Nothinggate

Whatever “legs” the Gannon story had are being cut off as adults in the center and on the left weigh in. Centrist Andrew Sullivan thinks that the only scandal is the gay-bashing in which the left has indulged. On the merits, he finds the matter “trivial.” And leftist David Corn suggests that the matter “may be smaller than it seems” and that, to some extent, Gannon has gotten a bum rap. Liberal Rik Hertzberg dubs the story “Nothinggate” but only because he thinks the Republican controlled Congress won’t investigate it. Missing from Hertzberg’s piece is any statement of what it is Congress should investigate. He asserts that “Nothinggate” is of the same order of magnitude as the Clinton travel office story. But that scandal involved substantial allegations of corruption and gave rise to criminal prosecutions, as I recall. What crime did the administration commit here — calling on a guy from a borderline news organization in the hope of fielding an occasional friendly question?