Sad Times at the Times

The Jayson Blair scandal was never the big deal that the mediocracy made it out to be. Young reporter makes some mostly harmless stuff up and does his reporting while watching TV. Compared to the much more serious (and much more interesting) Jack Kelley scandal at USA Today, or the Times' own problems with Jeff Gerth's various misdeeds and Judy's WMD reporting, it really was a minor event which should've amounted to nothing more than an amusing sideshow. But, as David Corn writes, the credibility of the entire organization is on the line:

Reading the Times on this critical story has unfortunately become like reading a state-owned newspaper on the conduct of its government-owner. Why cannot the Times tell us how these "newly discovered" notes were discovered? Or what they say? As HuffPost Head Honcho Arianna Huffington has noted once or twice, Time's Matt Cooper has told much--though not all--about his involvement in the case. Yet the Times comes up with a formulation bordering on magic--"newly discovered"--to describe (without explaining) the appearance of new evidence in this case.

Karl Rove or other top Bush officials may be staring down the barrel of an indictment. This all could become the Big Story of the day. Yet the Times seems to have tied itself up in a straitjacket. Why? To protect Judy Miller? To protect itself from Judy Miller? I don't know. Prior to the Plame/CIA leak scandal (a.k.a. the Rove scandal), Miller had already tainted the paper's reputation in a more significant manner than had Blair with her war-greasing stories on WMDs in Iraq that--whaddayaknow--didn't exist. These days she appears to be causing the Times to screw up its coverage of the most significant scandal yet to strike the Bush administration. Now this, we can say, is a journalist who has an impact.