Change Congress' Green responds to “r-i-d-i-c-u-l-o-u-s” Connolly's interpretation of his quote
Written by Media Matters Staff
Published
From Change Congress interim chief executive Adam Green's Open Left blog post in response to Ceci Connolly's June 28 Washington Post article:
Connolly then asked me why progressives were picking a political fight on the public option, as opposed to another issue. I guess the fact that it's the #1 domestic issue of the day -- one that affects millions of American families -- wasn't explanation enough.
I figured she was looking for a quote summarizing the political stakes, so I though for a moment and said, “The public option has become a proxy for the question of whether Democrats will stand on principle and represent their constituents.”
I was quite proud of that answer. It summarizes what a lot of people are feeling -- the public option is the “line in the sand” issue for Democrats, something Chris has written about here on OpenLeft several times.
Connolly's take on that quote:
Green, in an interview, was hard-pressed to articulate a substantive argument for the public plan but said that it “has become a proxy for the question of Democrats who stand on principle and represent their constituents.”
WHAT? Connolly asked me a question on the politics, and when I gave her an answer on that, she said I didn't answer on the substance? Did I mention Ceci Connolly is a r-i-d-i-c-u-l-o-u-s reporter?
FLASHBACK: In December 1 and December 2, 1999, Post articles, Connolly misquoted then-Vice President Al Gore, falsely claiming that he said he had discovered the Love Canal disaster. On February 17, 2000, Slate.com editor-at-large Jack Shafer wrote that New York Times reporter Katharine Q. “Kit” Seelye and Connolly were responsible for creating the false Love Canal story: "[I]t's Seelye's fault -- and the Washington Post's Ceci Connolly's -- that folks think Gore claimed credit for Love Canal in the first place. Which he didn't" [emphasis in original].