More Stephanopoulos Conflicts of Interest Emerge

Happier days for both men: Then-director of communications for the transition, George Stephanopoulos speaks to President-elect Bill Clinton during economic conference in Little Rock, Ark., Dec. 15, 1992. (AP Photo/Greg Gibson)

“Hillary Clinton’s Campaign Manager Interned for George Stephanopoulos,” Brent Scher writes as part of the ongoing auto-da-fé* of Stephanopoulos at the Washington Free Beacon:

George Stephanopoulos thanked Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager Robby Mook in the acknowledgement section of his 1999 tell-all memoir All Too Human.Stephanopoulos’ book, described as “a new-generation political memoir” of a man “who got his hands on the levers of awesome power at an early age,” was written after he left the Clinton administration and returned to his alma mater Columbia to be a visiting professor.

Mook was an undergrad student at Columbia during Stephanopoulos’ brief tenure and was already politically active. He was a member of the College Democrats and was active in Democratic politics in his home state of Vermont.

Mook was also part of the team of interns who worked under Stephanopolous’ research assistant at Columbia, responsible for “reviewing thousands of pages of public records and making sure I got my facts straight,” wrote Stephanopolous.

And at NewsBusters today, a flashback to 2009, when Politico “revealed that Stephanopoulos participated in daily strategy calls with James Carville (Clinton White House), Paul Begala (Clinton White House) and Rahm Emanuel (Clinton and Obama White House),” Scott Whitlock writes:

Politico writer John Harris explained, “In any given news cycle, it is quite likely that Washington’s prevailing political and media interpretation — at least on the Democratic side — is being hatched on these calls.”

In a statement at the time, Media Research Center President Brent Bozell wondered:

“What’s worse than the liberal media’s sycophantic coverage of President Barack Obama? ABC’s George Stephanopoulos actively helping design and deliver the Administration’s strategy and message – which he is then charged with reporting.

“Will Stephanopoulos be critical of the White House’s plans when he spends every morning helping to craft them? Not likely. He must from this point forward recuse himself from any reporting involving the Obama Administration.

“For Stephanopoulos, the line between journalist and liberal strategist would be completely obliterated were it not for the fact that it apparently never existed at all. He didn’t fail in his attempt at transformation from liberal operative to journalist – he never made the effort.”

Other Stephanopoulos statements are now coming into question. In February, he said disgraced anchor Brian Williams should be held to “the same standards journalists use for politicians.” In a March radio interview, Stephanopoulos admitted that when he started at ABC, network colleagues worried if he could be “fair.”

Well, about as “fair” as any Democrat operative with a byline. How bad is it for ABC? At the moment, they’re making NBC and even MSNBC, of all networks, look good by comparison:

NBC News not only suspended anchor Brian Williams for lying, the network also suspended Keith Olbermann for not disclosing a donation much smaller than $75,000 ($2400).

If ABC News expects to salvage its reputation, only immediate and complete transparency will accomplish that.

Does ABC care about its reputation? As Ace writes, quoting one of his Twitter followers, “The media’s ‘F*** You’ machine kicks into fourth gear,” to circle the wagons around one of their fellow Democrats. This is the network that censored Bill Clinton’s role in letting Osama bin Laden escape in The Path to 9/11 and then refused to release the miniseries on DVD to protect Hillary, after all.

Update: And speaking of conflicts of interest, as Erick Erickson writes at Red State, “You’re Missing the Story on George Stephanopoulos”:

The real story in my mind is that the Republican Party ever thought George Stephanopoulos should moderate a Republican Presidential debate to begin with. Did I mention he is a former Clinton employee?

George Stephanopoulos may be as objective as possible, but he is still a liberal with a liberal world view. That thinking shapes his questions to candidates and was on full display in 2012 when he asked Mitt Romney about banning birth control.

Not one damn soul in America thinks that is going to happen and there is not a single elected official in the United States who is seriously considering that, or was even considering it in 2012. But George Stephanopoulos felt the need to ask that question as a way to set up a media gotcha moment to feed on the “war on women” narrative.

And the Republican Party still felt like it could let the former Clinton employee moderate a Republican debate in a year Hillary Clinton is running for President.

That’s the story. That is the shocking part.

GOP chairman Reince Priebus has taken baby steps in the right direction, but the party’s near century-old Stockholm Syndrome as willing hostages of the far left and their media operatives needs infinitely more reform.

Especially in a media environment in which, as Jeff Dunetz writes, “At ABC News, Stephanopoulos Never Stopped Being A Democratic Party Spokesman.”

More: At Commentary, Jonathan S. Tobin outlines “Liberal Media’s Stephanopoulos Problem”:

He ought to recuse himself from any further reporting or comment about the Clinton Cash issue or Hillary but we know that won’t happen. Like the Clintons, Stephanopoulos will simply move on and act as if nothing has happened that should cause us to view him differently.

But while what happens to him isn’t all that important, it still must be pointed out that if a journalist were exposed as giving money to the Koch Brothers charities and then reported on them, there would be howls for his scalp throughout the media. The rules are different for liberals. Analysts who wonder about the shrinking audience for such shows and networks whose political coverage is drenched in the tired rhetoric of liberalism need wonder no more. Stephanopoulos’s lack of transparency is this story is just one more piece of evidence indicting mainstream outlets for outrageous and blatant liberal bias.

But it has ramifications far beyond the media bubble:

@DanRiehl It just hit me. The GOP *agreed* to have @GStephanopoulos as a debate moderator. AFTER what he did in 2012. THEY AGREED TO IT.

— Dread Pirate Cates (@drawandstrike) May 14, 2015