Does The Washington Post have a statute of limitations on crooked behavior by its sources?
Little more than a year after the Post reported on hypocritical behavior by a conservative activist, the newspaper is quoting him as an expert — on whether such behavior is wrong.
In October of 2005, the Post‘s Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi told the story of how Jack Abramoff had used conservatives Ralph Reed and Rev. Louis Sheldon (whom Abramoff and his colleagues called “Lucky Louie”) to kill an online anti-gambling bill on behalf of his client eLottery, a company that sold lottery tickets online. eLottery footed the bill, paying thousands to Reed and Sheldon. To secure Sheldon’s help, Abramoff had eLottery cut a $25,000 check directly to the Sheldon’s group, the Traditional Values Coalition.
Yet today, the Post seems to have forgotten Sheldon’s hypocritical fundraising.
Post reporter John Solomon’s story revealed that Newt Gingrich’s conservative political group was jump-started by a $1 million contribution from a Las Vegas casino executive. To prove that this would raise hackles among the values set, he quoted Sheldon saying that accepting “income” from “a vice” was an “issue,” and that “I certainly could never have done that and I certainly can’t encourage it.”
Except, well, he did, of course. Oddly, the piece references the Post‘s reporting on Reed’s acceptance of gambling money, but is silent on Sheldon.
