McCain Campaign Takes the Hard Questions

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Moments ago, Rudy Giuliani took three questions on a McCain campaign conference call for the national press corps.

The first question was about the bailout. It was from a staffer from TownHall.com, a conservative website, but the question itself was not glaringly pro-McCain. Nothing notable.

The second question was from someone named Chuck Pardee. Pardee asserted that Tina Fey and many reporters make their living “embellishing the facts.” After criticizing the press for treating Sarah Palin unfairly, Pardee concluded*:

“Do you think embellishing the facts is actually what the concerned voter is after? And specifically, Joe Biden seems to embellish and forget facts just to kind of impress people but when you take Sarah Palin she seems to impress others with her quick study without embellishing the facts. In other words do you think people want a straight shooter or do they want the stuff and fluff?”

Surprisingly, Giuliani said that the American people preferred the straight-shooter and John McCain just so happens to be one. Pardee, by the way, is the “founder and president” of Newsbull.com. He has donated the maximum $2,300 to McCain. It’s a shock he didn’t ask a tougher question. (And if you’re wondering, yes, the McCain campaign knows the affiliations of reporters before they are permitted to ask a question on these conference calls.)

The third and final question came from a woman named Sherry Riggs (sp?). Her affiliation was not announced. She took exception to Giuliani’s claim from earlier in the call that Obama had never managed a budget. A hard-hitting question? Not really. Riggs insisted that Obama had indeed managed a budget “with [William] Ayers” when they sat on a board together years ago. According to Riggs, Obama “always spent the money on educational programs that were socialistic in their agenda or their genre.”* And, in a real shock, Obama apparently had a $450 billion treasure chest to work with. That seemed a bit high to me, but I’m sure the McCain campaign would only allow legitimate professionals to ask questions on these calls.

Oh, and by the way, Giuliani agreed that more scrutiny ought to be applied to Obama’s “hidden” history with Ayers. And with that, the call ended.

* Questions updated with help from the Huffington Post.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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