"(I have been) the best Republican friend the incumbent governor's family ever had in West Virginia."
-- Disgraced former Gov. Arch Moore, to a GOP crowd in Logan County last month, as reported by The Lincoln Journal (and pointed out by The Charleston Gazette).
11 August 2008
Quote of the Day
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5 comments:
Certainly an unbiased post of "Just-the-Facts" in this entry. I don't recall if "Disgraced former" was officially added to every mention of President Clinton when he was campaigning here for his wife. Perhaps I should go back and check. No, I'm quite sure that would be a waste of time.
A search of the blog finds "disgraced" also applied to former Senate President Larry Tucker, D-Nicholas, and ex-House Education Chairman Jerry Mezzatesta, D-Hampshire. They, like Moore (but unlike, say, President Clinton) have been convicted of crimes.
Point to Messina
It seems to me that the disgraced former president avoided prosecution by admitting that he obstructed justice by giving false testimony under oath and had his law license revoked. Do you have to actually go to jail to get the "disgraced" tag? Isn't disgracing yourself and your office enough?
I think clear eyes wins, easily.
"Disgraced" is a highly subjective term and the selective use of it demonstrates a striking lack of objectivity. If you want to state this is a blog mixing reporting and opinion which is not bound by principles of objective reporting that is fine, but be honest and state your intentions.
A better course than making transparent post hoc rationalizations of biased word choices, however, might be to employ objective descriptive terms in all cases. Calling Moore, Tucker and Mezzatesta, "convicted" former officials and calling Clinton a "disbarred" former President officials would simply be stating objective facts and would not leave you wide open to allegations of slanted reporting as does the highly selective use of words such as "disgraced."
You might even consider thinking about whether your use of adjectives serves a necessary purpose when you are writing a story and if not exclude them, using a uniform standard to decide. An example would be that if you conclude it is not necessary in a story mentioning Clinton to mention he was disbarred because his history is well known, then it might not be necessary to remind people of other people's very well known pasts.
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