NY Times - The Gray Pallor Of Death

Here's some more about the N.Y. Times I still encourage all of you to read the first news link in the homepage's "The Whole Truth" links feature. Reading the next two links wouldn't hurt either. Today opened up with a real bracer didn’t it? The NY Times coming clean, in their usual squishy and self-excusing way, about killing an ACORN corruption story at a moment in the 2008 campaign that may have damaged the Obama election effort, wasn’t a complete surprise. Like the expected passing of a terminally ill relative, the final moment still comes as an unpleasant jolt. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Maureen Dowd’s apparent plagiarism, which is also explained away with an ‘aw shucks, I plain forgot’ justification regarding the lifting of a paragraph from Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo blog.

It is becoming a not infrequent thing to learn that the Times is involved in some sort chicanery or ethical lapse (what is more frequent than a lapse?), plagiarism or just plain prejudice –bias is too limp- when it comes to writing anything about people or events that cast a less than flattering light on their favored persons and issues. Sorry for that sentence. I’m not going to list all the examples of what I’m referring to. You either already know them or can easily look them up by googling “ NT Times plagiarism”, or “bias” or “Blair.” I’m sure if you hit one story you’ll easily find lots of information on the entire Times’ record.

I am no paragon of virtue. But the days are not so long gone when people who benefited from unscrupulous supporters would come out and at least chastise the culprit, or hopefully sever association with such a person or organization. Now I know Obama can’t stop the Times from covering him, and denying press credentials would, I think be draconian. But getting in front of a teleprompter microphone and telling folks oh something like “The New York Times acted counter to the best standards and practices of the journalism business and I hope a few heads roll over this.” would be nice. And the Times itself wouldn’t have to change much of that statement in a public apology regarding Dowd’s ethically lax attitude. But the state of things being what they are, neither of those honorable things is going to happen. As a senior Art History major I cited a quote that opened my term paper incorrectly. I didn’t leave the citation out, just erred on the book I got it from. I got an ‘F’ and nearly didn’t graduate because of it. How much do you think Dowd will find missing in her next paycheck?

This is another example of the Left’s rallying cry of ‘IT’S NOT ____________ WHEN WE DO IT!’. You fill in the blank. When the Left does it, it’s “editorial discretion”, when the Right does it it’s “censorship”. And the thing for me that is so migraine inducing is that the people on the Left of genuine goodwill and are not talking point parrots when having a conversation, even these decent folks will never raise a critical voice or entertain the thought that perhaps they’re “ridin’ with the wrong posse.” Not to blow the Right’s horn but it needs to be pointed out that in the ‘50’s, William F. Buckley took on the John Bircher’s, the anti-semites and other assorted kooks on the fringe of conservatism and purged them from the conservative movement. This was right, honorable and courageous. The Right’s swift and complete rejection of David Duke when he attempted to run for office as a Republican also demonstrates the Right’s refusal to amass gains at the expense of good ethics and high integrity. I know these two things exist within lots of folks who pull the ‘D’ lever. Who speaks for them? Why are they so invisible? Can it really be that the Left is really that bereft of people who will not sacrifice principled behavior for political gain? I really do know the answer to that question. I just really don’t like thinking about it.