At the end of another round of Levi Johnston-promoting interviews (two days and ten minutes of precious air time), the who-needs-substantiation folks at The Early Show on CBS read a statement Thursday from former governor Sarah Palin:
After our interview yesterday, where Levi said that he heard Sarah Palin refer to her son, Trig, who has Down Syndrome, as her ‘retarded baby,’ Palin issued this statement, quote, these are her words. ‘We have purposefully ignored the mean spirited, malicious and untrue attacks on our family. We, like many, are appalled at the inflammatory statements being made or implied. Trig is our blessed little angel who knows it and is lovingly called that every day of his life. Even the thought that anyone would refer to Trig by any disparaging name is sickening and sad. CBS should be ashamed for continually providing a forum to propagate lies. Consider the source of the most recent attention-getting lies. Those who would sell their body for money reflect a desperate need for attention and are likely to say and do anything for even more attention.’
After reading the statement, anchor Maggie Rodriguez tried to claim that her latest festival of wild accusations from the pistachio pitchman/Playgirl centerfold was perfectly acceptable, since she suggested these claims might not be factual.
Of course you heard we raised all those questions about credibility and his motivation for doing this with Levi and you heard how he answered. But we should say that we’ve also offered more than a dozen times to interview Sarah Palin, but she has declined each of those requests.
That’s a little sloppy. Actually, Sarah Palin’s parents appeared on the morning show in 2008, and of course Palin accepted a gotcha Evening News interview with Katie Couric on CBS as well.
This is the journalistic equivalent of the old Tom Lehrer comedy song about Wernher von Braun: “Once the rockets go up, who cares where they come down? That’s not my department, said Wernher von Braun.”