entombed in the shrine of zeroes and ones

In respose to the latest entry in the Public Editor's Journal:  Correcting any falsehood uttered by any public official is a small justice that must be done by any responsible journalist.  You ask, "How can the Times do this in a way that is objective and fair?"  My answer is: don't sweat it.  Any reasonable person who cares about objectivity and fairness will be in the ballpark.  If you don't get it right, readers will let you know, and you'll work to improve it.  Just start doing it now, because this can't wait any longer.

I am forced to add that i do not care for the phrase "truth vigilante"; it implies that there is an official authority for the truth.  There is none.  We must all be vigilant of the truth, but whenever a newspaper reports a falsehood, it is failing at its job, which is to inform and not to misinform.

Michelle Childerley, who describes herself as an animal communications expert, told CNN that all animals -- as well as humans -- possess a psychic ability, with telepathy the main way of communicating among many species.

CNN: the world leader of gaudy, hollow journalism.

Barack Obama's latest speech is available on MSNBC, sponsored by America's favorite cookie.

Kennedy Will Endorse Obama In Blow to Clinton: i guess it's safe now to use the words 'blow' and 'Clinton' in the same headline.

<ronebofh> god damn it, will someone PLEASE kill larry king.
<lb> maybe we can suffocate him with lou dobbs' balls.

• Warren Ellis brings us a disturbing answer to a troubling question.
• iayork could've been the coolest Dad ever.
• E. Howard Hunt died three months ago, and talked about LBJ's involvement in the assassination of JFK.
• "I have a great idea.  Let's rebuild the Internet from scratch!"
• Baseball might be getting rid of its longest-used performance enhancer, but in the meantime, the one undetectable performance enhancer might not be all that enhancing.
• Fox News never fails to disappoint: "Could [Seung-Hui] Cho have been possessed by the Devil? Could that explain the massacre at Virginia Tech?"
• The US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit has decided that the bit in the Second Amendment about "a well-regulated militia" was just fluff.  This is a complicated one, because i don't disagree with the decision, but i'm not crazy about the way they got there.  I wonder about how laws like Minnesota's Personal Protection Act can help Americans be responsible gun owners, and what the effect of these laws are (and, Seth, if you happen to be reading this, you're still a douche).
• This one's a real corker: Jundallah, a wholly owned subsidiary of Al-Qaeda, has been receiving carefully funnelled financial support from the United States and is fighting the Iranian government.  Follow all the links.  You know what?  Nothing surprises me anymore.  All of my predictions have come true.  At least we have the liberal media hammering the ... oh, wait, a Blue Angel crashed.  Sorry, where were we?

Turns out that one-track-mind Raghubir Goyal has been around at least as far back as the Clinton years, and Clinton's press people leaned on Goyal to bail them out as much as the Bushies.  Has there ever been a White House reporter that so insistently trots out his agenda for so long?  I find it all rather intriguing.

... i must point this out (from cjrcampaigndesk):

Most reporters, particularly on television, are reporting that Newsweek has retracted the allegation that U.S. interrogators desecrated the Koran at Guantanamo Bay. But that's wrong: The magazine has said only that it no longer stands by its claim that allegations of Koran desecration appear in a forthcoming report from U.S. Southern Command. [emphasis theirs]

Here's the secret Downing Street memo that details the intelligence manipulation regarding the Iraq war on the part of the UK and the US.  The link probably won't work tomorrow (it goes into the paid archives section of the Times), in which case you should head to Greg Palast's copy, if you're willing to put up with his somewhat emotional preamble.

Salon has further discussion on the memo, and Power Line has an opposing viewpoint (and is still flogging the cretinous "acting in self-defense" justification).

I need to read this stupid memo a few more times before i come to any conclusions i feel comfortable espousing.  However, the attention this has gotten in the US media has been minimal compared to, say, that stupid bitch that ran away from her wedding.

H. L. Mencken was the original gonzo journalist.