Yeah, that’s the NYT in a nutshell: Abramson > Baquet > Keller. Sigh.
Abramson’s errors/copying/misattributing isn’t all that bad. What I’ve seen was fixable given a competent editorial process by the publisher. There’s some interesting content and (sadly) she’s not the world’s worst journalist but, whew, the judgement call (or maybe they really just don’t know better, it’s sadly hard to say) to not properly fact check and edit her book was breathtakingly dumb. Being defensive instead of immediately admitting there are problems is maybe dumber.
I have little sympathy for Abramson and/or the NYT. They had their chances to make things right, to do solid journalism, to think clearly about their (and our) futures, and to insist on the truth instead of investing in corrupt politics and journalism and . . . every fucking time, the NYT and Abramson (and Banquet and Keller) have chosen the wrong path, cut the wrong corner, gotten into bed with power, and looked the other way when the obvious was right in front of them.
Charles Pierce, one of our better journalists, has a kind of slogan that works for me: “If this blog sees a man walking down the street with a duck on his head, it will report that it saw a man walking down the street with a duck on his head.” There are still many fine reporters at the NYT but I can’t think of one recent senior editor capable of accurately reporting on “a man walking down the street with a duck on his head.”
