Politics | 07/24/2008 1:15 pm

Why Is the Mainstream Media Keeping John Edwards's Alleged Love Affair a Secret?

By The Staff at wowOwow.com

Over the past 24 hours, Internet news sites have been reporting on this week’s explosive National Enquirer story exposing a supposed John Edwards tryst in a Hollywood hotel.

However, with the exception of the Los Angeles Times, a blog from The Washington Post online and cable TV’s Headline News’s Glenn Beck, few of the mainstream media outlets are touching this story.

One Internet outlet, Slate Magazine is also asking the question, poking fun at the media for not covering it and making a direct comparison to the mainstream media frenzy around Senator Larry Craig’s bathroom antics of a couple of months ago. Slate writes:

"So why hasn’t the press commented on the story yet? Is it because it broke too late yesterday afternoon, and news organizations want to investigate it for themselves before writing about it? Or are they observing a double standard that says homo-hypocrisy is indefensible but that hetero-hypocrisy deserves an automatic bye?"

The Huffington Post thinks that Edwards just isn’t prominent enough of a figure anymore for the public to care:

"It sure looks like Edwards is a hypocrite who misrepresented himself by showcasing his wife and kids so prominently in the campaign. But his campaign was unsuccessful. Voters didn’t buy his arguments or his life story as reasons to elect him. In short, nobody cares about this now, except as celebrity gossip. And that’s how it’s going to play when the media picks it up, as it probably will.

"The better question is, should the media have gone after this story more aggressively back during the campaign? Sounds like the answer is yes."

Tell us: Do you feel cheated by the mainstream media for keeping the alleged John Edwards affair a secret?

194 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

Oh I suppose the Enquirer rag is more creditable than the blogs who get their sources from MSM. Besides i read the story in the a daily paper. I don’t know anything about e=mails about Obama, and who cares.

By Alessan O on 07/25/2008 9:15 pm

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Alessan O

I wouldn’t touch a copy of the Enquirer if I was wearing gloves and a blindfold. I am not familiar with “MSM,” and do not understand your point. You did not cite some un-named “daily paper” in your original post, you wrote “internet reports.” The allegation you posted reads like a blatant unfounded smear. Gossip and rumors are dangerous cancers on the truth. You may not care about the spread of offensive false information, but I do not share your indifference.

Isn’t this a great forum? You can say whatever you want to say, I can question whatever I want to question, everyone else can process our posts through their own personal filters and arrive at their own conclusions. Works for me.

By ~ countrywoman ~ on 07/25/2008 10:31 pm

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Swift-boating, countrywoman…Just put it out there on the internet and suddenly it is true…especially if some people want it to be true so badly. Make the lies become a reality(remember what they did to Max Cleland?), and then, you won’t have to discuss fiascos like the war, the economy and this adminstration’s refusal to open up the Petroleum Reserves. And this administration’s suppression of pix and stories of our War Dead, and the fact that this administration is actively suppressing the latest environmental report, and the fact that this administration is cutting budgets on children services, health services, and so many other things, and the sorry state of our infrastructure, and the fact $12billion is going into this war monthly and we are in debt up to our ears, and the fact that our Soldiers are getting electrocuted due to faulty wiring done by outsourced companies that are making millions. No, that is too difficult. So, let’s just go on and make people think that Obama is a gay,cocaine-using, corrupt, muslim terrorist sympathiser guy who doesn’t know his a** from a hole the ground, as we say in the South. Sorry for the outburst, but sometimes I get weary.

By Diana T on 07/26/2008 1:07 pm

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Diana T….. appreciate your thoughtful post and the irony you are holding up to the light. I am so sick of the dirty tactics. And even though I realize this is how it has always been done, and that a campaign of sliming often succeeds, I still can’t take it quietly. I keep hoping that if enough people refuse to buy into the vile old status quo, we could actually use TRUTH to evaluate the candidates……. on their merits…….what a concept! As you could read in the post above mine, some people not only participate in the spread of the (excrement), the next one can hardly wait to jump in and declare gleefully “Oh I’ve heard that too!” then the first one posts a big fat WHO CARES! I am grateful to read your post and be reminded that there is some clear vision out there, and hence some hope for the future. Thank you for sharing your perspectives, Diana. Didn’t read like an outburst to me…..seemed like a welcome voice of reason!

By ~ countrywoman ~ on 07/26/2008 6:32 pm

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First off it’s the National Enquirer—I’d trust their sleazy reporting as far as I trust George Bush.

By Frank Peterson on 07/24/2008 1:25 pm

Frank —-You know — I think I’d trust GB more!!!

By Lady Gator on 07/24/2008 3:12 pm

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Thank you, Frank! I know the rest of you are too intelligent to really believe everything you hear - especially considering that this came from the National Enquirer. Alleged mistress, illegitimate child, no quotes, no photos, no eyewitnesses. Come on. I refuse to believe that John Edwards would do such a thing. And if he did, it’s not my business. But I doubt that he did. Doesn’t it make more sense that this is political?

By N P on 07/24/2008 5:14 pm

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Hey, Frank, I just happened by Huffington Post, and the John Edwards thing is being reported on Fox. Not much better than the Enquirer, but I think it’s starting.

By Diana T on 07/25/2008 3:57 pm

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“So why hasn’t the press commented on the story yet? Is it because it broke too late……. news organizations want to investigate it for themselves before writing about it?

What?? Now we are expecting the media to actually INVESTIGATE before they spread rumors? Shocking!

By ~ countrywoman ~ on 07/24/2008 1:33 pm

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lol—that’s LOL for the rest of you.

By mary lou s on 07/24/2008 7:19 pm

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In the New York Post last fall, there was a “veiled” statement (question) in their Just Asking …….. column on Page 6 that sounded very much like John Edwards. So I believe that news was reported way back then and might have been the reason he dropped out of the Democratic primary/campaign.

By Sheila L Hansel on 07/24/2008 1:41 pm

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Somehow, I’ve been spared any knowledge of John Edwards’ ‘affair’ (one night in a hotel does not an affair make). Edwards possesses movie-star good looks, compelling story-telling skills(as in creating a visual image for an audience) and keen intelligence. However, if his priority is attacking poverty, building a 23,000 square foot house seems incongruent with that image. Do I think he needs to live in squalor to understand squalor? No, but the path between squalor and ostentation is long and wide. In addition, Edwards received a handsome consulting fee from a company that was actually foreclosing on houses totally destroyed in New Orleans during Katrina. These issues reflect hipocracy, in my opinion. But John Edwards is entitled to live his life as he chooses…as long as he is willing to accept the consequences. Peace and grace

By beth willis on 07/24/2008 1:56 pm

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I don’t understand why rich people can’t be allowed to attack poverty too. FDR did.

By Tinka Parker on 07/31/2008 12:28 pm

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Point well taken, Tinka, but FDR always had his family money. Edwards display of wealth coincided with his emotional pleas to end poverty in our lifetime. The point was the house that he built, and the consulting fees he took were more hipocritical than a rumor in a tabloid. Just my opinion. Peace and grace

By beth willis on 07/31/2008 1:24 pm

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What about this as a topic?:
On CBS: McCain responds to Obama’s crediting the increased security in Iraq, not only to the surge, but also to the Sunni awakening and the Shiite government going after militias.’
saying:
“Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening. I mean, that’s just a matter of history”
Except of course the Anbar Awakening began in September 2006, well ahead of the surge. And that sheik McCain referred to was assassinated at the height of the surge.
CBS edited out that answer and replaced it with McCain’s answer to a previous question. This answer:
“Sen. Obama has indicated by his failure to acknowledge the successes that he would rather lose a war than lose a campaign…
CBS defending it’s cut-and-paste McCain interview, first said on July 23rd: “As all news organizations do with extended interviews, last night’s Obama and McCain interviews were edited to fit the available time and to give viewers a fair expression of the candidates’ major differences,”
and on July 24th: “The report was edited under extreme time constraints and one piece of tape was put in the wrong order. Fortunately, this did not in any way distort what Senator McCain was saying.”
Really? It didn’t distort it? It edited out McCain’s uninformed gaffes and pasted in his statement impugning the loyalty and patriotism of Obama.
And which of the mainstream media is covering this?

By Deni G on 07/24/2008 1:57 pm