The news on Troy King is that there’s no news on Troy King.

RE: this ongoing rumor mill, who knows? First, there was a vicious rumor – or a series of vicious rumors that played on the same theme.

The Montgomery Advertiser was going to have something on it.

They didn’t.

Then, the Tuscaloosa News was going to have something on it.

They didn’t.

Then, WSFA was supposed to have something.

They didn’t.

Then, the Birmingham News was supposed to have something yesterday, and King was supposed to have had a “full confrontational” news conference today, in which he would presumably deny what was to have appeared in the News.

They didn’t. So he didn’t.

Some say the News still has a story and is just waiting for the right time, more info, better sourcing, etc. Others say that because the story hasn’t been able to move beyond the blogosphere, its credibility is continuing to crack. Mainstream media outlets have lawyers. Lots of lawyers. And lawyers don’t like rumors. So although newspapers use “anonymous sources” (and don’t get me started on that), they still have to know who those sources are—so the lawyers can talk to them, you know, in case of a suit. That the newspapers can’t find sources—a week to several months after the fact, depending on the version you’re hearing—who are willing to go on record, even privately, about these rumors is the biggest reason for skepticism, in my view. Unless and until newspapers can source this to the satisfaction of their lawyers, these rumors will remain just that: Rumors.

And to that point, as for King himself, the most interesting theory I heard for his continued silence on the matter is that he doesn’t want to give the mainstream media the news hook they need to drag something that had previously existed only on blogs out into the open. If they can’t get across the river on their own, he supposedly figures, he’s not going to build the bridge for them.

All in all, I have to say I agree completely with Danny over at the Parlor on this. I have never seen anything like this in my life. Everyone knows something, or knows someone who knows something, or heard from someone who knows something or ran into someone who went to school once with someone who knows something. People will say matter-of-factly that they just KNOW it to be so. Others will tell you, just as matter-of-factly, that they know it CAN’T be true. Both camps will look at your like you’re stupid if you have an opinion opposite of theirs – or if you haven’t yet formed one at all.

I’ll just say this: Troy King hasn’t exactly been the Bradley Byrne of the newspapers and their editorial boards. Where they admire Byrne and his leadership of the once-beleaguered two-year system, they decry King and his unabashed, unapologetic conservatism.

In other words, if the papers have something on Troy King, they’re not sitting on it because they’re his friends. 

And speaking of friends, does King’s supposed strategy of not dignifying the rumor with a response also explain the GOP’s deafening silence on the issue? More than a few folks have suggested that this began in GOP circles, whether to get rid of King in the AG’s office or simply to damage him beyond repair so he’ll be out of the way in 2010. (Interestingly enough, there’s been no denial from top-level GOP leaders on this, either.)

And that begs one final question: If it did begin in GOP circles for 2010 purposes, when did supporters of other potential GOP gubernatorial candidates start seeing Troy King as such a threat?

See these posts on this issue over at the Parlor. Check out the comments, in particular: