By Tim Redmond
Okay, I promise this is the last item about Jerry Brown today (two’s plenty enough).
The CA Republican Party has released an attack on on the attorney general, trying to make a huge deal out of the secret taping of reporters.
I’m not much in favor of secret taping of anyone, although some leading thinkers on First Amendment issues aren’t sure this is such a huge deal. Peter Scheer at the California First Amendment Coalition, for example, argues that
Talking to a reporter on the phone (or in person) is about as open and nonconfidential an exchange as sitting for a live television interview or typing into a blog on a public, unrestricted website. The whole point of a conversation with a print journalist is to provide her with information to be communicated to her paper’s entire readership. A genuinely confidential communication with a reporter is the rare exception, not the rule.
But that’s beside the point. Carla Marinucci at the Chron says
Ouch. The ad pounds Jerry in the same way that Jerry’s GOP guv rivals and other GOPpers did earlier this week: Point out that ordering a self-investigation will fail you in Conflict of Interest 101 every time.
But really, is this the best the GOP can do? There are so many things to criticize about Jerry Brown, and we’ll be hearing them over and over all next year. This one just seems kind of lame. I think this whole “scandal” is over, and nobody really cares anymore.