As Twitchy reported Monday night, the New York Times published a bombshell about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh reportedly throwing ice on another bar patron as an undergraduate at Yale and being questioned by the New Haven Police Department.
As fascinating as that story was, more interesting was the piece’s co-writer: not a news reporter, but a staff writer for the New York Times Magazine who had tweeted her opposition to Brett Kavanaugh all the way back in July.
So why was an opinion writer with an obvious bias against Kavanaugh writing a hit piece on him for the news section? The New York Times addressed that question Tuesday:
NYT statement on Kavanaugh story last night. https://t.co/CD0tNwWXmT pic.twitter.com/05GBjIAhyK
— Yashar Ali ? (@yashar) October 2, 2018
That is not a good enough explanation. Sorry. https://t.co/z3rewMULJi
— Pradheep J. Shanker, M.D., M.S. (@Neoavatara) October 2, 2018
Emily Bazelon was the on-the-scene person, and the story has no footnote/update to indicate the publicly expressed bias of the writer against Kavanaugh, the subject of the story. If this was not a problem, why did the Times issue the statement at all. pic.twitter.com/0WsRcSw0EX
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) October 2, 2018
The more I think about it, this is absolutely incredible. Can you imagine a @WSJ op-ed writer digging up some documents about Hillary Clinton, handing them over to a reporter on the news side, and a news article being written based on that? https://t.co/IUBp2SEEoD
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) October 2, 2018
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Hmm … it is almost like an anti-Kavanaugh opinion writer fed documents to the newsroom for a hit piece against someone she openly opposed.
How can the @nytimes possible stand behind this article? Can they possibly be certain that Emily Bazelon would have submitted exculpatory documents that might have turned up? This article is tainted and they know it, but have not even footnoted it for the conflict of interest. pic.twitter.com/FjdxTotp2W
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) October 2, 2018
Am I naive? Is this done?
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) October 2, 2018
I assume all reporters have strong personal opinions and that they're regularly required to report on people they don't like. I think disclosing the biases, like was inadvertently done here, is about the best we can hope for.
— Greg Linaman (@GregLinaman) October 2, 2018
She writes op-eds. I do not see how you can have crossover between your news and op-ed pages and maintain credibility. Again, am I naive? Is this standard practice?
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) October 2, 2018
Shorter NYT: We regret that this article was assigned to a publicly liberal reporter rather than a reporter who is privately liberal https://t.co/y9R93XkAHp https://t.co/pnb9U22d8H
— Philip Klein (@philipaklein) October 2, 2018
At least they fully stand behind the story of Kavanaugh not being arrested or charged with anything.
No report of an arrest. Could have been expunged, I’m told. https://t.co/W3J4wr2Sp7
— Emily Bazelon (@emilybazelon) October 1, 2018
Of course you don’t know that. In fact you have absolutely nothing to suggest it is true bBut will irresponsibly put it out there anyway. Meet your media, America. https://t.co/OC4P0Kt1xR
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) October 3, 2018
Related:
Author of New York Times hit piece on Brett Kavanaugh sure seemed open-minded about his nomination https://t.co/L89Fvxmwf2
— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) October 2, 2018
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