I fooled 'em all, ex-Times scribe crows

New York Daily News ^ | 5/21/03 | BILL HUTCHINSON

[kattracks]

Scandalous scribe Jayson Blair says he "couldn't stop laughing" at The New York Times' Sunday opus on his wrongdoings at the paper and bragged about fooling "the most brilliant people in journalism."

In an interview to be published today in The New York Observer, the 27-year-old Blair seemed to even get a kick out of The Times' lengthy investigative report into his fraudulent reporting.

Referring to The Times' account of a deceptive story he wrote about rescued POW Pvt. Jessica Lynch, Blair told The Observer, "That's my favorite, just because the description was so far off from the reality."

Blair wrote that the Lynch family home overlooked "tobacco fields and cattle pastures." The porch overlooks no such thing.

"And the way they described it in The Times story - someone read a portion of it to me - I couldn't stop laughing," said Blair, who resigned from The Times in disgrace.

He also boasted to the weekly that he "fooled some of the most brilliant people in journalism" with his faked reports.

Blair, who has signed with a literary agent in hopes of landing a book and movie deal for his story, blamed unspecified personal problems for his in-print deceptions.

"I was either going to kill myself or I was going to kill the journalist persona," he told The Observer. "So Jayson Blair the human being could live, Jayson Blair the journalist had to die."

Originally published on May 21, 2003

[exnavy]

"the most brilliant people in journalism" that's a laugh.

[The Red Zone]

Shameless.

[Beth]

He's despicable.

[Bonaparte]

A full moon and Jayson in coke-blasted manic phase. The Times sures knows how to pick 'em.

[wretchard]

Jayson Blair,  the swindler, is the flip side of Howell Raines, the swindlee. Like most swindlers, he has contempt, not gratitude, for those he took. And there's Howell Raines, wandering around clueless with his beanbag moose clutched to his chest, trying to maintain his dignity as a "white man from Alabama" who meant well. And that whole scurvy crew style themselves as custodians of the Record, arbiters of all the news fit to print.

Those who the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad.

[Rudder]

He's also a bit crazy.

[Experiment 6-2-6]

Why is he dispicable? 'cause he showed how lax and assuming the press is, much less the New York Times?

Or the fact that he is gloating about it?

I, for one, having written editorials for a newspaper, see the irony in this that Journalism HAS NO ETHICS.

Ergo, they gets what they deserve. Shame on anyone who reads the New York Times and thinks it's the truth...

[Experiment 6-2-6]

dispicable is despicable, no matter how ya spells it.

Too much wine tonight..

[SAJ]

He's also a moron. The last 'brilliant' (pardon my barfing, but he was) leftist/statist was Lenin. For this Blair dildo to claim the Slimes' organisation and staff are 'brilliant' is, for my part, outright laughable, and for his part outright psychotic.

[Bonaparte]

Excellent post, smithers!

If they ignore Blair some might see that as retreat into embarassed silence. If they engage him, they just keep looking worse. Their only hope is that he has a psychotic break. If he spins out completely, they're off the hook.

[SAJ]

Presumably the paper for which you wrote editorials was an honest publication -- editorials are not supposed to be news articles, and vice versa.

Then again, there are such newspapers as the Slimes, where Jayson Clinton was employed, and where there is no distinction made between 'news' and 'editorial'.

[lainde]

Honest...You do have to laugh. Soooo ironic...Instead of being properly repentant he LAUGHS at the condescending, smug editorial charlatans who are also trying to pull a fast one: "Vee knew nothink!".

[WaterDragon]

Typica boring ravings of a drug addict.

[jagrmeister]

This guy could be a f@#$@#king genius.

>"I was either going to kill myself or I was going to kill the journalist persona," he told The Observer. "So Jayson Blair the human being could live, Jayson Blair the journalist had to die."

This is quite profound if true. I've always despised the power journalists have as a result of our perception of them as well-intentioned people who serve the ideal of truth. We question everything in society but the ability and willingness for the media to deceive us. Partisans always did, but not mainstream America. Blair did America favor by waking them up to the reality: the Media is not your friend.

[WaterDragon]

Kill the 'journalist' Jayson? There never was one, obviously. He's delusional, talking about killing an illusion.

[tictoc]

If the guy wasn't about to become filthy rich, I might actually feel sorry for him.

Because he is obviously a few cards short of a full deck.

[OXENinFLA]

Shameless.

yeah, and in need of a good a$$ kicking.

I just wonder what slime TV talk show will have him on 1st.

[Timesink]

The New York Observer article in question

[Timesink]

Schadenfreude

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