Don't Go Into The Light

H/T Think Progress, where there's a video and transcript posted. They briefly discuss the accusations made about Congressman Kolbe. (Disclaimer - I haven't followed the story about Kolbe and will not discuss it save to say that if he preyed on a child, he's absolute scum and deserves any bad consequence the law allows. If he didn't, he deserves some big apologies from those making the accusation.)

Washington Post reporter Dana Milbank was on Olbermann's show last night with not one, but two interesting admissions about media motives (well, at least his) in scandal coverage:

OLBERMANN: We know very little about these allegations, at least from Congressman Kildee’s remarks, and if it is Congressman Kolbe of Arizona, it’s important to stress we know nothing about the actual allegation yet, nor the investigation. But did the scandal, by dint of this one mention from Mr. Kildee, just get another set of legs?

MILBANK: Legs would be the least offensive body part. But, yes, we–Jim Kolbe is retiring, so it’s not necessarily a big deal about him. Already, there are rumors now about a third, this one involving a 16-year-old girl. That’s been swirling around Washington today.

To Dana, Kolbe isn't important since he's retiring. Can't harm him politically, eh, Dana? But this other rumor - if it's a Republican running for re-election, now that's a big deal. Nice sense of humanity, huh?

OLBERMANN: Congressman Kildee had complained that he had been shut out by the Republican chairman of the page board when he had learned about Mark Foley’s conduct in the fall of 2005. Presumably, he testified to that before the House Ethics Committee. We–do we know more than the presumption? And do we know if they’re taking it as evidence of a coverup, or how they’re treating that testimony?

MILBANK: Well, it’s hard to know exactly what the Ethics Committee is doing. But clearly, the public has made its decision. There’s a poll out today saying 57 percent of the people believe that there was, in fact, a coverup, 77 percent saying it was handled badly.

In other words, all that matters is public perception. Truth doesn't matter as the media's flogging of this story has been effective.

Should the Ethics committee clear Hastert (and I'm not saying they will), I wonder how hard "responsible" reporters like Dana will try to correct that perception?

Considering that Dana joked with Olbermann about an accusation involving an adult with a minor before dismissing it as no big deal because no political hay could be made of it, I think we know the answer. Disgusting. And jeers to Nico and the commenters for not catching it.