MacTheKnife
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Apparantly there was a cover up.........does anyone remember the story.
Remember When a Dead Intern Was Found in Joe Scarborough's Office?
Back in 2010, Markos Moulitsas, better known as the founder of the Daily Kos blog, was a regular guest on MSNBC. The pairing of a liberal blogger and a liberal network was a natural one, so Moulitsas was used to going on TV and swapping insults about Republicans with Keith Olbermann or whoever.
That state of affairs came to a screeching halt in July of 2010, when Moulitsas found himself summarily blacklisted from MSNBC. His offense? Mentioning, on Twitter, the strange, sad story of Lori Klausutis, the intern who was found dead in Joe Scarboroughās office when the āMorning Joeā host was still a Republican congressman.
Hereās their exchange:
Letās get one thing clear: There is zero evidence to suggest that Joe Scarborough had anything to do with the death of Lori Klausutis. But the story of Klausutisās death has nevertheless haunted Scarborough over the years.
A journey into the time machine is necessary at this point. We emerge in May of 2001. The world is merely a pit of misery, rather than the apocalypse-lite horrorscape weāll all get used to in the coming decades, and Florida Republican Joe Scarborough has just announced that heās resigning from Congress after a mere six years in office to spend more time with his kids, one of whom has just been diagnosed with diabetes. Itās an abrupt end to a brief political career.
Fast-forward to July 19, 2001. Two people looking for assistance in an immigration case open the door to Scarboroughās district office and find a grisly scene: Lori Klausutis is lying dead behind a desk.
From an Associated Press report:
The medical examinerās ruling didnāt satisfy a surprisingly varied cross-section of armchair conspiracy theorists and Poirots, though. There were your garden-variety crackpots. But there were also people like Vanity Fairās James Wolcott, whose mention of the case prompted an outraged Scarborough to write a lengthy letter to the magazine in 2005 (Wolcott apologized for bringing the story up):
Then there was Katherine Harris, the cartoon villain who went from helping tilt Florida into the Bush column in 2000 to running for Senate in 2006. That campaign was a legendary disaster, but one series of calls Harris made garnered particular attention. From the Miami Herald:
An especially fascinating wrinkle in this ongoing saga is the heated battle about it on Wikipedia. There are pages and pages of arguments about Klausutis in the internal editorial discussions. Thereās even some (seemingly fake) person claiming to be Joe Scarborough who keeps weighing in. Hereās one excerpt:
Lost in all this fracas, of course, has been Klausutis herself, whose story is a grain of sand in the annals of pre-9/11 America. Meanwhile, Joe Scarborough has failed upward, again and again.
Jack Mirkinson is a writer in New York.
Image via AP
Remember When is a series in which we remember things long forgotten. Would you like to remember something for Gawker? Email [email protected].
Remember When a Dead Intern Was Found in Joe Scarborough's Office?
Back in 2010, Markos Moulitsas, better known as the founder of the Daily Kos blog, was a regular guest on MSNBC. The pairing of a liberal blogger and a liberal network was a natural one, so Moulitsas was used to going on TV and swapping insults about Republicans with Keith Olbermann or whoever.
That state of affairs came to a screeching halt in July of 2010, when Moulitsas found himself summarily blacklisted from MSNBC. His offense? Mentioning, on Twitter, the strange, sad story of Lori Klausutis, the intern who was found dead in Joe Scarboroughās office when the āMorning Joeā host was still a Republican congressman.
Hereās their exchange:
After this happened, MSNBC president Phil Griffin wrote to Moulitsas to say that he was banned from the network. It was one of the more bizarre pieces of cable news weirdness in history. It was also one in a long line of mini-wars Joe Scarborough has waged in an effort to stop getting people to insinuate that he killed his intern.Markos: Like story of a certain dead intern. RT @JoeNBC: Luckily for the White House, the media has been negligent on this story since Day 1.
Markos: But if you want to talk about bullshit āscandalsā, @JoeNBC, thereās this one about Joe Sestak and the White House you mightāve heard of.
JoeNBC: @markos Unbelievable. You have a long history of spreading lies suggesting I am a murderer. This is the 3rd or 4th time by my count.
Markos: @JoeNBC, Iāve never suggested youāre a murderer. Iāve noted media hypocrisy in going after Gary Condit. But he was Dem. You arenāt.
JoeNBC: Anyone in media who interviews @markos, know that youāre extending your credibility to someone who regularly suggests that Iām a murderer.
Markos: A bit touchy, @JoeNBC? Links for where I accuse you of being a murderer please.
Letās get one thing clear: There is zero evidence to suggest that Joe Scarborough had anything to do with the death of Lori Klausutis. But the story of Klausutisās death has nevertheless haunted Scarborough over the years.
A journey into the time machine is necessary at this point. We emerge in May of 2001. The world is merely a pit of misery, rather than the apocalypse-lite horrorscape weāll all get used to in the coming decades, and Florida Republican Joe Scarborough has just announced that heās resigning from Congress after a mere six years in office to spend more time with his kids, one of whom has just been diagnosed with diabetes. Itās an abrupt end to a brief political career.
Fast-forward to July 19, 2001. Two people looking for assistance in an immigration case open the door to Scarboroughās district office and find a grisly scene: Lori Klausutis is lying dead behind a desk.
From an Associated Press report:
A month later, a medical examiner concluded that Klausutis had been feeling unwell and had died after heart problems caused her to fall and hit her head on the desk. There were no apparent signs of foul play. Case closed.A 28-year-old office worker for U.S. Rep. Joe Scarborough was found dead Friday in the congressmanās district office.
Preliminary findings from the medical examinerās office showed no foul play or any outward indication of suicide, said Police Chief Steve Hogue.
Authorities identified the woman as Lori Klausutis of Niceville. She had worked for Scarborough since May 1999, said Mick Serrano, press secretary for the congressman.
The medical examinerās ruling didnāt satisfy a surprisingly varied cross-section of armchair conspiracy theorists and Poirots, though. There were your garden-variety crackpots. But there were also people like Vanity Fairās James Wolcott, whose mention of the case prompted an outraged Scarborough to write a lengthy letter to the magazine in 2005 (Wolcott apologized for bringing the story up):
Michael Moore also faced Scarboroughās wrath after he āregistered the domain name JoeScarboroughKilledHisIntern.com,ā another Vanity Fair article notes. (The website never really got off the ground.)His libelous charge, pulled from a hate site on the Internet, led readers to believe that a good woman named Lori Klausutis carried on an adulterous sexual affair with a congressman before being killed in a sleazy sex-scandal cover-up. The article also suggested that this imaginary sex scandal forced me to leave office. I was painted as the Republican Partyās answer to Gary Condit, saved from prosecution by a right-wing media machine.
[...]
Here are the facts Vanity Fair and James Wolcott would have learned had they spent five minutes on the telephone engaging in rudimentary fact-checking: (1) Lori worked in my annex office in Okaloosa County, Florida. (2) I met her no more than three times; I was never alone with her. (3) I didnāt leave Congress because of her death; I announced my retirement from Congress in May 2001-she passed away several months later.
Then there was Katherine Harris, the cartoon villain who went from helping tilt Florida into the Bush column in 2000 to running for Senate in 2006. That campaign was a legendary disaster, but one series of calls Harris made garnered particular attention. From the Miami Herald:
It was Scarborough, host of the prime-time MSNBC show Scarborough Country and a former Pensacola Republican congressman who was courted by national Republicans to run against Harris. But before he could announce he wouldnāt, Harris called major donors and suggested Scarborough would have to answer questions about the strange death of a former staff member in 2001, according to two former high-level Harris staff members, a GOP donor and Scarborough.Katherine Harrisā floundering U.S. Senate campaign lost its high-level staff again this week and is groping for a message - which doesnāt surprise Republican insiders who trace the seeds of her trouble to the story of āJoeās dead intern.ā This wasnāt any old Joe.
An especially fascinating wrinkle in this ongoing saga is the heated battle about it on Wikipedia. There are pages and pages of arguments about Klausutis in the internal editorial discussions. Thereās even some (seemingly fake) person claiming to be Joe Scarborough who keeps weighing in. Hereās one excerpt:
These continued skirmishes have clearly not hindered Scarboroughās media career, but not every fight has been won. His Wikipedia page currently includes this unsourced passage: āThere had been speculation that Scarborough was having an affair with one of his Congressional aides, Lori Klausutis, who was later found dead in Scarboroughās office after allegedly fainting and hitting her head on a desk in July of 2001.āJoe Scarborough again. Though I am pleased that 50% of my life as described by Wikipedia no longer involves an event that I had absolutely nothing to do with, I am surprised that Wikipedia continues to allow Gamaliel to remain an administrator when she has shown such bad faith in this matterā¦
Lost in all this fracas, of course, has been Klausutis herself, whose story is a grain of sand in the annals of pre-9/11 America. Meanwhile, Joe Scarborough has failed upward, again and again.
Jack Mirkinson is a writer in New York.
Image via AP
Remember When is a series in which we remember things long forgotten. Would you like to remember something for Gawker? Email [email protected].
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