Demagogue

Yesterday's Washington Times top, above-the-fold headline:

Was the Schiavo Memo a Fake?

My initial reaction yesterday when I walked by a Washington Times box was-- are they serious? They missed the news cycle on this story, oh, about a week or more ago. Frankly it didn't really didn't have legs anyways. So what gives? (Besides that it glaringly reminds us that their paper is nothing but a Moonie-owned GOP rag.) The story blatantly attempts to cast doubt on the authenticity of the memo, tearing a page out of the Swiftboat Vets for Truth handbook, hoping that if the memo can't be authenticated that the rest of the story will die along with it.

However, there is one paragraph, towards the end, that is more interesting today.

"Senator Martinez has never seen the memo and condemns its sentiments," spokeswoman Kerry Feehery said. "No one in our office has seen it, nor had anything to do with its creation."

But today? Some disposable, anonymous GOP aide (allegedly a lawyer) admits to writing it. Guess whose office he worked for?

Martinez admits to giving the memo to Senator Harkin (D-Iowa) but claims it was an accident, that the didn't read the memo, he just gave him a folded piece of paper from his pocket that he thought was background info on Schiavo. (C'mon, they can do better than that, can't they? Of all the lousy explanations this has got to be one of the worst.) As for all the other GOP folks who claim they never heard of or saw the memo? Who knows? But the GOP may have inadvertently reminded this story.

Americablog has a nice post compiling a lot of quotes from right-wingers where they denounce the memo as "fake" repeatedly and accuse the media and/or Democrats for making it up. Maybe the Washington Times should host a big banquet where they can all sit down together for a nice crow dinner.