Senator and Presidential aspirant Marco Rubio (R-FL) received four tickets over an 18 year span – that\’s one every 4 1/2 years. (His wife got more, but she\’s not running for President). Rubio has also struggled financially.
Barack Obama had a bunch of tickets as well, and major financial troubles – until he hit it big politically and his books took off, along with who knows what else (he was a Democrat machine politician in Chicago: use your imagination).
Last Friday, and again Saturday, Mr. Rubio\’s parking tickets were major – we\’re talking front page – news at the New York Times. And now his financial struggles are getting the same treatment.
Is that fair?
I would say yes…so long as other Presidential candidates with the same issues get the same treatment.
With that in mind, please read the following excerpt from Tim Graham\’s blog at newsbusters.org:
Rubio, they wrote, struggled under student loan debt until he managed to make money with a 2012 book (“financial salvation” the Times called it). Rubio also liquidated a retirement account, incurring taxes and penalties. And he sold a house at a loss.
Eight years ago, an investigation would have shown that the Obamas struggled under huge student loan debt until his books became best-sellers (Dreams From My Father originally came out in 1995). Obama received 15 outstanding parking tickets from 1988 to 1991 when he was at Harvard – tickets he didn\’t even pay until January 2007, a couple of weeks before he announced his presidential campaign.
But a Nexis search shows the Times didn\’t write about the Obamas\’ student loan troubles in 2007, or Barack Obama\’s parking tickets at Harvard, when Obama was in the same position as Rubio, a freshman Senator running for his party\’s nomination.
Could the double standard possibly be more overt?
Now why would the New York Times obsess over Marco Rubio\’s parking tickets and his financial situation, after considering neither to be of any importance when it was Barack Obama in the same situation at the same point in his political career?
Could it possibly be the difference between having an R after his name, rather than Mr. Obama\’s D?
Media bias? Naaahhhh.
