Palin Non Grata: Even Drudge Avoids Wading into the Palin Ethics Swamp

I cannot help but notice that, as of 2:17 a.m. EST on Saturday, the vastly popular Drudge Report hadn't included a single reference to Friday's report that Sarah Palin did indeed abuse her powers as governor in the firing of Alaska Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan.

(Saturday Morning, at last, there has appeared a side bar story on the matter, under a piece on Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi, a White House economic plan non-story and allegations against an Obama fundraiser.)

In other news, yes, the financial markets continue to die, but I'd say that anytime the vice presidential candidate of a major party is determined to have abused his or her powers by a bi-partisan committee -- well, I'd say it's a bit more important than, I don't know, maybe Putin's pet tiger...

The story is that the Republican Party vice presidential nominee three weeks before the election has been found by a bi-partisan Alaska legislative investigation to have violated state ethics laws and abused her power by trying to have her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper. So there it is.

Understandably, as a conservative-leaning news source, Drudge ought to be afforded a certain amount of editorial discretion. For instance, it's no surprise that anti-Obama propaganda on the site has intensified as the McCain campaign scrambles to stop the bleeding. But failing to even mention the Alaska committee's report hours after it was released, even in an editorialized manner? A news story that's headlining on nearly every major network?

Really? No response?

That's just comical, and, frankly not all that re-assuring of Palin's innocence. One would think that the Republican juggernaut of the blogosphere would at least want to spin this. Has Palin become so unpopular in the collective unconscious of conservative America that not even the Drudge Report will rise to her defense?

No wonder those McCain rallies are so angry.

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Comments

[Tenley]

Drudge famously just pretends news he doesn't like never happened. It's Orwellian.

[Dwight Dunkley - Huffpost Blogger]

As a fan of new media , including HuffPo, and Politico, I have previously boosted the Drudge Report. So I am stunned and betrayed that he is attacking Obama with such a pointed racial line. Even now he has a pic of Obama pecking a youngish blonde woman on the cheek in a way that gets my spidey senses tingling. Drudge is a fraud.

His support for Palin smacks in the face of everything he ever professed to believe in during his radio show.

[whit4brains]

Drudge is a joke!

[RobinSeattle]

Drudge is trying to ignore the story so that it doesn't get bigger play than it already has since many MSM outlets set their storylines according to what they see on the Drudge Report. He may also be trying to infer that this story is too insignificant to be featured.

[wildishka]

we need to see some exposes on todd palin. he seems like the shy type.........

[TheAndrew]

Not even Canada is immune. Both the Calgary Herald and Globe and Mail buried the stories way inside on tiny little sidebars. If you look at the New York Times main web page right now, it's not there either. It was there early Saturday morning, but not now.

[lew]

St. Louis Post-Dispatch-Palin corruption story on page 20. Is this not a news story?

[readyfornewleadership]

It was front page in the Chicago Tribune (a conservative paper)

[shrinqrap]

I dont see any contradiction here, Dan.

For a widely-read conservati­ve-slanted "news" aggregator such as DREDGE, this was not good news. Like the kid who brings home a bad report card, he waits to the last, most distractable moment - hopefully in the middle of the night as DREDGE did - to drop the bombshell.

I believe it's called "burying the lede".

If I'm not mistaken, DREDGE prominently featured Palin's pre-emptive self-exculpation the evening before. He knows exactly what hes doing, and to what base hes playing. More often than not, he sets their agenda.

[genia]

Listen people....I can tell you with confidence that there is so so very much that they just don't tell them. I know this for a fact......­FOX...Drud­ge...et all.....they just don't give them the info...
They brainwash them into believing that MSM is a boogy man...don't watch....don't read the NYT....liberal rags ..all of them.
I was at a Nascar forum the other day..it was like visiting an alternate universe... and they had no idea that Todd Palin was a member of AIP...none..
They were yucking it up about Biden ....demanding to know how many millions he's worth.......WHAT??
So..this....not being posted at Drudge...is normal procedure..

[uclafan]

Drudge stuff is filtered political opinion. Politicshome is much better

[HeevenSteven]

Why does the drudge report still look like an 80's bulletin board? Don't those guys know anything about the internets?

[IzzyCA]

Excellent point. It's a terrible website, not just the content, but the design. So last century...

[Dannydel]

Drudge is a little bit to the right of 'Pesky's Pole' at Fenway. Of course he doesn't cover stories like that. I'm always amazed though that he supports the party which is vehemently opposed to gay rights. Go figure.

[uclafan]

I know

[DavidNOE]

Meaning he's foul?

[Dogamatic]

I noticed this as well, I like to look at all the Right wing propaganda machines like FoxNews and Drudge report. FoxNews actually did spin it right off the bat, the best they could. I believe the headline was somerthing to the effect (and yes it was a sidebar as well) "as found by a partisan inquiry" or some such. I was actaully so offended by Drudge reprt non grata that I Emailed Matt Drudge about it.

What do you expect from the protectionist media?

Now maybe it will get some play where it matters, but most Evangelicals and dogmatic repbs would dissmiss it anyway.

Cheers- Glug glug

[nodoginthishunt]

As a matter of reporting, Drudge has it right; the story hasn't even lasted a whole news cycle, in part because the report is so poorly written. Palin didn't even skip a beat, coming back to hammer Obama on abortion. Obama's starting to look like a one of those hanging sides of beef in Rocky I.

[Tenley]

Drudge doesn't have it right. What he does is run only those stories he wants everyone else to cover and pretends nothing else even happened. It's Orwellian. He sacrificed his solid news judgement some time ago and it's glaringly evident.

[CeeCee]

"Obama's starting to look like a one of those hanging sides of beef in Rocky I."

On what planet??????

[ebanks84]

McCain and Palin are the ONLY President and Vice President candidates in history to have "ethics" violations against them. Now what's up with that? That's a historical point that should be played up by most of the media. We have all kinds of "first" in this campaign it seems and we are not playing this particular FIRST up like it should be played.

If Obama had an ethic violation against him, it would be news 24/7 on every major and minor channel. When are you people going to see the light around here? McCain is being protected by the MSM while they claim Obama is being coddled. That a farce.

The entire MEDIA SYSTEM is for sale to the highest bidder and the sleaziest crooks out there. And because Obama has made plenty of money online for his campaign and can afford to pay for TV time, watch the MSM cry about McCain not being able to get the same time. They are going to cry like babies for McCain and could have cared less if the shoe was on the other foot.

Crooks have a tendency to look out for each other.

[MsDebate]

Drudge is full of ish, they only report what is favorable to the Repubs and what is unfavorable to Obama. That's not news that censorship and very untruthful reporting.

[winkin]

Don't give Drudge any more importance than he deserves, which is none.
Outing the news about Prince Harry in Afghanistan was reckless.
And his visitor stats are hogwash.

Olbermann goes overboard sometimes, but he was right when he called Drudge "an idiot with a modem".