‘Second Probability’: New York Occasions Confirms CNN Hasn’t Fired Toobin, Desires to Hold Him

The New York Times published an article Tuesday on “The Undo of Jeffrey Toobin” by reporters Katherine Rosman and Jacob Bernstein. The main takeaway is that CNN executives are still “unwilling to discuss his future,” which means “he will not be fired”. A spokeswoman confirmed that Toobin was still CNN’s chief legal analyst “but would not comment”.

Three CNN employees say CNN CEO Jeff Zucker is “a big fan of Mr. Toobin and believes in second chances. But Mr. Zucker could leave CNN in 2021, which may make his opinion irrelevant.” Toobin’s offense is described:

While working on a podcast about the presidential election for WNYC and The New Yorker with several other well-known journalists for the magazine, including Jane Mayer and [“non-binary”] Masha Gessen, He was seen lowering and raising his computer camera, exposing and touching his penis, and kissing someone other than his colleagues in the air, Mx. Said Gessen. The magazine suspended Mr. Toobin that day and executives opened an investigation.

“It wasn’t a full sexual act, but it was a lot more than a second,” said Mx. Said Gessen. “I was really, really shocked.”

The Times tried to downplay the offense, as anyone could do. “With so many people berating Mr. Toobin for indecent and inappropriate behavior in a virtual workplace, others thought or even said, ‘There, but for the grace of God I’m going,’ they were very aware of all of the private or potentially embarrassing moments they were having stolen in this strange new zone where we now meet our colleagues. “

The story raised a few eyebrows when he spoke of his mother, the journalist Marlene Sanders:

In a 2015 interview with The Times after her death, Mr Toobin said he grew up knowing that women can be both mothers and professionals: “This was her life. She had a job and she was traveling and she had a son she loved. “

She actually had two sons. Toobin’s younger brother, Mark, was born with Down syndrome in 1967 and lived outside the family, most recently in a group home in Connecticut. Mark was not mentioned in Mrs. Sanders’ obituary.

Why not? Because Toobin’s family apparently wanted it hidden.

The Times mentioned that Toobin had a son named Rory from an extramarital affair with Casey Greenfield, the daughter of journalist Jeff Greenfield. No mention was made of Toobin offering to pay for an abortion.

The Times article ended with a number of people now feeling unjustly punished – not the Times’ usual approach to Brett Kavanaugh.

Several long-time employees of Mr. Toobin feel wrongly punished. “You’re a good person and a great journalist and you’ve done nothing here to hurt anyone outside of you and your family,” tweeted Jonathan Alter, Mr. Toobin’s friend for 40 years after Mr. Toobin left The New Yorker had announced.

“I don’t like Twitter mobs, and I don’t like bullies from the left or right who participate in the demolition culture,” said Mr. Alter later by phone. “I have problems with crime merging. I didn’t put Al Franken in the same category as Harvey Weinstein. “

Woman. [Tina] Brown, who worked with Mr. Weinstein for years after leaving The New Yorker, agreed. “I think 27 years of excellent coverage and dedication to The New Yorker should have been weighed against an incident that embarrassed the magazine terribly but mostly embarrassed itself,” she said.

Malcolm Gladwell, one of the magazine’s best-known contributors, said in an interview: “I read the Condé Nast press release and was confused because I couldn’t find an intellectual justification for what they were doing. They just assumed he’d done something terrible but never told us what the terrible was. And my only feeling – the only way I could explain – was that Condé Nast had it took an unexpected turn towards traditional Catholic teaching.“(Mr. Gladwell then took out his Bible and read to a reporter an allegory from Genesis 38 in which God strikes a man because he has succumbed to the sin of masturbation.)

Even Mx. Gessen, who initially found the incident “traumatic”, said they now feel sympathy for Mr. Toobin. “I find it tragic that a man gets fired for really doing something really stupid,” they said. “It’s the zoom equivalent of having an inappropriately long lunch break, having sex and tripping over it.”

The last paragraph wasn’t as supportive:

But Mr. Toobin may not want anyone to feel sorry. Amid Supreme Court of Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation process in 2018, journalist mocked CNN at Republicans who said white men as a population group were being ill-treated. “Trash,” said Mr. Toobin. “All the whining about the plight of white men is ridiculous.”