Ethical Standards Made Of Lycra?
The NYT's ombud, Clark Hoyt, posted today about a number of issues. On the issue of the econ reporter with the house in foreclosure, not surprisingly, Dean Baquet, formerly of the LAT, sees no problem with having a reporter covering economics who shows little personal understanding of the topic:
Baquet said he saw no conflict in Andrews's personal situation and his beat, but he knew that some people would perceive one, so he tried to minimize the reporter's involvement in "covering things directly related to the housing collapse." Andrews told me: "I shy away from articles about the pros and cons of this approach or that approach in aiding homeowners. I would have too much at stake."
I'm with this guy:
After an article adapted from "Busted" was published in last week's Sunday magazine, Bradley Laue, a lawyer in Greeley, Colo., asked how Andrews could continue covering economics. Laue said it would be "like me being disbarred and then reporting on the ethics of lawyers."
Here's Hoyt's entirely unsatisfactory passage about Maureen Dowd (and her stolen, not borrowed, words. Unless...is there some chance she's going to give them back?):
Borrowed wordsLast Sunday, Dowd's column on Dick Cheney and torture picked up a paragraph, with one minor word change, from Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo, without identifying the source. Another blogger noticed, and the Internet was soon aflame with charges of plagiarism.
Dowd said she had not read Marshall's Web post, but was talking with a friend who suggested the wording without telling her where it came from. An attribution was added to the column online, and The Times ran a correction the next day.
Her explanation was unconvincing to some. How could a friend -- whom Dowd has not identified -- repeat verbatim a 42-word paragraph? I heard from readers demanding that Dowd be fired.
Dowd told me the passage in question was part of an e-mail conversation with her friend. She noted that she had credited two other bloggers for other information in the column, so there was no reason to intentionally slight Marshall.
Marshall posted his view: "We're too quick to pull the trigger with charges of plagiarism." He said he didn't think Dowd acted intentionally, and the correction was "pretty much the end of it."
I do not think Dowd plagiarized, but I also do not think what she did was right.
Andrew Rosenthal, the editorial page editor, said journalists collaborate and take feeds from each other all the time. That is true with news articles, but readers have a right to expect that even if an opinion columnist like Dowd tosses around ideas with a friend, her column will be her own words. If the words are not hers, she must give credit.
Well, okay then! (That was effective.)
The comment I left under Hoyt's piece:
Maureen Dowd's refusal to come clean on this suggests revealing the truth about what she did (have somebody else writing her column?) is more costly for her than sticking with the lame obfuscation.Ethical standards should not be made of Lycra. If the NYT fires people for plagiarism, Dowd should be fired, despite her draw for readers. Regardless, readers deserve to know what really went down here, and we have yet to be apprised.
Oh, and I'm with the reader above who noted the petty way of referring to The Atlantic's Megan McArdle as "a blogger for The Atlantic." The WSJ did this to me in the past in a similar case, when I was pretty much the raison d'etre for the story, and what I did was described within. It was just too painful for them to actually credit me, so the writer simply ignored the "Who" part of the "5 Ws" of journalism. If a blogger does the work, the blogger should get the credit -- by name. -Amy Alkon, syndicated columnist and blogger, advicegoddess.com
-- Amy Alkon, Santa Monica, CA
Re: McArdle and the NYT, Didja notice how when Andrews made his comment, he made it to NPR? Lefties can close ranks faster than anyone but Scientology.
Layne's selective ire cheapens the excellence of his famous admonition. He can fact check your ass, but he may not bother, if he thinks your heart's in the right place.
Apparently the investigative powers of the internet are given to us only to investigate Republicans.
Crid [CommentCrid@gmail.com]
at May 24, 2009 12:52 PM
I think there are huge differences between an econ reporter being foreclosed on and a practicing lawyer being disbarred.
First, econ reporter is not an economist, a lawyer IS the lawyer.
Second, how does Bradley Laue feel about economists wrong on say, Keynesian economics, OR supply side economics (I'll let Laue pick) practicing economics?
Economists and economic reporters can be wrong without being declared unethical.
Practicing Lawyers on the other hand, are schooled on the ethics, are given privilege in society based on their adherence to those ethics, and most likely are given required continuing education credits to learn more about those ethical practices.
And just what are we to do for Andrews and journalists anyway? Should we force all journalists to
A) Own property
B) Only rent property
C) Only participate in not-very-good-to-the-consumer loans
D) Be homeless
E) Move in to Laue's place?
F) Only participate in really-good-to-the-reporter deals?
There's a difference between acting unethically and being disbarred and being foreclosed on.
Lefties can close ranks faster than anyone but Scientology.
This is a property of GROUPS crid, not a property of leftists. And seemingly intelligent people such as yourself pushing such a dumb meme is pretty much why we can't have nice things.
jerry at May 24, 2009 1:47 PM
If you want to get on NPR's case, this week they allowed Barbara Bradley Hagerty to air 5 pieces on religion basically taken from her book, coming out now, on religion. And in each piece they made sure to make sure we all knew that Hagerty had a book coming out.
Someone should talk to NPR about allowing their newsprograms to become infomercials....
jerry at May 24, 2009 1:50 PM
> This is a property of GROUPS
Right. I'm saying lefties are faster and surer at it than other kinds of people.
> Someone should talk to NPR about
> allowing their newsprograms to
> become infomercials.
No, the entire enterprise should simply be excised from government budgets in all respects. If listeners want to pay for that dreck, let them.
Crid [CommentCrid@gmail.com] at May 24, 2009 2:25 PM
No, the entire enterprise should simply be excised from government budgets in all respects. If listeners want to pay for that dreck, let them.
More and more, I'm okay with that too. Not because I am against public radio per se, but because more and more, NPR IS becoming dreck, and the salaries are just one indication.
Regarding those salaries, I can't figure out why the anchors and top management need those salaries or in any sense why NPR needs to be competitive, salary wise, with TV. I think NPR would be much less dreadful if it were to regularly purge itself of anyone who has worked their more than ten years while earning more than $150K.
Seriously, why does a radio anchor justify a $350K salary? What value are they adding that can't be acquired for much much less?
If they had more reasonable salaries, they would probably be more interested in what their job is supposed to be, comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comforted. As it is, those kinds of salaries for jobs as an anchor help explain to me just how we got into the financial mess we did and just how we got the crappy financial reporting they gave us.
jerry at May 24, 2009 2:57 PM
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