Harvard computer science professor and ex-Dean Harry Lewis went out in a big way for Darcy Burner, taping this video validating her claims about her degree. That doesn't seem to matter to the remarkably malicious media crew in Seattle, as Manuel Valdes of the AP runs uncritically with Reichert's accusations about Burner's degree, who writes that "Harvard officials say that Burner's degree doesn't "indicate anything for economics."
Apparently, ex-Dean Lewis, the official in charge of the process at the time, is not a Harvard official for the purposes of this storyline. It's important to understand the backstory here, and the cooperation between the Reichert campaign and Emily Heffter, because it's a useful illustration of this noxious ecosystem. Mike Shields, Reichert's campaign manager, emailed me the storyline his campaign is pushing: "This issue is very simple: She lied. It's devastating to her campaign, they know it, so they are trying to cover it up with a distraction." One can't really fault Shields for overtly lying; if journalists let him use lies for political advantage, he will.
What's notable is the cooperation here between GOP operatives and supposedly nonpartisan journalists. Lewis himself explains in a comment on this blog that Seattle Times reporter Emily Heffter (whose work Valdes clearly cribs) was hostile and clearly seeking a certain type of response so she could tell the story Shields fed her.
I was surprised and puzzled by the tone. It seemed a simple matter for me to verify that Darcy had an Ec specialization within her CS concentration, and as I noted above, the Registrar would not have been in a position to do that so I was glad to do it. I didn't expect that it would be the reporter's intention to try to discredit the significance of that fact, but that is how I interpreted her odd question about what that Economics specialization would qualify Darcy to do. For some reason the reporter's questions struck me as hostile, so I simply repeated myself and ended the conversation rather quickly after that. But I did explain what a specialization consisted of in terms of coursework.
Emily Heffter has a stock response she is sending to those of you who email her, a response that is as dishonest and superficial as her original reporting.
Thanks for your note. Even Darcy Burner doesn't claim that she actually has a degree in economics, dual or otherwise. I spent quite a bit of time yesterday talking to officials at Harvard about Burner's degree, and they all agreed she does not have a degree in economics. So for me, it comes down to the claim Darcy Burner made in her debates, which you can see on the video. Did she claim to have a degree in economics? Yes. Does she have one? No.
Reasonable people can disagree about the way we played the story or the way I wrote it, but in the context of the national economic crisis, the way Burner characterizes her expertise in economics matters. That's why I wrote the story.
I hope that's helpful.
Despite Lewis's assertions that Burner has substantial and deep expertise in economics, that she has a specialization in economics in the computer science field, and that multiple Harvard graduates and former faculty members back up Burner's characterization of her education and attempt to correct Heffter's description of a system she clearly does not understand, Heffter chooses to characterize Burner's expertise as fictitious. And her justification for her dishonest reporting is that the "context of the national economic crisis" makes Burner's characterization important. One could as easily point out that this context applies to Heffter as well; getting this right is more important than ever, and getting it wrong cheats the voter.
But more than that, the superficial condescending tone obscures a total lack of substance. Heffter is not actually concerned with whether Burner or Reichert has actual expertise on the economy, for if she were she might have reported that Reichert has said that he is not an "economic expert" and that Burner actually has serious chops in the field. Indeed, by couching her email in soothing establishment friendly tones as 'reasonable people' and 'the way Burner characterizes her expertise in economic matters', Heffter substitutes what is essentially a discredited gossip column peddled by GOP operatives using sources that directly contradict the main thrust of the narrative for an actual examination of the region's economic difficulties and the two candidate's different approaches.
Furthermore, Heffter argues that since people care about the economy, whatever she writes and whether it's accurate is mostly irrelevant as long it has the words 'economy' in it. As Lewis indicates, Heffter had a story she wanted to tell. And certainly, you can expect Reichert's campaign or the NRCC to go on the air with this narrative (if they can actually afford to, considering the heat being put on them for the illegal money they are probably using to run ads).
I've focused my blogging on Heffter, but the rest of the journalists around here aren't exactly covering themselves in glory. Joining the anti-netroots and anti-progressive Manuel Valdes, Emily Heffter, and Amy Sullivan, Eli Sanders of the Stranger blames Heffter and Valdes doing sloppy and inaccurate work on ... Darcy Burner. Quite the wankfest.
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