There’s a clear double standard on sex allegations for presidential candidates in the New York Times.
The Times put 15-year-old anonymous accusations of sexual harassment against GOP candidate Herman Cain on the front page Tuesday morning, in an off-lead story by Jim Rutenberg and Michael Shear written with help from five other reporters: “
Cain Confronts Claim From 90s Of Harassment — He Denies Wrongdoing — Account of Settlement Changes — Reports Rock Campaign.”
The prominent story comes just one full day after the allegations first surfaced on Politico Sunday evening. The Times was also eager during Campaign 2008 to advance sex rumors against Republican John McCain, who was on his way to clinching the GOP nomination.
By contrast, the paper’s treatment of better-substantiated allegations of adultery against Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards were ignored until the candidate himself was compelled to confess.
On February 21, 2008 the Times attempted to take down the McCain campaign with a
front-page story focused on McCain’s alleged affair with a lobbyist, which promptly fizzled out among conservatives and liberals alike, who dismissed it as a strained mix of sex innuendo and old news. For its affair innuendo, the Times relied on two anonymous former staffers who admit “they had become disillusioned with the senator.”
By contrast, more substantiated and damaging allegations about 2008 Democratic presidential candidate (and 2004 Democratic Party choice for vice president)
John Edwards were ignored for ten months by the paper until the candidate himself confessed to adultery on ABC News in August 2008.