I haven’t had the time this week to dig into the stories about the Schiavo memo circulating on the hill.

Here is some of the press coverage:

AJC
Hartford Courant
Boston Globe
ABC News
Post (and here)

Many blogs are covering the coverage, and if you haven’t checked it out, you should do so at the following sites:

Michelle Malkin here and here.
Powerline
NRO
Kincaid
Eternity Road
Expertise
Uncorrelated
RightPundit
Decision ‘08

UPDATE 4/6: Lots of continuing coverage.

Washington Times story:

All 55 Republican senators say they have never seen the Terri Schiavo political talking-points memo that Democrats say was circulated among Republicans during the floor debate over whether the federal government should intervene to prolong her life.

A survey by The Washington Times found that every Republican said the memo was not crafted or distributed by him or her. Every one of them said he or she had not seen it until the memo was the subject of speculation in major news organs, particularly ABC News and The Washington Post.

Powerline:

The Washington Post isn’t the perpetrator of the underlying offense here, but it is in the middle of its own Watergate-style cover-up. Who will guard the guardians? Where’s Mistah Kurtz? Calling Mistah Kurtz…

Mudville Gazette:

Interesting that Tom Harkin was the only senator to see the memo circulate on the floor. Harkin, who ‘through a spokeswoman’ has accused every Republican senator in America of lying, is well known for lying about his service in Vietnam.

The Anchoress has some thoughts. In the Agora asks:

Every Republican has now denied any involvement. Tom Harkin suggests otherwise, but apparently won’t even state it had Republican origination. Why? And since ABC and the Washington Post no longer stand by their initial suggestion that Republicans authored it, why was this a story in the first place? Given that it made front page news and carried hefty air time, why will news sources not run a retraction?

PowerPundit:

Democrat Senate leader Harry Reid can’t even muster up the time to sit and answer a few questions about the memo, but that doesn’t stop him from continuing to criticize Republicans for allegedly creating and distributing it.

UPDATE 2 (4/6/05 10:52 pm) Josh Claybourn, via Brian Balta, is linking to The Raw Story, which claims to have obtained a leaked AP story about the source of the memo. It supposedly came from a staffer in the office of Florida Republican Sen. Mel Martinez:

“It is with profound disappointment and regret that I learned today that a senior member of my staff was unilaterally responsible for this document,” Martinez said

…

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, asked for information on the bill a Martinez authored in regards to the Schiavo case, Martinez said, and Martinez “pulled a one-page document from his coat pocket and handed to Harkin,” according to AP.

“Unbeknownst to me,” Martinez revealed, “I had given him a copy of the now infamous memo.”

But Claybourn still wonders how Mr. Martinez could be handing another Senator a document he had not read nor validated its origins.

Sen. Martinez should not have carried such a ridiculous memo, he should not have handed it to another Senator, and he shouldn’t let such a foolish aide have such access.

Powerline has picked this up as well:

In fact, if the current AP account is correct, the amazingly inept “talking points memo,” which got the number of the Senate bill wrong, misspelled Terri Schiavo’s name, and contained a number of other typographical errors, did not come from “Republican officials” or “party leaders,” but rather from an anonymous, unknown staffer. Senator Martinez himself–forget about members of his staff–is a freshman senator, in office for three months, not a “party leader” or “Republican officials.” (The plural in the Post’s original article is interesting.) Also, the reporting by ABC and the Post suggested that the memo was widely or universally distributed among Republican senators, while a survey reported by the Washington Tmes indicated that none of the 55 Republican senators had seen it. So, if the current AP story is correct, it confirms that ABC and the Post mis-reported the story–in the Post’s case, in an article that was picked up by dozens of other newspapers off the paper’s wire service.

It also looks like WaPo has an article on this in tomorrow’s issue.

UPDATE 3 (4/7): Michelle thinks Claybourn should reveal the phone numbers of the staffers who claimed to work for Martinez. And she wonders what is going on here.

Sen. Mel Martinez told the Washington Times he did not see the Schiavo memo until ABC News and the Post publicized it. But Sen. Tom Harkin told the Post that when Martinez handed him the memo, “[Martinez] said these were talking points — something that we’re working on here.”

How could Sen. Martinez describe the contents of the memo if he had not seen it? And who is “we?”

FishKite adds:

If not for a handful of blogs, a few rightwing pundits and some media watchdogs, the Washington Times probably would not have published their article, in turn putting the pressure back on the Senators and the reporters who first reported on this.

If not for the blogs, we would still be under the impression that GOP party leaders drafted that ridiculous memo and that all the Republican Senators received, read and approved of it.

Captain Ed has an opinion:

Quite frankly, based on the poor presentation of this memo — with its typographical errors, mislabeled Senate bill number, and the inept political approach it took — it’s difficult to understand why Brian Darling ever got a job in anyone’s political office, let alone that of a US Senator. Darling didn’t do Martinez or the GOP any favors by staying silent about his role, either. Had he owned up to writing the memo the first day it became controversial, it would have disappeared from the headlines as quickly as it rose. His resignation should really have been rejected; Martinez should have insisted on firing him instead.

Hah! Ace says:

They ought to be praising Martinez for his devotion to the mentally challenged.