C'mon NY Times

I may turn out to be VERY wrong on this issue, but I do believe the NY Times is "drinking the Kool Aid" on the Republican conspiracy to "get" former AL governor, Don Siegelman.

For those of you who don't know, Siegelman was indicted and convicted in federal court on charges that he essentially sold a seat on a state board for large contributions to his campaign to bring a lottery to AL. [Note: Guy Hunt, former Republican governor, suffered a similar fate after he left office.]

My opinion on the case was a bit divided. On the one hand, it seemed VERY clear that he did engage in some tit-for-tat fund raising. On the other hand, it seemed to me that lots of politicians were doing the same thing. In the end, I was pleased with the verdict for three reasons. First, it sent a message that politicians could be tried and convicted for shady backroom deals. Second, his entire administration seemed to be one sleazy deal after another -- from the incredibly inflated price he got for his house to the mysterious motorcycle gift he received. I hate to make such judgements, but where there's THAT much smoke, well something likely is on fire. Finally, and I realize this isn't a criminal justice argument at all, I thought he was a lousy governor. He ran on a single idea -- bringing a lottery to AL. Once the voters rejected a lottery in a state-wide referendum, well he sort of just took his ball and went home.

Anyway, ever since his conviction his supporters have been trotting out this "vast right-wing conspiracy" argument. You know who the real culprit was? It was Karl Rove! Was Karl happy that a Democrat attempting a political comeback was facing legal trouble? I'm sure. Would Karl have helped the case if he could? Probably. But what's the evidence backing the Rove conspiracy theory? Well there's a former Republican party "worker" who ties the whole thing to Karl. Problem is no one in the state Republican party claims to really know her. They say at most she was a low-level volunteer on some campaigns. No way, they say, would she have been allowed in on the inner workings of a vast national conspiracy. In a cynical way, that argument makes a lot of sense. On top of that, she keeps throwing out more and more explosive accusations. First, it was mostly things like, "I heard X say that Rove wanted to be kept up to date." Then it moved on to "I was present in a conference call where ..." type claims. Now, months after giving a sworn deposition about the whole thing, she claims Karl Rove personally asked her to try to get photographic evidence of Siegelman engaging in an extra-marital affair. I don't recall the exact details of the story, but I think she said he wanted naked pictures.

As you can probably tell, I'm skeptical of her story. I wouldn't entirely discount the idea of Rove-led conspiracy, as he seems to be a pretty intense, win at all costs, kind of guy. I do, however, have trouble believing he would dirty his hands directly in the mess by asking someone to get dirty pictures of Don. Further, I REALLY can't believe he would ask someone so marginally connected to the Republican party. I'll admit it, I'm suspicious of the woman's motives.

So how does this relate to the NY Times? Well this past weekend 60 Minutes ran a big story on the Siegelman case and the claims of a Republican set-up. [I hate all such "news" programs, but that's another post for another day.] During the week leading up to the program, there was much talk in the local media about the coming story -- "don't miss this week's episode!" and things like that. Well it just so happened that there was a "technical glitch" of some sort at the local CBS station during part of the Siegelman story. Yes it was embarrassing to them and it made them the butt of many conspiracy-related jokes, but WHNT (I believe) did all it could to atone. They replayed the segment during the 10:00 news and then again on the 6:00 news the next night. Still, some have latched onto the fact that WHNT is owned by a media company that has ties to Bush and the national Republican party.

When the right-wing crazies concoct these weird theories (e.g., the Vince Foster suicide), I don't recall the NY Times writing editorials furthering them. Yet, they chose to weigh in on this issue:

In 1955, when WLBT-TV, the NBC affiliate in Jackson, Miss., did not want to run
a network report about racial desegregation, it famously hung up the sign:
“Sorry, Cable Trouble.” Audiences in northern Alabama might have suspected the
same tactics when WHNT-TV, the CBS affiliate, went dark Sunday evening during a
“60 minutes” segment that strongly suggested that Don Siegelman, Alabama’s
former Democratic governor, was wrongly convicted of corruption last year.
[...]
In this case, if the blackout was intentional, it may also have
been counterproductive. Rather than take attention away from allegations that
Mr. Siegelman was the victim of a partisan campaign, WHNT’s technical glitch
seems to lend support to the charge.

This is too much. First, notice the claim that the 60 Minutes segment "strongly suggested" that Siegelman was wrongly convicted. Of course the segment strongly suggested that -- it's what those programs do. They take a multi-faceted issue and then air a strongly leaning version designed to inspire righteous indignation among the viewers. That's why people watch!

Further, the Times' stance reeks of regional snobbery. Do they really suppose that this devious plot to keep the segment off the air in the HSV market would have kept anyone from knowing about the claims. The story had been in the news for days before the program aired. Plus, the HSV area is the most tech-savvy part of the state! I guarantee that many interested viewers had already watched the segment online by the time WHNT was able to rebroadcast it. Finally, as the Times admits, such a plot would not even work in today's information age. Everyone knew about the story and any attempt to block it at the local level would have been doomed to this exact fate -- generating additional attention to the story. Don't you think the "masterminds" that were able to get an innocent man convicted in federal court would have figured that out? I seriously doubt the NY Times would have even considered such a plot could have worked on a more "sophisticated" population. Rubes in AL, though, well heck, just keep them in the dark.

The whole thing makes me angry.