The list of shame (Dona)

I don't get it.  Krystal Ball, Katie Halper and Ryan Grim love to Tweet non-stop.  Then along comes a one-two attack Friday on Tara Reade by hacks at POLITICO and PBS and these journalist (or 'journalists') have nothing to say about Tara Reade.

In fact, they act as though they don't even know her.  They refuse to defend her.  They refuse to support her.

Possibly intimidate by micro-penis blowhard Michael Tracey (most infamous for being physically attacked -- he says -- by the nearly 80-year-old US House Rep. Maxine Waters), they stay silent.

Silence was not the answer -- it usually isn't.

What was needed was for strong defense of Tara.  Instead, these journalists (or 'journalists') who were happy to vouch for Tara prior now acted as if they'd never met her.

POLITICO was a hit job where a Biden member (supporter or campaign staff) fed attackers to Mark Caputo and then, as Mike pointed out, bragged online.

PBS?  Ava and C.I. found many problems with the PBS report but the main one was this:

But you know what we found more interesting?

Tara Reade worked for Joe Biden.  Her personnel files might have the complaint she states she filed.  They may not have it.  Where is it?  Joe went on MSNBC and told the world it had to be in one place but that was a lie.  He refuses to open his own records at the University of Delaware.

Remember that?

So, help us out, how did PBS get employment records to contact 200 people?

A random survey of 200 workers, on the part of PBS, found nothing.

That's strange isn't it.  No one even had a beef.  How did that happen?

Don't wonder, it's right there in what PBS is calling a 'report:'

In all, the NewsHour tried to contact nearly 200 former staffers of Biden’s, based primarily on public records of his time in the Senate and White House and also from interviews with current campaign advisers.


Are alarms not going off yet?

They should be.

When THE NEW YORK TIMES did their expose on Harvey Weinstein, did they go to Harvey and ask for a list of witnesses who would back him up?

No.  But that's what PBS did.

Tara Reade makes an accusation and, instead of conducting an independent investigation, PBS went to the Biden campaign to ask for a list of people to talk to.

Are you really surprised that people the Biden campaign referred PBS to didn't have anything but kind words for Jo-Jo?

And what are the public records the sentence refers to because when this stood out to us today, we worked the phones and the best any PBS friends could offer us was "public records" were published news reports.  So when Joe's office liked a worker enough to get them publicity by engineering press, there's a record of that person and that's who PBS contacted.

This isn't journalism.

Shame on everyone who has endorsed PBS' 'reporting' which is nothing more than them taking dictation from the campaign of Joe Biden.


That's who they spoke to -- friends of the campaign who referred PBS to . . . friends of the campaign.

They are correct.  That is not journalism.

Now as Monday rolls around maybe these journalists (or 'journalists') will feel brave enough to stick up for Tara.  They may even steal from Ava and C.I. and from Mike.  And it will be a steal -- they won't credit, they never do.  If you're not part of their Circle Jerk, that's what they'll do.  That's what's always happened since this site began so I am comfortable making that obvious prediction.

But I think we need to register what happened.  An organized attack took place on a woman who was speaking out.  The response from the reporters who had said they found her credible and promoted her story was to stay silent.  Every person who might have a story to tell now knows they'd be better off not telling Krystal or Katie or Ryan because those three are not going to stand up for them.

Before someone e-mails saying, "What about Amy Goodman?"  What about her?  She doesn't live on Twitter like the three I'm calling out.   Nor does Rich McHugh.  I'm calling out Ryan, Katie and Krystal because they Tweet and Tweet and Tweet -- over and over and over.

I've called out Amy Goodman before and I'm sure I will again; however, she doesn't live on Twitter.  Amy's focus is her daily program DEMOCRACY NOW! and her weekly column.

Ryan, Katie and Krystal made my list of shame because they earned their places on it.