{"id":108189,"date":"2016-09-29T15:51:07","date_gmt":"2016-09-29T23:51:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=108189"},"modified":"2016-09-29T15:51:55","modified_gmt":"2016-09-29T23:51:55","slug":"the-megaphone-in-inaction-on-alicia-machado","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=108189","title":{"rendered":"The Megaphone in (In)Action On Alicia Machado"},"content":{"rendered":"

Steve Sailer writes<\/a>: From CBS News<\/em>:<\/p>\n

\n

Commentary: The curious case of Alicia Machado<\/a><\/p>\n

By WILL RAHN CBS NEWS September 29, 2016, 12:54 PM<\/p>\n

As a rule, reporters like to keep their stories interesting, which is why the coverage we\u2019ve seen of Alicia Machado is so curious.<\/p>\n

This has been the week of Machado, who became famous literally overnight when Hillary Clinton brought her up at Monday\u2019s debate. The next day saw numerous outlets writing pieces on Machado, boosted along by a conference call held by the Clinton campaign for journalists.<\/p>\n

The former Miss Universe, who says that Donald Trump fat-shamed her and alleges that he called her \u201cMs. Piggy\u201d and \u201cMs. Housekeeping,\u201d and generally humiliated her after she put on weight, is now the star of a Clinton ad. An obscure figure in America less than a week ago, Machado is perhaps the biggest story in politics at the moment.<\/p>\n

So it\u2019s almost inexplicable that, despite all this coverage, the publications discussing the extraordinary stories of her life are mostly right-wing ones.<\/p>\n

The most interesting thing about the mainstream articles is what they leave out. There is no discussion at CNN or The New York Times, for instance, about her post-pageant fame as the fianc\u00e9e of Phillies outfielder Bobby Abreu, or how he reportedly called it off after a reality show she was on revealed video of her apparently having sex with a housemate.<\/p>\n

Likewise, there is little mention of how a Venezuelan judge once alleged on live TV that Machado had threatened to kill him. Or how the Mexican attorney general\u2019s office later said she was the girlfriend of a major narco trafficker, and that she he had a child with him, according to Univision and other outlets. Or how a government witness who reportedly testified about their affair was later shot to death.<\/p>\n

A certain reticence is fair and appropriate when discussing the private lives of people alleging abuse at the hands of powerful men. The Clintons, of course, are no strangers to this, as they have been accused repeatedly of trying to smear women who\u2019ve said President Clinton was sexually inappropriate with them.<\/p>\n

But there\u2019s something odd about news coverage that avoids easily available and fascinating stories about that person\u2019s life. And it\u2019s especially peculiar when that person is a campaign surrogate for a major party nominee, which is what Machado is now. …<\/p>\n

But that doesn\u2019t mean that her life, which has been reported on extensively in the Spanish language press, should be sanitized and whitewashed by the press. The political media is not in the beatification business; if it\u2019s out there, readers deserve to know it.<\/p>\n

And it is all out there. …<\/p>\n

From an objective standpoint, this is all interesting stuff! Is it relevant to Machado\u2019s current role in the Clinton campaign? Let\u2019s take a look at what CNN and The New York Times reported about her life.<\/p>\n

The CNN story, which includes a total of four bylines, limits its main Machado story to a discussion of how Trump treated her. After Clinton name-checked her in the debate, the story reports Machado saying that she began \u201ccrying because I never imagined that such an important person like her would care about my story, know about my story.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the CNN story notes, Machado made that statement on a conference call with reporters organized by the Clinton campaign. There is no mention in the story of the judge, the kingpin, or the baseball player.<\/p>\n

The New York Times, however, went for more of a dive into who Machado is in a double-bylined story that ran Tuesday, \u201cShocked and Angry: Alicia Machado, a Miss Universe Mocked by Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Times reports that Machado was born in Venezuela and has endured 20 years of \u201cagony\u201d due to Trump\u2019s behavior. \u201cI was sick \u2013 anorexia and bulimia for five years,\u201d Machado says.<\/p>\n

It goes on to note that Machado has \u201cdone a series of interviews\u201d with the Times this year. Towards the end, it notes that she is \u201ca well-known actress\u201d in Latin America.<\/p>\n

And now she is a well-known political figure in America, a star surrogate for the leading contender for our presidency, which brings with it its own level of scrutiny and expectations.<\/p>\n

Machado has lived a full life, and a uniquely fascinating one. So why would any journalist avoid talking about it?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The immigration \/ voting question is the big one. Machado is the Democrats’ self-selected epitome of their strategy of winning by importing dubious foreign ringers to vote for them.<\/p>\n

COMMENTS:<\/p>\n

* \u201cAlmost inexplicable?\u201d Yeah, almost, except for the tiny, easily overlooked fact that they all want Hillary to win.<\/p>\n

But aside from, what possible explanation could there be?<\/p>\n

* There is all this talk about foreign actors trying to influence our elections. Forget the foreign actors. Our own press is trying to influence the election. And the Machado story is exhibit A in how they came together with one campaign to collude and prepare a pre-cooked story ready to be served to the American public at a specified time. Their continued ignoring of the unpleasant details only adds to the evidence of their treachery.<\/p>\n

* I read this as the closest thing we\u2019ll ever get to a public confession from the MSM that they screwed up by hitching on to this woman\u2019s story without doing a quick Google search first.<\/p>\n

Hell, single women these days are smart enough to Google the heck out of any potential suitors. Wouldn\u2019t it be wise to to apply at least that level of scrutiny with somebody you\u2019re about to make the poster child of your multimillion-dollar political campaign?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Steve Sailer writes: From CBS News: Commentary: The curious case of Alicia Machado By WILL RAHN CBS NEWS September 29, 2016, 12:54 PM As a rule, reporters like to keep their stories interesting, which is why the coverage we\u2019ve seen … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42787],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-108189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alicia-machado"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=108189"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108192,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108189\/revisions\/108192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=108189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=108189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=108189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}