Tim Graham whines in a May 25 NewsBusters post:
The press routinely flogged itself in the Bill Clinton years for being too quick to acknowledge when women suggested they’d had affairs or been harassed by Clinton. They would have been extremely slow to relay a cheating allegation with no details or proof. So why are national media outlets repeating an unproven adultery allegation….and against a woman? When the guy has a domestic violence record?
Because she’s a Republican? In Mark Sanford’s South Carolina? Sarah Palin-endorsed South Carolina gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley has seen an unsubstantiated adultery charge spread by the Associated Press, The Washington Post, Newsday, and CNN, whose Wolf Blitzer ran to the evidence-free story on The Situation Room Monday[.]
Graham discounts the one piece of evidence that there is — the person who is making claims of an affair is the one who says he had an affair with her.
Of course, claiming rumors of a candidate’s affair shouldn’t be reported because the only evidence is the person the candidate had an affair with says so runs completely counter to the MRC’s history, which eagerly reported claims by Paula Jones and Gennifer Flowers of affairs with Bill Clinton when there was no other evidence.
For instance, a November 1994 MRC MediaWatch laments that “the national media” won’t dig into “the questions surrounding Clinton’s personal life”: “The stories of Gennifer Flowers or the state troopers on Clinton’s personal security detail have been downplayed, as have the sexual harassment claims of Paula Jones.”
Since Graham’s post appeared, the man who claimed to have an affair with Haley has released a series of text messages on the issue. Is that enough evidence for Graham?