For Whose Campaign Is Mike Allen Working?

A little unfinished 2007 business …

I’m not sold on Politico.

[UPDATE, Jan 4: Neither does RedState: "Crack Whores Run The Politico"]

Rolled out by Washington insiders as an attempt to stanch the bleeding of the print media, a sort of internet/print hybrid, they’ve been hungry in this, their first year.

Perhaps a bit TOO hungry.

The first big “scoop” was, of course, Ben Smith’s revelation that John Edwards was going to DROP OUT of the presidential race because of his wife’s cancer.

(Whoops!)

The next big scoop was Mike Allen’s revelation that Rudy Giuliani had been caching his travel expenses in obscure accounts … purportedly to hide his visits to his mistress. You might recall the media firestorm about it, on November 30.

Only one problem: Turned out not to be exactly true. Giuliani wasn’t using the “secret” accounts to visit his mistress (now his wife). But the whiff of scandal was what was important, and, given the “catch” involved, I wasn’t in the least suspicious. (Mike Allen had covered Giuliani for the New York Times in an earlier reportorial incarnation, the newspaper which, coincidentally, repudiated his story.)

But then, Mike Allen shows up with ANOTHER “scoop” on December 21: Witnesses had come forward claiming to have SEEN George Romney (Mitt’s dad) marching with Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1963 saying, in part:

Basore said she was very angry about how the issue has been covered on cable television.

“This very arrogant guy on TV questioned Mitt Romney, and I marched with them,” Basore said. “I hope that the campaign demands an apology. I want him to publicly apologize to me. That was a personal insult, and an insult to Mitt Romney.”

Basore said she called the campaign, and the campaign supplied her contact information. [with Allen]

Another witness, Ashby Richardson, 64, of Massachusetts gave the campaign a similar account.

“I’m just appalled that the news picks this stuff up and say it didn’t happen,” Richardson, now a data-collection consultant, said by phone. “The press is being disingenuous in terms of reporting what actually happened. I remember it vividly. I was only 15 or 20 feet from where both of them were.”

And, suddenly, you might have noticed that the “scandal” went away.

Except …

The documentary evidence was clear. The Martin Luther King, Jr. papers’ curator, researchers, newspapers, etc. all failed to turn up any documentary linkage, other than a 1967 David S. Broder citation that got the DATE of the march itself wrong.

Great “spin control.” And the admission that the Romney campaign SENT the witnesses to Mike Allen to “break” the story.

But I’m not buying it.

Frankly, I have an exceptional memory (as has been noted by friends and family with the trite, annoying phrase: “How do you REMEMBER all that stuff?”)

But I don’t remember where I was or what I was doing in 1963 all that well. I remember seeing John F. Kennedy speak at the Wyoming Field House in September 1963, but I only remember snatches: the strange “bark” flooring that our folding chairs were shakily balanced on, the Future Farmers of America logos on the backs of the two teens sitting in front of me and Kennedy’s strange pronunciation of Soda Ash: “soderash.”

So, I don’t believe eyewitness accounts separated by forty-four years. Sorry. One of the truths of journalism is this: there is no final truth. Your mind plays tricks on you. Witnesses’ minds play tricks on them.

[See: The Secret Life of Waffler Mitty]

And listen to Mike Allen ladle it on (note his “conclusion” not backed by the facts):

Until this week, that was just a vivid memory for a sweet retiree who now lives in Pompano Beach, Fla.

But Basore’s memory became important this week when news accounts questioned the recollections of the late Michigan governor’s son, Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts governor.

News stories suggested that Romney was exaggerating. It turns out that he may not have attended the Grosse Pointe march, but it certainly happened. (emphasis added)

Because Mike Allen says so? Don’t make me laugh. He’s overstepped his bounds as a reporter and drifted into partisan land. But then, he seems to have pretty straightforward button-down conservative GOP and newspaper credentials. From his bio on Politico:

Before turning to national politics, he covered schools and local governments in rural counties outside Fredericksburg, Va., for The Free Lance-Star, then wrote about Doug Wilder, Oliver North, Chuck Robb and the Bobbitts for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, where he nurtured police sources on overnight ride-alongs through housing projects. Allen also covered Mayor Giuliani, the Connecticut statehouse and the wacky rich of Greenwich for The New York Times. Before moving to The Times, he did stints in the Richmond and Alexandria bureaus of The Washington Post. Allen grew up in Orange County, Calif., and has a B.A. from Washington and Lee University, where he majored in politics and journalism.

So, I have to wonder why he’s pimping so hard for a point of view.

Mike Allen is the chief political correspondent for Politico. He comes to us from Time magazine where he was their White House correspondent. Prior to that, Allen spent six years at The Washington Post, where he covered President Bush’s first term, Capitol Hill, campaign finance, and the Bush, Gore and Bradley campaigns of 2000.

OK, he’s hobnobbed in what seems to be Establishment Republican circles for a long time (you don’t cover ‘em that long if they hate your coverage, especially in the Bush White House). So we can draw some inferences there. And from the stickers on his suitcase.

But I weight documentary evidence above partisan (remember, they CONTACTED the Romney campaign, not a reporter) recollections spoon-fed to a seemingly sympathetic reporter. The Giuliani “scoop” seems logical. But the Romney “scoop” calls both into question.

Who is Mike Allen working for?

And there are two very important logical points that were dropped by the incurious, unthinking popular press, who never ask the next question (in this case, WHO does this revelation benefit?) nor do the back analysis.

Perhaps, my cynicism aside, it actually happened. For the sake of argument, let’s say that it DID (even though there are no photos, no documents, no reports, just two senior citizens provided by the Romney Campaign who think they remember it).

Remember the eleven words? “I saw my father march with Martin Luther King.”

The Detroit Free Press (emphasis added):

“He was speaking figuratively, not literally,” Eric Fehrnstrom, spokesman for the Romney campaign, said of the candidate.

The campaign was responding to questions raised by the Free Press and other media after a Boston publication challenged the accuracy of Mitt Romney’s account.

In a major speech on faith and politics earlier this month in Texas, Mitt Romney said: “I saw my father march with Martin Luther King.”

(And, this BONUS gem, in defense: “When we say I saw the Patriots win the World Series, it doesn’t necessarily mean you were there.”)

Romney admitted that he didn’t actually “see” it, and went into conniptions about what the meaning of “see” was.

If, in fact, it was true, then certainly, the “see” portion was a lie. And the coverup was an indisputable admission that it was a lie.

So, even the presence of eyewitnesses (of which Mitt, admittedly wasn’t one) doesn’t detract from the ‘meat’ of the story: Mitt Romney and the Truth aren’t on speaking terms. And this isn’t a new story.

As far as its political legitimacy? Well, after seven years of a serial and seemingly pathological liar in the White House, honesty is a legitimate election issue. And it’s not an issue that Mitt can win on, thus the satanic dodge of dredging up little old ladies who “remember” events from forty-four years ago that there is no documentation of.

And the whole post-coverup “spin” only serves to underscore Mitt’s mendacity.

Some “scoop” Mike Allen. Yessireebob.

But the fascinating story here is how quickly the media dropped the story when a reporter — who was admittedly being set up by the Romney campaign — published his second “scoop” in a month materially affecting the GOP presidential campaign from what one might infer is a less than disinterested basis.

And, of course, that’s the hat trick for Politico. Three phony major “scoops” this year. I think they’re trying so hard to put themselves “on the map” that they’re being dangerously sloppy. And, in this presidential season, that’s three strikes for the pompous pundits at Politico.

No, I’m not sold on Politico.

Courage.

And Happy New Year. The annus horribilis 2007 is ended. 2008? We’ll see.

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