The Kerry "Scandal": There's no 'there' there

[Mairead]

Read the Sun, if you don't believe me. They're hyping it as much as they can, but it's clear that they're trying to spin straw into gold.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0%2C%2C2-2004071162%2C00.html

This is a UFO story--all innuendo, no facts. They're making the best of a bad job, but that's all.

I bet the real story here is no more than 'middle-aged politician has hots for intern. She declines his offer of a staff job'.

There was a very good 40-ish Irish-immigrant fiddle player a few years ago who was a headline act in the Boston area. The performances often included stepdancing by a group of girls and young women from one of the local schools of traditional dance. The star dancer was 16 or 17 at the time, and this fiddler couldn't keep his eyes or hands off her on stage! And he was totally oblivious to how obvious his lust for her was. It was really quite embarrassing to watch, and easy to see that he made her skin creep and that she had her teeth gritted the whole time.

Judging from the Sun's article, that's all this amounts to, if that. Kerry gets the hots for this young woman--it's not volitional, after all--and is oblivious to how obvious it is to everyone watching. She, like the dancer, wants no part of it and moves away, end of story.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

1. Like Jimmy Carter 'lusting in his heart'

I think we've all been there.

[stickdog]

2. Why is this in the Sun, but not the NY Post? (nt)

[NewYorkerfromMass]

3. Did you e-mail them and lobby for a story? eom

[stickdog]

9. That's low. I've been consistent the whole time that I think this is bs.

Unlike many Kerry supporters, I don't judge candidates on their competing biographies.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

12. I'm sorry. You sounded disappointed.

I didn't know what to make of your post. My mistake apparently.

[KFC]

4. It is laughable how gullible people can be

If it is on Drudge and British tabloids, it must be a major scandal.

Seems as if the woman's parents just want a little limelight.

[dpbrown]

5. There's no "there" there

And I've noticed plenty of Kucinich supporters advocating calm.

I'm glad to be in such good company.

Fear Ends
Hope Begins
Kucinich 2004

Dan Brown
Saint Paul, Minnesota

[eileen_d]

7. You are right, and cheers to you!

DK supporters have class. :toast:

[stickdog]

6. What do you think Monica's parents would have said?

You think the fact that these parents are standing up for their daughter's honor and calling Kerry a sleaze is a good sign?

What would be a bad sign, in your opinion? If they sold out their daughter's reputation to a tabloid?

[JVS]

8. I suppose that a bad sign would have been if they brought out a baby...

that looks like Kerry

[Straight Shooter]

10. Ooohh, good one!

Poor baby. Plastic surgery isn't recommended until well past the teen years.

:evilgrin:

[woofless]

37. These two posts are not helping your candidate.

The attack mode is growing tedious.

[Mairead]

13. I think we're all aware that you want there to be something to this

But the key phrase is 'There is no evidence the pair had an affair'. Believe me, the Sun would have constructed a whole symphony for orchestra and artillery battery if they'd been able to find as much as a broken note lying about.

'I think he’s a sleazeball. I did kind of wonder if my daughter didn’t get that kind of feeling herself.' I'm sure the father of that dancer would have said (perhaps did say!) the same thing about the fiddler. Fathers tend to think the worst of men who are after their daughters, and the feelings he attributes to his daughter are exactly the feelings about the fiddler that played across the face of the dancer: 'Eeeuw, ick!'

[stickdog]

14. And if the father knew of or suspected an affair?

What would you expect him to say then?

[Mairead]

15. I would expect him to either say nothing AT ALL or

to say that his little girl was seduced and wronged by the 'sleazeball'.

[stickdog]

19. Admit that your daughter was having a two year affair with a married man?

Do you have a daughter?

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[stickdog]

25. ?

:wtf:

[JustinCredible]

11. No wonder it's not in the media yet

Just Drudge. Because it's hogwash!! I just heard my dad telling my mother last night that Kerry had an affair... but I didn't say anything because I was waiting for it to be on the news or something.

But that seems like they're just grasping at imaginary straws.....

[kanrok]

16. "Staff job?"

In the (slightly modified)immortal words of Colin "Colon" Powell:"I won't go there."

[Mairead]

22. Oy!

My double-intenders are always single-intenders til it's too late.

:silly:

[Bombtrack]

17. Then why did Clark claim he'd implode over it

Daily Kos, a liberal, claims to back up that part of the story

[eileen_d]

18. Daily Kos is wrong.

BTW, Clark endorsed Kerry today
http://www.clark04.com/speeches/044/

Edited to add link to Clark campaign denial:
General Clark's campaign yesterday called the report "utter rubbish", and let it be known that he was expected to endorse Mr Kerry's campaign today, having dropped out of the race himself.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1-1000251,00.html

[KFC]

20. Nice link

The Times article was great.

I knew this was total bullshit.

[papau]

24. Ms Heinz-Kerry would a great first lady!

Ms Heinz-Kerry, widow of Pennsylvania Senator John Heinz who was killed in an air crash in 1991, is known for her outspoken views.

She once told Elle magazine that she had warned her first husband on the subject of adultery: "If you ever get something, I'll maim you. I won't kill you. I'll maim you."

:-)

[dpbrown]

26. Is she hyphenated?

Don't want to get off-topic, and I guess I can look it up myself, but the thought just crossed my mind.

DPB

[papau]

36. I do not know - ??? first Dean - now Kerry - where is the traditional wife

:-)

[LizW]

23. So our purported nominee is NOT an adulterer

just a sleazeball perv?

I, for one, feel much better.:evilgrin:

[ant]

27. interesting bit o' gossip on wonkette

In case it hasn't been posted elsewhere - I haven't checked out the rest of the board today:

Sources tell us that She Who Must Not Be Named has recently told friends that there is nothing to the BIGGEST DRUDGE WORLD EXCLUSIVE OF THIS WEEK! She's returning to the States before the end of the month; maybe this will all have blown over by then. (We're bored, aren't you?)

We're especially relieved to pass this on, since it means we will no longer be haunted by the bizarre "Harold and Maude"-type mental images the rumor conjured. And we never really believed anyone would have sex with him anyway.

Now let's get back to talking about those National Guard pay stubs and General Turipseed!

http://wonkette.com/

[dfong63]

28. there had better not be, because he flat-out denied it...

there will be hell to pay if Kerry has to backpedal later.

[rucky]

29. The National Enquirer Story is MUCH worse!

and it goes out to nearly 3 million people

[yellowcanine]

30. If some tabloid reporter were asking about my adult daughter's

"relationship" with a celebrity - he/she would be shown the door. I can't fathom parents who would stoop this low.

[DU GrovelBot]

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[Jade Fox]

32. This story will fall flat

whether there is any truth to it or not.

Thanks to the slavering dog attacks on Bill Clinton, the aura of "old news" will take the momentum out of this story for everyone except those pre-determined to hate Kerry. Panty-sniffing politics has gotten old, and way too many Conservatives/Republicans have been outed in recent years as possessing less than perfect sexual histories themselves. The "Mayberry Machiavellians" thinking they can be effective beating this same old drum reveals that, bottom line, they are not very smart.

These allegations being brought out now, as opposed to closer to the election, is an indication of how desperate the Republicans are in the face of Memo-gate, Plame-gate, Buget-gate, AWOL-gate, and you-name-it-gate, not to mention the war and those missing WMDs.

[Nicholas_J]

33. The Sun

Is a Rupert Murdoch owned tabloid.


Afte I started seeing a few other papers covering either Drudges reportand allegations, or their own stories, and ten remembered the Sun was a Murdoch property, I started looking at who owned the pther papers like "The Scotsman" that were reporting on the "Kerry Scandal" and found so far that all of the British and Australian Papers that are reporting about this are either owned directly by Murdoch, or owned by ther media corporations he owns.

Murdoch verifying Drudges stories. Interesting Huh?

[mth44sc]

34. Actually its the pattern

Some wingnut starts the ball rolling - the FAUX crowd of Murdoch papers pick it - frequently the overseas bunch - and the "real" press - thinking they are getting left behind start playing the story. That is how they went after Clinton for years with all of the lies and how they attacked Gore.

Each Murdoch publication acts like it is moving the story "forward" in order to attempt to keep it alive and give it legs.

I can't believe the people here who seem to have no memory of this tactic and have either decided to use it for their own purposes or are being played by the wingnut crowd.

[blujig]

35. Not as Interesting as the fact it was a Democrat that shopped the story!

We won't win in November if this crap keeps up. But I suppose if it's one of the other candidates still in the race they don't give a crap about the rest of the country.

[stickdog]

38. So why isn't it on Fox News or in the NY Post?

Could this have something to do with it?

http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=1630

Although Dean has raised $12 million more than Kerry, the Massachusetts senator has relied on four times the number of bundlers, those financial backers who collect contributions up to the limit of $2,000 from others. So far, the Dean campaign has released the names of 14 individuals who have raised at least $100,000; another 18 individuals have bundled at least $50,000 for the Vermont governor. The Kerry campaign has identified 32 fundraisers who have brought in at least $100,000; another 87 rainmakers have collected at least $50,000.

Kerry’s $50,000 Hollywood supporters include actor Dennis Hopper, director William Friedkin, Viacom Entertainment Chairman Jonathan Dolgen, Paramount Studios chief Sherry Lansing, CBS Entertainment head Nancy Tellem and three top executives at Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. Kerry’s Massachusetts fundraisers include longtime backers Alan Solomont, the former finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC); Jonathan Lavine, managing director of Bain Capital; and the senator’s brother Cameron Kerry, an attorney at Mintz Levin – the firm that ranks as Kerry’s all-time biggest donor.

[RedDawnRising]

39. 'John Kerry' : There's no 'there' there