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Thread 6646

Thread ID: 6646 | Posts: 19 | Started: 2003-05-14

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il ragno [OP]

2003-05-14 02:13 | User Profile

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Part 1 of this is from the World Socialist News....a timely little reminder on what constitutes 'deceptve journalism' that tries to absolve Jayson Blair by holding Judith Miller accountable for her lies. All I see are two liars - one expendable, one a Jew. If the World Socialists could work up the onions to phrase it just that way, they might just amount to something more than a political placebo.

Part 2 are a few excerpted posts from an AOL chat-board (the dopey kind that pop up when you first log on & ask you to 'join the chat' on that day's Big Story, a la Yahoo) on the Jayson Blair story....I've selected a nice mix of brazenly babbling blacks and clueless white Toms to underscore why affirmative action doesn't work....instead of know-nothing blacks we now have imperious know-nothing blacks who possess both 'degrees' and an unshakable belief in black space aliens, orbiting Motherships and Big Headed Scientists....but what's even worse are the sort of "white people" we're getting. But what can you expect from kids who've - from birth! - watched every authority figure around them supplicating themselves before the shrine of White Guilt? It's things like AOL Chat that get me reaching for the little brown jug. Look, ye mighty, and despair, at how one purposeless generation can scatter the toil and tears of the ten before it to the four winds forevermore.

**http://wsws.org/articles/2003/may2003/nyt-m13.shtml

Jayson Blair and Judith Miller

Journalistic ethics, hypocrisy and war at the New York Times

By Bill Vann 13 May 2003

Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author

The New York Times Sunday carried out what amounted to the public vilification of a junior reporter, Jayson Blair, for his alleged use of lifted quotes and invented details in a number of stories he wrote for the newspaper. The Times management has engaged in an extraordinary round of breast-beating over the affair, describing it as a “betrayal” of both the paper’s readers and its employees.

Blair is accused of plagiarizing quotes and sentences from other newspapers as well as fabricating details about several stories. He is charged with pretending that he was covering stories in the field, when he actually had written them from New York.

All of these actions would be serious violations of journalistic ethics and, according to the Times report, they proved troubling for some of the subjects of these stories. They also would involve deception of both Blair’s employers and fellow journalists. If true, this conduct would without question be grounds for severe discipline, including dismissal. Such action would appropriately be accompanied by a sober notice to inform readers about the incident, while keeping in mind that the newspaper was dealing with someone that it itself described as “troubled young man.”

The actions of Blair, while grossly inappropriate, are hardly unknown within the media. An unfortunate atmosphere of sensationalism combined with a competitive environment and largely superficial writing create conditions where such conduct can occur. What would seem unusual in Blair’s case, given that the charges made by the Times are true, is the level of recklessness that opened him up to exposure.

One is forced to evaluate this conduct now, however, in the light of the extraordinary response of the Times, which chose to make Blair’s case a world event, dropping the journalistic equivalent of a fuel-air explosive on him. The more than four-page denunciation of him in the Sunday paper went far beyond an objective recounting of his transgression. Rather the paper launched a vitriolic and cruel personal assault on this individual.

Blair’s alleged violations of journalistic ethics must also be viewed in the context of the kind of behavior that the newspaper is prepared to tolerate. The diatribe against the young reporter described his conduct as a “low point” in the paper’s 152-year history. But in reality, his deceptions were of a relatively minor significance from the standpoint of providing an objective account of developments to the newspaper’s readers. Blair did not attempt to deceive the public for the purpose of furthering some hidden agenda.

The same cannot be said, however, for the work of Judith Miller. Assigned to Iraq, Miller has been the source in recent weeks of sensational stories purporting to substantiate US charges concerning the existence of chemical and biological weapons in the conquered Middle Eastern country. Having appeared in the Times, these stories have been picked up by the cable news channels, radio and other mass media and presented virtually as proof in and of themselves.

The biggest of her “scoops” came in an April 21 article titled “Illicit Arms Kept Till Eve of War, An Iraqi Scientist Is Said to Assert.” The story had everything the administration could have wished for in terms of justifying not only the aggression against Iraq, but also a future invasion of Syria, reportedly favored by some of the right-wingers in the leadership of the Pentagon.

It cited an Iraqi scientist as saying that Iraq had destroyed its chemical weapons stocks just days before the US invasion. He supposedly also stated that the Iraqi regime had collaborated with Al-Qaeda and had secretly shared “weapons of mass destruction” with Syria.

Coming at a time of mounting questions about the failure by American occupation forces to find any sign of weapons of mass destruction—whose alleged existence was the fundamental pretext for the US invasion—the story was seemingly a stunning vindication of the Pentagon and the Bush administration. It substantiated the claims made by Secretary of State Powell before the United Nations Security Council—accepted uncritically by the Times—that Iraq had amassed hundreds of tons of biological and chemical agents as well as the missiles to deliver them, while at the same time it offered an explanation as to why not a trace of these weapons could be found.

The only problem was that the only sources for these revelations were Miller and the Pentagon. She included in her story an extraordinary disclaimer that was largely ignored by the broadcast media that hyped her account as proof of the administration’s claims. It read:

“Under the terms of her accreditation to report on the activities of MET Alpha [a military unit assigned to hunt for WMDs], this reporter was not permitted to interview the scientist or visit his home. Nor was she permitted to write about the discovery of the scientist for three days, and the copy was then submitted for a check by military officials.

“Those officials asked that details of what chemicals were uncovered be deleted. They said they feared that such information could jeopardize the scientist’s safety by identifying the part of the weapons program where he worked.”

In other words, the only source that Miller had for what the scientist had to say, indeed for his very existence, was the US military. She did nothing to substantiate the identity of this individual, much less to verify his claims. She moreover agreed to prior military censorship as well as the withholding of information and the delay of the story itself.

In the case of Blair, the Times spoke mournfully of “pain resonating through” its newsroom, whose atmosphere resembled a “protracted wake.” The paper never bothered, however, to describe the uproar in the newsroom over Miller’s piece. Published reports citing Times reporters said that there was shock and dismay over the publication of an article on the newspaper’s front page promoting wildly unsubstantiated claims concerning the most important world development in recent history.

With the Blair case, a sober “editors’ note” was published on page three, detailing the Times’ response to the reporter’s alleged misconduct as well as plans to review newsroom procedures.

No such note was forthcoming with Miller’s piece, though it certainly was far more warranted than in Blair’s case. After all, her story concerned the justification for a war that has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people and launched the US into a openly colonialist venture.

There should have been some explanation to the readers that the newspaper had decided to suspend its normal rule that it publish only those news stories that contain verifiable facts; that general journalistic principles of questioning the motives of the story’s source, the demand for independent confirmation and the requirement that opposing views be sought out were all to be ignored. As for the grounds for such an extraordinary change in policy, the editors would have had to admit the truth: it suited the interests of the US government and the ideological prejudices of the reporter herself.

The Times reporter, meanwhile, has continued these joint efforts with the Pentagon. On the very day that the newspaper filled more than four pages with denunciations of its former junior reporter Jayson Blair, another Miller piece appeared asserting that “experts” searching for WMD evidence had concluded a truck found in northern Iraq was a mobile biological weapons laboratory. Once again, none of Miller’s sources—all of whom belong to the same military team—are named. She did not say whether this article was submitted for prior censorship.

As with the story of the mysterious Iraqi scientist, Miller’s piece was picked up by television and radio news and made the lead item of the day.

Curiously, the very same day, the Washington Post published a story reviewing the work of the very same units that Miller has been following. Unlike her pieces, however, the Post story quotes members of the team by name. Titled “Task force unable to find any weapons,” the story states, “The group directing all known US search efforts for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq is winding down operations without finding proof that President Saddam Hussein kept clandestine stocks of outlawed arms.”

It goes on to affirm that while members of the task force expected to find the hundreds of tons of weapons materials described by Powell at the UN, “scores of fruitless missions broke that confidence, many task force members said.”

The phrase “smoking gun is now a term of dark irony here,” the Post reports, citing Major Kenneth Deal, executive officer of one of the teams, sarcastically yelling out the words after finding a page torn from a history volume at one site.

It also points out that the very unit that Miller cited as her source for the Iraqi scientist’s supposed revelations—MET Alpha—is no longer even looking for WMDs. Instead it has been reassigned to investigate alleged Iraqi covert operations and to search for stolen Jewish antiquities. The name of the unit’s commander, incidentally, is included in the Post story.

One unnamed source, a Defense Intelligence Agency Officer, summed up the WMD hunt: “We came to bear country, we came loaded for bear and we found out the bear wasn’t here.”

The Post article amounts to a devastating exposure of the lies that served as the pretext for Washington’s predatory war against Iraq. It was written based on named military sources who provided credible testimony that completely discredited the pretensions of the Bush administration, the Pentagon and, incidentally, Judith Miller.

How can one account for such a marked contradiction between the story presented by the Post and the version written by Miller? To answer this question, one must delve into the Times reporter’s background.

Miller has been a reporter for some two decades, specializing in the Middle East and “weapons of mass destruction.” Her sources have consisted largely of US and Israeli intelligence agencies with which she has cemented close relations. One indication of this relationship was a 1993 story that was based on her being invited to witness the interrogation of a Palestinian-American who was unlawfully detained for weeks by Israeli security forces on suspicion of links to terrorism.

Publishing a series of books dealing with both Islam and weapons of mass destruction, Miller established her reputation within an interlocking group of right-wing think tanks that have long promoted US war against Iraq and the defense of Israel. The leading figures in these organizations now dominate the civilian leadership of the Pentagon. She co-authored a book on Iraq with Laurie Mylroie, a Middle East expert at the American Enterprise Institute, who is identified with the thoroughly discredited theories that the Saddam Hussein regime was behind not only the September 11, 2001 attacks, but subsequent anthrax attacks on the US Capitol as well as the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center.

Both Mylroie and Miller are connected to the Middle East Forum, a right-wing pro-Israeli lobbying group that describes its mission as “promoting American interests in the Middle East.” The key figure in this organization is Daniel Pipes, who argues in a recent article that the US has no “moral obligation” to provide humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people and that the war in Iraq must be judged less by “the welfare of the defeated than by the gains of the victors.” The organization lists as its key goals “strong ties to Israel” and a “stable supply and cheap price of oil.”

The Middle East Forum not only advocated a war against Iraq, but has promoted the use of US military force to expel Syrian forces from Lebanon as well.

Miller is listed on the organization’s panel of “experts” available for speaking engagements on “militant Islam” and “biological warfare.” Other “experts” include William Kristol, the editor of the right-wing Weekly Standard, and Martin Kramer, the Zionist academic who, together with Pipes, founded Campus Watch, an organization dedicated to creating a blacklist and dossiers on professors deemed hostile to the U.S. and Israel.

According to the Times’ ethics guidelines, its reporters are barred from participation in groups that “seek to shape public policy,” in order to avoid damaging the newspaper’s “reputation for strict neutrality in reporting on politics and government.” By any objective standard, Miller is in violation of this rule. Politically aligned with the very forces that promoted a war against Iraq on the false pretext of eliminating a threat of weapons of mass destruction, she has been assigned by the Times to the beat of digging up evidence to substantiate that pretext.

Those in charge at the Times are indifferent to this gross conflict of interest and are perfectly content to publish what amounts to politically motivated stories based on unsubstantiated and in all likelihood false allegations.

This form of lying, which has immense consequences in term of promoting government disinformation to justify an illegal war, is routine at the Times. Alongside it, the alleged sins of Jayson Blair are small potatoes indeed.

The paper’s publisher Arthur Sulzberger and its executive editor Howell Raines, however, have no fear that they will suffer any serious consequences for fabricating news, so long as it is in the service of the Bush administration’s policies. They can be confident that their stories will be picked up and praised by the right wing as evidence that even the “liberals” at the Times accept the administration’s lies as good coin.

In the Blair case, however, they had no reason to expect such immunity. They knew that a young black reporter, accused of misrepresenting his connection to stories touching on sensitive topics such as the Washington, DC sniper and the wounded and missing US troops of the Iraq war, would become the focus of a campaign of denunciations by the ultra-right. Fearing the consequences in the present environment of political intimidation and threats to democratic rights, the Times management sought to preempt any attack by carrying out the public humiliation of Jayson Blair.**

[color=purple]Date:5/13/03 3:01 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: Maximuss735 Message-id: 20030513025625.27083.00002342@mbs-m09.aol.com[/color]

Although Jayson Blair is guilty of filing fraudulent reports this has little to do with Affirmative Action. Jayson apparently was well liked and really its who you know in any business. Personalitly can work wonders and I believe this kid was bright and ambituous. However, the black race need not be put on trial because of his individual choices. He is an individual who made bad choices (like many of his white counterparts). I've been in a position where I've seen white people cheating on exams while I had to struggle. I watched as they passed answers around and got high scores they did not earn. These practices went with them into Corporate America and Jayson thought he could be like his white counterparts. You see he actually bought the lie, "Its a color blind America." Wrong Jayson........they get a slap on the wrist but you Jayson.....will get the Death Penalty. White privilege has shown its ugly face once again and this time in the administration of blame for what everyone knows is a broad practice. Many are angry about the progress of African Americans because the unwritten rule is that blacks are inferior therefore they can't out achieve whites. We have seen this type of attitude again and again. "Rosewood" is a good example. When blacks living in a segregated society amassed wealth and experienced lives of luxury they were bombed and everything they had was destroyed! This is evidence again that white people in this country are murderers, kidnappers, and theives. The number of lives that have been taken by murderous whites in america far exceeds the 6,000,000 jews wiped out by Hitler. And white people are still at it. God will Judge you for the blood that has been spilled while you hypocritally proclaim to be leaders of humanitarian efforts!........Surely you must know that white people have been syphoning black talent for a hundred years. This includes music, sports, comedy, ect. You couldn't have been thinking when you made that comment. The theft of black talent by white america is in the trillions of dollars. It is true that black america which was separated from family members and its culture during slavery was terroized by white in this country. Many who were conditioned and traumatized passed this on to future generations and the rich perpetuate this to keep the masses under control. But we still survived one of the most brutal explotations of any race on the planet and still we rise. We give ourselves credit because the entire system is designed to rob us of especially our young boys. 12 % of the black population is in jail. God will judge you if you don't correct your behavior. God will not saction lies and it is hypocritical to suggest that this is a color blind america with a level playing field.

[color=purple]Date: 5/13/03 3:05 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: Spaceflower2001 Message-id:20030513030508.02229.00002201@mbs-m01.aol.com[/color]

i dont blame you for feeling that way. If you have read all of these horriblre racist posts. I am white and I know most white people would be ashamed and horrified by these sickening posts. I am sorry if it hurt your feelings or offended you.These stupid people have no dignity remember that and dont let them take yours. be beautiful.

[color=purple]Date:5/13/03 3:08 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: Creonola Message-id: 20030513030812.06850.00002166@mbs-r03.aol.com[/color]

Keep your anger. That is good because that is all you have. Anger, affirmative action and basketball. Every American city has an across the tracks part of town. With Martin Luther King Boulevard running right down the middle of it. That scary part of town will never change. The people who run it and live there are incapable.

[color=purple] Date: 5/13/03 4:04 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: M2mld Message-id: 20030513040401.05486.00002552@mbs-r02.aol.com[/color]

You are a jack ass. Diversity is the key to intellectual growth. In the post Enron/World Com era, nobody has claimed that hiring "white" executives is the first sign in ultimate doom. Change your prospective or become irrelevant.

[color=purple]Date: 5/13/03 3:13 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: SiahFallah Message-id:20030513031359.19698.00001953@mbs-m05.aol.com[/color]

Every news media in this country are lyers, they have been reporting false info since the beginning. The assholes are directly connected to the political pool who spin false info to benifit their evil goals. And i find that educated white people are the most hungry for this kind of info, for instance, if they(news media) report that some other country is evil because it's done this or that ,they (whites) believe it right away because it suits them to do so. They (news media) have been telling us for years that Iraq has this or that, and now that the U.S. has been there all this time nothing has been found, but just give them enough time to plant false evidence and there you will have your justified war, and give it a little more time and you will have your occupation of that country, and a little more time and, you guessed it the oil takeover. All of this is an example of false reporting controlled by the political process.

[color=purple]Date: 5/13/03 3:17 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: Alienated80 Message-id:20030513031709.06814.00002166@mbs-r03.aol.com[/color] I certainly believe Jayson Blair was probably setup by some jealous employee at the NY Times. Maybe someone had his password to his computer, and modified a few paragraphs on various high profile stories he was assigned.

I don't trust the white establishment. With all of the recent corporate scandals involving high profile white executives, they have to create another scandal involving a person of color (Black) in order to refocus media attention elsewhere. White people are doing the same thing at other newspapers across this country, it just do not get investigated to the extent of the Jayson Blair case.

[color=purple]Date: 5/12/2003 10:29 PM Central Daylight Time From: VVmyers17 Message-id: 20030512232939.05520.00001755@mbs-r02.aol.com [/color]

I certainly wish that you would stop calling black folk ignorant and read your history. If true American History were taught black folk would certainly appreciate it. Tell the truth Sometime!

A very humorous and revealing story is told about a group of white people who were fed up with African Americans, so they join together and wished themselves away.They passed through a deep dark tunnel and emerged in sort of a twilight zone where there is an America without black people.

At first these white people breathed a sigh of relief. At last, they say, no more crime, drugs, violence and welfare. All of the blacks have gone!! Then suddenly, reality sets in. The NEW AMERICA is not America at all only a barren land.

[font=Arial]1. There are very few crops that have flourished because the nation was built on a slave-supported system.

1. There are nocities with tall skyscrapers because Alexander Mils, a black man, invented the elevator, and without it one finds great difficulty in reaching high floors.

2. There are few if any cars because Richard Spikes, a black man, invented the automatic gear shift, Joseph Gammell, also black, invented the Super Charge System for Internal Combustion engines, and Garrett A. Morgan invented the trafficsignals and the gas mask.

3. Furthermore, one could not use the rapid transit system because its precursor was the electric trolley, which was invented by another black man, Elbert R. Robinson.

4. Even if therewere streets on which cars and a rapid transit system could operate, they were cluttered with paper because an African American, Charles Brooks, invented the street sweeper.

5. There were fewif any newspapers, magazines and books because John Love invented the pencil sharpener, William Purvis invented the fountain pen, Lee Burridge invented the TypeWriting Machine and W.A. Lovette invented the Advanced Printing Press. They were all black.

6. Even if Americans could write their letters, articles and books, they would not have been transported by mail because William Barry invented the Postmarking and the Canceling Machine, William Purvis invented the Hand Stamp and Phillip Downing invented the Letter Drop.

7. The lawns werebrown and wilted because Joseph Smith invented the Lawn Sprinkler and John Burr the Lawn Mower.

8. When they entered their homes, they found them to be poorly ventilated and poorly heated.You see, Frederick Jones invented the Air Conditioner and Alice Parker the Heating Furnace. Their homes were also dim. But of course, Lewis Latimer invented the Electric Lamp, Michael Harvey invented the Lantern and Granville T. Woods invented the Automatic Cut off Switch. Their homes were also filthy because Thomas W. Steward invented the Mop and Lloyd P. Ray, the Dust Pan.

9. Their children met them at the door -- bare footed, shabby, motley and unkempt. But what could one expect. Jan E. Matzelinger invented the Shoe Lasting Machine, Walter Sammons invented the Comb, Sarah Boone invented the Ironing Board and George T. Samon invented the Clothes Dryer.

10. Finally, they were resigned to at least have dinner amidst all of this turmoil. But here again, the food had spoiled because another black man, John Standard invented the refrigerator.[/font]

What would this world be like without the contributions of Black people? If you value your students I challenge you to teach them the entire truth. Martin Luther King, Jr., said that by the time we leave for work we have been dependent on half the world -- modern America is created by dependencies on the inventions from the minds of Black folk. Teach all students that Black history includes more than just slavery, Frederick Douglas, Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and Jesse Jackson. Teach all students that Black history is American History and the History of America would not be so, without Black people.

And here is the one-two punch that sums up what the white man's inevitable future will be if we don't reverse course immediately. These two posts are so beautifully linked together they form a natural [color=blue]call-and-response[/color]:

**[color=purple]Date: 5/13/03 3:35 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: Rymnd979 Message-id:20030513033657.09505.00002306@mbs-r08.aol.com[/color]

Being White means I don't get stopped in my car cause the police think I must have broken some law, or been on my way to.

Being White means I'm a part of a culture that is soaking up most of the worlds resources at an alarming rate.

Being White means I'm part of a society that has learned how to end the world by pushing a button and end all life on this planet.

Being a white male, with a conscience, I resent any implication of guilt on my part for any of those above statements.

I resent the implication of guilt because I sometimes feel shame for what white people do. Things that I would have no part in.

I like what you wrote. I just wish it weren't true Rymnd979

[color=purple]Date: 5/13/03 3:37 AM Eastern Daylight Time From: Alienated80 Message-id: 20030513033730.06814.00002184@mbs-r03.aol.com[/color]

I'D LOVE TO BE LOCKED UP IN A CAGE WITH YOU...I'D HAVE A FIELD DAY ON YOUR ASS.**

PaleoconAvatar

2003-05-14 02:29 | User Profile

Aw, man, il ragno. That list of Black inventions is one of the stupidest things I've ever encountered. People who buy into that list obviously make the mistake of believing that because one was the first to invent something, that only that person could ever have invented it. Not to mention that many of those objects are minor and often have alternatives...if I have no mop or dust pan, then how about if I use a vacuum or a broom? Besides, when have I seen Blacks use dust pans? Didn't they just sweep it out the door back in those days around those parts?

2600

2003-05-14 02:42 | User Profile

Wow...that's just...disturbing, il ragno.

What would this world be like without the contributions of Black people? If you value your students I challenge you to teach them the entire truth.

If any teacher wanted to teach their students about the contributions of black people and show them the unvarnished 'truf', they can just load up their little charges on the bus and deposit them in inner-city Detroit, Philly, Los Angeles (where they can also see the wonderful contributions of our Mexican friends) etc.

Roy Batty

2003-05-14 02:54 | User Profile

That list of black inventors keeps flowing hither and yon through the internet - and our country's classrooms - like a malignant chain letter. Thanks Il Ragno. That was good for making the veins on my forehead stand out. If they ever decide to do a remake of "Scanners", I'll read this and then walk into the production offices. Who needs CGI?

Another example of the utter incapability of these people to accept responsibility for anything wrong - although they're quick to take credit where credit isn't due. Like I said in the other thread, we'll see this sad story played out on TV, with Blair made to look the victim of an uncaring white society that sips mint juleps while using an unlimited supply of talented blacks as cannon fodder. Before it's over, we'll all be asked to REPENT, and then to pony up, again, to the donation basket. Then we can all sit through an episode of "Blair on the Air", the new show that Jayson will host on CNN or ABC or some other worthy network.

il ragno

2003-05-14 04:07 | User Profile

**That list of black inventors keeps flowing hither and yon through the internet - and our country's classrooms - like a malignant chain letter. **

Sadly, this is true. Now think of how completely immersed in ghetto-delusionary reality the average black is these days; how often you overhear them referring to 'history'. By history they mean black history; and by "black history" they mean this sort of cloudcuckooland nonsense. The idea that no one thought to fashion a comb until a stablehand (who could not himself hope to ever use one) did in the 1800s is a 'fact' out of the PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE shooting script.

I guess we can close all the libraries now and just refer to the first 4800 years of human history as the Bad Hair Era.

Walter Yannis

2003-05-14 09:17 | User Profile

**What would this world be like without the contributions of Black people? If you value your students I challenge you to teach them the entire truth. Martin Luther King, Jr., said that by the time we leave for work we have been dependent on half the world -- modern America is created by dependencies on the inventions from the minds of Black folk. **

They could start by teaching the truth about MLK himself.

That would include his extremely close ties to the CPUSA and by extension Soviet intelligence at a time when his country was facing the nuclear arsenal of the USSR - perhaps the most bloodthirsty regime in history. It would also include his proven plagiarism, his womanizing (with white women, no less), and his heterodox Christian beliefs (denied the divinity of Christ privately, or so I'm told, while claiming membership in the Baptist convention).

While MLK was a truly great rhetorician and organizer who was in his own way loyal to his people, he just plain lied about himself, his academic accomplishments, his marriage vows, his status as an orthodox Christian minister, and his treasonous political connections far too often and far too fundamentally to ever be considered a model for young people to emulate. These egregious personal failings certainly disqualify him for the secular canonization his memory has enjoyed.

And MLK's central BIG LIE is that he considered anybody white "his people". His dream was for African Americans to take from whites and to rule over whites - his talk of "brotherhood" was just propaganda. Soviet propaganda, in point of fact.

Walter

TexasAnarch

2003-05-14 13:12 | User Profile

Il ragno,
This is so important I had to erase any hint of glibness, even in sincere appreciation for the information you have supplied here. Bill Vann has exposed the root connection -- between Blair & Miller -- walla, via the ancillary connection of the content each "covered" -- between: the sniper case, the anthrax poisoning, source of the lying claim of WMD to justify war, the lying attempt to link Iraq to Al Quada and anthrax, the 1993 bombing of the World Trade center (and Oklahoma City -- same fingerprints). Now the Big One hits again in Saudi Arabia.

 Who would have figured it would lead through the New York Times?  (paleos, and crazy Gugenheims like me, that's who.)

il ragno

2003-05-14 19:32 | User Profile

**Before it's over, we'll all be asked to REPENT, and then to pony up, again, to the donation basket. Then we can all sit through an episode of "Blair on the Air", the new show that Jayson will host on CNN or ABC or some other worthy network. **

Well, shet mah mouf and call me a joinaliss!

[url=http://nypost.com/business/75672.htm]http://nypost.com/business/75672.htm[/url]

[SIZE=3][font=Times]A BLAIR TELL-ALL COULD NET $1M [/font][/SIZE] By KEITH J. KELLY

May 14, 2003 -- Disgraced former New York Times reporter Jayson Blair may be out of work and out of friends - but he could be looking at up to a $1 million payday if he wants to come clean in a tell-all book. "I think the book would be worth around seven figures," said Robert Gottlieb, a literary agent at Trident Media. "A story like that goes right to the core of the Times editorial management."

Lucianne Goldberg - the literary agent who played a prominent role in bringing to light Monica Lewinsky's affair with Bill Clinton - said Blair would probably have to do more than tell the inside story of how he duped and betrayed New York Times executive editor Howell Raines and managing editor Gerald Boyd, who had mentored and championed the 27-year-old reporter.

"There are a lot of unanswered questions" about sex, possible substance abuse and the inner workings of a black journalist at the Times, said Goldberg. "It seems Blair didn't think he was good enough and they picked him up and carried him."

Blair resigned from the Times on May 1. The paper ran a two-plus-page article this past weekend detailing the inaccuracies, as well as an extensive accounting of the extensive fraud and plagiarism Blair apparently committed over his past four years at the Old Gray Lady.

One insider at Random House Inc. said it is doubtful the book would generate much interest inside the nation's biggest publishing house - which includes the Random House, Doubleday, Knopf and Dell imprints - but said, "maybe [Simon & Schuster publisher] David Rosenthal would buy it."

But of course, publishers frequently say that when a potentially controversial author surfaces.

Another disgraced reporter, Stephen Glass, received a six-figure advance for a novel based on his own behavior as a fabricator of stories at The New Republic more than five years ago.

But the newly released book, "The Fabulist," has been panned, and has created little buzz or excitement in media circles - despite Glass's appearance this past weekend on "60 Minutes."

One publisher said that a big problem with a nonfiction book by Blair: "who would pay for the fact-checking?"

"I think publishers are interested in publishing unpopular voices," said Todd Shuster, an agent at the Zachary Shuster Harmsworth agency; "but I think they'd be conservative about publishing someone who basically turned out to be a liar."

Hugh Lincoln

2003-05-14 20:33 | User Profile

Awesome. Gottlieb and Goldberg salivate over the prospect of cash from Jay-Tay's downfall, whilst Jews at the Times suffer nary a scratch. Is that what's meant by, "Jew sets up, Jew knocks down"?

Well, shet mah mouf and call me a joinaliss!

Hilarious, as usual.

Roy Batty

2003-05-14 21:24 | User Profile

Well Il Ragno, it isn't quite the TV show I predicted, but it's not surprising, is it? I'm waiting for Blair to start appearing as a guest on the various talk shows - once the whirlwind of "negative publicity" dies down. He'll get his 6 figure advance, if for nothing else than a payoff from ZOG for having to fall on ... one of their swords.

Meanwhile, the NYT can pretend to be making a sincere effort toward maintaining journalistic integrity.

N.B. Forrest

2003-05-15 08:21 | User Profile

Lemme see heah: lyin' geechie barfly goes too far even for the nigra-promoting Jew Yawk Times zhids, finally getting himself sh-tcanned - and as "punishment", he'll end up with a sebum figguh wad o' Simoleons.

Brutha gittin' paid, dawg! Hell yeah! Gawd Bless Amerikwa, know whum sayin?

Gottlieb. Goldberg. Rosenthal. Shuster. All hebes, every jewjack of 'em, and no doubt an accurate racial picture of today's publishing racket.

:gun: :hit: :gun:

eric von zipper

2003-05-15 13:18 | User Profile

Howell Raines referring to himself as a "white man from Alabama" is a riot. See, according to Howell, after you cut through the BS, he erred by loving blacks too well. That was his greatest sin. It was all because of that racist baggage he has spent a lifetime trying to overcome. He and that only other pure southern heart, Moe Dees.

I'm gonna predict something way outside the box on this one and say that Blair was the oh so willing bottom to some influential tops at the Times and that homosexuality, not race, is why his F**k Ups were tolerated.

All that stuff about Blair (there aren't 10 blacks in America with that classy WASP surname so I suspect a nom de plume) dating Raine's Polish wife's girlfriend is just a beard. I don't believe the Polock connection. It is a red herring, a false hare, just plain BS.

The irresponsible behavior, the booze abuse, the chain smoking, the cheese doodles (forget the Atkins diet - this is the Montgomery Cliff diet), the disappearing for long periods, the hospitalizations for "personal" problems, the freakin lying and stealing are all markers of the kept boy syndrome that pervades homo culture. That street kid who blew away the Italian designer Versace was typical of the type. These creeps steal their dying boyfriends stereo equipment while he's in the AIDS hospice.

Now Blair is rumored to be hospitalized. For what, I ask. These freakin refugees from a Tenessee Williams story all think they're Blanche Dubois.

There is sex involved in this scandal. And it ain't hetero sex.

xmetalhead

2003-05-15 18:50 | User Profile

[img]http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/art2/jaysonblair.jpg[/img]

EVZ, your theory definitely holds some weight, I think. You know, what was Blair doing with the Times National Editor's credit card?? What "favors" did Blair owe him?

MAY 15--Sometimes, when a guy's swamped at work--you know, busy piping quotes, inventing sources, falsifying expense reports--he can forget to pay his bills. That's what happened last year to poor Jayson Blair, the former New York Times novelist. Seems that Blair, 27, was so busy traveling (from one corner of his Brooklyn apartment to the other), that a pesky $3683.12 American Express bill went unpaid for many months. In fact, the credit card giant last year sued Blair in Brooklyn's Civil Court and obtained a judgment against him for the overdue balance and additional fees (for a grand total of $3853.36). And here's the really strange part: On May 6, days after Blair resigned in disgrace from the Times, he finally paid his Amex debt in full, according to a source familiar with the August 2002 legal judgment. What a stand-up guy! In the recent Times takeout on Blair, it was reported that he did not have a company credit card--the reasons for which were "unclear"--and had to pay work expenses with the credit card of Jim Roberts, the Times national editor. The paper's report noted that Blair had told a Times administrator his own credits cards were maxed out. Which was, of course, partially true. [url=http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/blairamex1.html]http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/blairamex1.html[/url]

Roger Bannister

2003-05-15 19:23 | User Profile

Is it just me, or does the picture posted by xmetalhead look like Tracy Morgan from SNL done up as a character? Maybe Blair is really Tracy Morgan. Or the other way around.

Think of the possibilities.

Hugh Lincoln

2003-05-15 19:24 | User Profile

In another life, I encountered the shegro version of Jayson Blair. A black female "reporter" was hired on by the paper I worked for, after a black editor spent the weekend at the National Association of Black Journalists' bongo party (and completely outside the usual hiring channels). Black female reporter had not yet arrived, and up on the bulletin board goes a cry for help, penned by another fellow black joinaliss: "(Black Female Reporter) has experienced a terrible tragedy. While riding the train up from (Previous Location), $10,000 in cash she had on her person was stolen. (Black Female Reporter) needed that money badly, and I am taking up a collection." Eyebrows go up, and precious few fall for it. Who carries 10 grand in cash on them? And how convenient is it that untraceable, unaccounted-for cash was "stolen," thus requiring "replacement"? Anyway. BFM arrives, and eyebrows arch higher. She proceeds to entangle various newsroom staffers in busted rent deals, bad car deals and other Blair-style financial chicanery. She falls asleep at work. She barely writes any stories, and the few that appear are near-total crap, and most likely gingered along by editors. Her whereabouts are seldom known. Within less than three or four months, she's gone. Explanation for her leave, the circumstances of which were never made clear: personal problems.

Meanwhile, a perfectly competent White could have filled the job, but no.

Avalanche

2003-05-16 04:34 | User Profile

A reminder to always use a WHITE doctor! (Or you can take a chance on a Hindu doctor, right rban?! :lol: :D )

Unfit to print Thomas Sowell May 15, 2003

The New York Times' famous motto -- "All the News That's Fit to Print" -- has been dishonored by the revelation that one of its own reporters has been printing stuff that he made up or stole from other publications.

Isolated scandals can strike anywhere. But this was no isolated scandal. Those who run the New York Times were warned again and again over the years by their own people that reporter Jayson Blair was doing things that crossed the line.

According to the Times' own account: "He concocted scenes. He lifted material from other newspapers and wire services. He selected details from photographs to create the impression he had been somewhere or seen someone, when he had not." During Jayson Blair's nearly four years as a reporter with the New York Times, his actions included writing "falsely about emotionally charged moments in recent history," including the sniper attacks in the Washington area and the families of soldiers killed in Iraq.

But none of this is a problem that has just recently come to light. That is why this was not just an isolated scandal but a sign of moral dry rot in the leadership of the New York Times.

Again, the paper's own account is the most damning. Far from not knowing what was going on, the Times acknowledges that "various editors and reporters expressed misgivings about Mr. Blair's reporting skills, maturity and behavior during his five-year journey from raw intern to reporter on national news events. Their warnings centered mostly on errors in his articles."

More than a year ago, one of the Times's own editors wrote a memo that said plainly: "We have got to stop Jayson from writing for the Times. Right Now." Instead, Blair was promoted to national news coverage.

New York Times managing editor Howell Raines has been quoted as having boasted in 2001 about Jayson Blair as an example of the Times' commitment to "diversity" -- because Jayson Blair is black. White reporters do not get promoted for doing what Blair did.

This is such an old story of the fundamental fraudulence of affirmative action, whether in the media, academia, or elsewhere. These stories are full of ignored warnings, arrogant self-righteousness by those who brush aside the warnings, and often the demonizing of anyone who dares to criticize either the policy or the incompetent individuals who got where they are because of the policy.

Jayson Blair is by no means the worst example. Just as Times editor Howell Raines boasted of Blair as a symbol of the paper's commitment to "diversity," so did many liberals (including Senator Ted Kennedy) boast of Dr. Patrick Chavis, who got into a University of California medical school because of affirmative action.

Years later, medical authorities suspended Patrick Chavis' license -- and then revoked it -- after discovering his incompetence and gross negligence when they investigated the suspicious death of one of his patients.

Back in the 1970s, Professor Bernard Davis of the Harvard Medical School warned about lower standards being used there to allow black students to become doctors, saying that it was cruel to abandon standards "and allow the trusting patients to pay for our irresponsibility." Not only were his warnings ignored, he was denounced as a racist.

Mistakes will be made in any institution. Real disasters usually require more than that. A key ingredient in many disasters is utterly blind arrogance in disregarding all warnings and all evidence, in order to persist in some headstrong course of action.

That is what the New York Times leadership has shown before, during, and even after the Jayson Blair fiasco.

The newspaper's publisher now says that there will be no search for "scapegoats" in the Jayson Blair scandal. In other words, holding the responsible officials accountable for what they do or don't do is called scapegoating. Even Blair himself is referred to as a "troubled" young man, rather than as someone who caused huge trouble to others because he knew how to hustle.

Having gotten away with so much, Blair knew that the rules and standards that applied to others would not be applied to him because he represented "diversity." He just pushed it a little farther than it would go.

Walter Yannis

2003-05-16 09:28 | User Profile

Originally posted by Avalanche@May 16 2003, 04:34 ** Just as Times editor Howell Raines boasted of Blair as a symbol of the paper's commitment to "diversity," so did many liberals (including Senator Ted Kennedy) boast of Dr. Patrick Chavis, who got into a University of California medical school because of affirmative action.

Years later, medical authorities suspended Patrick Chavis' license -- and then revoked it -- after discovering his incompetence and gross negligence when they investigated the suspicious death of one of his patients.

**

That was the guy who knocked Bakke out of his slot at the UC medical school, right?

That's really an enormous slam-dunk 'gotcha' against the Bakke decision - the very case that began the whole PeeCee sh#tstorm about "Diversity" that we've endured the past 25 years.

Walter

Hugh Lincoln

2003-05-16 17:34 | User Profile

That was the guy who knocked Bakke out of his slot at the UC medical school, right?

Yes. There is a detailed account of Chavis' implosion in William McGowan's Coloring the News. This guy was un-freakin' believable. He once apparently took a badly bleeding surgery patient TO HIS HOUSE and stashed her for a while. An utter disaster. That these affirmative action "heroes" fail so regularly, and SO SIMILARLY, it what OUGHT to be striking to the racially unconscious. I mean, these stories unfold practically identically, right down to the Cheet-ohs consumed by the negro in question. AR readers might recall Richard Lynn's piece on black personality pathologies... and how the behavior patterns there repeated themselves so predictably.

jeffersonian

2003-05-16 23:34 | User Profile

** Diversity is the key to intellectual growth. **

** Every news media in this country are lyers,... **

One need only examine the above thread with the least bit of objectivity to discern the "intellectual growth" the defenders of Jayson and the NY Times have achieved.

Idiots. So steeped in the political correct dogma that any suggestion that PC was put ahead of common sense, quality, and journalistic objectivity, at the expense of the Grey Lady's standing, is met with incredulity. Sad.

Must be the latter day products of public education.