October 2, 2008 10:37 AM
Leftist lies: Sarah Palin did NOT charge victims for rape kits
Since Palin's nomination, I have received and deleted emails and comments concerning this the baseless charge that Sarah Palin charged rape victims for evidence-gathering kits.
This is just one of the many LIES about McCain and Palin started in the blogosphere or Obama ads and being distributed by the Mainstream Media.
LifeNews deconstructs this LIE today in a lengthy article which begins:
At least since September 8 the extreme left has been pushing a lie that Governor, then Mayor, Sarah Palin "charged rape victims for rape kits" performed upon them in the Alaskan town of Wasilla.The charge stems from a May 22, 2000 article in the local Wasilla paper The Frontiersman and has been spun from a comment made by the Wasilla Police Chief. This comment was somehow made into a Sarah Palin policy.
Evidence of the incident, though, shows no involvement by Palin at all. Still, many Old Media outlets continue to keep illegitimately linking this rape kit billing claim to Sarah Palin, even though the truth is easily discovered.
and concludes:
On top of all of that, there are no stories prior to Sarah Palin being offered the billet as VP by John McCain that makes the claim that Palin was informed of or involved in this policy of charging rape victims for rape kits. And, since there was only one rape reported in the city between 1996 and 2000 when the story first came to the papers, it's no wonder she wasn't aware of the policy. When would it ever have come up? Does anyone think that any given mayor of any American town is fully cognizant of every single policy or law in their city, especially if it is a law not in use because of a lack of situations to bring it to light?For her part, Palin spokeswoman Maria Comella has said that the governor "does not believe, nor has she ever believed, that rape victims should have to pay for an evidence-gathering test."
In the end, it seems that this story is a wild exaggeration about Palin's role in this policy. There is no proof that she ever knew about the policy until long after the situation hit the news, it is untrue that her town was "unique" in blocking the measure, no evidence that she, herself, was notorious for the policy, and no proof that any victims were ever charged for rape kits. In fact, according to the Uniform Crime Report there were only 5 rapes reported in the 6 years she was mayor of Wasilla and four of those happened after the state law in question was passed.
In fact, this whole thing looks like another case where the media has been programmed by the nutroots and Democratic operatives.
Yet, the media still repeatedly bring this false charge up at every possible opportunity. Geraghty is right. The Old Media and the Obama campaign owes Palin an apology.
Read the entire article here.
Posted in Campaign 2008, Media Bias | Permalink
