NY Daily News Journalism Ethics: Don't Allegedly Sleep With Basketball Players in 1987, Do Quote Their Fake Twitter Accounts as if They Were Real

Mediocre New York Daily News sports columnist Filip Bondy thinks that the tawdry, questionably sourced, and defiantly irrelevant Sarah Palin/Glen Rice/Joe McGinniss hookup story is a sad tale of lapsed journalism ethics. Sarah Palin's, naturally:

There is plenty of funny and jaw-dropping material in Joe McGinniss' book, "The Rogue," but the one serious, grimace-producing revelation is that Palin had a one-night stand while covering the 20-year-old Michigan player who happened to be in town for a basketball tournament.

According to the Alaskan's acquaintances and neighbors interviewed by McGinniss, Palin, 23, had a "fetish" about black men. Rice reportedly confirmed the affair when asked by the author, though he wasn't commenting on it Wednesday from his home in Coral Gables, Fla.

This is the stuff that drives legitimate women reporters nuts, makes members of AWSM (Association for Women in Sports Media) furious because it tears at credibility and plays to false stereotypes. Palin had learned her ethics the previous fall and spring as a journalism major at the University of Idaho - her fifth college in six years[.]

So what does the Daily News' own journalism ethics look like? Beyond making the rookie error of reporting that the famous athlete in question was Hall of Fame football player Jerry Rice (pictured), and letting Mike Lupica (shudder) attempt writing about politics, the Snooze also deploys the memorable sourcing phrase "the [National] Enquirer said Rice confirmed the romance to McGinniss," and then writes about how the story "sparked an endless outpouring of cyberspace wisecracks," including:

NBA Hall-of-Famer Bill Walton took a shot at the notoriously offense-minded Rice.

"Sarah Palin had an intimate relationship with Glen Rice in the 80s," he tweeted. "Rice tried to resist but he was never one to stop anyone from scoring."

The main problem with that quote? It came from @TheBillWalton, a parody site (see image) that bills itself as "Tweets from Bill Walton…. if only he knew how to use Twitter."

Comments

[John]

Sports writers are kind of the retarded kid of the journalist world. Other journalists don't take them seriously. And they know it. So, they try to make up for it by being more Catholic than the Pope when it comes to leftist politics. You wouldn't think so. But sports writers tend to be the most mindless leftist twits on earth.

[J_L_B]

Their attempts to gain favor with leftists have largely failed as the left views sports as a waste of valuable resources.

Nevertheless, even the left is dismayed by their authoritarian idols (Soviet Union, Cuba, North Korea), who seek (sought) national excellent through athletic success.

[Yakov Smirnoff]

In Soviet Union, hoops shoot you!

[Fartriloquist]

You have to admit, those East German Youthsex Teams were world beaters!

[Colin]

+1

I used to read Peter King all the time until he got his nannystate on.

[Fatty Bolger]

I think I stopped reading King after seeing his coffeetardness asides one too many times.

[O2]

personally i wouldnt vote palin to be dog-catcher but this "book" strikes me as a smearjob & unfair. >however, if palin uses this book to grift her doops even morez then one must wonder about collusion

[Sparky]

I made the mistake of trying to decipher this comment, don't let it happen to you.

[teh rael o2]

ok thx

[R C Dean]

See, where I come from, using anonymous sourcing should be pretty close to the top of the list of violations of journalistic ethics, with the sole exception of a source who will suffer severe personal consequences if they are outed.

As near as I can tell, McGinnis entire book is unethical on that count.

[P Brooks]

Welcome to post-racial America.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Palin nailed Jerry Rice, too? I'm updating his wikipedia page as we speak.

[Abdul]

That was a mistake. The story was supposed to say she ate Uncle Ben's Rice.

But she was in college, still experimenting, so it's okay.

[Sparky]

I bet she used this kind.

[teh rael o2]

rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrAAACISSTT !!1111!1

[Fist of Etiquette]

I'm editing Sparky's wikipedia page as we speak.

[Mike Laursen]

Wouldn't that be, "Jerry Rice nailed Palin, too?" Euphemisms have meanings, you know.

[Copernicus]

Anatomy be damned. When Palin "makes love" with someone, she is the nailer, not the nailee. I'm sure of it.

[Brandt Hardin]

Hey, Bill Walton sounds as jealous as Barkley to me- and who says Tea Partiers are racist either? Turns out Sarah's as liberal as they come and likes to dip in the chocolate! Don't be ashamed Sarah- at least you didn't do it for the money. A lot has changed since '87 and she'll show us all the goods for the cash now. See what I mean with this racy picture at http://dregstudiosart.blogspot.....in_15.html

[Alan Vanneman]

Wait, I'm confused. Mediocre New York Daily News sports columnist Filip Bondy isn't screwing Bill Walton? Matt, maybe you shouldn't read either David Brooks or Filip.

[Ken Shultz]

Of course, there are good reasons to criticize Sarah Palin. You might even think she's an intellectual lightweight.

...but a lot of the stuff I'm seeing just comes across as misogynistic, and dare I say it? This whole story is coming across as racist--like for reals.

I don't understand how criticizing Sarah Palin for supposedly dating a black man isn't racist.

Maybe it is just an attempt by people on the left to distance Sarah Palin from what they see as the racists in the Tea Party...but trying to smear somebody for having a relationship with a black man? I don't see how that isn't racist.

I think a lot of the hate we've seen over the years directed at women like Bachman and Palin--and Hillary and Pelosi too--has been grounded in misogyny. So I guess it shouldn't be surprising to see people go all racist on Palin too.

I don't understand why non-racists should care about the race of the people Sarah Palin dated--even if every word of it were true.

[Fatty Bolger]

You know what McGinniss was thinking. "Wait until those racists teabagger hicks find out their goddess slept with a [black guy]! It's going to blow their fucking minds!" But of course it's the left that goes ape-shit over the news instead.

[Eduard van Haalen]

That is quite possible. Certainly there will be progressives saying, "it's OK to make a big deal about a right-wing bogey(wo)man dating across racial lines, because I'm just exposing the hypocrisy of those evil reactionary conservatives.

Here's the difficulty: Nowadays, it's the progressives who constantly invoke race in these situations - as if they were obsessed about it or something. When it comes to Clarence Thomas, I don't know about any right-wing figures who objected to his marriage to a white woman. It was a progressive journalist who publicly wished that his wife would poison him with unhealthy foods - helpfully pointing out that these kind of foods are a problem in the black community. We can imagine what progressives would say if a right-winger publicly wished that a black man's white wife would poison him.

When Ward Connerly, also married to a white wife, campaigned against racial preferences in California, a progressive legislator (as quoted in Wikipedia, at least) said: "He's married to a white woman. He wants to be white." Mainstream conservatives, to my knowledge, didn't really give a flip. A progressive supports racial discrimination and insults someone who marries interracially, yet it's the *right* that's racist.

If a conservative person dates or marries interracially, progressives generally find a way to bring it up in a derogatory way - supposedly to rebuke those hypocritical racist right-wingers.

The progressives believe their own propaganda rather than the (inconvenient) facts.

[teh rael o2]

"Nowadays, it's the progressives who constantly invoke race in these situations"
_

u mean like the progressives all over this thread? ^v

[Eduard van Haalen]

On this thread, people comment on Palin if she's with a white man, or if she sneezes, or if she says something on TV, etc. They also like to comment when progressives manifest spittle-flecked hatred toward the devil-figure of the moment, whether the hate-object is libertarians or (preferably) an attractive woman. The commenters don't have a problem with the race of her dates, and don't use the racial angle to denounce people for crossing racial lines.

Since commenters clearly have certain...feelings toward Palin, then any racist jealous they had would manifest itself, but it hasn't.

[Invisible Finger]

Don't forget that Jim Crow laws were enacted by Democrats. They love black people - as long as they keep their distance. Democrats think it's OK if black people get jobs - so long as everyone thinks they got their jobs because of quotas and not because of merit.

[Ken Shultz]

"You know what McGinniss was thinking. "Wait until those racists teabagger hicks find out their goddess slept with a [black guy]! It's going to blow their fucking minds!"

He might have been simply thinking--wow, I'm gonna make big bucks selling this incendiary book!

But when I see people perpetuating the story? I think that's hangin' out there in the background...

They think the Tea Party is racist. ...and they think hope news of Sarah Palin dating a black man will destroy her politically.

It's like they're pandering to the racism out there--and it's making them act just like the racists. If they're reporting on this for the purpose of, basically, disqualifying Palin? ...on the basis of having dated a black man?

That's racism by any other name.

[sunny black]

The stories that I've seen seem to emphasize that Palin hooked up with an African-American basketball player. Or she was involved in an interracial relationship. And, lastly, some mention that McInnis said she had had a fetish for black men.

An affair with former basketball star Glen Rice would be gossip-worthy enough. But nudging the race stuff strikes me as a blatant attempt to disillusion her white male admirers.

Why go to all this trouble??

No one thinks she's going to be President any time soon. Does anyone really think she could be President in the future and therefore she needs to be savaged now? Or is this just some exercise in journalistic sadism?

[Huh?]

For the life of me I cannot understand the depth of hatred & vitriol reserved for this woman (Palin) by the left. Her views are really no more or less vapid than dozens of other right wingers (and left as well), yet even "leftish" friends of mine come completely unhinged when speaking of her. Reciting with great anger commonly (and often inaccurate) account of "stupid" things she's said (Russia from my back door, et. al)... As Sunny said, no chance of getting the in the Oval Office, so what is it? Best case, some conservative wins the WH and appoints her to some "lifetime post" as a poke in the eye to the progressives who would go completely bat-shit!! That would be fun to watch

[Maxxx]

Justice Sarah Palin?

I love it.

[mad libertarian guy]

I think it's pretty simple.

While the left, particularly feminists on the left, sit and talk about women empowering themselves and "having it all" in their little bubbles, Palin is out there actually doing it. She has multiple college degrees, was the governor of a state, has a family, and is an outstandingly successful conservative celebrity who makes a ton of money.

But none of that is good enough because she's anti-abortion and for small government (allegedly anyways). So they MUST demonize her, lest women would think it's okay to emulate her.

[Invisible Finger]

The left can't stand the fact that Palin is actually more socially liberal (overall) than they are and yet chose to be a Republican. It's as if her very existence mocks the left every day she is alive.

This is why they lump her in with the tea party, conveniently disregarding the fact that she ran with McCain while the tea party wanted absolutely nothing to do with that ticket.

[Yawn]

[highnumber]

You sleepy?

[Yawn]

ZZZZZZZZZZZ

[Abdul]

How come no one's talking about all the blacks that Obama slept with? I heard from a reliable source that he slept with a darkie just last night!

[Ken Shultz]

You should be ashamed of yourself.

[Barack Obama]

Where da white wimmin!?

[teh rael o2]

in alaska, duh

[Kalpenn Modi]

You're a liar!! He was with me last night. TROLL!!

I'm reporting you to ATTTAACCCCKKK WATTTCH!!

[Abdul]

I've got another shocker for you: Palin slept with a half-breed Indian last night! (feather, not dot).

That's right, Todd Palin is part Eskimo!

George Wallace tried to warn us about the miscengenatin', but we just wouldn't listen!

[Colin]

Bondy wasn't doing anything different than what Sullum did here on this site yesterday. That is, regarding the allegations as fact simply because they were printed in a book.

Are you gonna write a post about him, too?

[Joe M]

Gah who cares? I fail to see how having consensual relations with another single adult is anything at all to get worked up about.

[Longtime Lurker]

How does this story square with what we were fed the other day about her having a bunch of non-white campaign volunteers fired because she allegedly wasn't comfortable around "those" people? I'm very confused....

[John]

It doesn't. But no criticism of Palin ever has to be true or make sense. It just has to make the person who hurls it feel better.

[argo]

imagining her riding black cock made me fill up. not my kind of scene typically, but, well, oh well.

[Tim Cavanaugh]

"Sarah Palin/Glen Rice/Joe McGinniss hookup story"

If Sarah Palin, Glen Rice and Joe McGinniss hook up, it's news.

If Sarah Palin, Jerry Rice and Joe Montana hook up, it's news. (Steve Young not so much.)

Anything else is dog-bites-man.

Are there no standards in journalism anymore?

[Kolohe]

If Sarah Palin and Donna Rice hook up, it's also news.

[John]

This is the stuff that drives legitimate women reporters nuts, makes members of AWSM (Association for Women in Sports Media) furious because it tears at credibility and plays to false stereotypes

I wonder, are they furious at Erin Andrews for dating hockey players and was rumored to be dating Aaron Rogers? Or sports journalist Lindsey McCormick who is or at least was dating Mark Sanchez?

What a bunch of hypocrites.

[Abdul]

At least Erin Andrews kept it within her race, even if it was a filthy Canadian

[John]

Spoken like a true liberal.

[Abdul]

A true liberal would have added "filthy Canadian, who is entitled to universal health care!!11!"

[Copernicus]

"legitimate women reporters"

I do not theenk dees words meen wot you theenk dey meens.

[danwgre]

I wonder how STEVE SMITH fills about all of this...

[Anthony G]

I think we are missing the bigger point here: that this Bill Walton parody account is F'ing hilarious.