Some Democrats are holding up a column by Robert Novak as "proof" of Hillary Clinton's "character issues".
So...the next time Bob Novak runs a column or goes on television and
says something like this (From MediaMatters Fri, Jan 14, 2005 )
NOVAK: Howard Dean is running for Democratic National Chairman the same way he ran for president: as the squeaky clean candidate. Well, he may have been squeaky, but he wasn't so clean. Zephyr Teachout, who was head of Internet outreach for the Dean campaign, has revealed the campaign hired two political bloggers to say positive things about Dr. Dean at the price of $3,000 a month -- that's play for pay. Meanwhile, one of the great former DNC chairmen, Bob Strauss, has endorsed one of the candidates, and it is indeed former Congressman Martin Frost, who, like Strauss, is a moderate and a Texan. Will the DNC members be that smart?
, you folks will generally agree that "he's pretty accurate, mostly"?
...and Fox News does some pretty good reporting on the war, right?
Let's remember who Bob Novak is, shall we (below the fold)...
This is what Bob Novak "reported" about the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth in 2004:
From the August 7 edition of CNN's The Capital Gang:
NOVAK: There's a new book out called Unfit for Command about his [Kerry's] record. I've read it all. It's coming out it'll be published soon. It is a shocking presentation of Senator Kerry's record. I just couldn't believe some of the things in there -- very carefully documented.
Margaret, these are not partisan Republicans. They're not Republicans at all. They're Naval personnel. They're not interested in [President] George [W.] Bush. One of the authors of the book told me he would have voted for John Edwards if he were nominated. Not particular Bush fans, but they just are appalled by John Kerry.
Now, I have some question whether 30 years later you should be inspecting the minutiae, the record of John Kerry, which is a very questionable record, how he got his decorations, his very short term of duty, four months of combat, one third of the time. But the fact of the matter is, he brought it on himself by concentrating at the convention and in the campaign on not his Senate record but his war record to try to bring about support from the middle and the center of the road.
Here's his Wikipedia entry:
"Robert Novak
Swift Boat Veterans:
In August 2004, after other journalists had reported on it, Novak admitted that his son, Alex Novak, is the Director of Marketing for the Swift Boat Veterans' publisher, Regnery Publishing. At the time he said that he didn't "think it relevant." Two months later Salon.com reported that Regnery's owner is also the publisher of Novak's own US$297 (annual rate) newsletter and that Novak is on the board of a foundation whose chief holdings are the stock of Regnery's parent company.[7]"
Entrenched Washington ghouls like Novak routinely take minute crumbs of truth they "overhear", bake scandal-bomb cakes, and then throw DC parties (to which everybody is invited).
Remember: Novak took a tangential kernel of reality--that Valerie Plame was secretly CIA, and that her husband was Joe Wilson--and then told an enormous lie about it (that nobody of any importance in the Bush Administration ever saw Wilson's report debunking "Saddam bought nuclear weapons material" before the war, and that the pro-Clinton Wilson got himself sent by his CIA wife on a boondoggle to discredit the Bush administration) on behalf of Karl Rove to besmirch the credibility of war opponents.
Here's some more on Novak...
...and some more...
...I could go on like this for days...
Are you people really going to validate innuendo written by Bob Novak before going into a campaign season?
He promoted Swift Boat Veterans for Truth!
Isn't that cutting off your nose to commit suicide?
(in the interest of full disclosure, I have given money to the Dodd campaign [after his FISA stand], but am undecided in terms of supporting a primary candidate)