Rumor leads America deep into John Kerry's pants!

XXXX DRUDGE RETORT XXXX 12:49:18 UTC FEB 12 2004 XXXX

Media observers and political junkies are waiting to see how quickly and deeply the mainstream press follows serious newsman Matt Drudge into John Kerry's pants.

This morning, Drudge pulled out the flashing siren with a giddy claim that Time Magazine and other media organizations are looking for a young woman who privately caucused last year with the Democratic presidential front-runner.

Reported Drudge: "Intrigue surrounds a woman who recently fled the country, reportedly at the prodding of Kerry, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned."

That wouldn't be the only prodding she received from Kerry, according to the completely unsourced story, which is reportedly being chased by Time, ABC News, the Washington Post, The Hill, and the Associated Press.

The tail tale first appeared in WatchBlog, a non-partisan political weblog that offers space to liberal, conservative, and moderate authors.

A Feb. 6 item in WatchBlog claimed that Time Magazine was looking for a "bimbo eruption" in John Kerry's past and would be going to press with it this week:

"Rumor has it that John Kerry (D) is going to be outed by Time Magazine next week for having an affair with a 20 year old woman who remains unknown. The affair supposedly took place intermittently right up to Kerry's Fall 2002 announcement of candidacy. At present, this is nothing more than a rumor ..."

The journalism industry publication Editor & Publisher pondered how long it would take the mainstream press to follow Drudge's lead. [Our guess: Four or five hours tops.]

As Editor & Publisher reported, "The Drudge site also declared that General Wesley Clark, in an off-the-record chat with reporters earlier this week, predicted that the Kerry campaign would soon implode due to an 'intern.' It would seem strange, however, if he really believed that, that he would drop out of the race, as he did yesterday."

Lending less credence to the story: Clark is going to endorse Kerry this weekend in Wisconsin, according to AP.

The unsourced rumor about Kerry is remarkably similar to a false accusation in 1992 linking Bill Clinton to a wire service reporter, as described by political reporter Walter Mears on C-SPAN:

C-SPAN HOST BRIAN LAMB: Former Congressman Guy Vanderjack (ph) did something you thought was a slanderous lie.
MEARS: In the final -- absolute final phase of the 1992 campaign when Bush was going down the tubes, he with -- with, I think some push from some of the people around the Bush operation, he was at the time -- he'd been defeated in his primary but he was still the chairman of the House Campaign Committee in him name, and using a statement that he put out at a press conference that he had. They accused Clinton of having an affair with a woman wire service reporter covering his campaign, which was not so. There was only one woman wire service reporter covering his campaign, a very hard working and very attractive and talented reporter. And I thought it was just slanderous.
LAMB: And working for AP?
MEARS: An AP reporter, and so I would have thought it was slanderous if she worked for UPI, but because I knew a good bit about this woman and her work, I thought demeaning her journalism that way just was totally unfair. And I seldom got angry at politicians, but I remember being very angry that time.

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