September 29, 2006
Hotline After Dark -- The Night Of 1,000 Interviews
TV last night was all about interviews:
"Hardball" had an interview with Patricia Waring, the former wife of Sen. George Allen's (R-VA) rugby coach, who claims she heard Allen use the "N" word:
MSNBC's Shuster: "Pat Waring of Chestertown, Maryland, first brought her story to MSNBC when she contacted us in a direct phone call. We then conducted a series of interviews. Waring says that a sports match in the late 1970's, Allen repeatedly used the N-word to describe blacks."
Waring: "I just didn't think in the late 1970's people would be so ugly and so overt about it, so public."
Shuster: "Waring says that in 1978 she and her then husband Robert Michael Schwartz had just moved to Charlottesville, Virginia. Friends from the time confirm Schwartz was a P.H.D. candidate at the University of Virginia, an avid rugby player, and the volunteer coach of the school's rugby club team. MSNBC has confirmed also Pat Waring worked in a doctor's office and came to some of the rugby games. Waring says there is one game from either the Fall of 1978 or the Spring of 1979 that she will never forget."
Waring: "I heard to my left the N-word and I heard it again and I looked around and I heard it again and there was this fellow sitting on the ground. He was putting on red rugby shoes. It is seared in my brain, believe me. And he was kind of showing off, I guess. But he was telling a story about something or other and in the story there were a lot of N-words. So I got out of the bleacher and I went over and I said, young man, I'm the coach's wife and if you don't mind, would you please not use that word. And he in essence told me to buzz off. And I thought, OK, so I went back to the bleacher and I said to the boy beside me, a man, who is that kid? And he said, oh, that's George Allen."
Shuster: "Waring says the incident has stayed with her because of the N-word, because Allen's father had been coach of the Washington Redskins in the 1970s and because she is a lifelong Redskins fan."
More Shuster: "Another Waring relative Beverly Bruster, who graduated from the U.V.A. law school one year behind Allen, told us Waring talked about the alleged Allen incident at the time. Another relative whom we spoke to says Waring told the story through the years and several people say she talked about it this summer."
Waring: "I have thought about it since I heard that George Allen was being considered as ... a possible candidate for the presidency. And I thought, well, gee in that case I guess I will have to speak up but then Macaca presented itself."
Shuster: "Neal Brendel, who played rugby with George Allen and remembers sitting at some games with Pat Waring says he does not remember the alleged incident. Furthermore Brendel says, quote, I don't recall ever hearing Allen use the N-word on or off the field, nor do I recall him ever talking about anybody unfairly."
Waring, asked why she never came forward before: "Soon after that, I left Charlottesville and I moved to Connecticut and so I was really kind of divorced from all that. I didn't know what was going on in Virginia. Unless you got the New York Times and I wasn't really interested."
Asked if she's a registered Dem: "I am indeed."
On the volunteer work she does for Dems: "I sit there and answer the phone and give people signs."
Asked if she'd had any contact with the Jim Webb campaign: "No."
Asked if she's had any contact with the VA Dem Party: "No."
Asked what she'd do if Allen was the Dem candidate: "I'd nail him even harder. That's what I'd do."
Shuster: "Senator Allen's campaign manager says this is all just another false accusation and that it is not true" ("Hardball," MSNBC, 9/28).
PIRRO ON POINT
NY AG candidate Jeanine Pirro was on "O'Reilly Factor":
Pirro: "I've run for office four times and won every time. Voters are smart. They vote for the person based on the job that you do."
On what happened: "I suspected that my husband was having an affair with another woman. I called Bernie Kerik, who at the time was a private investigator and someone that I knew when I was the D.A. in Westchester when he was the police commissioner in New York City. And to so many New Yorkers was a hero for what he did during 9/11. I talked to him about certain things. I was angry. I was frustrated. But ... here's the bottom line. This is a personal marital situation that has no business in the United States Attorneys office. This is a scenario where I said that I wanted to do certain things that I never did. And even if I did do them, they weren't improper in any event. And the truth is that the only crime that was committed here is the release of sealed federal wiretaps. That is a felony. ... The prosecutor on this case ... is someone who prosecuted my husband years ago. And in that case as well, there were leaks of information."
More: "All of us have marital discord. All of us have problems in our marriage, but I believe in family. And I have fought for New York families my whole career, whether it was battered women, abused children, neglected seniors. I'm not going to turn my back on my family."
Pirro: "I've asked Alberto Gonzales to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate me, to investigate the allegations. And I'm not afraid of them. And I've asked that they be fast tracked, that this investigation be fast tracked because we are 40 days before an election" (FNC, 9/28).
AND NOW, THE CONTENDERS
Senate Maj. Leader Bill Frist was on "Hannity & Colmes."
On the '06 elections: "We need to get out of Washington, D.C., and really paint that message very clearly of the contrast of moving America forward, based on principle and prosperity, or moving backwards, and obstruction, and partisanship, which we see here on the Senate floor. And really it's going to boil down to that contrast of winning the war on terror verses the Democrats who want to cut and run or surrender or defeat."
More, on George Allen: "I've had the pleasure of working with him every single day. He's a man of strong character, strong integrity, a man I have huge respect for. And, yes, there are a lot of allegations out there. He's answering each and every one. How much of it is slander, how much of it is false accusation, I think ultimately will come out in the campaign" (FNC, 9/28).
Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) was on "PZ Now":
Asked about WH '08: "I don't know the answer yet."
Asked about '08 polls: "The last thing I'm going to do is take a poll or listen to a poll."
Asked if he'd prefer not to face Hillary Clinton: "I think she's obviously got great assets. But, you know, if you believe in something, and I make the decision to do it, it isn't going to make a difference to me who else is there. I will do it because I believe in" (CNN, 9/28). [EMILY GOODIN]
Posted at 07:19 AM
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