O'Donnell's "Hook-Up": Gawker's in the Wrong

It’s a sorry moment in political journalism when we must look towards the National Enquirer as a standard-bearer in reporting ethics.

I’m not a fan of Christine O’Donnell and until this moment (actually, including this moment) considered her an embarrassment to the GOP.

However, if it is possible for a tabloid gossip site to lower itself any further than Gawker habitually does, it scored big today.

Here we have a completely anonymous story, posted less than a week before the mid-terms, by a man who claims he hooked up with Christine O’Donnell on Halloween a few years ago.

Nice timing, bud!  You even managed to get the Halloween news hook in!

I obviously have no idea whether any part of this story is true.  But if it or any part of it IS true, given its explosive effects not only on the election but upon O’Donnell’s career and reputation, Gawker has a duty to come clean (sorry—that may be impossible) or at least verify every sordid fact in it.

It’s a sorry moment in political journalism when we must look towards the National Enquirer as a standard-bearer in reporting ethics.

A thought to consider as you read the story:

Let's say every detail in it is true. O'Donnell was (and is) a single woman at the time this alleged incident happened.  She did not commit adultery.  She did not become pregnant out of wedlock.  She did not even masturbate. Indeed by the guy's own telling, she didn't even violate her views on abstinence -- not with him, and not subsequently in the alleged year-long relationship with his roommate.  Yes it's true she might have violated her own self-professed sexual ethics -- getting drunk and giggly and naked, like some 1950s sorority girl -- but really!  Is this the standard we are now going to hold public figures to?  Are we really going to get into a public debate about private dating behavior, and whether  or not one sticks to a standard on a consistent basis?

Either way this whole story reeks as a pre-election plant, a completely made-up fiction, and Gawker should own up to the identity of this cowardly sexual creep. If only so that Christine O’Donnell’s older brother can find him and give him a well-deserved punch in the face.

Although I wouldn’t put it past O’Donnell to be able to level that punch herself.