Liar Liar, or Where There's Smoke, There's William Weld's Pants
In his campaign for governor of New York, former Massachusetts Governor William Weld has put a whole new meaning on "There's no such thing as bad press". His website has numerous news reports on it, from various newspapers, under the category, "News". But until yesterday, they didn't mention that those stories are not exactly what appeared in print. In fact, a New York Times article needed to be sheared from 1500 words to 800 words, including the headline, to extract all the negative things from the article. Between just two articles that appear on the website, they mention his difficulties with fundraising, his role in bankrupting and destroying a small college while its CEO, his lack of momentum, and questions about his leadership. This is the sort of phrase he looked to eliminate: "Dogged by an investigation", "campaign...down", "setbacks", "mini-slump", "getting back on track", and "raising money has been a challenge". Amazingly, phrases like "political dilletante", "flighty", and "flakier than a croissant", though equally appropriate, did not appear in the news articles on the former Massachusetts Governor, who famously quit that office because of boredom.
This is consistent in all past articles on former Massachusetts Governor Weld; if there is anything negative in the article, the article is "excerpted", stripped of the negative mention. If it is entirely glowing, the article appears in full. But it doesn't matter what I say, or what anyone says. On former Massachusetts Governor Weld's website, everything the press says about him is beautiful, because if it isn't, it gets cut.
For instance, if it were to appear on the Weld website, my article would say:
William Weld has put a whole new meaning on "There's no such thing as bad press". Everything the press says about him is beautiful.
Now, I might not think that's a fair summary of my point, but the Weld campaign has defended the practice (his spokesman has claimed that everyone does it, even though at this point he cannot cite a single other political website to back up that startling thesis), and suggests they think it's both fair, and even honest. How about you?
3:36:27 PM 
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