Frat Story

The Post Star's story today was sure to include one of the more flattering images of John Sweeney's drunken fiasco. Unlike the NY Times, which used a picture that demonstrates why (in spite of the spin) many believe the students are telling the truth - that Sweeney was intoxicated. Though there are two students who are claiming that the story in the college paper was exaggerated, one of them is the son of a local republican town board member, so some partisans would say that even if Sweeney had to be scraped up of the floor and dragged home. Though the story admits:

John Tomlin, who reported the story, said he was not politically motivated. "The story is not that it was a Republican on campus. It is that there was a congressman on campus," he said. Tomlin said he based his report on accounts of seven or eight students who attended the party, including two who were named in the article. Tomlin said he personally saw Sweeney outside the fraternity house on his way into the party, and the congressman appeared intoxicated. Tomlin said Sweeney's speech was slurred and he was loud and was cursing.

It seems odd to me that though the story was first reported by the school's independent newspaper, even the NYT has taken up the conservative view that democrats somehow are responsible for this story.

Of course Dems are going to talk about it once it is reported. But we didn't create this story. John Sweeney created it by doing something that doesn't seem very "representative" to people who live here.

And don't we all know that if it had been Gillibrand who looked like this in a photo and who students claimed were drunk, Sweeney and Carlson would be the first ones in line to say that it was irresponsible. This man has the wrong priorities, this is just one more example of it. Plain and simple.

Can you just imagine if it were Senator Clinton in those photos? Rush Limbaugh and Bill O Liely would have hourly updates on the progress of a Republican led voter recall initiative to have her replaced. Come on, you know it is true.

This is another example of the double standard of reporting by biased media like Fox News and The NY Post who ignore stories that portray a Republican in an unflattering light. Instead of doing what they should do: reporting the same way for any party or candidate.

Forbes quotes Sweeney saying, "If I'd known going to a frat house would get me that much attention I would have done it earlier," he joked, adding that he went to another area college Friday to accept an award.

Doi, Mr. Sweeney, it is not that you went to a frat house, or a college, it is that you were drunk. With students. It isn't appropriate.