Keller Defends Times Ayers Story
New York Times executive editor Bill Keller defended last weekend's front-page story on radical William Ayers and his connection to Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama. Mr. Keller writes an e-mail to Politico.com's Michael Calderone:
"We've reported the Ayers relationship before, and we had it on our ‘to do’ list for a while to take a more comprehensive look... When the McCain campaign began to make it a major focal point of ads and stump speeches, we decided the time was right.”
“It didn't take any prodding... When the conversation on something controversial reaches a certain level, curious readers look to The Times to help them sort the facts from the fictions and figure out what to make of it. That's what we did.”
The Keller article lacks context. Anyone working on inner city projects would work with a variety of people. You don't find too many Republican types championing reform programs. However, the innuendos and half truths are splitting the nation, and they are weakening the democratic process, which in the end will destroy years of goodwill, splitting us into racial camps. At the next debate, in the interest of clarifying the issues, Obama should answer questions about Ayers and Wright. However, in the interest of fair play, McCain should also answer questions as to:
1- his participation in an anti-Semite organization in the 1980s that also had associations with the Pioneer Fund and the death squads in Central America.
2- His association with a Republican delegate who praised a woman who shot a physician because he performed abortions.
3. His asking and getting the endorsement from a rabidly anti-Catholic minister
4. The accusation made by former Vietnam POW that he was a songbird.
5. Address the context of temper tantrums widely documented on You Tube
6. Palin's husband's membership in the Alaska secessionist party, and her friendship with its founder who said he hates America
7. The views of Palin's church toward Catholics and Jews.
8. Palin's attending and participating in witch cleansing ceremonies.
Then both parties should promise to concentrate on the economy, and proposals on how to fix it. McCain and Palin's campaign via innuendos amounts to cowardliness. Journalism should be like good history, it should seek the truth.
So WHAT!!