And Joe Lelyveld as well. All that money, months of investigation, a dozen reporters assigned fulltime to the case … and all they got was this lousy non-story. Bottom line: there was no electoral fraud in Florida; there was “no support for the suspicions of Democrats that the Bush campaign had organized an effort to solicit late votes”; the Bush people were no more aggressive in getting their military ballots counted in Florida than the Gore team was in getting recounts in favored counties; the Bushies’ military ballot success would have made no difference to the final result. Surely an A12 story. Perhaps Joe Lelyveld was trying to make this his breathless, show-stopping finale. But he has such a glittering career, it would have been better for him to have given this non-event the placement it deserved, rather than fronting it all over the front page and yards and yards within. The Times is now surely on a knife-edge of credibility. It’s still the best paper in the world – and I’m proud to contribute to its magazine. But if it keeps blaring non-stories like this to appease its leftist Manhattan base, and maintains its close to unanimous chorus of editorial and op-ed hostility to president Bush, it will become less authoritative. People like me who care about it and groan about some of its obvious news bias will simply stop reading it. Or, worse, we’ll start assuming it’s propaganda until proven otherwise.
THE BAR LOWERS EVEN FURTHER: “Kausfiles’ goal is to have no unpublished thoughts on the Chandra Levy story.” – Mickey Kaus’s bid to violate anyone’s privacy – and indeed raise any Chandra scenario whatever – on the Internet. So why hasn’t Mickey named the ABC News reporter whose relationship with Condit was purely professional, according to her bosses? In his piece, Mickey also makes a weird mention of the likelihood of Chandra using a motorbike at the time she disappeared. (For those of you who, like me, remain befuddled by this leap of the imagination, it apparently explains why she left her purse behind, but kept her I.D. with her.) Huh? Is this some nudge-nudge wink-wink reference to a surreal story yanked a few days ago by Newsmax, linking Levy and Condit to all sorts of sado-masochistic, biker shenanigans? Ok, Mickey. If you really want no unpublished thoughts, can you be more explicit here? Or is this just a complete guess? After all, everyone knows that anyone into S&M sex is just a murderer waiting for his chance.
THOSE CHANDRA MAKE-OVER PICS: If Chandra is still alive and comes back from wherever she is unharmed, I hope she tells the DC Police Department what she thinks of those artists’ renditions of her with new hair and accessories. Blimey. She looks like Linda Tripp with an Afro. Come to think of it, there’s a drag-queen performing in Provincetown right now who’s the spitting image of this Chandra. Could I have a scoop on my hands? Headed out now on my motorbike (without my purse) to investigate …
SANITY ON RIOTING: The best little piece of analysis on rioting came my way this week via an email. (The best, that is, since The Onion’s spoof front-page of the L.A. Riots in 1991: “Rioters Demand Justice, Tape Decks.”) My friend Matthew Parris points out in the Times of London that rioting is fun; it resonates with a permanently violent and aggressive part of human nature, which only needs an excuse or an opportunity to be vented. Why are people rioting, every well-meaning person asks, and sets up a commission to investigate its causes, and seeks dialogue and ponders where this will all end up. Phooey, says Parris. This whole approach is typical of a modern mind that refuses to believe that there are any human problems that cannot be solved, any human crisis that cannot be alleviated, any human experience that cannot be turned into a problem begging for a solution. Maybe the problem is the point. Asking why people are rioting is a function of naiveté or utopianism. “You might as well look at a dinner table piled with food and surrounded by diners, and ask: “Why? What do they mean by this? What can we learn? What are they trying to say?” They do not mean anything; they are communicating nothing; we can learn from the rhythmical working of their jaws nothing. The consumption of food is explained by the human appetite for food.’ And rioting is explained by the human appetite for conflict. With a little bit of testosterone thrown in for good measure.
The Dish 