Jake Tapper, that shining beacon of integrity, again reminds us what is important in this election cycle.  On his Political Punch blog, he writes a compelling story of how maybe, just maybe, Obama had smoked a cigarette in August, 2007.  I fail to see the significance of this.

I did not recall that Obama was a smoker, nor that he had pledged to Michelle that he would quit, using Nicorette as an aid.  Luckily for us, Tapper includes as a reminder the story he wrote on it back in February of '07, cleverly titled Obama to Quit -- Smoking, That Is.  If you have ever been a smoker, as I still am, you probably understand that it is a difficult habit to kick.

In Tapper's latest piece, he mentions his talking with Obama back in August, saying that he "reeked of cigarettes."  Tapper goes on to mention that "Obama ran off before I could ask him if he'd just snuck a smoke, so I called his campaign. [emphasis added]"  His campaign, either concerned with possible impacts on his image or simply not seeing this as a major issue, "reported back that he had told them he hadn't had a cigarette since he quit."

Tapper then shares with us that Obama admitted on MSNBC's Hardball that he has struggled to quit, and "[Obama] fell off the wagon a couple times during the course of it, and then was able to get back on [...] But it is a struggle like everything else."  To which Tapper reacts:

"Now I wonder about last August."

I ask you, just how major of an issue is the possibility that Obama has snuck a cigarette or two while trying to kick the habit?  Does this change your view or your vote for the current Democratic Frontrunner?  I would certainly hope not, because we have all slipped at something from time to time.  How are your New Years Resolutions coming?

Tapper did not directly ask Barack Obama if he had smoked a cigarette on the day in question, nor did he ask Obama if he had slipped from time to time in his quest to quit.  In the article, Tapper wants us to assume that Obama intentionally dodged the situation, saying that he "ran off before I could ask him."  Instead, Tapper asked someone with the Obama campaign to check, and as a result, the information provided is third-party, "somebody told me" at best.  Tapper never asked Obama, and Obama never told Tapper.

In the Headline-Hungry world, I came across the article from the front page of the Politics section of HuffPo, with the absolutely-misleading headline, "ABC Reporter: I Think Obama Lied To Me About Smoking"  Regardless of the shared fault of Tapper and the writer at HuffPo (though admittedly, it could have come that way directly from the ABC RSS feed, I'm not certain), an obviously minor and insignificant issue - one man's difficulty in quitting smoking - came out with the aim of painting Obama as a liar.

Jake Tapper is certainly no stranger to presenting insignificant issues as politically damning.  Though Tapper admits, in the thirteenth paragraph of a sixteen-graf post that, "It's not a big deal in the scheme of things -- the war on Iraq, a major economic crisis -- indeed, it's miniscule. Hardly worth mentioning," he follows with a closing that only helps perpetuate the idea that it just may be a big deal.

Except that I don't like feeling that I wasn't being dealt with honestly. And as much as citizens who are suspect of the media might scoff at such a notion, many of us consider ourselves to be your representatives to help make sure our leaders are telling us the truth, and leading the country down a path we're confident is the right one. (Corny, I know.)

This isn't the only time I've felt that way about the Obama campaign, of course -- its response to the Austan Goolsbee controversy was a profile in dissembling. (Not that Sens. Hillary Clinton and John McCain or their campaigns are entirely innocent in this area either. Or even that Obama is necessarily the worst offender.)

Still.

I would imagine The Horse's Mouth would have a field day with this piece from Tapper, as it is just one of the many egregious displays of petty reporting and sensationalism.  Should we not expect a higher standard of reporting from ABC News' Senior National Correspondent?  This certainly will not be the last time Jake Tapper takes it upon himself to twist and turn an insignificant, he-said-she-said situation into a screaming headline painting one candidate or another as untrustworthy and, assumedly, unfit to be President.

But I think it is important that "reporters" like this should be held accountable, even if it only comes by way of my first TPM Cafe post.