On Thursday we learned that Clarence Thomas's billionaire friend, Harlan Crow, had bought some of Thomas's property at an above-market price and then spruced it up for Thomas's mother. Thomas disclosed none of this. Seems like an important story! Nevertheless, the Washington Post ran only a short online AP dispatch about it that day¹ and didn't bother mentioning it at all in the print edition.
Today we learned that for many years Thomas has been reporting income from Ginger Ltd., a defunct company. He should have been reporting income from its successor, Ginger Holdings, LLC. This seems like a very trivial story, but the Post ran it at the top of its front page in the print edition.
Why the difference? Because the first story wasn't originally reported by the Post. The second one was.
So stupid.
¹A staff-written reaction piece was posted online the next day, but still nothing in the print edition.
Corporations are people, too, my friend.
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Newspaper story placement is always kind of weird. It is much like television and movie credits with the varying font sizes, carefully negotiated order, precise timing and long traditions. Why did the New York Times choose Lise Meitner as the first page scientist behind the atomic bomb when it reported on its use on Hiroshima? There were thousands of scientists involved.
If the Post wants to play up its own reporting as opposed to an AP story, that's their prerogative. The Post is the inside baseball newspaper for political sorts in DC, so running a Thomas follow up story more prominently than the original story may be based both on editorial politics as well as follow up mechanics. It doesn't sound stupid at all.
P.S. It seems like the AP broke the story based on their own sources, then the Post pulled Thomas's financial reporting info and did some follow up work. Odds are Thomas hasn't updated his filing for years. People tend to get lazy about this. When you have to disclose, they warn you to keep up to date precisely to avoid this kind of situation. As a friend of mine discovered, you never know when your obscure committee is going to get live television coverage.
P.P.S. If you wear a good suit, as my friend did, you'll get a full focus shot rather than just a pan.
I thought it was ProPublica’s story.
Yes, it was. As was the earlier story about good friend Harlan Crowe.
You had to be among the best to play for John Wooden. His first lesson on the first day of training camp was how to tie your shoes. His message? Details matter.
I’m in no position to tell anyone how to write. This is just a different perspective that someone might read and find useful. Specifically, my message is that the details of language matter. More specifically, I happen to believe that, if you’re writing about intelligence, natural or artificial, then it’s important to understand that intelligence and wisdom are not the same.
So, what does “stupid” mean? Does it mean “not intelligent” or “not wise?”
From my perspective, stupid means not intelligent, and the Washington Post’s editorial judgement is not stupid if they end up benefiting from their actions. Likewise, a person with a Harvard law degree is not stupid. But, if a person with a Harvard law degree happens to be the current governor of Florida, then that person is ignorant, which is the opposite of wise.
In summary: Wise and intelligent is good. So is wise and stupid. Ignorant and stupid is bad. Ignorant and intelligent is dangerous.
The brewing Thomas - Harlan Crow scandal has some parallels to a story during the 2016 election. Trump had donated $25K to Florida AG Pam Bondi's campaign in 2013. Bondi responded by dropping FL's lawsuit alleging fraud by Trump University. By all appearances, there was a quid and there was a quo. Proving the connection might not have been easy, but to the fair observer it looked like a bribe.
In spring of 2016, an ethics watchdog group filed a complaint with the IRS. How did WaPo cover the story that March? As a bookkeeping problem. Trump's donation came from his charity, which was not allowed to make political donations (or bribes, for that matter), and did not make a record of the gift. But at least WaPo ran a story. The NYT did not even cover the Bondi gift story, even though the Trump campaign admitted the gift and bookkeeping error, and (uncharacteristically) apologized.
Other news outlets (inc. CNN, Vox) ran a few stories about the appearance of a bribe, but it never got much traction.
In September, Trump paid a fine for misreporting the gift to Bondi in 2013. News outlets covered the Trump gift to Bondi at the time. NYT's first article on the matter ran on page A16. It was an item for a few days and then died.
Soon the media would turn to wall-to-wall coverage of more important news: Hillary's pneumonia, the "basket of deplorables," and of course, "her emails."
I thought the deal with the Ginger company was that it is not at all clear where the money they are reporting through it is coming from.
I thought this story was really about the how corrupt the man is. The nuts and bolts of the side acts of his putrid character is nothing but distraction. It's his jurisprudence that needs to be examined in minute detail.
The New York Post doesn't play these silly ego games. It shamelessly runs one story after another that consist of nothing more than paraphrased passages cobbled together (with attribution) from proper news networks. I don't think it employs any reporters at all these days.
In regard to editorial judgment, what about the excessive amount of coverage that Trump STILL receives? What about the insane, step by step, reporting on his brief appearance in, and arraignment at, a NY court? Was that necessary? Did anyone in the country even notice that Biden made an overseas trip to Ireland last week? Was there any major coverage of his speech to the Irish Parliament? What's going on when the press seems hell-bent on covering the ex-president at the expense of the President?
He's been violating everything around him for decades.
Workplace sexual harassment has been illegal since the Civil Rights Act, 1964.
And good ol’ Clarence Thomas was in charge of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that was in charge of enforcing that law when he sexually harassed Anita Hill and Angela Wright. He has no respect for the laws of this country.
So Bezos.