Posted on 09/25/2005 10:42:45 AM PDT by wagglebee
The mainstream media's newspaper of record admitted late Saturday that one of its reporters fabricated part of a news story on Hurricane Katrina relief.
Saying his paper "flunked" the test of basic journalistic fairness, New York Times public editor Byron Calame said Alessandra Stanley's Sept. 5 report claiming that the Fox News Channel's Geraldo Rivera "nudged" an Air Force relief worker out of the way so he could film himself rescuing a Katrina victim had been made up out of whole cloth.
"Since Ms. Stanley based her comments on what she saw on the screen Sept. 4, the videotape of that segment means everyone involved is looking at exactly the same evidence," Calame noted.
"My viewings of the videotape - at least a dozen times, including one time frame by frame - simply doesn't show me any 'nudge' of any Air Force rescuer by Mr. Rivera," the Times internal watchdog said, adding, "Ms. Stanley declined my invitation to watch the tape with me."
Times editor Bill Keller, however, is still standing by Ms. Stanley's bogus report. He told Calame that she was "writing as a critic, with the license that title brings - [and] was within bounds in her judgment."
"Ms. Stanley's point was that Mr. Rivera was show-boating - that he was being pushy, if not literally pushing - and I think an impartial viewer of the footage will see it that way," Keller insisted.
But Calame countered: "Ms. Stanley certainly would have been entitled to opine that Mr. Rivera's actions were showboating or pushy. But a 'nudge' is a fact, not an opinion. And even critics need to keep facts distinct from opinions."
Stanley's bogus report continues a pattern at the Old Gray Lady of making up the news.
Two weeks ago, columnist Paul Krugman was forced to admit that he falsely claimed media recounts in Florida showed Al Gore winning the 2000 presidential election. In August, a Times profile of Hillary Clinton changed a quote first reported by NewsMax where Clinton said she was "adamantly opposed to illegal immigrants."
In the toned down Times version, Clinton's opposition was to "illegal immigration" rather than the immigrants themselves.
Neither will a socialist, communist, terrorist, rapist, child molester, murderer, junkie, or arsonist.... They are sick bastards.
Yes that's what they want you to believe...I don't buy it..
The NYSlimes is entitled to its opinion, but not its own 'facts'!!!
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