BY DAN
KENNEDY
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Friday, February 20, 2004
Did Drudge smear Wesley Clark,
too? When Matt Drudge smeared John Kerry with his non-sex
non-story, he also dragged Wesley Clark into it, claiming
that Clark, "in an off-the-record conversation with a dozen reporters
earlier this week, plainly stated: 'Kerry will implode over an intern
issue.'"
In my piece this week on
"Sex,
Lies, and Republicans," I
write that "it appears that the rumor either originated with or was
spread by the now-expired Wesley Clark campaign." This has caused
some consternation among those who think that Drudge unfairly implicated
Clark.
So what do we know?
For my money, the most striking and
credible description of Clark's alleged outburst was reported on
Sunday by Boston Globe columnist Tom Oliphant. He
wrote:
The sin of commission
occurred during an astonishing, even for a rookie, judgment lapse
with the gaggle of reporters covering his campaign on its final
day last week. Bantering with them at length under supposedly
off-the-record ground rules, Clark actually said he was still in
the race because he thought Kerry's campaign was going to implode
over what he inelegantly called an "intern" scandal.
No matter what you think of
Oliphant as a columnist, he's a pretty good reporter, and he travels
extensively during presidential campaigns. I don't know about you,
but I took his description to mean that he, personally, had witnessed
Clark when he supposedly went off about Kerry - especially since he
added such I-was-there details as "gaggle of reporters" and
"[b]antering with them at length." If Oliphant wasn't
there, I'd say his description is at least a little bit
deceptive.
The New Republic's Ryan
Lizza, who definitely was there, writes this:
Just in case anybody was
still wondering whether anything in the original Drudge
item about John Kerry was accurate, I can confirm that Wesley
Clark did not say what Drudge says he said at that off-the-record
conversation with reporters in Nashville one week ago.
I was there when Clark spoke,
and just to make sure I didn't miss anything, I've also checked
with other reporters who were there. Since it was off the record
(sort of), I can't get into what Clark actually said (let's just
say it was not his finest moment on the campaign trail), but I can
report that the quote Drudge attributes to him - "Kerry will
implode over an intern issue" - is not accurate. He never said
that.
What is Lizza trying to tell us? I
don't know. The most likely interpretation is that Lizza heard Clark
slime Kerry, but not in precisely the same way that Drudge claimed.
Clark may not have even used the word "intern." Beyond that, though,
this isn't particularly helpful.
Washington Post reporter
Ceci Connolly has also denied Drudge's claim about Clark. The
Incomparable One recounts
this exchange on Fox News Sunday:
JUAN WILLIAMS: Now, let me
just say that Democrats, including the man who endorsed
[Kerry] this week, General Wesley Clark, was overheard
saying, "Oh, you know, Kerry's campaign is going to implode over
an intern," that kind of thing. That adds to it. And I
think-
CONNOLLY: You know, what,
though? That's not accurate. That's not accurate. That's the way
that Drudge reported that supposed off-the-record conversation.
But I've spoken to reporters who were there, and that's not even
what General Clark accused. It was something far more peripheral,
and it was pinned to a tabloid.
Getting warmer? Perhaps. But
Connolly apparently wasn't there, either, based on her
description.
Now, in some tellings of this tale,
Drudge has the rumor being spread by one of Clark's top campaign
aides, Chris Lehane. Joe Conason offered some insight
into that on Salon last week:
The Drudge item blaming
Lehane quoted Craig Crawford, a former Democratic operative who
now works as a consultant and columnist for MSNBC. Within 10
minutes after Drudge posted the Kerry intern item, Crawford sent a
memo to his superiors that said the story was "something Chris
Lehane (clark press secy) has shopped around for a long time."
According to Crawford, someone at MSNBC promptly leaked his memo
to Drudge. But when Lehane called Crawford with a loudly indignant
denial, the MSNBC columnist quickly issued a public retraction. He
said:
"The comments attributed to me
are from a private email to television news associates based on
conversations with Democratic campaign operatives. I did not
consider any of it confirmed enough to report or publish. I can
only verify that Chris Lehane's rivals in other Democratic
campaigns made these claims and I have found no independent source
to confirm it. Which is why we did not go with the story. But then
someone sent my email to others, which is the only reason it got
into the public domain." In other words, there is no proof that
Lehane circulated the rumor, let alone that the rumor has any
basis in reality.
Lehane also denied it directly to
Conason. No disrespect to Lehane, but that's not quite dispositive,
since clearly someone is lying - either Lehane or his "rivals
in other Democratic campaigns."
Still, I'd say that it all comes
down to Tom Oliphant. If he says he was there, and that he heard
Clark smear Kerry, then that's good enough for me. For that matter,
if he was relying on an eyewitness account by one or more of his
colleagues, then that works, too.
But short of that, I'd say Clark is
off the hook - and Drudge only looks that much worse.
What about it, Tom? Inquiring minds
want to know.
On John Edwards's qualifications
for office. From
today's New York Times:
"I believe he is the one
who can beat George Bush," Ms. Wells said. "He's got that Southern
thing going for him. He will hand you your guts on a platter,
and you will thank him for it before you even feel the
knife."
posted at 11:28 AM |
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Dan Kennedy is senior writer and media critic for the Boston Phoenix.
