WaPo’s “Mitt the Bully” piece runs into problems
[Posted by Karl]
The WaPo’s lengthy hit piece on Mitt Romney, leading with a 1965 incident in which Romney and high school pals gave John Lauber (a fellow student) a forced haircut, was definitely distraction du jour. But a couple of problems have cropped up with the story.
First, the WaPo story originally reported that Stu White had “long been bothered” by the incident, but White told ABC News he was not aware of it until this year when he was contacted by the Washington Post. The WaPo has now airbrushed this section of the story to read:
“I always enjoyed his pranks,” said Stu White, a popular friend of Romney’s who went on to a career as a public school teacher and said he has been “disturbed” by the Lauber incident since hearing about it several weeks ago, before being contacted by The Washington Post.
As I write this, the WaPo has failed to append a note about the alteration of the story, in an apparent violation of the the WaPo’s corrections policy. Moreover, the new WaPo version remains at odds with White telling ABC he had not heard of it until he was contacted by the WaPo.
Second, it appears that the Lauber family is not happy with the WaPo hit piece. Christine Lauber — who appears to be quoted in the WaPo story — told ABC News she and her sisters will likely put out a statement later via a family attorney.
“If he were still alive today, he would be furious [about the story],” she said with tears in her eyes.
The NYT’s Ashley Parker has been tweeting bits of what that statement may contain. Although the Lauber family did not refute the haircut story, they say the portrayal of John is “factually incorrect.” The family adds: “We are aggrieved that John would be used to further a political agenda.”
It will be tough for the media to use the victimization of John Lauber as a cudgel against Mitt Romney if Lauber’s family thinks the media are the ones doing the victimization.
–Karl
Ding!
Karl (6f7ecd) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:15 pmThe problem for the left is that they are still using the Alinsky play book without taking into account the new media. To paraphrase Twain, no longer can a lie make it half way round the world before the truth can get its boots on.
Gazzer (571a9f) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:23 pmThank Buddah!
This just makes you sick to your stomach. Oh please Lauber family, sue and shame Phillip Maxwell, the lawyer who called the alleged haircut assault and battery. Is there anyone who doesn’t think that the Maxwell cat got the old gang together, softened them up, and “refreshed” the “details” in their memories so Axe could tip off the WaPo and tell them exactly who to interview for the hit piece?
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:39 pmElissa, they got plenty more stories teed up and ready to go. It is surely no coinky dink that this 5000 word travesty appeared just after Barry’s flip flop, oops I mean evolution.
Gazzer (571a9f) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:41 pmNow, they’re probably investigating Romney’s nursery school records. “He spilled fruit punch on Jimmy Thompson’s head during an argument about possession of a fire truck !”
…and still no Obama college transcripts !
I wish someone like Donald Trump would offer a million dollars to the charity of Obama’s choice if he would just sign off on the release of his official college transcripts from Occidental, Columbia, and Harvard.
“C’mon, Barack, I’ll sign over a million dollars to the Boys and Girls Club of Washington DC if you just sign off on releasing your transcripts. Don’t you want to help those underpriviliged children ? Or are your transcripts reallllly that bad ?”
Elephant Stone (0ae97d) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:47 pmI just don’t know how they got it past their multiple layers of fact checkers. 🙂 You’d think at the very least someone at WaPo, or somebody who linked it elsewhere, or at least one producer who headlined it on all the news shows today might have said, “hey, did anybody contact the alleged ‘victim’s’ family for a quote on how they feel about it? Maybe we should do that!”
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:52 pmTommy Christopher must be on vacation.
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:54 pmlooks like National Soros Radio hasn’t kept up with these new developments
that would mean going outside of what narrative stenographer duty usually entails
happyfeet (3c92a1) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:55 pmFailed to check with the Lauber family before characterizing John Lauber as a homosexual in a political hit job story?
What could go wrong?
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:55 pmHey @jasondhorowitz I eagerly await hard hitting expose on my HS years in WaPo. Will be boring – I was a saint! #Hack #JournoList #JuiceBox.
@NotReallyBarack (f81f1b) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:56 pmIt would be interesting to see what kind of background Phillip Maxwell has, especially politically. Hopefully someone can do this research. This story seem way to convenient.
Ipso Fatso (7434b9) — 5/10/2012 @ 9:58 pmKarl
good catch on the airbrushing. if you can document it meticulously enough you could get a lot of play with that. I mean, if you look at my piece on the airbrushing of that o’donnell story early on in my tenure as guest poster, you can see that ended up being a big deal.
Aaron Worthing (73a7ea) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:03 pmIpso–the original article which is linked above states Maxwell is a lawyer and that most of the “classmates” who were interviewed lean left. Was there something else you needed to know?
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:05 pmelissa,
Tommy isn’t on vacation but suffice it to say his drivel tonight is not worth linking to. His panties are in a twist and he’s hyperventilating…. nasty and mean along the lines of,
Here’s hoping Iran looks sufficiently faggoty for President Romney.
Dana (4eca6e) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:13 pmAaron–Retracto the Correction Alpaca is on the case and I am pretty sure knows all about the airbrushing since it coincidentally occurred right after Retracto contacted the WaPo about doing a correction.
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:16 pmDana–Tommy’s prolly just steamed that he didn’t get fed the big scoop this time. I can see why he’d be surprised, too, since he did such a bang up job for them with Betty and Veronica and mom that other time.
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:20 pmIran is up to the challenge I think
happyfeet (3c92a1) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:22 pmWhenever I hear liberals offer up a story like this to attempt to take the high road, I remind them of a lion of a liberal who left his lover to drown in the Bay of Chappaquiddick.
AZ Bob (1c9631) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:26 pmthe other part of the story was a lot the spotlight on the childhood of privilege and entitlement Mr. Governor Romney enjoyed
and that’s getting completely obscured in the eagerness of the dirty socialist obamawhore media to paint him as a bashy bashy gay-basher
and since they’re not exactly selling the gay-basher angle it kinda looks like he’s coming out of this as well as could be hoped
so far
happyfeet (3c92a1) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:31 pmMr Feets–do you have any of your always excellent ideas for what to put on the cake (or pillow) for this situation?
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:37 pmhow about “prep school ain’t beanbag”
happyfeet (3c92a1) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:43 pmAnd local ABC in L.A. tonight offered the three-fer: Obama’s evolved view on gay marriage and Teh Clooney party!, Mitt’s bullying and “more on national news tonight”.
But it’s just a coincidence. Really! 😉
Patricia (e1d89d) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:50 pmOMG Patricia! Are you breathing, like, the same air as Clooney and teh One tonite?
elissa (9b36ed) — 5/10/2012 @ 10:57 pmThere are much better stories about Obama and Punahou School.
I mean the place is located on 76 acres in the middle of fricking Oahu — how much money do you think that land is worth?
The sense of entitlement from Punahou kids dwarfs anything described in the piece about Cranberry.
shipwreckedcrew (4cabc6) — 5/10/2012 @ 11:11 pmI really need to journal about all the bad things I did in high school….and college….and after college….and well just never mind.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/10/2012 @ 11:33 pmWhy didn’t this story come out while Romney was running for governor in 2002?
Lauber was alive. He knew who Mitt was. If he wanted to come forward, he would have.
Now that he’s dead, they can say anything about him.
They can exaggerate the story, manufacture a narrative (by telling former classmates about the story who didn’t even know it, and then reporting on how “disturbed” they are), etc.–now that Lauber is out of the way.
Daryl Herbert (dac5fb) — 5/11/2012 @ 12:12 amGazzer, I have to point out that it was ABC News that broke both problems (so far) with the WaPo piece. Yes, it is a new media section of ABC News, but it is nice to see at least someone in the legacy media is doing honest reporting.
max (131bc0) — 5/11/2012 @ 1:30 amMaxwell,being an attorney , will have no problem spinning this. It’s what lawyers do.
sickofrinos (44de53) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:19 amthis turn of events is both unexpected and unprecedented…
redc1c4 (403dff) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:46 amComment by Daryl Herbert — 5/11/2012 @ 12:12 am
Why didn’t this story come out while Romney was running for governor in 2002?
Because they don’t usually run stories like that. For one thing, he was almost a juvenile, and he certainly under 21. They don’t usually go into things people did before graduating from college. And it would probably boomerang on anyone who tried to use it.
Now, the newspapers probably didn’t know it, but there are probably worse things that he did that they did know (from the human, not “politically incorrect” perspective)
Lauber was alive. He knew who Mitt was. If he wanted to come forward, he would have.
He had long since forgiven him, if he even still thought about it. He didn’t think Mitt Romney was still like that. He was probably on good terms with him. Whether someone could just “come forward” and get attention is another story.
Now that he’s dead, they can say anything about him.
They don’t have to worry about his reaction, anyway.
About the facts, Mitt Romney isn’t disagreeing with it. And one reason may be, because even if this is not true, there are other things that are true and can be proven that could be printed.
They can exaggerate the story,
Or just get it wrong. Make it into something it wasn’t. And they don’t have to fear corrections, or announcement of forgiveness.
manufacture a narrative (by telling former classmates about the story who didn’t even know it, and then reporting on how “disturbed” they are), etc.–now that Lauber is out of the way.
That they could do even if he was still alive.
Sammy Finkelman (779659) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:50 am24- I have a niece who goes to Punahou, as did her father. They are a school of do as I say not as I do. All I can say is I hope my niece learns how to think for herself. It is very hard to get into this school. Donating to the proper people is a must. So democratic.
sickofrinos (44de53) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:52 amMoreover, the new WaPo version remains at odds with White telling ABC he had not heard of it until he was contacted by the WaPo.
There’s only one word that’s possibly wrong in the current version:
I always enjoyed his pranks,” said Stu White, a popular friend of Romney’s who went on to a career as a public school teacher and said he has been “disturbed” by the Lauber incident since hearing about it several weeks ago, before being contacted by The Washington Post.
Before. This is actually probably a continuation of the old error. This could be a genuine error on the part of the person who wrote that, since the reporter who interviewed him for the story and got the quote may not have been the first person to alert him. (by the time he was interviewed he already knew, and had known already for days or weeks, and the Post’s investigators knew more or less what he was going to say, and they sent some poor innocent zhlub to collect the quotes and get the quotes or write the story.)
It could even be that they used an intermediary, or at least someone who was not on the staff or did not technically work for the Washington Post.
It could even be that Stu White got it completely wrong, or ABC did, and whoever contacted him didn’t work at all for the Washington Post, but rather, say, for the Democratic National Committee, or some agency hired by the DNC, and someone just assumed they were working for the Washington Post because the reporter from the Washington Post had referenced it in some way.
Also, the word “until” might mean “at about the same time” and Stu White didn’t think it wasn’t the Washington Post that informed him, but this little detail got lost when this was condensed into one sentence. The quote probably came from an interview done some time after the initial contact.
Where there is a real contradiction is between “I always enjoyed his pranks” and his being “long disturbed” about this. Of course the reporter probably did not question him about his reaction years ago – didn’t even realize Stu White had not known about this particular incident for a long time.
Sammy Finkelman (779659) — 5/11/2012 @ 3:19 am* Stu White didn’t think it was the Washington Post that informed him,
It is possible by the way, that Mitt Romney was not involved in this one. Is there anyone who actually remembers this, or claims to?
Sammy Finkelman (779659) — 5/11/2012 @ 3:22 am“I certainly don’t believe that I thought the fellow was homosexual. That was the furthest thing from our minds back in the 1960s, so that was not the case.”
They thought he was a h***ie.
Can anyone guess the word?
Sammy Finkelman (779659) — 5/11/2012 @ 3:29 amattention Kessler
Colonel Haiku (555d03) — 5/11/2012 @ 3:54 amclean up on Aisle Sixty Five
use the rubber gloves
elissa, color me skeptical that this is true. Here are several guys who lean left, (their and the Wa Po’s admission) who after 45 years or so come out and say this about Romney to a leading national left wing publication, who has a reputation of going after R’s and ignoring stories about D’s. All I am saying is that Maxwell (and the others) may be more of a political figure than what is reported here. They are being portrayed by the Wa Po as these school chums, who have no political axe to grind, who now conveniently have a guilty conscious over some long ago school prank. The story is already starting to smell. It would smell more if Maxwell and the other’s political background was fully vetted.
Ipso Fatso (7434b9) — 5/11/2012 @ 4:25 amThe correction still states that Stu White heard about the “incident” weeks before being contacted by WaPo. That still is at odds with what ABC reported.
This is no correction. It’s the original lie being twisted like a pretzel into a revised lie.
RB (e7b1bd) — 5/11/2012 @ 5:05 amSammy (32),
There’s one word of difference. But it happens to be the key word in the sentence. The issue is when Stu knew. Did the WaPo tell him, or had he heard about it before the WaPo call? If the latter, why did he suddenly hear about it just a few weeks ago?
Karl (6f7ecd) — 5/11/2012 @ 5:08 amAQbout Mr. Maxwell,
http://www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/299652/romneys-classmates-account-real-disciplined-disturbing
After the Jen Preston experience, I’m a little hesitant on relying on the Times,
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 5:35 amReasons for skepticism;
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/clay-waters/2011/08/25/ny-timess-ashley-parker-takes-another-snipe-mitt-romney-out-touch-milli
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 5:58 amHomophobes
JD (8ddefe) — 5/11/2012 @ 6:19 amOn the one hand, you have Matt Damon’s character from School Ties, on the other;
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/ken-shepherd/2010/10/05/wapo-offers-gauzy-review-tropical-reign-hawaii-democratic-sen-daniel-i
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 6:21 amYou were saying something about Maxwell’s political affiliation;
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2012/05/11/Washington-Post-Romney-Bullying-Profile-Contradicted-By-Automobile-Magazine
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 6:27 amLook at it this way. If the attack were in Florida today, then the hapless victim could shoot and kill the Trayvon Martin-aged Romney who came at him with a blade. Progress.
SmearTheQueer (77ac66) — 5/11/2012 @ 6:27 amSmear the hohophobe is predictably tiresome
JD (8ddefe) — 5/11/2012 @ 6:29 amSpeaking of that,
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2012/05/11/cnn-legal-analyst-obamas-grandparents-would-have-looked-lot-george-zi
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 6:32 amWhen did long hair become conflated with hohosexuality?
JD (66b3fb) — 5/11/2012 @ 7:28 ami think that was a 60s and 70s thing
before fabio made it cool
happyfeet (3c92a1) — 5/11/2012 @ 7:30 amActually as I recall in the ’70s, at least, really short hair was associated with homosexuals. All the straight guys had long hair.
Sure, it’ll be tough. But don’t doubt that most of them are up to it. Which is why I’m confident that if anyone can make the media more of a laughingstock it’s the current crowd populating it.
Steve (90e0d3) — 5/11/2012 @ 8:38 am“Actually as I recall in the ’70s, at least, really short hair was associated with homosexuals.”
Steve – Earrings also started appearing as an accessory.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/11/2012 @ 8:44 am“When did long hair become conflated with hohosexuality?”
Mitt doesn’t remember.
SmearTheQueer (77ac66) — 5/11/2012 @ 8:45 amSmear the Troll – what other names have you utilized here?
Did 51 make any sense to anyone?
JD (66b3fb) — 5/11/2012 @ 8:47 amThis is an example of a very badly thought through and poorly executed liberal version of what Progs and the media call a “swiftboat” operation. (They still blame the courageous swiftboat men who came forward for Kerry’s election loss.) The coordinates and overall framework of the Lauber high school story are too obvious. The difference of course is that the real swiftboat men of Kerry’s group were uniformly telling the truth about a serious and relevant matter of wartime. And there were a whole lot of these grown up military men with very long clear memories and solid, official military records to back them up.
The folly of having way too many young, white, overzealous ill-educated in history campaign operatives employed at Camp Axelrod — coupled with the always reliably lazy
journalistsmedia activists– led to the obvious botching of this set-up operation against Mitt. Did they not realize that every voting person in America was once a teen ager and went to high school and behaved in a less than adult manner and heard rumors?Are the former “classmates” and “chums” of Romney who volunteered to be used or who got suckered into participating enjoying their 15 minutes of tarnished fame?
elissa (00f0b3) — 5/11/2012 @ 8:58 amJust some expendable Chtauri minions, they have run ambushes and hagiographies before, they will do so again.
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:04 amSo far this week I really can’t find any fault with how Team Mitt has reacted to either the gay marriage thing or the prep schol thing.
happyfeet (a12946) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:14 am*school* I mean
happyfeet (928ad9) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:15 amShrink wrapped story got moldy under the shrink wrap.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:16 amIf these are the kind of lies that the Obama campaign is planting this early, this is going to be the dirtiest Presidential campaign in history.
All to keep the loser in office.
SPQR (26be8b) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:16 amJD, I have no idea what “hohosexuality” would be. Getting freaky with snack cakes?
Simon Jester (8e4cff) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:44 amOf course; it has to be. First of all, Obama never got elected on any record of achievement. He never would have become a US Senator if his minions didn’t dig up, distribute to the press, then ask to unseal records of his opponents divorces.
He painted Blair Hull as a wife beater. He painted Jack Ryan as a perv who exploited his wife.
Now he and his minions are painting Romney as a gay basher. As far as I’m concerned the timing of Obama’s flip-flop was driven by the fact they had dug up this “dirt” on Romney. So his political position was timed to “evolve” to take advantage of it.
Obama’s huge problem is that now he has a record, and it’s one he can’t run on. So he’s got to double down on slinging mud. Even the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus has admitted that if this were any other President, the CBC would be marching on the WH.
They’ve got a strategy; it’s the only one they can possibly turn to. Make it the election about “the people who hate.” This is the same strategy the Democrats used in 2010. And they discussed it openly. The Politico sponsored an online discussion during the run-up to the election. The title of the discussion was telling; it wasn’t about whether the TEA Party was really racist or not, but about “…will branding the tea party racist work?” as an election year strategy for the democrats. Former civil rights commission member and all-around committed lib/socialist Mary Frances Berry was unusually frank in admitting that the TEA Party wasn’t particularly racist but forcing their opponents to “rebut charges of racism is far better than discussing joblessness.”
Now they definitely can’t make this election about Obama’s “wrecker’d” of achievement. Everything he’s touched has turned to crap. So they’ve got to make this election about not only what a mean, heartless out-of-touch rich pig, but that only a mean, bigoted, homophobic racist who wants to return to the days of slavery and back alley abortions would vote for him.
Make no mistake. This will get dirty. But it won’t just be about smearing Romney. It’ll be about smearing the American people. This represents the amount of contempt they have for their base. After all, Murtha and Obama could keep getting the votes of Western Pennsylvanians even after calling them racists. As DRJ noted at the time on this blog, “(i)t’s hard to believe voters actually elect someone who talks about them this way.”
The Democratic base will. Fortunately, I think Obama through his truly amazing political skills and really astounding levels of leadership and organizational ability has reduced that number sufficiently for Romney to pull this out.
Steve (90e0d3) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:50 amHey – didn’t Obama use cocaine in college?
And didn’t he eat a dog?
Amphipolis (d3e04f) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:52 amelissa, where I live, the northside of Chicago, Maxwell would be treated as a hero. Remember, however poorly we think any of this reflects on Obama and his supporters, these same people will view this story as gospel truth and Maxwell will be the toast of the town. That is why Maxwell’s politics and his political activity are important to know, chances are this is just a convenient set up b etween the media and Obama’s campaign.
Ipso Fatso (7434b9) — 5/11/2012 @ 9:59 amAhh snack cakes!
Like carb-laden succubi they are!
Seductive and deadly
And they taste even better deep-fried
happyfeet (a12946) — 5/11/2012 @ 10:01 am“First of all, Obama never got elected on any record of achievement.”
Steve – I need to remind people that Emil Jones, the President of the Illinois Senate, felt it necessary to tune up Obama’s resume and profile in that body prior to his run for U.S. Senate by slapping his name on a bunch of legislation because he was a non-entity most widely known for voting present.
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/11/2012 @ 10:03 amIpso–for some reason based on several of your comments I feel you think I disagree with you. I do not. At all. I thought my comment all the way up at #3 was pretty clear that I see the Axelrod/media connection clearly. I thought my sarcastically meant “well duh” reply at #13 to you was obvious. Sorry if it wasn’t. It was late.
I do gather that maybe you think “operation haircut” was a bit more successful than I do. I guess only time will tell. BTW I too live in the People’s Republic of Illinois–apparently a little north of you. Many of my neighbors are professionals and small businessmen. Quite a few are Jewish. There are also a number of highly educated Indian and Chinese heritage engineers and doctors. Many of them who foolishly voted for the historic presidency last time are very vocal that they will not do it again in 2012. Their money is not flowing into Obama this time. They don’t trust him at all. Yeah, the eternally stupid and the deep deep blue ones are probably lost forever. But many independents and moderates of both parties are still awake.
elissa (00f0b3) — 5/11/2012 @ 10:48 amelissa, my bad if I gave you the impression I thought you and I were in disagrement. I was just trying to make a point. Needless to say, Illinois will go for BO overhelmingly despite the recognition of your neighbors. I wish that weren’t true.
Ipso Fatso (7434b9) — 5/11/2012 @ 10:54 amIsn’t it interesting that immediately after Barack Obama comes out with his “personal” support of same-sex marriage, one of America’s leading liberal newspapers – the Washington Post – chose to run an above-the-fold front page hit piece on Mitt Romney that alleges that at the age of 17, Romney participated in a prep school hazing of a fellow student, a story that relies on a classmate who has now admitted he wasn’t present at the alleged bullying incident and where the alleged victim’s family says they have no knowledge of the incident, that their late brother would be furious that he has been used in this manner, a story that they, themselves, have called “factually inaccurate,” and who have now castigated the Post for using their brother to “further a political agenda”.
We should expect more of this nonsense, as it has to be a b8tch of a job to dig up opposition research on a man who has lived an honorable, squeaky-clean life. However, we should not expect any reportage of Barack Obama’s admitted “enthusiastic” drug use, his description of his “last two years of prep school” as being “a blur”, his 20 years of listening to his mentor Jeremiah Wright’s sermons, his friend Bill Ayers’s domestic terrorism, or his own personal evolved support as an Illinois state senator for what can arguably be described as infanticide. And we certainly won’t hear any reports on how prominent private citizens who have the temerity to donate to a political rival during this campaign season will end up on Barack Obama’s enemies list and will then have the Obama campaign comb through all available data/records in an attempt to dig up some dirt.
The Post is more interested in confirming that Americans need to think twice before electing a teenager to the presidency than reporting on the havoc wreaked by this golfing, preening, incompetent, narcissist one-term president who believes he deserves a mulligan.
Colonel Haiku (b3da95) — 5/11/2012 @ 11:07 amThanks, Ipso. I keep hoping that some other neighborhoods across the country are having Obama epiphanies too–where it can actually make a difference. Even though Chicago will make IL go Blue for Obama the lessening of individual contributions to him from the collars, which has been documented, is at least a good sign.
A couple months ago a neighbor called to inform me her elderly father-in-law had just died. The second thing out of her mouth after telling me the news was: “he’s gonna be so pissed that he didn’t live long enough to vote Obama out!”
elissa (00f0b3) — 5/11/2012 @ 11:15 amAshley Parker @AshleyRParker
Lots of angry email this a.m. from readers who don’t think a politician’s high school indiscretions are fair game. #WelcomeToTheGeneral
narciso (1c125b) — 5/11/2012 @ 11:25 amExpand
So you are telling me that in high school, Mitt Romney got a bunch of friends together to beat up a long-haired hippie?
I’d been undecided about Romney before, but now I want to vote for him twice.
luagha (5cbe06) — 5/11/2012 @ 11:57 amObama the bully, now trying to intimidate donors to his opponents.
Gangster government. Just how far are we from a Putin style mafia running the government?
SPQR (871bc3) — 5/11/2012 @ 12:26 pmWell of course the family is upset. Lauber was gay and the piece “outed” him.
Homophoba is such fun, isn’t it? Especially when it’s practised by your own family.
David Ehrenstein (2550d9) — 5/11/2012 @ 1:04 pmReally short hair didn’t come into fashion until the 80’s, Steve. Check 70’s gay porn. It’s all long hair.
I’m a Professional Homosexual and know what I’m talking about. So send all your Queer Queries to me in future.
David Ehrenstein (2550d9) — 5/11/2012 @ 1:07 pmhttp://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/05/11/washington-post-young-joe-biden/
Tip for WaPo: Look Into Young Joe Biden
……
What It Takes: The Way to the White House, a story of the 1988 presidential election by reporter Richard Ben Cramer, a troubling snapshot of young Biden emerges:
Once Joey [Biden] set his mind, it was like he didn’t think at all—he just did. That’s why you didn’t want to fight him. Most guys who got into a fight, they’d square off, there’d be a minute or so of circling around, while they jockeyed for position. Joey didn’t do that. He decided to fight … BANGO—he’d punch the guy in the face. Joe was kind of skinny, and he stuttered, and the kids called him Bye-Bye, for the way he sounded when he tried to say his name. But Joey would never back down, and he knew how to box, when no one else did. …
Even after he left, after Mr. Biden got the job selling cars in Wilmington and moved the family away, Charlie Roth would still (in moments of duress) tell guys that his friend Joey Biden would come back and beat them up, if they didn’t watch out. (When Joe did come back, Charlie always had a list.)
… According to What It Takes, Biden apparently also led neighborhood boys in carrying out what he would call “pranks”…Joe always had an idea. … If their notion of a summer evening’s prank was to put a bag of dogshit on old man Schutz’s doorstep, Joey would say, “No, here’s what we’ll do. You know behind my house, where they got all those little trees? Get a shovel …” And they did: they went out with shovels and planted a forest of saplings on Mr. Schutz’s lawn. It was so much more elaborate—all thought out, the way Joey had it figured.
And later, the book recounts a story about how Biden was put on student probation in college for apparently assaulting a resident adviser with fire extinguisher fluid….
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/11/2012 @ 1:34 pm38. Comment by Karl — 5/11/2012 @ 5:08 am
Sammy (32),
Did the WaPo tell him, or had he heard about it before the WaPo call? If the latter, why did he suddenly hear about it just a few weeks ago?
Somebody was trying to get this story into the papers.
If this is the case, the Washington Post was most likely not the only news organization approached.
Stu White might have heard it from, say, the Boston Globe, or the National Enquirer, maybe even a month before being contacted by the Washington Post.
I was kind of stupid a little bit in going along with this idea it was all just the Washington Post – I thought about the DNC, but didn’t realize, of course, like has happened in a number of other damaging stories about politicians, the core of this was more than likely leaked to more than one news organization!!
You know that’s even true of the Bush National Guard story in 2004. It happenes with both true and false stories – maybe more with false, or irrelevant ones.
Newspapers just don’t like to say they were tipped off.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/11/2012 @ 1:42 pmIn the novel which was the basis for the original Rambo movie, “First Blood” by David Morrell, (M> Evans, 1972) a young man (Vietnam veteran) with long hair, is arrested and persecuted by Sheriff Teasle of Madison, Kentucky.
Though driven to the outskirts of town he keeps coming back. At one point the cops attempt to cut his hair and shave him without shaving cream, but Rambo, unlike John Lauber when attacked by Mitt Romney and others, succeeds in escaping that fate, and keeps his hair.. (this is fiction after all)
Later on, he steals a motorcycle, a manhunt ensues, and a lot of people get killed, including Teasle and Rambo.
The plot was a little bit different in the 1982 movie.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/11/2012 @ 1:57 pmObama eating local fare in an exotic lication as a kid… huge news. Romney terrorizing a gay man… non-story with obvious holes. I forget… is this site slanting to the right or the left. It is certainly not unbiased.
tye (a51a78) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:03 pmObama ate dog, “tye”.
Silly hazing of cutting long hair has now morphed into terrorizing a hohosexual.
JD (e7d387) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:09 pmSo let me get this straight, eating a local delicacy in a country in which you live (as a child) is worse than holding down a gay man to give him a forced haircut? Got it. I’ll bet you really enjoy the blue collar comedy tour.
You might be a conservative if you enjoy pooping on the civil rights of people who don’t look or act like you…
tye (a51a78) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:18 pmhttp://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304203604577398222591440002.html
James Taranto mentions that he posted the following parody news story to a BBS in 1988:
QUAYLE A DEAD DUCK
WASHINGTON, August 22 (AP)–Vice President George Bush is expected to announce today his decision to drop Sen. Dan Quayle, R-Ind., from the number 2 spot on the Republican presidential ticket, in response to damaging revelations about Quayle’s past.
Bush has scheduled a press conference for this afternoon with Senate Minority Leader Robert Dole, R-Kans., fueling speculation that Dole will replace the ill-fated Quayle on the ticket.
The furor over Quayle began last week. Almost immediately after Bush announced his pick for the vice-presidential spot, it was revealed that Quayle joined the National Guard in 1969.
This controversy, which dogged the Bush-Quayle ticket, was compounded Sunday when the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that Quayle got little better than a “C”-average as a college undergraduate. “He was an average student,” one unidentified professor told the newspaper. “There’s nothing wrong with that, but someone who wants to be vice president should be held to a higher standard.”
Today’s newspapers were filled with even more potentially damaging allegations about Quayle:
— The Miami Herald quoted an unidentified former babysitter as saying that as a two-year-old, the senator-to-be was “an impossible child, who often cried and stayed up past his bedtime.” She added, “I realize two is a difficult age, but someone who wants to be vice president should be held to a higher standard.”
— The Albuquerque Journal reported that Quayle has an extensive police record. According to the Journal, Quayle has been cited for jaywalking and driving 63 mph in a 55 zone. “His wife was pregnant at the time, and he was driving her to the hospital,” said the unidentified police officer who ticketed Quayle for speeding. “Under normal circumstances I wouldn’t even have given him a ticket, but someone who wants to be vice president should be held to a higher standard.”
— The New York Post quoted an unidentified law school classmate of the junior Indiana senator, who said that Quayle, as part of a bizarre Satanic ritual, killed 52 neighborhood pet cats, skinning them and leaving the entrails on their owners’ lawns.
Quayle admitted killing the cats, but sidestepped the issue of Satanic worship. “It was a learning experience,” he told reporters. “In our
complicated world, anyone who wishes to hold high office needs to know there’s more than one way to skin a cat. I’m proud to say I know of at least seven.”
— The Chicago Tribune, quoting an unidentified first-grade classmate of Quayle, said that the senator once mispronounced a word in the Pledge of Allegiance, calling the United States “one nation under guard” rather than “under God.”
The unidentified classmate said, “I know most kids get the words to the Pledge wrong. Heck, I’m 41 and I still don’t know them. But someone who wants to be vice president should be held to a higher standard.”
One unidentified Bush aide said the decision to drop Quayle from the ticket was prompted by this revelation. “This is highly embarrassing because the vice president has made his opponent’s opposition to the Pledge of Allegiance into a major campaign issue,” said the unidentified aide. “Michael Dukakis may not care whether Lloyd Bentsen can say the Pledge, but we believe someone who wants to be vice president should be held to a higher standard.”
He says if he had been more ambitious, he might have ended up at The Onion, rather tahn teh Wall Street Journal.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:18 pmTye you are a typical left wing sh**head for repeating lies about John Lauber.
Ipso Fatso (7434b9) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:27 pmSo let me get this straight
Why is it that when a leftist troll leads with that, inevitably that which follows is pure unmitigated nonsense?
JD (e7d387) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:30 pmAnswer the question.
tye (a51a78) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:35 pmThey use “So, in other words..” a lot, too, JD. With the same inevitable result as you mention.
elissa (00f0b3) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:37 pmIt is a BS question, “tye”. When was the last time you ate dog? When did you stop killing homeless puppies? ANSWER THE QUESTION !!!!!!!!
JD (e7d387) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:40 pmHomophoba is such fun, isn’t it? Especially when it’s practised by
your own familythe Democrat media complex.David Ehrenstein – FTFY
daleyrocks (bf33e9) — 5/11/2012 @ 2:57 pmIf I thought that you believed the dog story to be a non-issue then I would agree that it is a BS question. Somehow you think it’s more important than hate crimes, though.
tye (a51a78) — 5/11/2012 @ 3:00 pmAnd its not like you ever pose really stupid strawman questions to others and demand that they answer them…
75. No it wasn’t the Boston Globe. The Washington Post website according to a PJ Mediaz post linked to here:N
Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story reported that White “has long been bothered” by the Lauber incident. White later clarified in a subsequent interview that he has been disturbed by the incident since he learned of it several weeks ago from a former classmate, before being contacted by The Washington Post.
A former classmate. So somebody set him to collecting other classmates who would back this up.
Sammy Finkelman (d22d64) — 5/14/2012 @ 9:15 amtye, you are rather brazenly dishonest in your attempt to pretend to be too stupid to understand.
The Obama/dog eating story was pushed by Treacher in reaction to the Obama campaign pushing the story about Romney’s vacation tale of putting the family dog in a crate atop the car. The Obama campaign created the theme that somehow how Romney treated a dog was relevant to the campaign.
Treacher’s main point was how stupid the Obama campaign is – because it has on several occasions started up campaign themes where Obama is in fact the more vulnerable. Here, that the Obama campaign hadn’t even read their own candidate’s autobiography.
This is why you are just an offensive little troll, tye.
SPQR (26be8b) — 5/14/2012 @ 9:29 amTye,
What about Obama bullying a young girl named coretta? Or making fun of a black guy named Tim who he thought should have been called Tom because he “acted white?”
How about Obama bullying Romney’s donors?
You remind me of the Obama supporters who still think Obama is an antiwar president; you don’t care what your guy does, but you accept as gospel any disparaging rumor about the other.
The only point conservatives are making with the dog/bullying nonstories is that for every horrible thing Romney has done, Obama has done worse. And if what Romney did in high school matters so much, than maybe what Obama did in college might be relevant, too. But for some reason, there’s just no interest there.
And as mark Steyn pointed out, you put a plate in front of any normal American child and say, “dog meat. Eat up,” they wouldn’t (at least not without crying first).
Ghost (6f9de7) — 5/14/2012 @ 9:51 am