I am going to try to say something here and it may not come off right, so I apologize if I offend people. Two things. The first one, the first four words of the above paragraph. I realize this is a British paper but my question is what is it – is it black or African-American? Myself, I refuse to use the AA term when I am talking about an American who is black. Just as I am not Irish-American, or Scottish-American, or English-American, I know I will not be addressed as such and I refuse to address myself as a hyphenated American. But the larger question, is this part of the problem. When we attach a importance to an American with a hyphen, are we not making a false importance to that group of people. And then, if this group feels important, does it go as far as feeling that they should be treated special, treated different, given more breaks, etc. Does this go into Balkanizing America, bringing all of us to view others with resentment and envy?
Second thing. If I apply for a job with a small business, let’s say an auto mechanic shop, I could possibly get by with false references and past jobs. They may or may not call to check on me. But how difficult is it for an organization as large as NYT to check out whether someone graduated from a college? This is just mind-numbing. I can understand hiring for diversity. I can understand if you want to hire a black reporter. But is the NYT saying that five years ago when they hired this clown that not another black, graduating from a journalism school, applied to work at the Times? If you want to hire a black reporter, why not get a bunch of applications from black graduates, and then hire the best one?
A deft bit of database searching by the Weekly Standard magazine showed that Blair's 50 corrections worked out at 6.9% of his stories - a rather better rate than the paper's veteran commentator RW Apple (14.1%) or Washington bureau reporter Adam Clymer (9%). Among his Times colleagues, Blair had a reputation as a friendly face who would compliment people regularly on their articles, and often claimed access to important gossip or documents involving senior executives.
I like this paragraph. So Apple and Clymer have higher correction rates. Well, maybe they are making stuff up also. Why not check these guys out and see if they are where they say they are. The last bit – reading between the lines, this guy Blair was a suck up who kissed arse to get where he got. I also consider it just irony that the part that did him in was ripping off a reporter he worked with as an intern. Not very bright!