The Nevada Sagebrush

Colleen Hagen

The adage “If you have something to say, say it to my face”was good advice in preschool and it still applies.

While I’m not fan of Gov. Sarah Palin and I’m not shocked to hear accusations that she’s an idiot, the decision of McCain aides to anonymously leak these “stories”to the press is the height of cowardice.

Can I fault the press for printing and airing this anonymous information? Not really. As a proponent of a national shield law, I am all for anonymity.

But can I fault the source? You bet. This isn’t news. It’s gossip. Even Perez Hilton owns up to the mud he slings.

If you’re leaking information that has to do with the president’s involvement in a break-in at the Democratic National Committee, use any pornographic pseudonym you like.  But this Palin stuff is not Watergate material.

Which brings me back to the media. They have any right to  print information from confidential sources.  But if your top headline is “Palin can’t tell countries from continents,”it had  better be in the National Enquirer.

The media seems to have lost the ability to distinguish between actual news and ratings-grabbing gossip.  The buck gets passed all around for this particular sin, from the reporters to editors to publishers with one eye constantly on the bottom line.  In a time where newspapers are in trouble, the press seems to be reverting back to sensational yellow journalism to keep its head above water.

But it seems in this case that the reporters are the villains. MSNBC revealed that Martin Eisenstadt is the McCain adviser who leaked the story that Palin did not know Africa was a continent. Trouble was, no such person exists.  How exactly did reporters make a confidentiality agreement with a man who is not real?

The entire profession, print and broadcast alike, was duped by a non-existent adviser and member of an imaginary think tank. It is being reported that Eisenstadt was made up by two filmmakers, Dan Mirvish and Eitan Gorlin, as a possible sitcom character.

I shudder to think that a phone call to the McCain camp to verify the existence of this adviser could have stopped the whole thing.

But once again, the buck is on the move and this time it falls smack dab in the lap of the people themselves.  We want this sort of crap.

We want it so badly, stories about former vice presidential candidates in their towels crack the top-10 most-read headlines on certain Web sites.  We want it so badly, we don’t care where it comes from or if you can verify it. We want it so badly we are willing to destroy someone’s political career without demanding proof.

If anyone has a case for libel based on reckless disregard by the media, it’s Palin. Perhaps the public should pay the legal fees.

Colleen Hagen is a columnist for The Nevada Sagebrush. She can be reached at editor@nevadasagebrush.com.

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