The Kerik Conundrum

Even before his Zoe Baird problem came to light, I'd been wondering whether Bernard Kerik had too much baggage to be confirmed.

Unlike most of Bush's other Cabinet picks, from Margaret Spellings to Samuel Bodman, the Homeland Security nominee seemed to bring with him a string of controversies that were becoming fodder for the media -- and, inevitably, a Senate confirmation hearing.

Here's a lifelong street cop who suddenly became a multimillionaire from his involvement with the Taser company, which sells its weapons to law-enforcement agencies, including Homeland Security. And yet a few years earlier, an arrest warrant was issued for Kerik because he couldn't keep up his condo payments. (The FBI can't find an arrest warrant that reporters uncovered in days?)

It was never clear why Kerik's term in helping train Iraqi forces was cut short, or what if anything he accomplished there.

And then there was the story about Kerik supposedly investigating the personal lives of employees when he worked for a Saudi Arabian company in the 1980s.

If there's one thing that can sink you in a hurry, it's a nanny problem -- the Bush administration, after all, went through a similar situation four years ago with Linda Chavez. So what was Kerik thinking in allowing his nomination to go forward? Do you really think he didn't know, or somehow forgot, that he hadn't paid taxes for a household employee of questionable (read: illegal) status? And this for a man who was going to be in charge of the nation's immigration laws!

The main reason he got the presidential nod, it's clear, is because of his pal and business partner Rudy Giuliani -- to the point that the ex-mayor felt the need to hold a news conference Saturday after Bernie's withdrawal and to apologize to the White House.

The post-Kerik spin is all about how the White House got snookered. Here's the New York Times:

"White House officials were clearly annoyed at Mr. Kerik for not determining the nanny's immigration status before this week but said they had no evidence he had sought to mislead them. 'It was Kerik's screw-up, it was that simple,' the official said. 'But it's a mistake you can't tolerate with someone who has oversight for immigration.' . . .

"Mr. Kerik's withdrawal was the first major blunder in the administration's process of assembling its second-term cabinet, but not a new experience for Mr. Bush's team. Four years ago, when Mr. Bush nominated Linda Chavez as labor secretary, it was discovered after the initial vetting process that she had given shelter to, and employed, an illegal immigrant. At the time, Mr. Bush's aides were outraged and promised to change their methods for reviewing potential nominees, but on Saturday several officials said that because Mr. Bush wanted to make his decisions speedily, their initial review had been quick."

The Washington Post:

"White House officials yesterday blamed Bernard B. Kerik for repeatedly failing to disclose potential legal problems to administration lawyers vetting his nomination to be homeland security secretary, as President Bush prepared to quickly name a replacement and try to put the controversy over the former New York police commissioner's background behind him.

"Kerik, who withdrew his own nomination Friday and apologized yesterday for embarrassing Bush, was asked numerous times by White House lawyers if he had employed an illegal immigrant or failed to pay taxes on domestic help, the sources said.

"Kerik was told he would humiliate his family, himself and the president if he lied on either account, the officials said. He responded with firm denials."

The Los Angeles Times calls it what it is: "The abrupt withdrawal of the White House's choice to head the Homeland Security Department is an embarrassing setback for President Bush's effort to put his second-term Cabinet in place quickly and without controversy. . . .

"Even before Kerik's nanny troubles surfaced, Democratic opponents and news organizations were mining his colorful and controversial record for evidence of possible conflicts of interest and other questions about his ethics.

"Some analysts said that Bush had been in such a hurry to complete his Cabinet -- and to name a hero of the Sept. 11 attacks and protege of former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani to a leading role -- that the White House did not catch obvious problems in Kerik's background."

Newsday says yet another problem was brewing:

"In the 48 hours before his withdrawal as nominee for the nation's top security post, Bernard Kerik and his lawyer scrambled to keep damaging assertions about his past out of the public spotlight. A week after President George W. Bush announced the former city police commissioner as his choice for Homeland Security secretary, an array of charges and questions about Kerik's past were coming to a boil, threatening his crafted image as an American legend and portending a rougher Senate confirmation process than first predicted.

"On Thursday, the day before he took his name from contention, Kerik, 49, was forced to testify in a civil lawsuit about an alleged affair with a subordinate.

"The case, which involves Kerik's use of authority when he was city correction commissioner between 1998 and 2000, was brought against the city by a former deputy warden. Plaintiff Eric DeRavin III contends Kerik kept him from getting promoted because he had reprimanded the woman, Correction Officer Jeanette Pinero."

And Newsweek opens another can of worms:

"Consider, for instance, Kerik's relationship with Judith Regan. A flamboyant, stiletto-heeled -- and highly successful -- book publisher, Regan published Kerik's sensational memoir, which begins with the scene of Kerik's mother, a prostitute, murdered in her pimp's bed. Occasional workout partners, Kerik and Regan became close friends. But their relationship soured, and Regan told friends Kerik had hounded her, and that she hired a bodyguard. Kerik's lawyer confirmed that Regan and Kerik were friends, but says 'there was nothing untoward about their relationship.' The lawyer called the allegation that Kerik had hounded her 'absurd.' "

Who'll get the nod now? "The difficulty of filling the spot," says the Wall Street Journal, "has fueled speculation that President Bush could cross party lines and offer the slot to a prominent Democrat, Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman, an early proponent -- over initial White House objections -- of creating the department."

I see. Would this be the same "speculation" that has been wrong on those other Cabinet choices?

Rudy tells the NYT he's really sorry: " 'I feel very bad,' Mr. Giuliani said in a telephone interview on Sunday afternoon, adding that he felt somewhat responsible for the nomination of Mr. Kerik. . . .

" 'Even though there was never a conversation about it, I realize that one of the reasons they did it was because of my confidence in Bernie over the years,' he said. 'And I feel like maybe I should have involved myself more in it.'"

Bush does have a liking for Horatio Alger types, says the Philadelphia Inquirer:

"President Bush was born to wealth and privilege, but he has a soft spot for advisers who know another side of life.

"His top appointees include a high school dropout, the son of migrant farmworkers, and an immigrant who once peddled Frosted Flakes to corner grocery stores in Mexico City. Some of their personal stories can match any rags-to-riches tale dreamed up by novelists.

"To Bush, they are living symbols of the American dream, and confirmation that anyone can make it in this country. They also fit Bush's self-image as a down-to-earth man of the people.

"Although born to a family with deep roots in the Eastern establishment, Bush sees himself as a product of the Texas oil patch, where anyone has a shot at wealth and prominence. He detests intellectual snobbery and class-based pretension. He clearly enjoys mixing with Americans who know little about the elite prep schools or Ivy League institutions that shaped his youth."

I've been under the impression that the Pentagon press corps is a seasoned bunch that does a pretty good job. But Salon's Eric Boehlert has a decidedly negative view:

"Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's rude reality check on Wednesday -- broadcast worldwide during a town-hall-style Q&A session with surprisingly blunt Army reservists in Kuwait -- generated headlines in part because it's so rare for Army grunts to challenge the Pentagon leadership in public. But the critical give-and-take also made waves and jolted the secretary because Rumsfeld is simply not accustomed to facing this type of tough questioning, certainly not from the deferential press corps that covers him and the Pentagon on a daily basis. Instead, many reporters in the clubby world of the capital continue to hold Rumsfeld in unusually high regard, considering he's the point man for the deeply troubling U.S. strategy in Iraq.

"On Wednesday, though, soldiers and reporters switched roles. Suddenly it was the troops, usually called upon during public forums to loft softball questions to high-ranking administration officials, who were raising uncomfortable lines of inquiry. After suffering through nearly two years of unforeseen and chaotic violence in Iraq, seeing nearly 1,300 of their fellow soldiers killed, and watching their tours of duty being extended again and again by the Pentagon, rank-and-file members of the U.S. military took it upon themselves to turn up the heat on the war planners and seek some semblance of accountability. That used to be the job of journalists. . . .

"The revelation Thursday that an industrious Chattanooga Times Free Press reporter embedded with Wilson's unit reportedly talked with the soldier beforehand about posing his pointed question to Rumsfeld simply highlights how complacent the Beltway press has been on the urgent issue of armor shortage. Why haven't reporters worked up the nerve to ask these questions themselves before now? Meanwhile, the reporter's handiwork regarding the armor query doesn't explain away the other tough questions Rumsfeld had to fend off from the troops on Wednesday."

Actually, lots of stories have been written about equipment and other problems for troops in Iraq, even if Rummy hasn't been grilled on the subject.

"Rumsfeld's unsteady performance in Kuwait was reminiscent of President Bush's first debate with Sen. John Kerry. Bush was so accustomed to being surrounded by Washington yes men -- and that includes the press corps -- that he appeared jolted when Kerry forcefully challenged him on an array of assumptions about the war in Iraq.

"Without the press filters on Wednesday, Americans saw a different Rumsfeld, and certainly a less sure-footed one."

Now, without further ado, today's print column:

Mark Potts, a self-described "recovering journalist," says with a bit of understatement: "It isn't Woodward and Bernstein stuff."

He means that a major metropolitan newspaper -- say, The Washington Post, where he was once a reporter -- can't penetrate to the nitty-gritty, hyper-local level of school plays and soccer league scores that will be prime fodder for his new Web site.

"A housewife or hardware store owner can have something to contribute, that's important to them, that would be way under the radar of what we as journalists think is important," says Potts. "It's the kind of thing you talk about at cocktail parties and barbecues."

Potts and his partner, Susan DeFife, are launching Backfence.com in two Fairfax County towns, McLean and Reston, early next year. If the idea flies, they would expand to 16 other metropolitan areas over three years, with 10 town-sized sites in each market.

What makes this a noteworthy challenge to the traditional Big Media model -- we report, we decide --is that Potts and DeFife want ordinary folks to do most of the work, with no more compensation than an occasional T-shirt. That would be a seismic shift from the top-down approach in which news organizations judge what is worthy of mention and customers have to take what they can get.

There are already some community sites practicing what's been dubbed "open-source journalism," and the potential appeal to people who feel little connection to metropolitan dailies is obvious. Backfence is generating some online buzz because of its national ambitions, its founders' track record and the notion of stealing some turf in the shadow of the nation's capital.

Spurred by the success of political blogs, Potts and DeFife are convinced that thousands of people in places like McLean and Reston can become bloggers, or post responses to other bloggers' columns, or contribute photos and information about their particular subcultures. Backfence would have a five-person staff -- plus free classifieds, Yellow Pages-style listings and a local search function -- but the content would be provided by the users. The goal: Build it and they will post."Yes, the Iraq war and the presidential election are important to me," says DeFife, a McLean resident and former soccer mom who founded Womenconnect.com, a portal for professional women. "But what I'm most focused on is what's going on in my world today."

There are plenty of question marks about the venture, modeled in part on a Web site launched by the Bakersfield Californian newspaper. But DeFife and Potts, a co-founder of washingtonpost.com and the @Home Network, say they don't need much to make it work. Ads would cost local merchants just $150 to $200 a month, and the partners say the site needs only a few thousand regular users to become viable. They are beginning to peddle the idea almost door to door, pitching Backfence to PTA groups and church organizations and perhaps sponsoring a Little League team.

Potential investors have been wary, waiting to see if the Virginia experiment can generate revenue. The Bakersfield site's editor says it is nearly breaking even from ads that also run in a companion print edition. The site currently has a feature on local cheerleaders, a man who wrote 75 self-help books and a first-grader who won an essay contest, along with crime logs, home sales, church news and a holiday lights photo contest. Other companies, including Advance Publications, are planning town blogs, which could either be the Next Big Thing or a faddish bubble like pets.com.

"Backfence sees the de-professionalization of news as a key to its success," says New York University's Jay Rosen on his PressThink site. "The pros gave away the 'news of your neighbors' franchise -- or never had it."

Unlike sites where journalists control the content, the users theoretically will be in charge -- within limits. Abusive posters won't be allowed, though what constitutes abusive remains to be seen. "If you cross a certain line, absolutely we will ban you," DeFife says. Good posters might be awarded a certain number of stars, as on Amazon.com.

The key concept here is that what becomes hot -- such as a pie-recipe contest on the Bakersfield site -- will bubble up from the masses rather than being imposed by smart-aleck media types.

Of course, there may be some similarities with actual journalism. "What happens if two people go to the same council meeting and write two different accounts of it?" Potts says. "Fantastic. Controversy is great."

Roger's Rockets

Much of the debate on C-SPAN is rather decorous, but not when Roger Ailes is the guest on a new Sunday night program.

The Fox News chairman appears this Sunday on "Q & A," an interview show hosted by C-SPAN founder Brian Lamb and others to replace Lamb's long-running "Booknotes." And the sharp-tongued Ailes isn't exactly restrained in the taped interview about taking shots at his rivals.

CBS? "We're not retracting stories. We don't have a former attorney general looking into us to try to determine how we screwed it up," Ailes says, referring to the investigation into CBS's use of apparently bogus National Guard documents.

CNN? Ailes rips the overseas network CNN International, "or, as we call it, the anti-American channel." He likens it to the BBC and al-Jazeera in that "you can't find a whole lot good about America." CNN spokesman Matthew Furman says the international network "works hard to provide its global audience with a range of news without any political or national perspective."

ABC? Ailes apparently took offense at a recent Harvard speech in which ABC News President David Westin said Fox News had been "effective" in bringing talk radio and opinion to TV news. "David is in the process of trying to turn himself into Fred Friendly," the late media executive and ethicist, Ailes says. "He's a corporate lawyer who's trying to be a great journalist. But he has got some problems. He's the guy who wanted Leonardo DiCaprio to be a journalist for him." ABC sent the actor to interview President Clinton four years ago for a special on the environment.

Ailes mischaracterized a memo from ABC's political director, Mark Halperin, as arguing that "they didn't have to be fair, they should support Kerry in the debates." Halperin wrote that while President Bush and John Kerry should be called on exaggerations and misstatements, the Bush campaign was engaging in more distortions, and "that doesn't mean we reflexively and artificially hold both sides 'equally' accountable when the facts don't warrant that."

Westin says in a statement: "Apparently I struck a raw nerve with Roger in talking about the important difference between opinion and reporting the truth -- comments that incidentally were not directed at Roger. I do believe there is an important and healthy discussion to be had about fact vs. opinion in journalism today . . . As for Fred Friendly, don't we all have a long way to go?"

By the way, Ailes, a former Republican operative, tells Lamb that "I quit politics because I hated it . . . I thought it was getting mean-spirited."

Press Gets Snowed

The Washington Post, Nov. 29: "One senior administration official said Treasury Secretary John W. Snow can stay as long as he wants, provided it is not very long."

The New York Times, Dec. 6: "President Bush has decided to replace John W. Snow as treasury secretary and has been looking closely at a number of possible replacements, including the White House chief of staff, Andrew H. Card Jr., Republicans with ties to the White House say."

Dec. 8: Bush asks Snow to stay for his second term. Never mind.

World Exclusive

"Canadian Authorities Arrest U.S. President Bush On War Charges" -- Dec. 1 headline on Google News, which is assembled entirely by computers. As Slate noted, Google's non-humans picked up this stunning news from a clearly labeled online satire.