Hotline's Chuck Todd ignored key fact in stating that Bradley, too, was a member of CAP
SUMMARY: Hotline editor-in-chief Chuck Todd defended Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr.'s membership in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton by saying former Sen. Bill Bradley also was a member. Todd neglected to mention that Bradley resigned his membership in the first year after the organization was formed because of its stance on women and minorities.
In a discussion during the January 13 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, Chuck Todd, editor-in-chief of the National Journal's Hotline weblog, defended Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr.'s professed membership in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP) by pointing out that former Sen. Bill Bradley (D-NJ) was himself a member. But what Todd didn't note was that, unlike Alito, Bradley renounced his membership in CAP the year after its formation, calling it, as The Washington Post reported, a right-wing organization that "opposed the admission of women and minorities in the school."
According to the Daily Princetonian, CAP was formed in 1972 -- the year of Alito's graduation -- and remained in existence into the 1980s. The year after the group's formation, Bradley, a 1965 Princeton graduate, reportedly resigned from his position as a member of the alumni advisory board to the Prospect, CAP's magazine, after the release of its second issue. The Washinton Post reported on January 12: "As a Princeton alumnus and professional basketball player, Bill Bradley in 1973 renounced his membership in Concerned Alumni of Princeton, calling it a 'right wing' organization that opposed the admission of women and minorities to the school." Alito, by contrast, listed his membership in CAP on his 1985 job application for the position of deputy assistant attorney general in the Reagan administration.
From a discussion that included host Chris Matthews, Todd, and Chris Cillizza, editor of washingtonpost.com's weblog The Fix, on the January 13 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews:
MATTHEWS: Calling him a racist because he's a member of some tired-ass yesterday's mossbag Princeton alumni group, that's all he's got on him?
CILLIZZA: Well, like Chuck --
TODD: Bill Bradley was a member of that group.
CILLIZZA: Right.
TODD: Now granted he --
MATTHEWS: -- for a while.
CILLZZA: Yeah.
TODD: -- yeah, I mean, so you can't, look -
MATTHEWS: Thirty-year public adult record, and all you can nail him for is some club he never went to?
The issue was never whether Alito is a racist. Even Chuck Schumer said he didn't belive he was.
The issue is why "Say-Anything-Sammy" put CAP membership on his resume. Did he think it would give him clout with the Reganites? And why did he change his story about why he put it there?
Has Chris brought this up? No, because he doesn't think senators actually should do their jobs and thoroughly question people who are up for lifetime appointments to the highest court in the land.
Shouldn' that be "mossback" rather than "mossbag"?
"MATTHEWS: Thirty-year public adult record, and all you can nail him for is some club he never went to?" ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gee, Chris. If he never went to the club, does that mean he lied on his application letter? Or did he just lie to the committee about his "recollection"?
One way or another, he has a credibility problem. And I know after 5 years of living in Republicanland, it is definitely harder to distinguish truth from lies, but don't you think it's kind of important that a Supreme Court justice shouldn't perjure himself either on an application or under direct questioning?
For goodness sake, we hear about what an intelligent man of impeccable integrity Alito is.
It used to be that lying on an employment application was grounds for dismissal.
I love the upside down world of Republicanland.