Glenn Greenwald: The Dan Gerstein sham

[babylonsister]

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/04/27/akers/index.html

Glenn Greenwald
Friday April 27, 2007 09:28 EST
The Dan Gerstein sham

(updated below)

On Tuesday of this week, Hillary Clinton wrote for a post for FireDogLake regarding a bill she has sponsored in Congress, the Paycheck Fairness Act, which is designed to "toughen the penalties for violating the Equal Pay Act." Clinton then participated in the comment section of the post, responding to questions and comments from FDL's bloggers and readers.

The following day, The Washington Post's Mary Ann Akers, wrote a piece claiming that Clinton's posting at FDL "is raising a few eyebrows in Democratic political circles." This is so, she asserts, because "in Democratic political circles Hamsher is better known as the author of a racially offensive attack against Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.)." Akers then "reports" this:

A day after Clinton's post appeared on firedoglake.com, Democratic activists in various corners privately questioned the wisdom of the Clinton campaign in choosing to write for a blog associated with Hamsher.

Who are the "Democratic activists in various corners" complaining? She cites a grand total of two people -- one who is a "Hillary backer" who cowardly agreed to express these views only anonymously. Why grant anonymity to someone like this to do nothing more than express some sort of run-of-the-mill political criticism? Why deprive readers of knowing who that person is, to assess their importance, influence and credibility? Granting anonymity to people to spout little more than garden-variety political gossip is the sign of a reporter desperate to manufacture controversy in order to have something to write.

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