Maybe, but judging from this article, it seems Blair was just more of a bloviator than anything else. Notice that he seemed to find a way to "identify" with every writing subject he came in contact with. After Columbia blew up, suddenly his dad worked for NASA, etc. I think that aspect of his personality was just to make himself look good to his colleagues. So I don't think it's any indication he would have intentionally set out to screw up the Malvo prosecution.
Of course, just because there's no such indication in this article, doesn't mean it couldn't have happened.
This much seems sure though: The guy has serious manic depression. It alone would explain everything he's done. It would also explain the booze and coke; when anti-bipolar drugs don't work, manic-depressives (and regular depressives) will self-medicate. Anything to take the edge off. And, IMHO, this puts far more of the blame on Howell Raines and the Times management for this whole mess. Simply put, most acute depressives, unipolar or bipolar (and I hesitate to even mention unipolars and bipolars in the same post, because even though they're both types of depression, they manifest so differently that it's rather unfair to lump one group in with the other), show their symptoms extremely obviously. If Blair was boozing and coking out as well, there is no way in hell his colleagues at work couldn't have noticed that the guy was experiencing severe personal problems. They should have a) suspended him immediately, WITH PAY, and b) gotten him some help. That's always been the official policy at the news organizations I've worked for with regards to employees that develop alcohol and drug abuse problems and/or serious mental illness. Instead, the Raines gang just kept having him pump out more and more crap so they could parade him around like a circus animal at every "diversity" organization meeting that came along.
The Times management is looking more and more crooked in this matter by the day.
How many of those colleagues do you suppose are alcoholics themselves? How many of them might be cocaine snorters? These are liberals we're talking about here. They approve of this sort of thing. How often have you seen the NYT editorialize against street drugs and excessive drinking?