Exposed

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 13, 2007 7:52 AM

I went through my stack of papers yesterday and saw the face of the woman I'll call The Accuser staring out from the New York Post and the Washington Times. The Raleigh News & Observer has also named her.

It made me uncomfortable, but I don't think I can mount a strong argument against it.

This woman, shielded by the MSM's policy of not identifying rape victims -- with which I wholeheartedly agree -- practically destroyed the lives of the three Duke lacrosse players and brought shame on the institution, all based on what we now know was a lie. What responsibility do the media have to keep protecting her identity?

Isn't it time The Accuser was held accountable?

If a woman charges rape and there's a trial and a jury concludes there's not enough evidence to convict, that doesn't mean the media should suddenly carry her name and face. That, undoubtedly, would have a chilling effect on the willingness of women to report this most personal of crimes.

But that's not what happened in the Duke case. The North Carolina attorney general has concluded that the whole thing was a tissue of lies from the start and that the indictments should never have been brought.

My main hesitation about naming The Accuser hired to strip at that late-night party is that the AG hinted that she has mental problems. Roy Cooper could have charged her with making false accusations, but told reporters that the woman believes her account (which kept changing, by the way). Whatever her mental state, she has been shielded by the press until now.

New York Post columnist John Podhoretz makes the case:

"It is the policy of the news media not to publish the names of rape accusers on the grounds that they should not have to fear public shame for coming forward with word of a horrifying personal violation.

"That is a noble policy. But it needs a codicil. The codicil is that if a rape accuser is revealed as a liar, her name should be spoken loudly and often -- as loudly and often as the names of those whom she falsely accused have been over the past year . . .

"She must be denied anonymity because she makes a mockery of the very policy of granting anonymity to rape accusers. We do not publish their names so that they will not fear public exposure. But people who are tempted to do the monstrous thing [the Accuser] did should fear public exposure.

"They should be terrified of it.

"They should have nightmares about it.

"They should be given no encouragement whatsoever to believe they can launch a nuclear weapon at someone's reputation and escape unscathed."

Andrea Peyser, in the same paper, recounts a piece that was controversial at the time:

"This story so neatly fit the radical agenda of our 'newspaper of record,' The New York Times, that the paper disgustingly advanced the hoax on its front page, long after other media outlets had backed off.

"In a case of 'all the lies fit to print,' the paper on Aug. 25 affected an air of Timesian authority in a damning article, spoon-fed by DA Nifong. It tried to put to rest some of the alarming inconsistencies in the accuser's story about the night she was 'attacked.'

" 'While there are big weaknesses in Mr. Nifong's case, there is also a body of evidence to support his decision to take the matter to a jury,' quoth the Times. And, 'The full files, reviewed by The New York Times, contain evidence stronger than that highlighted by the defense.'

"Will the Times make reparations now?"

Well, the Imus radio show is now history, at least on CBS. Les Moonves axed the program late yesterday, a day after NBC's Steve Capus killed the cable simulcast. In both cases, we report here, rising anger among the networks' own employees seems to have tipped the scale. And there's no doubting that outrage over the awful Rutgers crack morphed into a larger national furor over indecent broadcasting that made it all but impossible for Imus to survive.

Glenn Reynolds: "I've never liked Imus, and his comments were disgraceful, but this seems like it's been a feeding frenzy. And, really, who cares what Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson think about proper public demeanor?"

Time's James Poniewozik, while criticizing the racial remark, frames the broader question:

"A reasonable person could ask, What was the big deal? And I don't mean the lots-of-black-rappers-say-'hos' argument, though we'll get to that. Rather, I mean, what celebrity isn't slurring some group nowadays?

"I exaggerate slightly. But our culture has experienced an almost psychotic outburst of -isms in the past year. Michael Richards and [the N-word]. Isaiah Washington and [the F-word for gays]. Senator George Allen and 'macaca.' Mel Gibson and '[blanking] Jews.'

"But we also live in a culture in which racially and sexually edgy material is often--legitimately--considered brilliant comment, even art. Last year's most critically praised comedy, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, won Sacha Baron Cohen a Golden Globe for playing a Kazakh journalist who calls Alan Keyes a 'genuine chocolate face' and asks a gun-shop owner to suggest a good piece for killing a Jew. Quentin Tarantino has made a career borrowing tropes from blaxploitation movies. In the critics-favorite sitcom The Sarah Silverman Program, the star sleeps with God, who is African American and who she assumes is 'God's black friend.' And the current season of South Park opened with an episode about a Michael Richards-esque controversy erupting when a character blurts [the N word] on Wheel of Fortune . . .

"This is not to say that Borat made Imus do it or to make excuses for Imus. Even in the midst of his apology tour last week, Imus did enough of that for himself, citing his charity work, his support of black Senate candidate Harold Ford Jr., even his booking the black singing group Blind Boys of Alabama on his show . . .

"But in the middle of his stunning medley of sneer, apology and rationalization, Imus asked a pretty good question: 'This phrase that I use, it originated in the black community. That didn't give me a right to use it, but that's where it originated. Who calls who that and why? We need to know that. I need to know that.' "

"So let's ask. Imus crossed a line, boorishly, creepily, paleolithically. But where is that line nowadays?"

A very good question, given all the filth out there.

Civil rights attorney Constance Rice in the LAT:

"Imus should only be fired when the black artists who make millions of dollars rapping about black bitches and hos lose their recording contracts. Black leaders should denounce Imus and boycott him and call for his head only after they do the same for the misogynist artists with whom they have shared stages, magazine covers and awards shows. The truth is, Imus' remarks mimic those of the original gurus of black female denigration: black men with no class. He is only repeating what he's heard and being honest about the way many men -- of all races -- judge women."

But Joe Conason says justice was done:

"Whatever the true motivation behind the decisions by NBC and CBS to rid themselves of Don Imus, the executives who decided to jettison the bullying schlock jock managed to focus on what mattered most to them. Perhaps they were pandering to frightened advertisers or perhaps they were soothing outraged employees, but the network suits ultimately ignored all the special pleadings, racial diversions and other distracting irrelevancies.

"So should the rest of us, when Imus and his defenders whine about the injustice inflicted on him this week."

The L.A. Times sees a partisan tilt to Imus's show, noting how it helped such Dems as Ford, the (yes) African-American congressman Imus backed for the Senate:

"Over the years, Democrats such as Ford came to count on Imus for the kind of sympathetic treatment that Republicans got from Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity. Equally important, Imus gave Democrats a pipeline to a crucial voting bloc that was perennially hard for them to reach: politically independent white men."

Sure, but who were among the pols who most quickly forgave Imus and said they'd go back on the show? McCain and Giuliani, both Republicans.

Rudy is getting much more scrutiny these days, as this New Republic item by James Kirchick suggests:

"Rudy Giuliani, who recently said that he would have backed efforts to keep Terri Schiavo 'alive,' has now declared, before a swooning crowd at the Alabama state capitol, that he believes that the decision to fly the Confederate flag on state property ought be 'left to the states.'

"The Confederacy was, should Giuliani need any reminder, from the firing on Fort Sumter, an act of treason against the United States. Never mind the crime against humanity that the Confederacy was formed to protect or the lives that were lost in order to defeat that treason. Of course, an individual who wants to fly the Confederate flag or put its likeness on the back of his pick-up truck is perfectly permitted to do so, just as one can legally fly a Nazi flag outside his house or goose-step around his neighborhood wearing a swastika. But the same freedom of expression should not apply to government institutions (in this case, state legislators and the public property in which they conduct their legislative business).

"John McCain had the honesty to admit that his back-and-forth on the issue during the 2000 Republican presidential primary was 'worse than waffling' . . . Perhaps Giuliani will take a cue from his primary opponent and realize it's best to be unambiguously opposed to state governments expressing nostalgia for a symbol that represents human bondage and historic treason."

Even worse: Rudy doesn't know the price of a gallon of milk! Dick Polman deconstructs the episode:

"I first saw this pop quiz in action 11 years ago, at eight in the morning during a snowstorm in New Hampshire (yeah, it's a glamorous job). We stood in a town square, listening to a campaign pitch by Republican presidential candidate Lamar Alexander. Suddenly, a local reporter asked him whether he could correctly recite the price of milk and a dozen eggs. Alexander blanked. He quickly turned to an aide for help. The aide was no help. Then he told the aide, "I need to know the price of a gallon of milk and a dozen eggs. I need to know right now." Alexander's rivals in the Bob Dole campaign were delighted; later that day, the Dole team put out a press release saying that the next time Alexander went stumping, 'he might want to stop in a supermarket' . . .

"Here's my pop quiz: Who cares?

"The price test is just a lazy journalistic gimmick which is designed to imply that a political candidate is out of touch with the lives of the masses. (Some political scientists refer to pop quizzes as 'degradation ceremonies.') Giuliani flunks the milk question, ergo he is an elitist . . .

"If I was asked to explain why any of this should matter, I'd flunk. Presidential candidates, and those few who actually make it to White House, are not like you and me. They tend to have people around them who buy the goods and pump the gas. They tend to focus on things like the Consumer Price Index, not the price at the local grocery."

There's a great deal of chatter about John McCain's speech at VMI. Andrew Sullivan is impressed but says McCain faces a huge obstacle:

"There is much in his speech to applaud, even while its historical poignancy remains. Unlike many of his fellow Republicans, he has exhibited patriotic candor about the appalling leadership that brought us into this mess. But his presidential ambitions prevent him from naming the truly guilty men: the duplicitous Cheney, the arrogant Rumsfeld, and the glib, clueless Bush. McCain says this:

" For the first time in four years, we have a strategy that deals with how things really are in Iraq and not how we wish them to be.

"That is a brutal indictment of a president he eagerly supported for re-election. And yet support him he did with an embrace that only helped sustain the madness of King George (including the right to torture). And that's why the Democrats have a huge advantage going into the next election. They don't have to defend Bush's record, or Bush himself. Painfully, McCain still does."

Slate's John Dickerson sees a more partisan candidate:

"What's new here is obviously not McCain's unhedged support for the war. He's talked about that at length. What makes this speech different is the full-force, no-caveats attack on his opponents. It went beyond attacking policy inconsistencies--such as the fact that Democrats voted to confirm Gen. David Petraeus as Iraqi commander but against his plan for action--or raising questions about how opponents of the war would deal with the chaos following an American withdrawal. It repeatedly questioned not just their views but their motives . . .

"Will Republicans buy the aggressive posture? They distrust McCain in part because Democrats have often said he's their favorite Republican. But it's certainly easier for McCain to win them over on the war than it would be on social issues, the way Romney is trying to do. McCain has the advantage of believing what he is saying on this subject quite passionately. He does believe in the surge, and in Gen. Petraeus, and in doing what it takes to win the war, even if it means sending a lot more troops. Lest there be any doubt about his sincerity, McCain's son Jimmy is about to be deployed as a Marine . . .

"This choice has costs. McCain has said he'd rather win the war than the election, and his supporters argue that he's trying to wake people up about the situation the country is in. But politicizing the issue so blatantly is likely to polarize the debate further and make McCain's task of selling a bigger commitment in Iraq even harder."

McCain did a conference call with bloggers, as Ed Morrissey reports:

"Speaking as bluntly as I have heard in some time, he acknowledged the credibility deficit of the Pentagon and White House on the war. Saying that "too often, we misled the American people in the past" about deadenders, mission accomplished, and so on, McCain said that the press has become too reluctant to report actual progress in Iraq...

"Who does he blame for the credibility gap? McCain pointed out that President Bush has to accept the ultimate responsibility for that as well as for the faulty strategy used up to this year in attempting to pacify the insurgencies."

Betsy's Page criticizes a WashPost piece that began:

"'Sinking in polls and struggling to reinvigorate his foundering presidential campaign, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) delivered a robust defense of the war in Iraq on Wednesday . . . '

"Hey, the country is at war. Terrorists around the world are trying to bring down more moderate Muslim governments and to kill as many westerners as they possibly can. And so shouldn't the candidates for president be talking about this every chance they get? And if John McCain gives a speech saying many of the same things he has been saying since the war [began], is he acting out of political calculation? I have disagreed with McCain on several issues, most notably campaign finance reform and cutting taxes, but the one thing I have always admired is that he doesn't take positions out of political calculation but out of his sincere beliefs in what he thinks is right. Remember that McCain's son is set to be deployed over in Iraq. His speech deserved more than to be cast as a political maneuver."

I confess that I'm not a fan of "Sinking in the polls" leads, because whatever follows carries an air of desperation.

In case you missed it, TPM's Greg Sargent says that Fox News and Drudge kept reporting that Nancy Pelosi might go to Iran even after her office flatly denied it.

And Paul Wolfowitz gets his girlfriend a cushy World Bank job--what was he thinking?