Rocky strikes back against Both Ways Bob
Both Ways Bob Beauprez recently sent out a press release with this quote from Democratic gubernatorial nominee Bill Ritter:
"A guy's got to work at getting jail time in Denver. He's got to do something very bad, or keep doing something fairly bad over and over again," said Bill Ritter, as reported in the Rocky Mountain News, May 3, 1998.
The point Beauprez was trying to make is that Ritter is soft on crime. But what he forgot is that the Rocky has the ability to check up on its own quotes. And the paper's editors weren't too happy about what they found. Today they wrote:
Ritter had made the point not as a boast but as a complaint. The DA was irritated with the report of two consultants who claimed that overcrowding in the Denver jail could be alleviated by releasing apparently harmless traffic and drug offenders...
In short, the Beauprez campaign lifted a Ritter assertion - not a quotation - in which he was taking a hard line against criminals and twisted it to make him sound like a crime-indulging wimp. The Trailhead Group, an independent outfit supporting Republicans, did the same thing in an earlier press release.
We can understand the frustration among Republicans trying to build a case against Ritter given the maddeningly narrow focus of his public comments over the years. But that's no excuse for the altogether sleazy misuse of what the candidate actually has said.
(You can read the rest on the Rocky's website.)
Beauprez has made some big miscalculations. Ticking off the editors of the Rocky might just be one of the worst.
"A guy's got to work at getting jail time in Denver. He's got to do something very bad, or keep doing something fairly bad over and over again," said Bill Ritter, as reported in the Rocky Mountain News, May 3, 1998.
The point Beauprez was trying to make is that Ritter is soft on crime. But what he forgot is that the Rocky has the ability to check up on its own quotes. And the paper's editors weren't too happy about what they found. Today they wrote:
Ritter had made the point not as a boast but as a complaint. The DA was irritated with the report of two consultants who claimed that overcrowding in the Denver jail could be alleviated by releasing apparently harmless traffic and drug offenders...
In short, the Beauprez campaign lifted a Ritter assertion - not a quotation - in which he was taking a hard line against criminals and twisted it to make him sound like a crime-indulging wimp. The Trailhead Group, an independent outfit supporting Republicans, did the same thing in an earlier press release.
We can understand the frustration among Republicans trying to build a case against Ritter given the maddeningly narrow focus of his public comments over the years. But that's no excuse for the altogether sleazy misuse of what the candidate actually has said.
(You can read the rest on the Rocky's website.)
Beauprez has made some big miscalculations. Ticking off the editors of the Rocky might just be one of the worst.
3 Comments:
They'll probably endorse him anyway!
Newspapers generally endorse winners. Occassionally, they will smell the way the wind is blowing and buck that trend, but those exceptions are few, and that kind of reaction is unlikely in a race as high profile as this one.
Also, while newspapers do have partisan tendencies (the Rocky tends to endorse Republicans), they are most likely to break with their tendencies in a race that isn't close. The Ritter-Beauprez race is no longer close, which is one of the reasons that the Rocky is comfortable being so bold now.
Hope you're right, oh-Welleke. Remember the bizarre Post endorsement of Bush in 2004 that sounded like an endorsement of Kerry until you got to the one line about Bush being better for our security? Clearly different circumstances in this race but nothing would surprise me!
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