NYT Public Editor Slaps Friedman, Dowd, Andrews

New York Times:

IT has been a busy week or two for the ethics police -- those within The Times trying to protect the paper's integrity, and those outside, ready to pounce on transgressions by Times journalists.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[marignymitch]

That money was returned in five months under a Friedman Unit.

[Anonani]

The next time a lowly doctoral student is taken outside, beaten, torched, and then relegated to never never land for stealing another persons thoughts or verbatim words let them use the Dowd Defense. Shameful!

[sloreader]

Plagiarism = Good cause for firing in the newspaper business.

[truthyguy]

Not that I condone what the writers in question did. I do not. However, I find it interesting that the NYT holds itself to a higher standard than the typical republican writers and talk show hosts who claim to be fair and balanced. With the latter, speaking fees (many very substantial) are the norm, even though paid by groups who clearly are not “educational and other nonprofit groups for which lobbying and political activity are not a major focus.” The higher standard by media such as the NYT gets used by the republican right wing as fodder for their rants about how the media has a liberal bias; and, except for outlets like Media Matters, they are never called on their bias when reporting stories or reporting on what others who they condemn as liberal are reporting. With the republican right wing the balancing of the truth against sensationalism always comes down in favor of sensationalism - any everyone seems content to let it slide because it is what the republicans do and it is expected from them. Why is that?

[Kiabell04]

Wait, so Krugman isn't included??

[billw8017]

Krugman is the one best reason anybody should look for the NYT. Dowd is OK; she is an excellent reporter at heart; but her columns are merely (sometimes delightfully) snarky. It depends on whose ox is gored. Friedman is more dubious since he is shallow and his opinions are suspect.

[SeeKitten]

Please tell me that it was an accident that you used the words "Dowd" and "reporter" in the same sentence.

[Loompa]

does anyone with a brain still read the NYT?

[marignymitch]

I do. I'm a major Krugman fan.

[mikep]

Used to be a huge Krugman fan, but not anymore. Had to face reality when he began claiming that the way out of a problem created by excessive debt would be to create even more debt. (Huh!!!) And when he began suggesting that huge deficits don't matter, because the interest rates are low. And when he began suggesting that if the American consumer chose not to continue to buy so much then the federal government ought to just force them to buy. And when he suggested that excessive saving is a problem, not a solution. Don't know what happened to him, maybe he began hanging out with Friedman. But he doesn't make a lot of sense to me anymore.

[Skyhawk]

Some of us don't watch Fox News.

[Doofus]

At least, Clark Hoyt wrote a pretty interesting story. It's great
when Mo Do gets caught up in some snarky details, and Thom
Friedman is rich enough that $75K is just walking around money.

Still the best paper in the US, try though they might to make it not so.

[CHRISSYLEE]

"Still the best paper in the US"

High praise, indeed!

[Bob Charles]

So long NYT.

Your motto is now "All the Lies Fit to Print."

[Bulbul]

How lucky Dowd is, stole a paragraph, and got off of the hook, with a feather duster....

[SEQUOIABISON]

Dowd is an equal opportunity humiliater and not worth reading, Friedman helped Bush beat the drum for war and the invasion of Iraq and he would have to pay me to listen to one of his speeches.

These people are very much like the Newspaper they work for, fading rapidly in importance and relevancy.

[LeroyJenkins]

my sentiments exactly. do not forget Judith Miller

[zapper502]

dowd is both a phony and a hypocrite. she trashed the dems for years and years helping rupublicans have a stranglehold on this country. now that the tide has turned and only dems are welcomed in the upper east side, she is all kissy kissy on everythhing obama. she is the biggest phony around and a big bore to boot. she has no ideas for solving any problem this country has. she is incapable of positive thought.

[TruEngineHearing]

This is a little pissy, don't you think?:

"I do not think Dowd plagiarized, but I also do not think what she did was right."

Unless you are making an accusation that she actually tried to get away with something, then your comment is the cheap feel here.

[StillAmused]

“I just wasn’t paying attention,” Friedman said.

Same as when he led the cheering section for the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Wonder when we're going to start judging the merits of columnists, not just on how eloquently they weave word-pictures and collect Pulitzers, but also on how often they're proven grotesquely, unforgivably WRONG...

[dillydawg]

Spot on. But as long as they are commercially viable they will live on.

[ProfessorDuh]

Exactly. These columnists should have been fired -- particularly Friedman, who has been murderously wrong on the most important issues of the day and utterly vapid when he wasn't wrong.

[Gib]

Not to mention pompous, self-important, and pretentious.

[DonCosenza]

I just wasted 7 minutes of my life reading that article. Thanks, Hoyt and NYT. Keep fighting the good fight against columnists caught not paying attention and reporters with poor personal finances. Seriously, I'm surprised reporters even have finances these days... maybe that's the biggest scandal.

Oh BTW, did you hear that there's 2 wars and a recession going on?

[AnnfromCA]

Time to give some others a shot.