Alaska Reporters Plotting To Sting Miller Campaign With Made Up Stories? UPDATE: TV Station Responds

A brief recap of the Alaska Senate race to date:

-Insurgent candidate backed by national tea party organizations and national conservative super star, who just happens to be from the same state, defeats entrenched Republican hack in primary. (Check!)

-Entrenched Republican hack Senator refuses to accept the judgment of her party and flirts with running on minor party line. When that fails, she launches long shot write-in campaign. (Check!)

-Insurgent candidate's security staff gets into fracas with editor of online political website. (Check!)

-State Supreme Court invents new rules to help long time incumbent to bitterly cling to her long shot hopes. (Check!)

-The race can't get any more bizarre. (Check!)

Big Journalism has the recording and transcript of a voicemail accidentally left on a Miller campaign staffer's phone from a reporter for the Anchorage CBS-TV affiliate. In the conversation reporters (possibly including the station's news director and assignment editor) discuss trying to identify sex offenders at a Miller event and using social media outlets to announce that "Joe Miller punched at rally".

Palin is, um, pissed.

Corrupt bastards. CBS/media plot against Joe Miller before our Anchorage rally Thurs Kinda'what I've put up w for 2 yrs

No comment so far from the station or the reporters propagandists involved. I'm sure they will say, "hey just joking! Don't you wingnuts have a sense of humor?"

Funny one guys! You know just like when MurCOKEski had a talk radio host thrown off the air for supporting Miller and criticizing Her Royal Cokeness.

I know some of you will say the idea of an "objective media" is a joke in itself but I would disagree. The MFM are objective...objectively hyper-liberal partisans.

UPDATE: Monty sends along the station's confir-denial...Yeah, it's us but it's not what you think it is.

A press release issued Saturday October 30, 2010, by the Joe Miller campaign claims that KTVA personnel, "openly discuss creating, if not fabricating, two stories about Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, Joe Miller." KTVA General Manager Jerry Bever says, "It's unfortunate that this recording has happened. It's unfortunate because it does not accurately reflect the journalistic standards of our newsroom and the garbled context will no doubt leave more questions than answers. The Miller campaign's analysis of the recording is incorrect in many material ways ranging from personnel involved in the conversation, the interpretation of conversation snippets and the reported transcript of the perceived garbled conversation."

"While the recording is real, the allegations are untrue," said Bever. "The recording was the result of a cell phone not being hung up after a call was placed to Randy DeSoto, Joe Miller campaign spokesperson, Thursday afternoon to discuss Joe Miller's appearance on that evening's newscast. That phone call was placed near the end of a coverage planning meeting in our newsroom regarding that evening's Miller rally in downtown Anchorage. The group of KTVA news personnel was reviewing potential "what-if" scenarios, discussing the likelihood of events at the rally and how KTVA might logistically disseminate any breaking news."

Bever continues, "The perception that this garbled, out of context recording may leave is unfortunate, but to allege that our staff was discussing or planning to create or fabricate stories regarding candidate Miller is absurd. The complete conversation was about what others might be able to do to cause disruption within the Miller campaign, not what KTVA could do."

While Bever would not discuss any personnel issues linked with the recording, Bever says "Have we had internal discussions about the level of professionalism we need to bring to our conversations, internally and externally? Of course we have, this is a lesson to learn from."

It's tough to say for sure without knowing what was said before or after but let's be honest...that snippet was not a "what if" conversation. The whole bit about at least one person being a child molester and "...I’d wait until you see who
shows up because that indicates we already know something..." demonstrate trying to hide their knowledge not that they are reacting to it.

posted by DrewM. at 10:56 AM

| Access Comments