Bill Keller and the New York Times: Heal Thyself

I saw Bill Keller, former editor of The New York Times (now one of its writers), on MSNBC a little while ago, roundly criticizing Rolling Stone for not checking out its sources more carefully before publication of its enormously important rape on college campus story, which has finally gotten America to pay some attention to this endemic and awful part of frat culture.

Rolling Stone no doubt should have checked its sources more throughly before going to press, and it could have handled its apology issued today a little better, and not blamed the source by saying Rolling Stone's "trust in her was misplaced".   When issuing an apology, it's best to just stay with what you didn't do right.

But Bill Keller of all people attacks Rolling Stone about this?  He was at The New York Times during the years of probably the worst journalistic travesty in history, when Jayson Blair regularly faked stories, plagiarized, made up sources, and in general made The New York Times a laughing stock, a sad position for the once "newspaper of record".

Further, where have The New York Times and Bill Keller been all these years in which rapes have taking place on campuses such as the University of Virginia?   Rather than getting on his high horse, Keller should encourage his own newspaper to do more reporting on this grievous problem.

And Rolling Stone, let us not forget, deserves eminent credit for breaking this story wide open, and bringing it to public scrutiny.   They erred, but on behalf of a noble and critically important goal, and deserve every decent person's thanks not attack for this.

New York Times Publishes Fake Letter Criticizing Caroline Kennedy

The New York Times just apologized for publishing a letter purported to be from Bertrand Delanoë, Mayor of Paris, who wrote about Caroline Kennedy that "in my opinion she has no qualification whatsoever to bid for Senator Clinton’s seat" and her bid was "appalling".

The letter was published this morning, and now, after a day of damage, the Times says "we have already expressed our regrets to Mr. Delanoë's office and we are now doing the same to you, our readers." The letter was not written by Mr. Delanoë.

This isn't as bad as Jayson Blair, and his fictional and plagiarized reporting that went on for several years at the New York Times, but it's still plenty appalling. The Times says it is their "procedure to verify the authenticity of every letter. In this case, our staff sent an edited version of the letter to the sender of the email and did not hear back." And they published the letter, anyway.

This is the kind of error that could happen at a college newspaper - which, if it did, would become an important object lesson about what not to do when editing and publishing a newspaper. But at The New York Times, the newspaper of record?

The Times can't go back a day in history, and undo its publication of this letter. But with every day that passes, it is increasingly clear that newspapers are no more immune to errors than blogs or any other form of communication, and should not be treated with any greater respect. Everything anyone reads, in any venue, should be taken with a healthy grain of salt.

The Wire Season 5 Episode 5: Media Chasing Their Own Tales and Tails

A real standalone gem on The Wire tonight - which I predict will become a classic, almost Hitchcockian hour-long morality play of media chasing their own tales/tails...

The medium in question, of course, is the Baltimore Sun, under fire both from staff reductions and from McNulty, who is trying to feed it his concocted story about a Baltimore serial killer - as a way getting some police funding to bring down Marlo and crew.

Gus Haynes (great continuing performance by Clark Johnson) is doing his best to keep the Sun running, but the pressure to perform gets rookie reporter Scott Templeton (well played by Tom McCarthy) to do something daring and devious: he pretends to get a call, on a public phone, from the serial killer - the one who doesn't really exist, the one being created out of almost thin air by McNulty. (I say "almost," because there are, at least, some dead bodies.)

McNulty is called in for a meeting at the Sun, and in one of the best scenes in the entire series realizes that here is his chance to really nail down the serial killer as a reality. So he chimes in at perfect times with confirmations that what Templeton is reporting the serial killer told him rings true, and conforms to what the police already know about the serial killer. McNulty's "weak shit" has suddenly become a lot stronger.

Can this be taken as a metaphor for the way our media nowadays conjures stories out of questionable sources and the drive to be successful? Well, Jayson Blair certainly did similar things a few years ago at the New York Times - though, as far as anyone knows, no police like McNulty were involved.

The Wire has certainly presented a powerful indictment here of our media - even Gus, who at first doubted that Templeton had really heard from the serial killer, is pretty much taken in (though he may have some lingering doubts).

And the story moves on, with the serial killer now truly having a life of his own... and Omar walking into a blaze...

See also The Wire's Back! Review of Season 5 Episode 1 and Episode 2: The Great, Dangling Conversation ... 3. McNulty and Marlo ... 4. One Down ... 6. Superman Omar and Tall Stories ... 7. King of Diamonds ... 8. Two Down ... 9. Cold, Killer Sweetheart ... 10. The Wire Bows out Gracefully

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