Walgreen’s Drug Stores uses the catchy, clever slogan “At the corner of happy and healthy”. That, obviously is a very good place to be.
Unfortunately, some – way too many – media personalities are stuck at the corner of ignorant and partisan. That, just as obviously, is not a very good place to be .
Case in point: CNN’s Poppy Harlow.
This weekend, while Ms. Harlow was interviewing Ohio Republican Matt Borges, she turned the talk to presidential aspirant John Kasich and “birtherism” – the term used for a belief that Barack Obama was born outside of the United States. Here, pulled from Brad Wilmouth’s piece at newsbusters.org, is a transcript of what followed:
POPPY HARLOW: But what about those who argue, “Where was Kasich? Where were the other members of the GOP establishment during the past few years as some in the party attacked the President, President Obama with false claims, talking about where he was born, his citizenship, and many of them just stood by? Where was he then?”?
MATT BORGES, OHIO REPUBLICAN PARTY CHAIRMAN: Well, John Kasich has been running a positive campaign throughout this entire effort in his run for President, and I don’t think anyone would ever argue anything otherwise. All those things you brought up were actually created by the Democrats, were created by Hillary Clinton in 2008, and some of the-
HARLOW: What? What? Wait, wait.
BORGES: -wild things that Donald Trump says, we just don’t think are representative of our party-
HARLOW: What, what do you, wait, what do you mean? What do you — what do you mean? What do you mean when you say those were created by Hillary Clinton? What do you mean?
BORGES: I mean the, I mean the birther movement. I mean, I mean the birther movement. I mean the notion that-
HARLOW: You’re saying Hillary Clinton is to blame for the birth-
BORGES: -somehow Barack Obama was a secret Muslim. Those things came out of the-
HARLOW: You’re saying Hillary Clinton is to blame for the birther movement?
BORGES: Those things came out of the 2008, those things came out of the 2008 very ugly Democratic primary that went on on their side that lasted until June, and then of course Barack Obama became their nominee and then ended up winning the presidency, so-
HARLOW: Can you clarify for me how you’re pointing to Hillary Clinton for starting the birther movement against the current President?
BORGES: Well, I think it’s well-documented that that was, in fact, where this all came from, the 2008 primary that the Clinton campaign started these rumors about Barack Obama, and they were still able to come together as a family for the Democratic party. Our party will heal, and, on Tuesday, when John Kasich wins the Ohio primary, we’ll start to set this election on a much different course.
HARLOW: All right, Hillary Clinton, just, we’re gonna move on, but Hillary Clinton never asked for the President’s, you know, then-Senator Barack Obama’s birth certificate. Donald Trump led a lot of it, and a lot of people, and Mitt Romney wanted Donald Trump’s endorsement and got it at the time, and he was the leading candidate on your side.
First off, Mr. Borges’ claim that Hillary Clinton floated the prospect that Barack Obama was not born in the United States is absolutely, unequivocally, 100% correct.
Even politifact.com, which is so partisan it might as well be an arm of the DNC, had to concede it came out of the Clinton camp:
The allegation about Obama’s birthplace tracks back to the bruising 2008 Democratic primary between Obama and Clinton. According to a Telegraph article, as early as April 2008, a Clinton supporter passed around an email that questioned where Obama was born.
“Barack Obama’s mother was living in Kenya with his Arab-African father late in her pregnancy,” it said. “She was not allowed to travel by plane then, so Barack Obama was born there and his mother then took him to Hawaii to register his birth.”
The cry that Obama was not a legitimate candidate grew much louder in June 2008.
On June 7, 2008, Clinton conceded and called for all Democrats to rally behind Obama.
Actually, the article did not say a single Hillary supporter passed around the email, it said the email was “circulated by supporters of Ms. Cilnton” – as in some number of them, not just one.
I guess maybe somebody should have done a politifact check on politifact.
Also, the politifact writeup somehow neglected to note that, although the email got a great deal of press coverage, there is no record of Hillary Clinton contesting or in any way disavowing it. She may not have personally had it written (that we know of), but she certainly did not have any problem allowing it, for months, to be used by her supporters to take down Barack Obama, did she?
Even when Ms. Clinton conceded on June 7, she did not say “oh, by the way, now that the campaign is over I think he was born in the USA”. You can read her entire – very lengthy – concession speech by clicking here. Try and find it.
So, going back to Poppy Harlow, the fact that she was taken aback so completely by Matt Borges’ statement of fact (not claim, but statement of fact) that the “birtherism” came from Hillary Clinton and her 2008 campaign, demonstrated ignorance.
The partisanship came out when, confronted with this in a way that she could not just push aside,Ms. Harlow tried to deflect it by saying “All right, Hillary Clinton, just, we’re gonna move on, but Hillary Clinton never asked for the President’s, you know, then-Senator Barack Obama’s birth certificate.
Uh….if Poppy Harlow didn’t even know that Hillary Clinton’s campaign was pushing the birther claim, how could she possibly know whether Hillary Clinton asked for Barack Obama’s birth certificate? The answer, of course, is that it would have been impossible for her to know one way or the other. Therefore, this was a visceral “defend Hillary” reaction, based on nothing but partisanship.
Call me a purist, but I think Ms. Harlow owes her viewers, and her network, an apology for acting so far outside the norms for professional broadcast journalism.
Somehow I doubt it will be forthcoming.
