Palin -- quotes and links

Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/03/AR2008090300711.html

In an extraordinary and emotional interview, Steve Schmidt said his campaign feels "under siege" by wave after wave of news inquiries that have questioned whether Palin is really the mother of a 4-month-old baby, whether her amniotic fluid had been tested and whether she would submit to a DNA test to establish the child's parentage.

Arguing that the media queries are being fueled by "every rumor and smear" posted on left-wing Web sites, Schmidt said mainstream journalists are giving "closer scrutiny" to McCain's little-known running mate than to Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

The McCain camp has been unusually aggressive in pushing back against the media, and it seems to hope to persuade journalists to back off in their scrutiny of Palin. Obama campaign officials have complained to news organizations that their man has been subjected to considerably more investigative reporting than McCain has, but they have done so in more low-key fashion.

By contrast, Schmidt spoke on the record in denouncing as "an absolute work of fiction" a New York Times account of the process by which the McCain campaign vetted Palin. He also charged that Newsweek columnist Howard Fineman was predicting that the governor might have to step down as McCain's vice presidential choice.

Fineman said that he has "never, ever said that," and that he has pointed out positive aspects of Palin's candidacy. "They decided a long time ago that they were going to work the refs," he said.

Susan Reimer, a columnist for The Baltimore Sun, also reports a level of anger she hasn't experienced before:

The things that were said about me, my personal appearance and my children - as well as Barack Obama - were beyond the bounds of decency, and many were said in language that might only be seen in a bathroom stall.

Generally, the comments were not made behind the veil of anonymity the Internet can provide. The writers signed their names. And they revealed what I think has become the bare-knuckles nature of our national conversation.

So much pent-up anger, so much barely concealed hate was released in those e-mails and those postings. I wonder where next they will find a vent.

It is still two months until the presidential election. Things could get really rough out there.

On the other hand Jack Shafer of Slate.com, whom I consider one of the best media analysts in the business, sees an tried-and-true GOP gambit and thinks the coverage of Palin's family life was over the top, yes, but predictably so and entirely legitimate. Well, maybe not entirely:

Journalistic mayhem is a fine description for the last couple of days of Sarah Palin coverage. Starved to the point of collapse from the restricted-calorie diet served at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, the press needed a news feast to restore its powers. With the Republicans' convention lite staring them in the face, the ravenous press corps decided to switch the menu from St. Paul to New Orleans. The evening news anchors—NBC, CBS, ABC—were all defecting to the Gulf Coast over the weekend. But then the press scented the lard-fried Snickers bar that was Palin.

Irresistable. Right?

Maybe it is just politics as usual.

An ABC News poll finds a partisan split in reaction to the media coverage:

The public divides on whether the news media have treated Palin fairly -- half say yes, four in 10 no -- and among those who do fault the coverage many more blame political bias than sexism. In this there is a difference between the sexes, with men (55 percent) more apt than women (46 percent) to say she's been fairly treated. But more women are undecided, rather than saying the media have been unfair, and the far sharper divisions are partisan again. Fifty-seven percent of Republicans see the coverage as unfair; that declines to 27 percent among Democrats.

Among those who see unfairness in the news coverage, 39 percent mainly blame partisan bias, 15 percent sexism and 10 percent both equally. The rest, 34 percent, cite some other cause. Women who fault the media are slightly more apt than men who do so chiefly to blame sexism, 18 percent to 10 percent, but substantially more women and men alike mainly perceive political bias.

METHODOLOGY -- This ABC News poll was conducted by telephone Sept. 4, 2008, among a random national sample of 505 adults. The results from the full survey have a 4.5-point error margin. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by TNS of Horsham, Pa.

Finallly, Dana Milbank of The Washington Post files this video report on the "Eastern media elite." I think Milbank, who has skewered both Obama and McCain, treats the brotherhood and sisterhood of the elite media -- and himself -- with the degree of high seriousness they deserve.