operatives get paid obscene amounts of money. And speaking of politicos getting paid obscene amounts of money, Jonny went to a very knowledgeable source on that particular issue, Ed Failor, Jr., of Iowans for Tax Relief fame.
Hey Ed, how much were you paid by the Pataki campaign only to end up submarining it when you had a change of heart and decided McCain was your man? Oh well, at least Ed refrained from calling Palin a jackbooted Nazi, so he did show some self-restraint.
Jonny also got some inside info from David Kochel, who was a top aide to former (and future) presidential candidate, Mitt Romney.
Hey Dave, didn’t I just read a story about how Mitt Romney tried to buy off the Iowa Christian Alliance? I heard you helped facilitate that little scheme. And somehow you are shocked at the thought of a well-known political figure (who very likely isn’t running for president) getting paid a speaker’s fee for (gasp) a public speaking appearance?
Another of Jonny’s sources was the Iowa Christian Alliance’s Steve Scheffler, who is totally impartial given that he runs a competing organization which is dealing with its own scandal.
And then we’ve got Tim Albrecht quoted. He was the Iowa spokesman for Romney’s 2008 caucus campaign.
Hmmm… Between Kochel and Albrecht, this sounds suspiciously like yet another case of former Romney staffers “going rogue” and badmouthing their meal ticket’s perceived competition.
And that leads us back to Jonny Martin himself. He was in charge of writing the Politico’s GOP blog during the 2008 caucus season. And it always seemed like, whenever the Romney people had rumors they wanted to start about other candidates, Jonny was their go-to guy to get those rumors in writing in front of a national audience.
Some things never change.
You’ve raised a question in my mind. Did Geraldine Ferraro ever have anywhere near the kind of support after he VP bid that Gov Palin is enjoying?
Thank you for posting this. Anyone who knows guys like Scheffler know that he doesn’t have a job besides Professional Christian.
Geraldine Ferraro served as a CNN pundit in the 90s. Now she is a part time pundit on Fox. Ferraro did write a book, but it didn’t receive the sales that Palin received so far.
Joy Behar asked on her CNN show, “When are Palin’s 15 minutes up?”
The Left attacks Palin so viciously, because they feel that Palin’s fame is undeserved.
WHAT!!??
Mitt Romney is involved in a scheme???
Why do you people hate him so?
(This is NOT my thread; so ANYone can post here.)
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Iowa conservative “leaders”...Oh what a tangled web they’ve weaved...
It’s interesting that the Right never attacked Ferraro the way the Left came after Palin. I don’t remember any personal attacks against Ferraro, except as they related to her husband. Her candidacy in historical context is more significant than Palin’s and by comparison was a walk in the park.
Of course, Ferraro ran in ‘84 and the whole tenor of politics changed in ‘87 with the introduction of “Borking,” the latest, most glaring example of which is Palin. Nor did Ferraro have to suffer a hate-filled blogosphere, 24 hour media attacks, and an adolescent press corps that was drooling over another of the 4 major party candidates for POTUS/VA. Palin cleverly took all those lemons and made lemonade.
Sorry, Mz. Behar, but those 15 minutes aren’t ending any time soon.
[[No surprise here. Politico is just a liberal whorehouse, a bunch of WaPo sluts who decided to kick their pimp and freelance.]]
Agreed- I used to read politico in the past thinking it was fairly balanced, but lately, it’s becoem very evident they are nothign but a clone of Wapo
Johnathan Martin a magna cum laude graduate of the Jayson Blair school of liberal Hot Tub wet dreams becoming opeds.
Johnathan should stay in Jayson’s Hot Tub and focus on bringing out opeds pushing his Great Gay Agenda: http://search.yahoo.com/search?ei=utf-8&fr=slv8-hptb5&p=Jonathan%20Martin%20%2b%20gay&type=
I for one applaud Free Republic's approach to Romeny Bots. I think it is wise and honest. Some of the very best and most powerful ammunition to defeat Romney is right here on Free Republic because of FR's right approach in letting the RomneyBots fully reveal themselves for the Eddie Haskell connivers they are.
Romney and, I'm sad to say, Fox News. I became disillusioned with Fox during that primary. There was an amazing story and an honest reporter would have seen it whether they liked the candidate or not: Thompson did more faster and with a fraction of the money that it took Romney, let alont the other candidates. I watched feeling sick as I watched Fox Sundays and saw Thompson's name, or his presence in the race at all, scrupulously avoided.
Brit Hume abandoned me and I see him now as no different than the other "We decide, then report" talking tools.
If [Romney] wanted to take a big step, you'd think he'd get out there and make a benchmark speech about what a doodoohead Zero is. But no. He sends seamstresses out with poisoned needles to stab Sarah in the fitting room. What a guy.
Not even close, as I recall.
Ferraro’s selection was more a stunt choice. She was exceptionally underexperienced. Barely 5 years in the House as a backbencher, no executive experience whatsoever (what’s funny is from a federal standpoint, she STILL had more experience than Zero !).
Mondale should’ve gone with whom a lot in the media were expecting, that of then-San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein. She at least had “executive” experience and could claim she had her own leadership baptism by fire when she was thrust into the job following the Moscone-Milk murders.
That might very well have elevated Feinstein’s profile enough (mind you, it wouldn’t have gotten Mondale elected, but perhaps gotten him more votes overall, especially in CA) to have made her the ‘88 nominee for President. At least she’d have had the SF Mayorship to go back to after losing in ‘84.
Ferraro was just a House member, and once she lost as VP following the ‘84 elections, that was it, she was out on her butt. She wasn’t even able to get the nomination for the Senate later on in the ‘90s. Getting the VP selection probably was the worst thing to happen to her.
With their daily segment on Morning Joe, they're a subsidiary of MSNBC.
I have no idea why Hugh Hewitt keeps bringing Mike Allen on his show.
Scratch that...Hewitt is a Romney-bot, so it makes great sense.
Post #34.
I'm gonna hang his "present" vote in NYS-23 like an albatross around his effin' neck. That goes double for Huckabee.
If you recall, Right to Life activists and even a few Bishops questioned, “How could she be a practicing Catholic and support abortion on demand?”. To the Left, that amounts to a smear campaign.
If only for her genuine ability to rally Americans to her, whether in books sales or speaking engagements -- something Obama has failed ever to accomplish without stagecraft; his "popularity" is manufactured and his accomplishments nil -- Palin's fame is most certainly "deserved." That's a pretty rare quality in any politician, let alone an apparently true-blue Limited Government Republican, in case you missed it.
Things I've read about her effectiveness in Alaska also indicate somebody who's a serious player. Obama is empty. Palin is substantial.
I think a lot of Americans want what I want: a Republican who will make it clear that the main goal is to get Government off our backs, out of our hair, and back into the servants' quarters where it belongs. That goes for everything from the First and Second Ammendments to gay "rights" which confer no rights but only take them away. Big government is the problem, and I want a polital party that will approach governance that way -- start hacking at the shackles of Big Government that are crippling American innovation, morality, productivity, prosperity, and liberty both spiritual and financial.
So far, Sarah's looking good in that department.
What I see from Palin is authentic.
God bless this Republic.
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