The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

NY Times Reporter and Senate Staffer Caught in Sex-for-Leaks Scandal

Posted on | June 8, 2018 | 3 Comments

Ali Watkins worked for Politico before joining the New York Times.

The former security director for the Senate Intelligence Committee has been arrested after lying to the FBI about illegally leaking classified information to a young reporter he dated for three years. The arrest exposed James A. Wolfe as the source of multiple leaks of sensitive national security information — including details of the investigation of former Trump campaign aide Carter Page — to New York Times reporter Ali Watkins. Wolfe, 57, had been in a sexual relationship with Watkins, a 2014 Temple University graduate who previously worked for BuzzFeed and Politico before joining the Times late last year.

And after writing that lead paragraph in the Official Neutral Objective Journalism Style, now permit me to add: BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Don’t ever lecture me about “journalism ethics,” you bastards.

All that “full disclosure” business about “conflicts of interest”? Trying to guilt-trip an honest man about a few free beers with Republican operatives who just happened to be useful sources? Not me, baby. I was never ashamed of smoking cigarettes with Herman Cain’s campaign director Mark Block or having beers and pizza with Rick Santorum and his finance director the weekend before the Iowa caucuses. You do whatever it takes to get the story, and there’s no shame in that. The whole point of Gonzo is to be more or less blatant about your biases, as if any reader of Hunter S. Thompson could be mistaken about his opinion of Hubert Humphrey, “a treacherous, gutless old ward-heeler who should be put in a goddamn bottle and sent out with the Japanese current.”

So, no “ethics” lectures from you thieving bastards at the New York Times, or Politico, or BuzzFeed, or whoever is currently employing Dave Weigel and his various friends in Neutral Objective Journalism. Look, Dave’s a friend of mine, and I would never burn a friend. Good relationships are based on reciprocity and trust, and I owe Dave a few favors, so I would certainly never do anything to hurt my friend Dave.

Never mind all that. Veiled threats were never my style, but I know a thing or two about the behavioral patterns of herd animals, and the universal contempt for Our President among the left-wing hacks of the D.C. press corps is hardly a secret, unlike the classified information that James Wolfe was handing over to Ali Watkins in exchange for sucking his middle-aged penis. Heckuva job there, Miss Watkins.

You do whatever it takes to get the story, but none of my sources ever expected that from me, at least not in a literal sense. Yeah, I’ve written a few paragraphs of journalistic fellatio in my time, providing favorable coverage in an effort to butter up a source, but that’s the minor currency of informational commerce in Washington, D.C.

All I ever wanted out of this miserable racket was an appointment as the first U.S. ambassador to Vanuatu, an honorable ambition. A six-figure salary from the American taxpayers as a reward for my long years toiling in the field of Neutral Objective Journalism, and why should this diplomatic post in the South Pacific go to some deep-pocket GOP campaign donor, huh? Why not give it to the man with the keen political insight that enabled him to see that, once Herman Cain got taken out by his enemies, the man to beat as the “Anyone But Mitt” candidate was a former Pennsylvania Senator then languishing at sixth place in the polls? The Santorum Surge in late 2011 didn’t just happen by coincidence, my friends. No, there was a telephone conversation, where Santorum was in the Fort Worth airport between flights, and he promised me that gig in Vanuatu. If he tells you he didn’t, he’s lying, and my close personal friend Rick is a pious Catholic, so he would never lie. Whether he actually would have delivered me that coveted ambassadorship, had he won the White House in 2012, is another question altogether. But I digress . . .

My old friend Hogan Gidley‘s working at the White House now, and he’s not the only one of my buddies who’s moved up the political food chain since I left the campaign trail after the 2012 catastrophe. Now that I’ve finally got my driver’s license back, I could conceivably return to that miserable swamp in D.C. to do some shoe-leather work, maybe reporting on how this Wolfe-Watkins connection exposes the collusion, you might say, between the “fake news” media and the corrupt “Deep State.”

All I need now is a vehicle. Just a couple thousand dollars in the tip jar ought to be enough to get my hands on an old secondhand car.

Let me make a few phone calls, and we’ll see what happens. Just crowdfund me — $5 or $10, whatever you can afford — and in a week or two, I might take my old fedora off the rack and hit the road. Selah.



 

 

Category: Fear. Loathing., Media Bias, Neutral Objective Journalism, New York Times, Shoe Leather Fund, Vanuatu

Comments

3 Responses to “NY Times Reporter and Senate Staffer Caught in Sex-for-Leaks Scandal”

  1. The Ethics of the Modern Jounalist | 357 Magnum
    June 8th, 2018 @ 12:22 pm

    […] Or lack thereof. NY Times Reporter and Senate Staffer Caught in Sex-for-Leaks Scandal : The Other McCain […]

  2. Let's Review 85: Of Peanut Worms and Ali Mouths - American Digest
    June 8th, 2018 @ 3:53 pm

    […] NY Times Reporter and Senate Staffer Caught in Sex-for-Leaks Scandal : Veiled threats were never my style, but I know a thing or two about the behavioral patterns of herd animals, and the universal contempt for Our President among the left-wing hacks of the D.C. press corps is hardly a secret, unlike the classified information that James Wolfe was handing over to Ali Watkins in exchange for sucking his middle-aged penis. Heckuva job there, Miss Watkins. […]

  3. News of the Week (June 10th, 2018) | The Political Hat
    June 10th, 2018 @ 6:55 pm

    […] NY Times Reporter and Senate Staffer Caught in Sex-for-Leaks Scandal The former security director for the Senate Intelligence Committee has been arrested after lying to the FBI about illegally leaking classified information to a young reporter he dated for three years. The arrest exposed James A. Wolfe as the source of multiple leaks of sensitive national security information — including details of the investigation of former Trump campaign aide Carter Page — to New York Times reporter Ali Watkins. Wolfe, 57, had been in a sexual relationship with Watkins, a 2014 Temple University graduate who previously worked for BuzzFeed and Politico before joining the Times late last year. […]