The sensationalist websites Politico and Huffington Post (among others) have spread the falsehood that Sarah Palin called David Letterman, as a person, "pathetic," when in fact she referred to the particular joke (i.e., that she dresses like a slutty flight attendant) Letterman had made the previous night.
The goal of news websites these days is to attract readers by posting shocking, bold headlines, even if they're not accurate. "Palin despises Letterman" is a much more spicy narrative than "Palin did not like one joke Letterman made."
In fact, the Huffington Post broke the rules of journalism by re-arranging Palin's words to make it seem as if she attacked Letterman, and not his joke.
Palin's actual words:
"for him to pick up on such as thing..a distortion...that..again..it's based on a slow news day..not having anything else to talk about...that's pretty pathetic, good old David Letterman!"
What the Huffington Post said that Palin said:
"Pretty pathetic, good old David Letterman, that old David Letterman, what a commentary there ... very sad to not recognize what this trip was all about," she said.
While quoting a person, are journalists supposed to shift words around to achieve a desired effect?
Here's the audio via Youtube.
The sad thing is that the Huffington Post felt confident that virtually no one would notice its misleading journalistic malpractice, because
- conservatives are too dumb to notice, and
- liberals will pretend they didn't notice because they hate Palin anyway.
The purpose of this diary is not to slam a left-wing site only. Even Newsmax gets the title right but caves to the temptation in the first paragraph:
Title: Palin Calls Letterman Attack 'Pathetic'
Lead: Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin castigated David Letterman as "pathetic" for his unflattering observations of her on his TV show, including saying she has "slutty flight attendant look."
Newsmax does not make up its mind: What did Palin attack? Letterman's joke? Or Letterman?
Why is all of this important? You may ask.
Simple. If Palin is viewed as having judged Letterman's character on the basis of one single botched joke in his repertoir, then Palin deserves to be called an over-reacting loony. But if she is simply protesting a joke that portrayed her as "slutty," then the situation becomes not nearly as controversial, as any woman would hate the idea of being painted as "slutty," even by a comedian.
Politico did no better.
I'll tell you what's pretty pathetic: American journalism.