Looks like Jason Leopold was out to lunch on the Rove indictment after all. And I took the bait, breathlessly spreading the news both here and on my blog.
While I don’t doubt that Jason Leopold believed the story in good faith based on multiple sources, it looks like he would have done well to vet those sources.
And it looks like I would do well to vet mine in the future: and I’m fairly certain that Mr. Leopold won’t be among them–at least until and unless he can tell us WHO he talked to, and WHY things didn’t pan out as he reported…
Nevertheless, I still do believe that Rove will be indicted. It’s just a matter of time.
In any case, mea culpa.
Spoon (or none) means never having to say you’re sorry.
The sad part is that Truthout still has the story on its front page, and Marc Ash has not reputiated the story.
I e-mailed Ash early this week practically begging him not to make the same mistake that some mainstream editors do: standing behind a story instead of being a true journalist. You see journalism, despite what some may think, is not about being right or wrong, it is about reporting the facts as you know them at that moment.
In other words, Ash should have said as early as Wednesday that it “appears that some things written in the story may be incorrect, though, by and large, we stand by our story.” Then today he should have simply given up the ghost and said the story didn’t pan out.
Instead, Truthout ruined what little reputation it had and made itself a laughing stock. It was amateur hour from Monday on.
As for Leopold, well, his work speaks for itself, as they say.
From the Truthout blog: “The time has now come, however, to issue a partial apology to our readership for this story. While we paid very careful attention to the sourcing on this story, we erred in getting too far out in front of the news-cycle. In moving as quickly as we did, we caused more confusion than clarity. And that was a disservice to our readership and we regret it.”
Running this on the blog, while at the same time keeping Leopold’s story on their front page is incredible. Clearly Ash is hoping, beyond hope, that an indictment will materialize out of clear air.
This is not how news outlets should act. I suppose it’s good he issued some sort of apology — but why keep the story on the front page while repudiating it on the blog?
I think it is trust in their sources.
Roll w/ it spoon, there’s only two people who should be posting mea culpa’s…JL and Marc Ash, and this ain’t gonna cut it.
Who was/were the un-empeachable sources is the only question I want answered.
Peace
thx. I’m just sorry for any embarrassment I caused the community–not to mention myself.
optimism. Optimism is in such short supply around here I can’t afford to be embarassed by my little bit of it.
…that KR could have been indicted without there being any public announcement?
:o)
I like you Mythmother
Ditto, supersoling! (How’s tricks?)
Of course it’s possible. Sealed indictments are handed down all the time, whenever the prosecutor deems it necessary to avoid endangering an ongoing investigation or investigator, or when the accused has enough clout or good enough lawyers to keep things quiet…
Thanks, stormkite. This would cover the facts, wouldn’t it?
internet news sources, and more specifically left wing blogs, will be seriously underway.
Whether this particular Rove-Indictment scoop has indeed been the first major example remains to be determined. Either way, we should expect attacks of this nature. Until the internet is totally under gov-corp control the ratherization process may prove to be an effective tool to discount the validity of blog reporting.
I’d say we need to tighten the protection mechanisms, ie. back to basic journalism… ( I don’t recall Jack Anderson having these sort of problems.)
to something that no longer exists. The consolidation of the media in the hands of the corporate masters is a fait accompli, hence the assault on the internet and the transparent actions, to anyone paying attention, to bring it into the fold.
Right, wrong, indifferent, polemical or biased in whatever fashion; blogs, especially left/progressive blogs are a threat to the status quo. The potential for them to influence the nature of political and news discourse is growing daily and has not gone unrecognized by the hierarchies of both parties. Every effort will be made to marginalize and discredit those who publish and support them.
Buckle up, it’s going to be a very unpleasant ride.
As I remember it, the Rove indictment story was getting everyone’s attention at just about the same time as the story about the phone companies turning over all our phone records and the story of the massive database of “every phone call you’ve ever made”. My first thought was that the Rove story might have been leaked to distract us from the phone record story.
Then I had a somewhat more chilling thought. Put the two stories together. What if the apparently false story of Rove’s imminent indictment was leaked to smoke out Leopold’s sources? Given the existence of the phone call databank, how hard would it be to find out every call to or from Leopold’s known numbers within some time frame immediately before he broke the story?
Over the weekend there were two or three similar but conflicting versions of the story. A fifteen minute courtesy visit. They met for fifteen hours. Rove was given 24 hours. No, that was 24 business hours. The clock started Monday, not Friday. And so on. What if they leaked different versions of the story to different people and correlated story versions with call times? It wouldn’t be too hard to connect the dots.
Yeah, I know. This is crazy, paranoid fantasy stuff. My tinfoil is slipping. I admit it. But if you’re not paranoid, I can only assume you haven’t been paying attention.
Truthout No Longer Listed w/ Google News
I have been trying to follow this story, and every link leads back to truthout.org
So I was surprised when I ran a search to find that truthout.org is no longer listed on Google News.
This has nothing to do with alogarithms…. this was a management decision at Google. I was not able to use the search function to find out when the de-listing happened.
I also did as much looking around today as time allowed to try to find out: did anyone else notice it and write about it, what possible reasons could Google have to de-list truthout.org?
Still looking for answers.
————————————————————
[new] Incorrect Statement on Google Delisting TO
Your statement about a “management decision at Google” is incorrect. Google News and the search engine are two distinct services. If you run a google search on truthout, the site does come up.
As for Google’s management making an executive decision to delist TruthOut, I invite you to provide relevant information before you make these allegations.
Pascale
system administrator
by TruthOut (fyi@truthout.org) on Fri May 19th, 2006 at 11:00:51 AM EDT http://truthout.org
[ Parent ]
I just read Truthout’s statement to the readership and they are still confident about their sources but apologized for putting the news out there in such as fashion that caused more confusion than clarity. I believe that there were 9 days from the time that Libby received his indictment and Fitzgerald held the public news conference. We have no idea why Fitzgerald may choose to not go public with this for some time. Why would Google make a move like that until it was known without doubt that the Rove story wasn’t accurate?
.
National Review Ed: ‘Rove has been indicted’
(TPM Café) — The NR editor says, ” It happened last Friday at his lawyer’s office in Washington. Patrick Fitzgerald was there, and so was Rove. They tried to make a deal, but in the end Fitz handed Rove the indictment and gave him 24 hours to get his affairs in order. It’s a huge story. Huge. But the right-wing MSM–you know, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the networks–are so in the tank for Bush that they’re covering it up.
(Capitol Hill Blue) — Any way you slice it, today is “drop dead day” for Karl Rove or some web sites and blogs that have staked their reputations on an indictment story that may be fact, fiction or just wishful thinking.
Writes Tim Grieve Thursday in Salon’s War Room: If reporters in Washington are working hard on the Karl Rove indictment watch, they’ve sure got a funny way of showing it.
(TalkLeft) — We are all, Karl Rove included, waiting on pins and needles. What do you think? Today, will an Indictment be announced or will nothing happen?
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
What’s the rush? The longer the wait, the more Rove is bankrupted by Luskin’s bills, the bigger the hole in his stomach, the more Bush is discombobulated.