{"id":20283,"date":"2018-04-04T20:39:06","date_gmt":"2018-04-05T00:39:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=20283"},"modified":"2018-04-04T20:39:06","modified_gmt":"2018-04-05T00:39:06","slug":"politics-as-usual-no-comment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/politics-as-usual-no-comment\/","title":{"rendered":"POLITICS AS USUAL: No Comment"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Alison Collins-Mrakas<\/strong><\/p>\n

With the 60 Minutes interview with Stormy Daniels, followed close on the heels by the interview with former Playboy Bunny Karen McDougal, and then, of course, the longstanding sexual harassment suit by Summer Zervos, the wall to wall coverage of all things Trump has gotten even worse, if that is at all possible.
\nPersonally, the sexual escapades \u2013 alleged or actual \u2013 are of little concern to me. They are none of my business. Whatever happens in someone\u2019s marriage should be of no concern to anyone.
\nUnless, of course, campaign finances were expended in the obviously vain attempt to keep it all quiet. Then THAT is a story folks would be interested in. Because that is actual news.
\nIf this is a John Edwards fiasco all over again, well then, the \u201cmainstream media\u201d (you know, the actual journalists out there) are right to cover it. The rest is just salacious tidbits of what should be personal matters between consenting adults (well, except the whole sexual harassment allegation. That is clearly a separate matter entirely).
\nBut why I am bringing the whole thing up is because of another angle to the story that has really irked me: the coverage of Melania Trump\u2019s reaction or non-reaction to the sordid story.
\nAs the messy details of the tawdry \u2013 alleged \u2013 affairs are splashed across headlines, I cannot count how many times I have seen the same thing in print or heard the same thing stated on air \u2013 \u201cMelania Trump has kept silent\u201d. Or words to that effect.
\nThere are repeated calls for her to make a comment on the whole thing. Some talking heads are getting down right persnickety about the fact that she has remained silent, as if somehow she owes it to the American public to comment on her husband\u2019s alleged shenanigans with adult film stars.
\nThe question is, why? Why should she comment publicly? If she came out with a public statement stating that the women were liars, then yes, I would agree that she would be fair game as she would have inserted herself into the story. She would open herself up to the questioning of the media hordes.
\nBut she has chosen to stay silent on the matter. And would you blame her? How incredibly humiliating; how extraordinarily painful it is for her and her child, to witness the most personal aspect of their lives become a spectacle, fodder for the tabloids.
\nWhy do people want to make it worse for her? I don\u2019t understand. It\u2019s like they want to stick the knife in, twist it, pour salt and lemon juice on the wound, and then watch her squirm. It\u2019s horrible.
\nWhat if it was you, your marriage imploding, would you want to talk about it with complete strangers? Or better yet, talk about it to reporters and have your comments repeated in national news coverage for the entire world \u2013 your child included \u2013 to see? Of course not!
\nI understand that Ms. Trump is a public figure. Her ridiculous public crusade about cyber-bullying? Yes, she most definitely should be held up to public scrutiny for that, especially given the context of her relationship to the bullier-in\u2013chief. But her marriage? Her personal life? Nope. I don\u2019t think she gave up every aspect of her private life just because she\u2019s married to the President. Just leave her alone.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alison Collins-Mrakas With the 60 Minutes interview with Stormy Daniels, followed close on the heels by the interview with former Playboy Bunny Karen McDougal, and then, of course, the longstanding sexual harassment suit by Summer Zervos, the wall to wall coverage of all things Trump has gotten even worse, if that is at all […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[29,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns","category-opinion"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-5h9","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-02 14:27:59","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20283\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}