Memo to media: Statement attributed to Clinton in Game Change is not a direct quote

[meegbear]

On page 218 of their book Game Change, John Heilemann and Mark Halperin write:

But Bill (Clinton) then went on, belittling Obama in a manner that deeply offended Kennedy. Recounting the conversation later to a friend, Teddy fumed that Clinton had said, A few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee.

Note the lack of quote marks around the statement attributed to Clinton. That means it's a paraphrase, not a direct quote. That means that Heilemann and Halperin did not or could not verify that Clinton said those exact words -- their source is not Kennedy or Clinton, but someone else who was supposedly aware of a later, alleged conversation between Kennedy and a "friend." As The Plum Line's Greg Sargent points out, the authors do indeed admit in their book: "Where dialog is not in quotes, it is paraphrased, reflecting only a lack of certainly on the part of our sources about precise wording, not about the nature of the statements."

As Sargent notes, Clinton may have said something along those lines, but: "In cases like these, when people are hinting at racism, the precise wording is everything. And in this case, the whole claim is based on an anonymous source's recollection that someone who has now passed away told him or her that Clinton said something like this."

So why are news organizations treating this as an exact, direct quote?

<snip>

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201001110043

[CTyankee]

1. I think the tide is turning on this book with the more responsible media people.

I didn't know that the "quote" had no quotation marks. That just confirms what I suspected, which is that this book is the product of lazy, quick buck grabbing political hacks who recycle garbage of doubtful credence and peddle their garbage on national TV.

Look for a youtube that will show Bob Woodward's take on the book on today's Morning Joe...hopefully there will be one soon!

[MrsBrady]

6. My dh and I were talking about this

We didn't think this was something that Clinton would say.
I mean, we can understand if he was supporting his wife and putting
the hard sell on. And we can even understand if he was claiming that Obama
didn't have enough experience. Glad to know this wasn't a direct quote. We could smell
the bs.

[Toots]

2. Even if the quote was exact it doesn't imply racism.

It implies lack of Seniority. A new kid on the block that would be fetching coffee or papers or whatever..That is what happens to new people. Obama was exactly that, especially as the quote says "a few years ago".

[waiting]

3. Agreed

That is my analysis of the remark as well

[SteelPenguin]

4. It's insane

It's like tar and feathering someone for something the last person in the chain of the phone game says. Has the media forgotten what sources are? It's not that long ago that this wouldn't even have been covered or mentioned, because it had no sources, or they couldn't confirm them.

Now we have some Person A on Fox/CNN/MSNBC regurgitating what Person B says in a book, that says person C told them a story about how they once heard that Ted Kennedy had a conversation with person D about Bill Clinton, and that Clinton said blah blah blah.

Wtf is that?

[CTyankee]

7. Essentially, that's what Bob Woodward was saying on Morning Joe today.

You had to read between the lines but I think what he was trying to do was to separate his works of reporting and this piece of crap. Heh. The knives are coming out on Halperin and Heileman...great...

[gratuitous]

5. And apparently asking Bill Clinton directly about it is out of the question

After all, none of the Villagers seem to know how to get in touch with him.