If any shreds of positivity can emerge from the wreckage of the New York Times’ latest madness, it’s that more people discover Nicholas Kristof should never be trusted about anything.
In addition to his long record of being wrong, which I discussed yesterday, his own political ambitions laid bare his disregard for the truth. In the new episode, I dig into Kristof’s run for governor of Oregon, which fell apart in spectacular fashion. His effort to deny reality became a national joke.
Also in this episode: A new law will expose how Qatar and other nations are infiltrating schools to brainwash kids in a U.S. state.
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When ‘journalists’ are blinded by ego
A few years ago, Kristof decided that developing name recognition for writing in the New York Times somehow prepared him to serve as governor of Oregon. It’s exactly the kind of thing that happens when people get blinded by a sense of “fame.”
He wrote about travails in the state where he grew up, and began attempting to present himself as a resident of Yamhill, Oregon who knows his fellow “residents” oh so well. But it didn’t occur to him to learn basics about the city.
When Mayor Yvette Potter mentioned she never met him and no one ever talked about him, Politico asked him for a response. Kristof “said he didn’t recognize Potter’s name or even know that she was mayor.” So he was happy to use the city’s name for his political goals, but didn’t bother to learn the mayor’s name.
That was nothing compared to what followed. He claimed, including in sworn legal documents, that he met the requirement of living in Oregon for at least three years leading up to the election. But in that same timeframe, he voted in New York and attested in sworn documents that that was his residence.
It was a simple, obvious blockade to candidacy. But Kristof was totally unprepared for anyone to even look at the facts. He hired an expensive group of lawyers to argue that he could get away with this. They put together a 15-page letter that became a joke.
On local news station KGW, reporter Dan Haggerty said the letter started okay, noting that Kristof owned a home in Oregon and, through his family, had an agricultural business. Then came this (italics are from the document; the rest are Haggerty’s responses):
“‘He has hiked the entire length of Oregon along the Pacific Crest Trail.’ That just kind of sounds like a flex, but okay. He ‘sent his children to OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) camps.’ I really feel like we’re losing relevance here to being governor.
He ‘backpacked around Mount Hood’ — and now we’re just saying stuff that people do when they come here. ‘He’s eaten at Moe’s in Lincoln City.’ What are we talking about? I feel like… they’re listing random things.”
In an interview with the station, Kristof somehow managed to make things even worse. “I think that, you know what’s more important than checking the boxes here and there is that my soul is here. Um, my bones are here,” he said. Well, if your soul and bones are there, who cares what the law says?
When journalists tried to get documents and proof, he ran the other way. The Oregon Capital Chronicle found itself defending its effort to pursue facts. Ultimately, the Supreme Court of Oregon ruled against Kristof, of course, noting his voting record, driver’s license and more.
A guy with this track record — who doesn’t look for facts and then tries hard to deny them — this is who the Times entrusts to run with the most incendiary allegations you can make against Israel, at a time when Jews everywhere are under attack by people radicalized with vitriolic hatred of the tiny Jewish state.
Then again, it’s not surprising from the Times, which has run op-eds directly from Hamas and many, many people who echo the Islamist terrorist group’s lies.
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JL
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