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Course Material for Media & Politics Professor Susan E. Gallagher, UMASS Lowell
Page Two: Robinson's History In 1982, in an early instance of what would eventually become his stock-in-trade, Robinson wrote an unflattering profile of John R. Lakian, a candidate for the Republican nomination in the Massachusetts gubernatorial primary. As he would in subsequent articles on other public figures, Robinson focused on contradictions between his target's self-portrayal and what documentary records seemed to indicate. Thus, in the Lakian profile, Robinson led with the line that his "inquiry into Lakian's background found what appears to be a pattern of discrepancies between what he says and what the records show about his upbringing, schooling, military service and business career." Then, as evidenced in the jury verdict in John R. Lakian v. Globe Newspaper Company, Robinson proceeded to malign Lakian with a series of true statements, along with a handful of lies. According to the jury, Robinson's 55-paragraph profile of Lakian included five paragraphs of substantially false information and three of those paragraphs were defamatory. Despite this finding, Robinson and the Globe claimed victory because the jury elected not to award Lakian any monetary damages. The jury opposed compensation for Lakian because the "libelous" information contained in the story did not alter its overall drift, which the jurors found generally accurate. With Friends like These... While most journalists would probably concede from this outcome that they ought to show more regard for the truth, Robinson apparently concluded that his mistake in the Lakian case was that he had relied too heavily on actual records. In any event, when later reporting on seemingly similar discrepancies in the personal histories of Parks, Ellis, Gore, Flynn, and Edwards, Robinson seized a new tactic, one which simultaneously increased the credibility of his allegations against his subjects, but decreased his need for verification. Specifically, rather than focusing on written documents or quoting particular individuals, Robinson adopted a practice of taking down his targets by summarizing the thoughts and opinions of vaguely defined collections of "colleagues" and "friends."
In some of these pieces, Robinson reinforced his accusations by actually obtaining commentary from people who could be plausibly counted among his targets' former friends, acquaintances, or professional associates. However, in his raft of articles on Edwards, who had accused two priests of sexual abuse, Robinson took this technique a step further. In story after story, Robinson quoted or paraphrased statements made by the organized supporters of the priests. However, rather than identifying these sources as defenders of the accused, he gave their negative comments a ring of credibility by consistently describing them as "Edwards's childhood friends."
Although all of the people paraphrased in these passages had earlier signed a letter written on behalf of accused priest Monsignor Michael Smith Foster, in which they declared, without proof or support, that Edwards' allegations were false, and most of them had not spoken to Edwards for over fifteen years, Robinson's description of them as the alleged victim's "chums" and "friends" understandably misled readers into thinking that Edwards had earned a reputation as a liar even among people who were close to him. Moreover, when it was later revealed that all of the claims made by Foster's supporters were irrelevant and unfounded, Robinson responded to calls for correction by insisting that he had simply conveyed the doubts expressed by people who knew the accuser. In other words, Robinson first supplied his dubious sources with a veneer of credibility and then used that false authority to justify his own groundless attacks. |
