CNN is currently running with the following headline:

White House refuses to release full terror report

The opening text follows below:

The White House refused Wednesday to release in full a previously secret intelligence assessment that depicts a growing terrorist threat and has fueled the election-season fight over the Iraq war.

Press secretary Tony Snow said releasing the full report, portions of which President Bush declassified on Tuesday, would jeopardize the lives of agents who gathered the information.

"We don't want to put people's lives at risk," Snow told a White House news briefing.

How about we try on some alternative headlines CNN could have run?

White House refuses to endanger intelligence operatives

White House refuses to expose U.S. intelligence methods to the media

Bush Administration insists on keeping CIA agents alive

Snow: '"We don't want to put people's lives at risk'

I guess it's simply a matter of perspective and goals.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 11:43 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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He admits to to photo fakery being widespread and almost impossible to detect at this time, which I think is a gutsy thing to do. Allah has the video over at Hot Air.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 08:25 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Remember the Reuters news vehicle that was fired upon, but not directly hit by an Israeli helicopter gunship while acting suspiciously near Israeli positions in Gaza?

The Israeli Government Press Office is now stating that they believe armored vehicles licensed to news agencies, such as the Reuters vehicle attacked, might be being used by terrorist groups to launch attacks against Israel:

Armored vehicles that were given to foreign news agencies operating in the country with the authorization of the State of Israel, may be used by hostile groups to carry out terror attacks against Israel, Director of the Government Press Office Danny Seaman warned in a letter addressed to Shin Bet Head Yuval Diskin.

On August 27 an Israel Defense Forces helicopter hit an armored vehicle that belonged to the Reuters news agency in Gaza. According to
Seaman, the incident illustrated the failures in overseeing the use of armored vehicles granted to the foreign media agencies with the permission of the State.

The vehicle's presence in Gaza in itself constituted a violation of its license terms, and moreover, the jeep was carrying only Palestinians – one with links to Hamas who was not a Reuters employee.

Licenses for armored vehicles are granted by the State to foreign news agencies in Israel for the purpose of carrying out journalistic missions in the West Bank and Gaza. The State has even agreed to extend the permits for more than the one year stipulated by the law, on the condition that the license holder is a foreign national and that he alone will drive the car.

"To the best of our knowledge, all of the vehicles' owners have been violating the conditions for a long time now, despite our requests. This is not the first time we are warning that these vehicles will be used by hostile agents to carry out a terror attack against Israel. The recent incident in Gaza only illustrates the danger," Seaman wrote the Shin Bet chief.

In more direct terms, Israel is saying that the Reuters news vehicle was not being operated by newsmen, but terrorists using the vehicle as a sort of "Trojan horse." The press office is directly stating that those injured were not newsmen, but likely terrorists.

As one of the injured non-journalists was a Iranian, we have to ask if this could be considered as an act of war by Iran against Israel.

My gut says "yes." Mein darm also says Israel won't take direct action against Iran.

What hangs in the air as an interesting possibility is the very much implied threat that Israel might very well yank licenses for armored vehicles from news services for violation of the terms of their licenses. Allowing the vehicles to be used for terrorist transportation and attacks would obviously constitute a serious breach of contract.

We've long suspected that international news agencies have been sympathetic to the cause of terrorism. The Israeli Government Press Office is now stating publicly that they believe it as well.

Update: photos added. Thanks to reader "yet to use" for the tip.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 07:54 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Dan Riehl makes the stunning accusation that Associate Press photographer Bilal Hussein, a liberal and MSM cause de jour over the last week, staged photos of posed bodies with Iraqi children on January 25, 2005 in Ramadi, Iraq.

Dan is correct in charging that a body has been clearly moved in the photo about 3-4 feet, and in fact dragged over the top of another body between the first and third photos on his site.

I, however, have some problems with the photos used as examples.

(WARNING: graphic photos follow) more...

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 01:57 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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In this mail today was a copy of Jim Geraghty's Voting To Kill: How 9/11 Launched the Era of Republican Leadership. Pressed for time, I slipped it into a cargo pocket of my shorts and took my daughter to her beginning tap/ballet class.

After Little One disappeared behind the door of the dance studio, I schlepped back to the waiting area and began to read, interrupted here and there by toddlers toddling and cross-chatter--all moms; the other solo dad bolted within minutes to return when the lesson was over, and not a second before--and the oddest thing occurred. Geraghty's assumptions were put to the test directly before my eyes.

The first chapter of the book is called "Post-9/11 America" and it deals, as you might guess, with the emotional impact of 9/11 as it reverberates even today. Among the people discussed were "security moms," suburban mothers who had voted Democratic in 1992 and 1996 and 2000, who radically had their worldviews resculpted as they watched five hundred Americans vaporized on live television.

Leading up to the 2004 elections, Democrats seemed to discount the security moms, and they lost. They still discount the security moms, and act as if they never existed. They do exist. I heard them tonight.

Yesterday morning, an equipment malfunction shutdown nearby Shearon Harris nuclear power plant, and the plant remained offline under the non-emergency shutdown today.

As little girls scuffed tap shoes on hardwood floors in the next room and I buried my nose in Chapter One, these moms were discussing more than just the shutdown. They talked about the shutdown, what they would do in the event of a leak, what they thought might happen if terrorists attack, and what they thought the likelihood of a successful attack was (not good, according to the moms). They discussed other possible area targets as well before the line of conversation ran dry and they switched over to another topic... the up-coming year-round schools, l think.

But my point is that while I was reading about the security moms in Voting To Kill that many Democrats seem to think have gone the way of the dinosaurs, there they were--crikey!--all around me, still very much aware and alert and as conversant on matters of nuclear planet security as they are school fundraisers. Security moms are alive and well and now an integral part of the big Who We Are. Democrats will ignore them again in '06, and find new and exciting excuses for why they continue to lose.

Class was over for the night. I learned something. It's also apparent in the first chapter of Voting To Kill, that Democrats obviously haven't.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 08:00 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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AFP's caption writer seems to take issue with Israel treating captured members of Hezbollah like criminals:

Israeli soldiers arrest two alleged Hezbollah militants outside the southern Lebanese village of Bint Jbeil in August 2006. Three suspected Hezbollah fighters who were captured during the Lebanon war were charged in Israel with "murder" and belonging to a "terrorist organisation".(AFP/File) Email Photo Print Photo

Apparently, AFP does not believe that Hezbollah is a "terrorist organisation," nor does it think that killing eight Israeli soldiers in an assault inside Israel during a time of relative peace before the recent conflict was "murder."

AFP did not say what they would prefer Hezbollah to be called, nor did they say what, if any, offense should be ascribed to the deaths of eight Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah gunfire.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 03:33 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
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And just who do they think they're kidding?

Air America Radio will announce a major restructuring on Friday, which is expected to include a bankruptcy filing, three independent sources have told ThinkProgress.

Air America could remain on the air under the deal, but significant personnel changes are already in the works. Sources say five Air America employees were laid off yesterday and were told there would be no severance without capital infusion or bankruptcy. Also, Air America has ended its relationship with host Jerry Springer.

The right wing is sure to seize on Air America's financial woes as a sign that progressive talk radio is unpopular. In fact, Air America succeeded at creating something that didn't exist: the progressive talk radio format. That format is now established and strong and will continue with or without Air America. Indeed, many of the country's most successful and widely-syndicated progressive talk hosts — Ed Schultz and Stephanie Miller, for instance — aren't even associated with Air America.

While I'm sure Think Progress might even believe what they say is true, facts point us towards the opposite conclusion.

Progressive talk radio at least as voiced on Air America, is unpopular; that is the reason Air America is going bankrupt. The math isn't very hard: very few people listen to them, advertisers know this and won't pay them enough to keep them on the air, and so Air America is in big trouble.

Trying to give them for credit for things that don't exist--"the progressive talk radio format," which is in no appreciable way different than any other talk radio format--is a particularly sad attempt to salvage something from nothing.

I wish Ed Schultz and Stephanie Miller all the best with their progressive radio adventures, and wish them successful career. Liberals need something to listen to, even if they have to buy a satellite radio to tune in many markets. Apparently Shultz and Miller have something all the "big names" on Air America lacked.

Talent.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 02:10 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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Last week, USA Today columnist Andrew Kantor attacked blogger Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs in a story meant to highlight the "professionalism" of the mainstream media, while calling into question the ethics and accountability of bloggers.

The problem was, Kantor's attack on Johnson was not grounded in fact. Kantor's shoddy research into the issue was exposed, and I formally asked him for a correction to his USA Today article early Saturday morning.

It is now Monday morning, and Mr. Kantor's USA Today article has gone uncorrected, even though I left a detailed comment on his blog explaining precisely where he made his errors, and asked him for a formal correction shortly before he closed comments.

As a result of the inaction to date, I sent the following email to Mr. Kantor this morning:

Dear Mr. Kantor,

I formally asked you this weekend to ask USA Today to correct the factual inaccuracies in your story that accuses Charles Johnson of “digging up” the story on Editor and Publisher's 2003 column by Greg Mitchell. You have not responded to that request on your blog or in email, and no changes have yet appeared in USA Today.

Do you intent to ask USA Today to make those corrections, or do you intend to let the known inaccuracies in your story stand? Please contact me this morning and let me know if you intend to make these corrections, and if you do not intend to ask USA Today to make those corrections, please let me know why.

I also ask to know whether or not you intend to follow up with Editor and Publisher's Greg Mitchell and Charles McKeown to see what their response to the “stealth” rewrite of Mitchell's 2003 column less than four hours after I linked it, and after two weeks of them refusing to answer questions about that rewrite in any way, shape, or form.

Thank you very much for your time and your (expected) prompt response.

Respectfully,

In addition, I sent a request for correction to USA Today.

Kantor professes to be a professional with "pro principles," and yet his inaccurate article has not be changed more than 48 hours after his inaccuracies and incomplete research were detailed to him precisely. Perhaps Mr. Kantor will eventually get around to updating his misleading column, perhaps not.

The fact remains that this professional journalist, like so many the blogosphere has exposed, is no more accurate than the amateurs he dismisses out of hand.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 08:28 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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In a USA Today column of September, 7 entitled, Technology empowers amateur journalism — for better or worse, Andrew Kantor decided—for whatever reason—to attack Charles Johnson of the blog Little Green Footballs and his principles.

Kantor stated:

Take the blog that exposed those Reuters/Adnan Hajj photos — Little Green Footballs (LGF). It's written by a Web designer from California named Charles Johnson.

Johnson took offense to a column by Greg Mitchell, the editor of Editor & Publisher magazine, in which Mitchell decried the baseless attacks on war photographers after the Hajj affair.

So Johnson went from using his technology toolbox like a pro to using it like an amateur. He dug up an article Mitchell wrote in 2003 in which Mitchell admitted that — more than 30 years ago — he faked some quotes while working for a local newspaper in Niagara Falls.

Mitchell was clearly embarrassed — it went against his professional ethics enough that 30 years later he told the story. But what was Johnson's take? He claimed it as proof that Mitchell had "first-hand experience with staging news."

Calling it "staging news" or saying Mitchell "faked a news story" was a bit off the deep end, and neither accusation would have gotten by a professional editor. But Johnson isn't a professional. He's just a guy with a toolbox. He had great success using it, helping to expose the faked Bush National Guard memos, as well as those Adnan Hajj photos.

But he mistook having a well-worn set of professional tools with being equivalent to a well-followed set of pro principles.

For someone who purports to be a professional journalist critiquing and criticizing citizen journalism, Mr. Kanor seems to have a problem with a core element of journalism, i.e. getting his facts and sources correct.

Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs did not "dig up an article Mitchell wrote in 2003."

Jon Ham, currently VP for Communications for The John Locke Foundation wrote about Mitchell's admitted malfeasance the first time around while writing as a professional journalist for the Durham Herald-Sun.

After Mitchell wrote a pair of editorials attacking bloggers (though billed as a defense of war photographers), Mr. Ham sent a link to the 2003 editorial to me, which inspired me to write a post on it on my blog that quickly spread through the blogosphere exactly two weeks ago today.

To the best of my knowledge, every person who wrote about this admitted example in Mitchell's past of staging the news did, in fact, cite my blog as the source, including Little Green Footballs. Mr. Kantor expresses an interest and concern for "pro principles," and so I find it disturbing that he would institute such an attack without getting his basic facts correct.

I'm equally disturbed that a writer of technology does not seem to understand the term "hat tip" which Mr. Johnson used to clearly indicate that I was the source. Perhaps Kantor's understanding of the cyber-culture he covers is perhaps not quite as extensive as he would have his readers believe.

I wish Mr. Kantor had understood that bit of terminology, for if he had, and followed Mr. Johnson's link back to my blog, he would likely have discovered that the act of citing Mr. Mitchell's 2003 editorial led to "someone" at Editor & Publisher to suddenly rewrite the lede of Mr. Mitchell's 2003 editorial to cast him in a far more favorable light. Mitchell is now the obvious suspect in an ethical breach that one Washington, D.C. based newspaper editor said was serious enough to warrant dismissal.

Neither Mitchell, nor publisher Charles McKeown, nor parent company VNU Media's spokesman Will Thoretz will comment two weeks after this clear violation of journalistic ethics, putting up a stonewall of silence, no doubt hoping that the concrete example of journalistic fraud committed in the rewrite of Mitchell's 2003 column will simply die away.

Andrew Kantor say that bloggers have a nice tools for communication, but not the principles. As the editor and publisher of Editor & Publisher both continue to stonewall critics over a serious and obvious breach of journalistic ethics, and no professional journalists with come forth to defend them, I find his nose-in-the-air defense of journalistic principles to ring quite hollow.

( h/t: LGF)

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 11:38 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Anti-personnel mine, or battery? Brought to you by the same folks who force children to stand next to unexploded bombs.

And the letter "C."

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 01:37 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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The Israeli military was busy Tuesday evening in the Rafha refugee camp in Gaza, striking two separate vehicles driven by Hamas activists, according to the Beeb:

Three Hamas militants have been killed in two Israeli air strikes on cars in Rafah, southern Gaza, Palestinian officials said.

The first attack killed an activist from Hamas' military wing and hurt his companion. Dozens of bystanders were also hurt, Palestinian doctors said.

Two Hamas militants were killed in a second strike on a car in Rafah.

Israeli forces have been carrying out raids and air strikes on Gaza after the capture of an Israeli soldier in June.

Hundreds of Palestinians have since been killed by Israeli action.

An Israeli military spokeswoman said the first of the two strikes on Tuesday targeted militants who were planning an attack on Israel.

"After the aerial attack, there were a number of explosions, proving that the vehicle was carrying explosives," the spokeswoman said.

Photographers from the Associated Press and Reuters were quick to converge upon the two cars, as captured in Yahoo's "Gaza" photostream.

AP's Khalil Hamra captured two photos of the vehicle I've dubbed "Car 1," a white vehicle absent all easily identifiable signs of its doors, roof, and even roof pillars.

The exposed steering wheel and beveled hood, which is apparent in the second photo, are also useful identifiers, as are the rather plain wheels. It is also perhaps worth noting the surroundings of the photo, which shows an audience of many men in paramilitary attire identified as Hamas-led Palestinian Authority's security forces, in a very well-lit and back-lit area.

The second vehicle hit in Israeli air strikes I've dubbed "Car 2," but you may wish to refer to it as the "Incredible Re-Burning Car," or "IRC" for short, for reasons that will shortly become apparent.

Reuters photographer Ibraheem Abu Mustafa, provides us with this photo and caption:

Palestinians help with rescue work on a car as water is sprayed to douse flames following an Israeli airstrike in Rafah camp in the southern Gaza Strip September 5, 2006. Israeli airstrikes killed four Palestinian militants in Gaza on Wednesday, the Israeli military and witnesses said, ratcheting up violence in the coastal strip further.

Please note that the vehicle fire appears to have been doused at this point. Also note that the door pillar extending over the passenger compartment is somewhat intact, as it a battered driver's side door, the roof-supporting column behind the driver's door, and the rear door on the driver's side, which has blown (or perhaps, looking the two sets of hands on it, pushed) upward and inward.

Also please note the five-spoke wheel, the deformed hood, and the dark mark on the left front quarterpanel, which I estimate to be perhaps 3-4 inches from the back of the panel, and roughly eight inches down from the top of the panel. It is worth noting that the crowd make-up in this photo is exclusively civilian in nature, and that the only readily apparent source of light is from the camera's flash, if for no other reason than to firmly establish that the first two photos are a distinctly separate even than the second pair of photos.

And now, a miraculous AP photo and caption of the exact same vehicle... well, not quite.

Palestinians gather around the burning wreckage of a car destroyed in an apparent Israeli airstrike in the Rafah refugee camp, southern Gaza Strip, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2006.Three Palestinians were killed and 12 wounded late Tuesday in explosions, at least one of them the result of an Israeli airstrike, Palestinians and the Israeli military said.

Suddenly this car, still readily identifiable by its five-spoke wheel, deformed hood and dark quarterpanel mark, has burst into flame, after the door pillar extending over the passenger compartment, the battered driver's side door, the roof-supporting column behind the driver's door, and the rear door on the driver's side have all been removed or pulled down.

Perhaps there are other alternative explanations, but it appears to my eye that parts of the vehicle were pulled out of the way and the car reignited between the time the Reuters photographer took the first picture of this vehicle and the unnamed AP photographer took the far more dramatic second photo. Either that, or the order of the photos are reversed, and these fine resident mechanics and body shop fabricators of Gaza were already well on the way towards reconstructing the car before it was even removed from the scene.

I'll let you decide which scenario is more likely.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 12:05 AM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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1 Hooray for Pallywood!!

Posted by: jay at September 06, 2006 03:34 AM (PMugO)

2 Too bad vinyl seats and plastic trim burn but once!

Posted by: Tom TB at September 06, 2006 06:50 AM (vFS/o)

3 Kinda makes the "bombed" ambulances look like they were involved in fender-benders, doesn't it?

Posted by: Robert Crawford at September 06, 2006 06:56 AM (1j9aH)

4 Wrecked car: $0.00 Gallon of gas: $3.00 Bic lighter: $1.00 Propaganda value: priceless

Posted by: Purple Avenger at September 06, 2006 09:17 AM (WxRQS)

5 ANd the wheel keeps on spinning...on and on... You'd thing Reuters and AP would learn by now.....

Posted by: Specter at September 06, 2006 11:00 AM (ybfXM)

6 "My only regret is that I have but one car to give for my terrorist pals!" - Reuters and the AP

Posted by: K T Cat at September 06, 2006 02:23 PM (KDU/K)

7 Time to confiscate the Photoshops!..Heh..great find!...Say cheeeeeeeeeeese Palli's ..youre on "lets rewrite history" camera!

Posted by: Angel at September 06, 2006 04:58 PM (vl6B/)

8 Gotta love those blue camouflage uniforms worn in a DESERT environment.

Posted by: Tim at September 06, 2006 04:59 PM (xqtXG)

9 BTW, doesn't that guy in the first pic look like he's lighting a match - ready to toss onto the charcoals?

Posted by: Tim at September 06, 2006 05:01 PM (xqtXG)

10 Looking at the photos on the wire, it looks almost as if the car re-caught on fire due to a cigarette or some other spark. They certainly seem to be rolling the cars over more than is necessary in any "rescue" operation. Any cultural elites out there know if mourning the automotive dead is common practice on the Gaza Strip?

Posted by: Brian C. Ledbetter at September 06, 2006 06:05 PM (YzVtD)

11 HAHAHAHAHAHAA. Oh how similar to our culture they are. I recall just the other day when our van got hit. Boy, the neighbor kids sure had a blast with their weenie-roast over my van's charcoals. Funny thing though, the fire started after they arrived. But, you know, those nice kids, after discovering the van was on fire actually flipped it over for me. Now wasn't that nice? Then, a few of the more religiously minded kids decided to do one of their "honor the dead" dances on top of the now overturned hulk. It was so sweet a site to behold. That these kids felt so much love for my van that they would go to all this trouble to help ease its passage to the other side. sniffles (SCHAW....the pics are in semi-reverse order. Series goes: Pic 3, then 4, then 2 and 1 and SnappedShot has the final pic of the series on his page. WAIT. WAIT. THIS IS A FRAUD!!!! This is an obvious fraud because this can't be what happens to a vehicle when a missle strikes it. Compare your pic #3 (before the fire) to those of the ambulances and the al-reuters press vehicle. THis car looks nothing like those other vehicles. This car MUST have been taken out by an A-Bomb or something. I mean, look at all the damage, look at all the fire damage, the missing glass, the messed up body pieces. Granted, that could be done by all the people "worshipping" it too.)

Posted by: captainfish at September 06, 2006 08:00 PM (T+LZ0)

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A week ago this morning, I caught "someone" creatively editing a three-year-old editorial written by Greg Mitchell of news industry trade Editor & Publisher. The lede in Mitchell's editorial was rewritten to cast him in a more favorable light in a story in which he already admitted to being guilty of journalistic fraud three years ago.

Greg Mitchell wrote this as the lede to his 2003 editorial:

Since the press seems to be in full-disclosure mode these days, I want to finally come clean. Back when I worked for the Niagara Falls (N.Y.) Gazette (now the Niagara Gazette), our city editor asked me to find out what tourists thought about an amazing local event: Engineers had literally “turned off” the famous cataracts, diverting water so they could shore up the crumbling rock face. Were visitors disappointed to find a trickle rather than a roar? Or thrilled about witnessing this once-in-a-lifetime stunt?

It stayed unchanged for over three years until I criticized him for it, at which point the editorial's lede was changed to this within hours:

Since the press seems to be in full-disclosure mode these days, I want to finally come clean. Back in 1967, when I was 19 and worked for the Niagara Falls (N.Y.) Gazette (now the Niagara Gazette) as a summer intern, our city editor asked me to find out what tourists thought about an amazing local event: Engineers had literally "turned off" the famous cataracts, diverting water so they could shore up the crumbling rock face. Were visitors disappointed to find a trickle rather than a roar? Or thrilled about witnessing this once-in-a-lifetime stunt?

The changes—most likely made by Mitchell himself—are obvious:

Since the press seems to be in full-disclosure mode these days, I want to finally come clean. Back in 1967, when I was 19 and worked for the Niagara Falls (N.Y.) Gazette (now the Niagara Gazette) as a summer intern, our city editor asked me to find out what tourists thought about an amazing local event: Engineers had literally "turned off" the famous cataracts, diverting water so they could shore up the crumbling rock face. Were visitors disappointed to find a trickle rather than a roar? Or thrilled about witnessing this once-in-a-lifetime stunt?

Over the course of the week, various bloggers have attempted to contact Mr. Mitchell and other figures inside both Editor & Publisher and its parent company, VNU Media, about this journalistic fraud, and neither publisher Charles McKeown of Editor & Publisher, nor VNU Media's company spokesman Will Thoretz has had enough courtesy, professionalism, or even concern about the reputation about the craft they are supposed to represent to respond to those asking very serious questions about a very real breach in ethics apparently committed by one of their senior staff members.

Media organizations have essentially two ways with which they can deal with situations of journalistic fraud as noted by Dr. David Perlmutter recently and ironically enough, in this editorial in Editor & Publisher about a similar journalistic scandal:

News picture-making media organizations have two paths of possible response to this unnerving new situation. First, they can stonewall, deny, delete, dismiss, counter-slur, or ignore the problem. To some extent, this is what is happening now and, ethical consideration aside, such a strategy is the practical equivalent of taking extra photos of the deck chairs on the Titanic.

The second, much more painful option, is to implement your ideals, the ones we still teach in journalism school. Admit mistakes right away. Correct them with as much fanfare and surface area as you devoted to the original image. Create task forces and investigating panels. Don't delete archives but publish them along with detailed descriptions of what went wrong. Attend to your critics and diversify the sources of imagery, or better yet be brave enough to refuse to show any images of scenes in which you are being told what to show. I would even love to see special inserts or mini-documentaries on how to spot photo bias or photo fakery—in other words, be as transparent, unarrogant, and responsive as you expect those you cover to be.

In an email earlier this week to E&P Publisher Charles McKeown I said:

The self-serving rewrite of Mr. Mitchell's column has been described as "journalistic malpractice," by one media commentator, and another suggested today that Mitchell has a "truth problem." This is obviously not the kind of public face you would want your publication to have.

Neither Mitchell, nor others that have been contacted about this incident have sought to explain what happened, why it happened, and what can be done to prevent this from happening in the future. Editor & Publisher, or at least Mitchell and those under him, seem to be trying to stonewall this, apparently hoping that if they can delay long enough, that the issue will simply go away. I fear that when the issue does finally pass, it will take its "pound of flesh" in the form of the credibility of this publication with it.

Trust in the media continues to fall and circulation continue to decline, precisely because people such as Mitchell seem to think they are beyond accountability and beyond reproach. I ask you to help save your publication.

All it takes is a simple look to the server logs to conclusively identify who rewrote Mitchell's 2003 column late this past Friday afternoon. An even application of the kind of company policies I expect in any large media organization against this kind of unethical behavior should provide the remedy. Address the problem transparently, and you can gain credibility for Editor & Publisher instead of losing it.

Instead, officers of Editor & Publisher and VNU Media have chosen to stonewall, dismiss, and ignore the breach of journalistic ethics in an editorial by one of their senior editors, and have chosen a failed path. They can publish articles about journalistic ethics, but seem incapable of practicing what they preach.

Sadly, Editorial & Publisher is apparently unable to follow the advice that it provides to the publishing world; allowing journalistic malpractice to reign in its halls unchallenged, unfettered, and unafraid.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 10:05 AM | Comments (14) | Add Comment
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They never seem to learn.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at 07:55 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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An utter shocker, I know:

MIKE MALLOY FIRED BY AIR AMERICA RADIO

There will be no Mike Malloy program on Air America Radio as we have been terminated as of 8/30/06.

We are as shocked as you are, especially since as recently as last Tuesday we were told we had the go-ahead to announce our return to NY airwaves and that our contract was "on the way."

We are told its a financial decision.

Is Air America having financial problems? If so, no Boys & Girls Club in America is safe.

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