In what can only be called a stunning, face-slapping rebuttal, Jeffrey Lord has discovered that Elliott Abrams’ story about Gingrich’s alleged criticism of President Reagan were not only erroneously characterized, but almost certainly indicates it was an intentional hit-piece by Abrams, that Abrams must have known was dishonest. It points out the problem going on with much of Romney’s campaign of destruction aimed at Gingrich, and it points out how thoroughly damaging such a thing can be when amplified almost infinitely by the roaring link-fest of the Drudge Report. Abrams’ hit-piece stayed up on Drudge for more than twenty-four hours, and there will be no rebuttal. The only way the truth will be distributed at this point is for you, the public, to undertake this chore.
Matt Drudge is making a lot of hay over Gingrich’s alleged anti-Reagan speech, that we know know wasn’t, and he’s clearly sympathetic to Mitt Romney, but why is it that conservatives are reacting badly against this? The answer is simpler than most will admit, and it comes down to just two things. First, the conservative base and Tea Party folk in the GOP are beginning to doubt media altogether, and they’re seeing through the obvious anti-Gingrich bias, but more importantly, I believe it comes down to this more than any other thing: They are sick to death of the media and the GOP establishment selecting the Republican nominee. I think this explains everything you need to know why conservatives and Tea Party folk look at these exaggerated, out-of-context headlines and stories, and just say “No.”
If you wish to know how dishonest Matt Drudge has been on this story, up in the top-left of his site all morning Thursday were three stories agitating against Gingrich’s alleged anti-Reagan sentiments, but the third of these, from 1988, has already been debunked. Why didn’t Drudge take this down? No, he waited until it was thoroughly debunked, but the damage of the lie was done. He left it up in exactly the same way he allowed his anti-Newt stories of last Wednesday and Thursday to remain up most of the day, despite the fact that it had been revealed most were over-hyped re-hashings of old stories. Drudge has relocated this a bit, but this is how it appeared just more than an hour ago:
