Multiple choice on evolution

When it comes to evolution, Republican presidential candidate Sam Brownback's not going to say one thing to one audience and a different thing to another audience. No, sir. He's going to say many different things to the same audience, as he does today in his New York Times op-ed. Brownback doesn't believe in evolution. Except that he does. Sort of. I guess.

Hot air over a Cape Wind book

Has WGBH's Cape Cod radio station, WCAI, been suppressing news about a new book that takes a favorable view of Cape Wind, the controversial proposed wind farm? It's a claim that's been rattling around for the past few weeks. Now the Phoenix's Adam Reilly takes a look. And though he finds no definitive proof, he does dig up some interesting tidbits about power, money and potential conflicts of interest.

You want conflicts of interest? Well, you've come to the right place. I'm a paid contributor to another outpost of WGBH, "Greater Boston with Emily Rooney." The editor of Cape Cod Today, Walter Brooks, who's pro-wind farm and who first alerted me to this story earlier in the month, is a friend of Media Nation. Walter and I have appeared together on WCAI to talk about online journalism.

So it's just as well I'm taking a pass on this. Read Adam's story and decide for yourself.

A libel case is dropped

If you're trying to make sense of the news that the Islamic Society of Boston has dropped its libel suit against the Herald, WFXT-TV (Channel 25) and several other defendants (Globe story here; Herald story here), I suggest you read this backgrounder from November 2005, written by Mark Jurkowitz when he was with the Phoenix.

The shorthand version: The Herald and Channel 25 reported that the Islamic Society, which is trying to build a mosque and cultural center in Roxbury with an assist from city officials, has had some uncomfortably close connections with certain Islamist radicals who are, at the very least, soft on terrorism. The Islamic Society denied the allegations.

The Globe was not named as a defendant even though columnist Jeff Jacoby has written several columns on the subject, the latest of which appeared on April 25. It's a must-read.

This is a pretty convoluted saga, involving not just a suit but also a countersuit, which was also dropped this week. The case also encompassed some angry rhetoric between members of the Islamic and Jewish communities. Even though the libel case has been dropped, we almost certainly haven't heard the last of this matter.

The winner here is the First Amendment. Libel suits should not be used to squash discussion of important public issues. Perhaps the reporting on this matter fell short of perfection, but, as my man Louis Brandeis liked to say, the solution to alleged bad speech is "more speech, not enforced silence."

Correction of the day

From the New York Times:

An article last Wednesday about a decision by the Brooklyn borough president, Marty Markowitz, to remove at least five members of Community Board 6 who oppose the Atlantic Yards development project — which Mr. Markowitz supports — misstated the reason for the absence of a response by Mr. Markowitz. At the time the article was being reported, Mr. Markowitz could not be reached by his aides because he was on a ship at sea, had no telephone access and was not regularly checking his e-mail messages. He did not "refuse" to comment.

Dr. Shaughnessy is in

Why does he do this? In his Globe column today, Dan Shaughnessy insinuates that the Red Sox were lying — or at least blowing smoke — about what was really wrong with Josh Beckett between May 13, when he hurt his finger, and last night, when he made a successful return. Writes Shank:

He appeared to be bound for a start in the All-Star Game in San Francisco before suffering an "avulsion" on his right middle finger while throwing a pitch against the Orioles in what turned out to be the most memorable game of this young season (a.k.a. the "Mother's Day Miracle"). Remember, boys and girls, this was not a blister — it was an avulsion.

Shaughnessy, of course, presents no evidence. But reports have been pretty consistent that Beckett did not get a blister, a problem that plagued him pretty consistently when he was younger. For instance, here is what the Globe's Amalie Benjamin reported on May 17:

Beckett suffered an avulsion — a torn piece of skin below the pad on his right middle finger — in the fourth inning Sunday against the Orioles. He has experienced similar skin problems in the past, though the Sox are careful not to characterize the injury as akin to the blisters he developed with the Marlins.

Medline Plus defines "avulsion" as "a tearing away of a body part accidentally or surgically." That doesn't sound like a blister, either.

A small matter, obviously. You just wonder what's rattling around Shaughnessy's brain when he types this stuff.

Will Kerry save Edwards?

Only John Kerry can save John Edwards now. Will he? It depends on who is telling the truth.

I am not an Edwards fan. However, I admire the way he has resolutely refused to exploit the death of his son Wade. Now a new book by Democratic political operative Bob Shrum tells an ugly, ugly tale. My former Phoenix colleague Michael Crowley of The New Republic finds (sub. req.) the relevant excerpt, involving the period when Kerry was considering Edwards as his running mate:

Edwards had told Kerry he was going to share a story with him that he'd never told anyone else — that after his son Wade had been killed, he climbed onto the slab at the funeral home, laid there and hugged his body, and promised that he'd do all he could to make life better for people, to live up to Wade's ideals of service. Kerry was stunned, not moved, because, as he told me later, Edwards had recounted the exact story to him, almost in the exact same words, a year or two before — and with the same preface, that he'd never shared the memory with anyone else. Kerry said he found it chilling, and he decided he couldn't pick Edwards unless he met with him again.

Crowley does point out that there is some circumstantial evidence to suggest Shrum's devastating tale may not be true, writing, "When I asked one person close to Edwards about it, he argued that Shrum's account makes no sense because Edwards had publicly recounted similar versions of the funeral home story before — and thus wouldn't possibly have claimed on either occasion that he was telling it for the first time."

Fair enough. But what gives this legs is that Kerry — who, after all, isn't running for anything — now has the power to make or break Edwards. If Kerry denies it in firm, straightforward language, then the Edwards campaign survives, and Shrum will henceforth be known not just as a loser, but as a liar as well. But if Kerry confirms it, or refuses to discuss it, then Edwards might as well pull out.

By the way, if Kerry does confirm it, why on earth did he go ahead and put Edwards on the ticket?

Oh, and another thing — Edwards may not be all that big on gays and lesbians, either.

Web pioneer Holovaty goes solo

This is big news. Adrian Holovaty, one of the most important journalists you've never heard of (or maybe you have), has quit washingtonpost.com to strike out on his own after winning a Knight grant to experiment with hyperlocal journalism. His project will be called EveryBlock.

Holovaty, who's in his mid-20s, is the master of the mashup, in which datastreams are merged to create something new and useful. Using publicly available data from the Chicago Police Department, he created ChicagoCrime.org, which automatically sorts crime information and plots it on Google Maps. (If you'd like to see such a feature in Boston, forget it — although the Boston Police deserve credit for their innovative blog, they do not make crime data available in a form that would allow an outside programmer like Holovaty to make sense of it.)

Another Holovaty special: The Congressional Votes Database at washingtonpost.com.

I saw Holovaty speak last summer at the Media Giraffe conference at UMass Amherst. I thought his most interesting comments were in response to a question as to whether he considers himself a journalist. His answer: absolutely. He laid out the differences between an electronic journalist and a traditional journalist like this:

• Gathering news: A traditional journalist calls sources and conducts research. An electronic journalist writes programs to fetch data.
• Distilling the news: A traditional journalist decides what's worth including in her report for print, online or broadcast. An electronic journalist decides which data queries are worth showing to readers.
• Reporting the news: A traditional journalist writes or broadcasts news stories. An electronic journalist puts together Web presentations.

Do young people who want to pursue careers in journalism need to become programmers? Well, it's certainly a promising field for those with the inclination and talent — but it's not absolutely necessary. In fact, the Congressional Votes Database depends on contributions from traditional journalists, who do old-fashioned tasks such as deciding which are the key votes and describing them. At best, such journalism is a skillful amalgamation of old and new.

You can watch a video of Holovaty demonstrating ChicagoCrime.org here. And here is an excellent Q&A with Holovaty posted in the Online Journalism Review.

Photo of Holovaty (cc) by JD Lasica. Some rights reserved.

Ketter on the Herald libel case

William Ketter, a Pulitzer Prize-winning editor, former Pulitzer board member and past president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors, has written a fine op-ed piece on the Herald libel case.

Ketter goes right after the dubious notion — recently endorsed by the state's Supreme Judicial Court — that Herald reporter Dave Wedge knew his characterization of Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy as having demeaned a teenage rape victim was false, or that Wedge harbored serious doubts. Ketter writes:

It is reasonable to assume that reporter Wedge and the Boston Herald believed the information they were fed by the district attorney's office was truthful. The news media frequently turn to prosecutors for details of cases they are involved in. A trust builds up. They are an official source of critical information.

But the SJC would have you believe the Herald had reason to seriously doubt the accuracy of the story after it was published because a lawyer for the judge said he didn't say what the paper had published, and the Boston Globe carried a story with Murphy's direct denial.

Ketter's essential point — that Wedge reported what his sources in the Bristol County district attorney's office told him (more or less), and that he had no reason to believe they weren't telling him the truth — is right on target. I hope Herald publisher Pat Purcell keeps fighting this.

Doing our homework

Normally I don't get all that excited about protests against the awarding of honorary degrees to those thought by some to be unworthy. Nor does it matter to me much one way or the other whether UMass Amherst goes ahead and hands such a degree to former White House chief of staff Andrew Card this Friday.

But I was struck by an op-ed piece in today's Globe by Vijay Prashad, director of the International Studies Program at Trinity College. What caught my eye was that, according to Prashad, Card has actually been lobbying for the degree, initiating an hour-long conversation with at least one UMass trustee and defending himself in an interview with the Daily Hampshire Gazette.

Card's message to his critics: I'm not the guy you think I am. Media Nation diverted $1.99 from its capital-projects budget in order to buy the Gazette article, which is hidden behind a pay wall. Some highlights:

"I am greatly flattered and grateful to UMass for this degree," Card said in a telephone interview. "I defend that right to speak out, but they [the protesters] might want to do some homework."...

Protesters are critical of what they see as Card's role in orchestrating the lead-up to America's invasion of Iraq and the ongoing war. Some have accused him of lying.

Card, who served as President Bush's chief of staff from 2001 to 2006, said he has done no such thing.

"I don't know what lie they say I have perpetrated," Card said. "I have not lied and the people who know me know that I would not do that."...

"In my experience, protesters have taken quotes in newspapers out of context and the things they say don't always reflect the reality of the burden of the decisions we have to make," Card said.

I'll stop there. I'm up against the limits of fair use here, but I do want to get my two bucks' worth.

Now, I'm not sure whether Card has ever actually lied about anything important, but he did amass quite a record in serving George W. Bush. (He was a top aide to Bush's father, too.) The most notorious example — which Prashad mentions in his op-ed — was Card's statement about the build-up to the Iraq war in 2002, when he said that "from a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August."

Were Card's words "taken out of context," as he suggests in his interview with the Gazette? Without a transcript, we can't know for sure. But we can at least look at the context in which that particular quote was used — in a Sept. 7, 2002, page-one New York Times story by Elisabeth Bumiller headlined "Bush Aides Set Strategy to Sell Policy on Iraq." Her 1,000-word story describes a coordinated effort by the White House. Here's how it begins:

White House officials said today that the administration was following a meticulously planned strategy to persuade the public, the Congress and the allies of the need to confront the threat from Saddam Hussein.

The rollout of the strategy this week, they said, was planned long before President Bush's vacation in Texas last month. It was not hastily concocted, they insisted, after some prominent Republicans began to raise doubts about moving against Mr. Hussein and administration officials made contradictory statements about the need for weapons inspectors in Iraq.

The White House decided, they said, that even with the appearance of disarray it was still more advantageous to wait until after Labor Day to kick off their plan.

"From a marketing point of view," said Andrew H. Card Jr., the White House chief of staff who is coordinating the effort, "you don't introduce new products in August."

Toward the end of Bumiller's story, Karl Rove says pretty much the same thing:

White House officials said they began planning more intensively for the Iraq rollout in July. Advisers consulted the Congressional calendar to figure out the best time for Iraq hearings while Ms. [Karen] Hughes [a former top Bush aide], even as she was driving back to Texas, discussed with Mr. Bush the outlines of his Sept. 11 speech.

By August, with Congress out of town and the United Nations not convening until September, White House officials decided to wait out the month, even as final planning continued by phone between advisers in Washington and at Mr. Bush's ranch in Texas.

"There was a deliberate sense that this was not the time to engage in his [sic?] process," Mr. Rove said. "The thought was in August the president is sort of on vacation.

Based on the context in which Bumiller quotes Card, and on Rove's similar remarks, I'd say Card's infamous "new products" remark is every bit as cynical as his critics charge. I hope Card reflects every day on the consequences of that sales job.

Also, though Prashad doesn't mention it, just last week we learned something new, important and disturbing about Card's conduct in the White House. Former deputy attorney general James Comey testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee that, in 2004, he had to rush to the hospital in order to intercept Card and then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, who were trying to pressure the gravely ill attorney general, John Ashcroft, to reauthorize a no-warrant spying program that Ashcroft had already ruled was illegal.

The Globe's Charlie Savage reports that Ashcroft refused, and that Card was furious with Comey for attempting to intervene on behalf of the ailing A.G.

Time was when Andy Card's reputation was that of a moderate Republican state legislator from the South Shore, a good guy who probably would have made a pretty good governor. But it was his choice to cast his lot with George W. Bush.

You almost wonder whether the old man asked Card to keep an eye on his impetuous son. If that was the case, it didn't work out.

Into the fast(er) lane

Media Nation is in the midst of upgrading from EarthLink DSL to Comcast cable. I haven't grasped how to configure our Airport base station yet (or whether we need to upgrade to Airport Extreme), so I'm posting this from the Peabody Institute Library in Danvers, one of Media Nation's numerous satellite bureaus. But the iMac is working just fine.

The natural truth about Michael Graham

It was a few minutes before noon today, as I was driving in to Boston, when I heard Michael Graham briefly make fun of me on his talk show on WTKK Radio (96.9 FM). The subject: my alleged support of a bill filed by state Rep. Byron Rushing that would outlaw discrimination against obese and unusually short people. (For a PDF of the bill, click here and enter "1844" next to "House, No.")

To say the least, I was surprised. You see, Graham had invited me to appear with him this morning, then rescinded his invitation when I told him I didn't consider myself a strong proponent of the legislation. I wish I had recorded precisely what Graham said about me on the air, and what he might have said earlier in the broadcast when I wasn't listening. But there was no doubt that he was characterizing me as a bleeding-heart liberal supporter of the measure, even though I had clearly told him that was not the case.

In fact, here are the exact words I e-mailed to him after receiving his invitation:

Michael —

My home phone's xxx-xxx-xxxx, and I'm around. I might step out for a few minutes -- my cell is xxx-xxx-xxxx.

Just in case you're laboring under any misconceptions, I think it's an intriguing idea, but I don't consider myself a strong proponent. But you probably got that from reading the MetroWest article.

DK

The article I'm referring to was published in the MetroWest Daily News yesterday. It was written by Dan Loeterman, who quoted me on the subject as follows:

"We might as well add colorblind, left-handed, allergic-to-cashews and get it over with," Todd Domke, a Republican analyst, told the Associated Press....

But Dan Kennedy, a visiting assistant journalism professor at Northeastern University, rejects Domke's suggestions. Kennedy, whose daughter is a dwarf, is the author of "Little People: Learning to See the World Through My Daughter's Eyes."

"By God, if we pass this, we're going to have to be nice to everybody. It seems that the slippery slope is treating everyone with the dignity and respect they deserve, and I'm not particularly troubled by that," said Kennedy.

What Kennedy is troubled by, however, is how the bill might play out in the real world.

"Is Fenway Park going to be sued because the seats aren't wide enough? In some ways, this doesn't bother me, but in other ways, I'm asking myself, is this mainly going to be about lawsuits?"

Now, does that sound like I'm a full-throated supporter of the Rushing bill? Obviously not, and I made sure Graham knew it. But that didn't stop him from painting me exactly as he pleased. (For good measure, he also called Rushing "limp-wristed.")

By the way, after I sent my response to Graham, he e-mailed me again and wrote:

Thanks for getting back to me, Dan. If you're not a strong proponent, then let's wait for another issue where you're more enthusiastic in your support.

Thanks again.

Michael Graham

I'm sorry to be so self-referential here. So Michael Graham made fun of me — who cares? But I think it says something pretty revealing about the way he operates. And as Lily Tomlin once said, "No matter how cynical you get, it is impossible to keep up."

Media Nation on CNN

CNN is scheduled to interview me at 1 p.m. about the Bernard McGuirk/WRKO matter.

Update: I'm told that my interview will be used today at 8 p.m. on "Paula Zahn Now."

Class warfare

Carpundit has taken me to task for telling the Globe that Tom Finneran is someone with "some class and some dignity." Carpundit instructs: "He is a convicted felon." The Scoop offers a similar observation.

I'm not going to reargue the case against Finneran, except to say, again, that I think it was largely bogus, not to mention politically motivated. Essentially, Finneran was given a choice: Plead guilty to trumped-up charges or go to prison. If you haven't done so before, I do urge you to read Harvey Silverglate's take, published in 2005.

Am I a Finneran lackey? In 2004, when he was still speaker, I profiled him for the Phoenix. You be the judge.

McGuirk gets shirked

WRKO Radio (AM 680) has canceled plans to let fired Imus producer Bernard McGuirk co-host its morning show with Tom Finneran for a few days this week. The Globe's got the story here (again, with a quote from the proprietor of this blog); the Herald here.

Herald appeals libel ruling

The Herald has asked the state's Supreme Judicial Court to reconsider its decision to uphold a $2.1 million libel verdict against the paper. The Herald lost a 2005 trial in a suit brought by Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy, who charged that Herald falsely and recklessly reported that he had demeaned a teenage rape victim.

You wouldn't think there would be much chance that the SJC would reverse its own unanimous ruling. But I've read the brief filed on behalf of the Herald, and it makes a strong argument that the SJC completely mischaracterized the testimony of the Herald's only eyewitness source, former Bristol County prosecutor David Crowley.

I was in the courtroom, and I'd say the brief is right on the mark. So stay tuned.

Give Richardson a hand

Bill Richardson announced today that he's running for president. He may or may not have what it takes, but give him credit for having made his peace with bacteria.

My former Phoenix colleague Mark Leibovich explained how in a New York Times story on hand sanitizer last fall. It turned out that Richardson refuses to use the stuff. Why? Leibovich wrote:

"It's condescending to the voters," said Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, a Democrat.

A fervent nonuser of hand sanitizer, Richardson holds the Guinness Book of World Records mark for shaking the most hands over an eight-hour period (13,392, at the New Mexico State Fair in 2002).

Indeed, what message does it send when politicians, the putative leaders in a government by the people, for the people, feel compelled to wipe the residues of said people immediately after meeting them?

"The great part about politics is that you're touching humanity," Richardson said. "You're going to collect bacteria just by existing."

I'm sorry, but that's just strange. I hope Richardson has a strong immune system.

Not such a linchpin

New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen is ambivalent about doing interviews, and Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post asks him why. Kurtz, though, seems to think that the institution of the journalistic interview is more firmly established than it is. He begins:

The humble interview, the linchpin of journalism for centuries, is under assault.

In fact, what is widely regarded as the first newspaper interview was conducted not centuries ago, but in 1836, by New York Herald publisher James Gordon Bennett, who talked with the proprietor of a brothel in the hopes of shedding light on the notorious murder of a prostitute.

It seems strange to realize that great American journalists from Benjamin Franklin to Isaiah Thomas never interviewed people, but such were the customs of the day.

Ron Borges' departure

As you probably already know, Globe sportswriter Ron Borges has quietly left the paper. That means his two-month suspension for lifting chunks of a column from the Tacoma News Tribune will stand as the last word on his long career at 135 Morrissey Boulevard.

David Scott, who's been blogging prodigiously on this (see this and this), invites me "to comment on the significance of the botched Borges bye-bye." Well, I don't know. At the time of Borges' suspension, I wondered if he'd ever come back. I guessed he would, since the Globe has been his platform for various broadcasting and outside writing assignments. I guessed wrong — hardly the first time.

Readers of Media Nation know that I'm an exceedingly narrow sports fan. Since Borges didn't cover the Red Sox, I've read very little of his stuff over the years. I do recommend this John Gonzalez profile of Borges in Boston Magazine, which includes the following hilarious passage:

Boston sports junkies might be surprised to hear this. Dan Shaughnessy has always been the guy they'd most like to dump into the harbor. But over the past few years, Borges seems to have supplanted his fellow Globe scribe as the most vilified writer in town. "We should have one of those Globe polls — 'Who do you hate more?'" Shaughnessy says. "I've challenged Borges to see who could get out the vote. It would be close. And it would be a lot more interesting than who's going to win the MVP."

Actually, it would be a lot less interesting than to see who's going to win the MVP, but that's Shaughnessy: a sportswriter who doesn't seem to like sports all that much.

One aspect of Borges' meltdown continues to trouble me. You cannot judge whether or not he committed plagiarism without taking a close look at the disclosure that ran with his football notes column, as well as with the notes columns of several other Globe sportswriters: "[M]aterial from personal interviews, wire services, other beat writers, and league and team sources was used in this report."

How do you hang someone out to dry for lifting material when there was a huge, blinking sign telling readers that the material they were about to read was at least partially — yes, lifted from other sources? Of course Borges should have rewritten the stuff he was taking, but it's not as though he'd claimed that it was the fruit of his own labors. To this day, I doubt that he thinks he did anything wrong. (Just to be clear: He did.)

The most fully reported piece on Borges' departure is by Jessica Heslam, in the Herald's Messenger Blog. Reading between the lines, it sounds like Borges — who actually returned to the Globe two weeks ago — realized that his outside work was not going to disappear if he left, and that he'd rather pursue that than stay with an employer who had publicly accused him of being a plagiarist.

Update: Cold, Hard Football Facts, the Web site that first reported on Borges' light fingers, weighs in on his departure — right down to some Snoop Dogg-style boasting about the size of its virtual testicles. Really.

Say what, George?

Al Sharpton, debating former Imus producer Bernard McGuirk on Fox News' "Hannity & Colmes" on May 11:

Forgiveness has nothing to do with penalty. If you abuse a job, you can forgive somebody and say you lose the job. Moses was forgiven. He didn't get to the Promised Land. There is penalty.... I think that there must not be amnesty. There must be — people pay for their deeds. And I think it was appropriate that y'all paid.

Boston-based PR magnate George Regan, in the Boston Herald today, talking about WRKO Radio's decision to audition McGuirk for a possible stint as Tom Finneran's sidekick:

If Al Sharpton has no problems with this man, neither do we.

Well, George, Sharpton does have a problem with McGuirk. Does that change your thinking?

Curious George: The deceptive headline of the day appears in today's Globe. "WRKO clarifies McGuirk bid" may be the head, but the story consists of a Regan obfuscation job worthy of Scott McClellan. To wit: "Regan said yesterday that the three-day spot was not an audition, but said he could not rule out the possibility that McGuirk would be offered a job."

So it's not an audition, but if McGuirk does well, he might be offered a job. Right.

Even curiouser: Brian Maloney on Regan's triple play.

Jeff Greenfield on the "liberal" media

Jeff Greenfield on liberal media bias:

[I]n my view the danger of bias does not lie in political coverage. I mean, ask Al Gore and John Kerry if they were the beneficiary of a poodle press. They were treated very critically — appropriately.

"Appropriately"? As has been well-documented (start here and here), Gore in 2000 was subjected to the most viciously false media pounding of any modern presidential candidate. From the media-created lie that Gore had claimed to have "invented" the Internet to the hue and cry that he give up on a race that he'd actually won, the 2000 presidential campaign amounted to a shocking eruption of media irresponsibility. The media's shoddy performance was just as responsible for Gore's loss as the five Supreme Court justices who handed George W. Bush a victory he hadn't earned.

No, it wasn't as bad with Kerry. The swift-boat lies never really broke out of the cable and radio talk ghetto (although Eric Boehlert shows the mainstream media deserve at least some blame), and by 2004 the media were finally starting to catch on to Bush. But Greenfield really needs to bone up on what happened in 2000.

Then again, I remember Greenfield's popping up on the radio some years ago — on Imus, naturally — to say that he wasn't all that troubled by the outcome in Florida, because whatever went wrong was balanced off by the fact that the media had mistakenly called the state for Gore before folks in the Panhandle had finished voting. Good grief. (Via Romenesko.)

The serious and the frivolous

Should newspapers report what's important or what interests people? Good ones do both, attempting to strike a balance between the serious and the frivolous.

Last night, at a panel discussion at the Boston Public Library sponsored by the fledgling New England News Forum, I caught an interesting exchange between John Wilpers, the editor of the free commuter tabloid BostonNOW, and Ellen Hume, director of the Center on Media and Society at UMass Boston.

Among BostonNOW's innovations is a daily webcast of its editorial meeting, and the ability of viewers to send text messages about what they're watching. On one occasion, Wilpers said, he and his staff were discussing a government story, and a viewer wrote in, "I'm bored already, and you haven't even written the story." Wilpers said he decided on the spot to kill the story, and then proceeded to offer a few disparaging words about the notion of government stories in general.

When Hume next got a chance to speak, she responded, "Part of what you said, John, gave me a little bit of a creepy feeling. You've got to cover government. I don't want to kill the government stories."

Wilpers responded, "I would never kill a story just because a blogger or a viewer of the webcast didn't like it. I'm not going to turn my newsroom over to whoever happens to be
watching."

Well, that's a relief — even if Wilpers did seem to contradict what he'd said just a few moments earlier. Yes, it can sometimes be difficult to make government stories interesting. But the First Amendment wasn't written into the Constitution to protect the right of newspaper publishers to cover Paris Hilton endlessly. That's just a side effect.

Finneran's race-baiting co-host

If talk-radio executives know one thing, they know this: racism sells. It's titillating, it's naughty, it gives some middle-aged white guys a thrill as they're driving to work in the morning to hear jokes they'd never dare tell at the office being blasted out at 50,000 watts.

How else can we explain the decision by WRKO (AM 680) to audition fired Imus producer Bernard McGuirk alongside the substantive but ratings-challenged morning host, former Massachusetts House speaker Tom Finneran? (The Globe reports on the story here, along with a quote from yours truly; the Herald's "Inside Track" weighs in here.)

Let's be clear. McGuirk, at least in terms of his on-air persona, is worse than Imus. The standard shtick on the late, unlamented "Imus in the Morning" show was for McGuirk to come out with something so offensive that Imus would stop him, professing to be horrified. Indeed, it was McGuirk's reference to "hardcore hos" that started the infamous exchange that led to Imus' putting a torch to his own career.

And lest we forget, Imus told "60 Minutes" back in 1998 that he'd hired McGuirk to tell "[N-word] jokes."

Media Matters has gathered a few of McGuirk's greatest hits:

• While portraying a stereotyped Irish cardinal, McGuirk referred to Barack Obama as a "young colored fellah."
  
• Claiming that Hillary Clinton was "trying to sound black in front of a black audience," McGuirk exclaimed that Clinton "will have cornrows and gold teeth before this fight with Obama is over."
• During an appearance on "Imus in the Morning" by Democratic presidential candidate Bill Richardson, McGuirk was heard saying in the background, in Spanish, "Kiss my ass, fat one." Richardson's mother is Mexican.

Finneran's show is not off to a good start. His ratings are worse than those of Scott Allen Miller, the host he replaced. Having a local morning program helmed by a smart host who really knows the Boston area is a good idea, and I want to like it. But it's pretty dull.

But attempting to save it by pairing Finneran with an out-of-towner who made his reputation telling racist, sexist and homophobic jokes is reprehensible.

Jerry Falwell

Just because Jerry Falwell is dead doesn't mean I'm obligated to weigh in, does it? I hope not — I'm not sure I can muster the energy, except to say that the only good thing about him I can think of is that he, like Pat Robertson, had lost much of his influence over the years. (Not that James Dobson and Tony Perkins are an improvement.)

Timothy Noah has a great roundup on Slate of the worst things Falwell ever said. Jon Keller shares some thoughts about what it was like to be David Brudnoy's producer at the peak of Falwell's influence.

"Pretty ugly," redefined

I usually get a kick out of James Taranto's "Best of the Web" on the Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal.com Web site. But I don't even get this. Then again, Taranto has to explain it, which is a sure sign that it's not working.

What is "actual malice"?

I'm late to this, but in case you didn't see Jim Braude's take on the Herald libel case, I want to call it to your attention now.

You can watch it on NECN's Web site in two parts. In part one, Braude interviews Howard Cooper, the lawyer for Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy, who won a $2.1 million judgment against the Herald in 2005, an award that was upheld by the Supreme Judicial Court last week. In part two, Braude talks with pair of lawyers — Ed Ryan, former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association, who supports the verdict against the Herald, and Mary-Rose Papandrea, who teaches at Boston College Law School and who holds the opposite view.

Braude's interview with Cooper is admirably tough-minded. Watch it, then watch Papandrea. I just don't see how anyone can escape the conclusion that the Herald was negligent — maybe even grossly negligent — but that it did not commit "actual malice." Did Herald reporter Dave Wedge report something that he knew was false, or harbor serious doubts as to its truth or falsity? I still think the answer is no.

Plug/disclosure: I'll be on "NewsNight" tonight to talk with Braude about genetic discrimination.

Not-so-local news

Now this is a truly wretched idea.

The Associated Press reports that the Web site Pasadena Now has decided to outsource coverage of the local city council to reporters in India. In a follow-up, the Los Angeles Times says that one of these distant journalists, based in Mumbai, will make $12,000 a year, while the other, in Bangalore, will make $7,200. They'll watch webcasts of the council meetings, consult relevant documents online and send their stories by e-mail. Who cares if they wouldn't know Pasadena from Rawalpindi?

Pasadena Now editor and publisher James Macpherson tells the Times: "A lot of the routine stuff we do can be done by really talented people in another time zone at much lower wages."

Reacting to Macpherson's quote, Kevin Roderick of LA Observed digs up a terrific rejoinder from an anonymous Pasadena blogger:

That's true, to a certain degree. The type of journalistic coverage McPherson [sic] is talking about really could be done by someone in another country, largely because their "coverage" often consists of little more than glorified press releases and parroting of the local media.

This is really quite a bit worse than the Boston Globe's decision to outsource some circulation and advertising functions to India. Indeed, they're even scratching their heads at the Hindustan Times, observing that "it remains to be seen how reporters would file their dispatches on local news — with all its flavour — from such a distant geographical location."

No telltale byline, but here's a possible example.

Dan Gillmor: "For the money he's paying, he [Macpherson] could hire local bloggers. They'd do it better, with more perspectives — and have the advantage of, uh, being there."

Political whoppers, Bush edition

Jon Keller has nominated his top five list of all-time political whoppers. Although Dick Cheney makes an appearance, President Bush is strangely absent. To rectify that, the crack staff at Media Nation has been hard at work for the past 12 or 13 minutes, putting together an all-Bush edition.

We think this holds up well even against such classics as "I am not a crook" (Richard Nixon) and "Last night I announced to the American people that the North Vietnamese regime had conducted further deliberate attacks against U.S. naval vessels operating in international waters" (Lyndon Johnson). But we'll let you be the judge.

Here are our top five Bush whoppers, in chronological order. We realize we could have chosen many, many more.

1. "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." (Jan. 23, 2003)

2. "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. And now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country." (May 1, 2003)

3. "There are some who feel like that, you know, the conditions are such that they can attack us there. My answer is bring them on. We got the force necessary to deal with the security situation." (July 2, 2003)

4. "[W]e are fighting terrorists in Iraq so that we will not have to face them and fight them in the streets of our own cities." (Oct. 3, 2003)

5. "We do not torture." (Nov. 7, 2005)

David Ortiz's non-roid rage

Did the Herald do David Ortiz wrong? Globe columnist Jackie MacMullan ups the ante today with a lengthy piece on the fallout from the headline on a short Michael Silverman item in Tuesday's Herald. The headline: "Papi unwitting 'roid user?"

MacMullan writes: "The headline was a disservice to Ortiz, and to Silverman, who does not write his own headlines. In fact, no writer at a major paper writes his or her headlines."

OK, the headline was kind of idiotic. But, as these things go, it wasn't that bad. Here's how Silverman's item begins:

On the topic of steroids, Red Sox designated hitter David Ortiz said he is not 100 percent positive that he's never used them. If he did, it happened when he was much younger.

"I tell you, I don't know too much about steroids, but I started listening about steroids when they started to bring that [expletive] up, and I started realizing and getting to know a little bit about it," Ortiz said Sunday. "You've got to be careful.... I used to buy a protein shake in my country. I don't do that any more because they don't have the approval for that here, so I know that, so I'm off of buying things at the GNC back in the Dominican [Republic]. But it can happen anytime, it can happen. I don't know. I don't know if I drank something in my youth, not knowing it."

I'd say the headline was an exaggeration of what Ortiz actually said, but not by that much. MacMullan says this about the Herald's headline:

It was an inflammatory rhetorical question that set off a national chain reaction of speculation. One of the first hints was when Red Sox manager Terry Francona said a Toronto reporter entered his office and declared that Ortiz had exposed himself as a steroid user.

The Toronto reporter needs a reading-comprehension lesson.

This is the second time the Globe has let Ortiz vent about the Herald; here is Gordon Edes' piece from Thursday's paper. And yes, I think the Herald could have written a more deft headline to describe Ortiz's remarks.

But the real story here is that Ortiz let himself get caught thinking out loud at a moment when everyone is baseball is freaked out about steroids. He said nothing wrong, but, sadly, in the current climate, he probably shouldn't have said anything.

Bush boosts Michael Moore

You can't make this stuff up. The Bush administration has given a huge boost to Michael Moore's upcoming documentary, "SiCKO," by investigating a trip he took to Cuba. The New York Times reports that Moore may have violated the travel ban by taking sick 9/11 rescue workers to Cuba in order to seek free medical care.

As a publicity stunt, what Moore did pales in comparison to what the White House has done for him. Moore's having great fun with it on his Web site, and, as this Google News search shows, the administration's attempt to intimidate Moore has garnered worldwide attention.

What the Bushies seem not to understand is that if you're going to attempt to exercise Putin-like controls over your critics, you need Putin-like powers. Fortunately, they never quite succeeded in getting those powers — although they certainly tried.

Today's obligatory BostonNOW item

I'm rooting for BostonNOW because, like Adam, I want to know that there's an endless source out there of cheap, entertaining items.

Today's: A front-page tease that says, "Extortion cop pleads guilty." Turn to page four, and there's an Associated Press story about Boston police officer Jose Ortiz, who's been charged with drug-dealing and extortion. The problem is that he hasn't pleaded guilty to anything.

The page-four headline is considerably more accurate: "Boston cop admits to drug debt threats." And the head on BostonNOW's Web site is positively subdued: "Officer facing drug charges held."

Shelley Murphy's story in yesterday's Globe makes it absolutely clear what's going on with Ortiz:

Ortiz, 44, of Salem, who faces charges of attempted extortion and conspiracy to distribute cocaine, has in custody since his May 2 arrest. He appeared in shackles, grim faced and wearing khaki prison garb, for yesterday's hearing on whether he should remain in custody until the case is resolved.

I'd love to see BostonNOW give its principal competitor, Metro Boston, a run for its money. But saying someone has pleaded guilty when he hasn't is serious business. Perhaps Russel Pergament and John Wilpers can find it in their budget to hire a copy editor or two.

McGrory named metro editor

The Herald's Jesse Noyes has the news, and Universal Hub's Adam Gaffin has the link. All I've got are the leftovers, but what the heck.

Globe metro columnist Brian McGrory has been named the paper's new metro editor, replacing Carolyn Ryan, who recently left for a job at the New York Times. According to editor Marty Baron's memo to the staff, McGrory will be replaced. So much for my theory that, with Pulitzer-winner Eileen McNamara already gone, Baron would find a new home for remaining metro columnist Adrian Walker and let the position wither away.

Gee, this won't short-circuit McGrory's sideline as a restaurant critic, will it? Check out his review today of Mamma Maria. The first reference to the food comes in, yes, the 10th graf.

Buckingham departs

You may have forgotten this, but Virginia Buckingham's arrival at the Herald was controversial. A Massachusetts Republican operative, she'd been in charge of Logan Airport on Sept. 11, 2001. So when she began working as deputy editorial-page editor at the Herald in January 2003, she was greeted with a petition, signed by 40 of her new colleagues, that referred to her partisan background as an "embarrassment," and by questions as to whether she could ever be tough enough on the folks with whom she had once served.

When I checked in on her, 10 months later, she'd done a pretty good job of answering her critics. Buckingham switched to column-writing in 2005, which gave her more of an identity. But her timing was lousy. The paper was shrinking and loading up on gossip and flash, and there just didn't seem to be much room for a cautious, moderate voice.

Now Buckingham is leaving to become a lobbyist for Pfizer. Her last column appears today. I like this:

The first thing I've learned that government officials should understand about the media is that having a bias is not the same as having an agenda. The issue of liberal or conservative bias in the media is way overplayed. Journalists are human and bring their life experiences to their job. How could they not? But Herald State House reporters are no more looking to uncover a Patrick administration scandal than the Globe was looking for a Romney one. Both are looking for stories — good stories (which, granted, are often scandals) that will interest readers, shed some light on how government works and, as an added benefit, maybe help someone out, like a family that’s about to lose their home. Journalists aren't cheerleaders but most are equal-opportunity critics, no matter their own political ideology.

She's also got some worthwhile things to say about cheap-shot artists in the media and a journalistic aversion to nuance.

I wish Buckingham well, although, considering who her new employer is, not at the expense of consumers and taxpayers.

Looking for an article

I don't think this is a stupid question, but even if it is, I'll ask it anyway. I'm trying to find an article by Zephyr Teachout titled "Come Together Now: The Internet's Unlit Fuse." Supposedly it's here, but when I tried, I got an "Access Denied" message — even after I registered. Any ideas?

Another take on the Herald libel case

I'm going to pronounce myself officially blogged out on the subject. But I do want to call your attention to Adam Reilly's smart piece on the Herald libel decision, which has been posted on the Phoenix's Web site and will appear in tomorrow's paper.

Pay careful attention to the words of First Amendment lawyer Jonathan Albano, who wasn't involved in the case, but who did help write an amicus brief on the Herald's behalf. Albano tells Reilly: "You've got some very talented lawyers out there who are going to be looking at this decision, and saying, 'What can I take from it?'"

In other words, you don't have to produce something as sensationalistic and error-filled as the Herald's articles on Judge Ernest Murphy to be worried about the implications of the Supreme Judicial Court's opinion. This could harm freedom of the press for all of us.

Down's, dwarfism and eugenics

I highly recommend Amy Harmon's story in today's New York Times on efforts by parents of kids with Down syndrome to educate medical professionals and expectant couples about the good lives many folks with Down's lead. With prenatal screening for Down's and other genetic conditions becoming more and more pervasive, activists are trying to get out the word that abortion should not be an automatic choice.

A major theme of my book on dwarfism, "Little People," is the degree to which our culture remains profoundly uncomfortable with difference — and what we would do about difference if we were offered the chance to eliminate it. Within the dwarf community, there's a sense that several of the most common types of dwarfism could be routinely screened for at some point in the not-too-distant future. If couples are told that their child, as an adult, would be four feet tall, with disproportionately short arms and legs, and would walk with a waddling gait, what would they choose to do?

In most cases dwarfism, which does not affect mental development, is not nearly as debilitating a genetic difference as Down syndrome. (Although, to be fair, Down's families assert that the condition is often not as serious as it's generally portrayed.) Yet plenty of people would choose abortion. More important, that attitude is more pervasive among medical professionals than among prospective parents.

One of the people I interviewed for "Little People" was the late Dorothy Wertz, a psychiatrist who was affiliated with the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Center in Waltham. In the late 1990s, Wertz conducted a study of about 2,000 people — 1,000 genetics professionals, 500 primary-care physicians and 500 parents. Among her questions: If achondroplasia, the most common form of dwarfism, were detected in utero, would you opt for an abortion? Here are the results:

• Genetics professionals, 57 percent
• Primary-care physicians, 29 percent
• Patients, 24 percent

I'll bracket this with two more of Wertz's findings. For Down's, the breakdown was geneticists, 80 percent; physicians, 62 percent; and patients, 36 percent. For a genetic predisposition to severe obesity, it was geneticists, 29 percent; physicians, 13 percent; and patients, 8 percent. Thus, dwarfism was right in the middle. And the obesity finding, I think, is significant in that it reveals an underlying aversion to virtually any kind of difference. It's no wonder that activists often refer to genetic screening as "eugenics."

The problem, of course, is that when expectant parents receive a diagnosis of a genetic condition in utero, the first thing they are told to do is to schedule an appointment with a geneticist — a person who, statistically, at least, is far more inclined to think they should terminate the pregnancy than the parents themselves. The parents, of course, have a right to choose, but it should be an informed choice. And an informed choice involves knowing something about the real lives of people who have that genetic condition.

With dwarfism, at least, attitudes may have changed for the better in recent years thanks to the "normal" roles played by actors and actresses such as Peter Dinklage and Meredith Eaton, and, most notably, by the Roloff family, stars of the TLC reality series "Little People, Big World."

But the threat posed by a future of cheap, pervasive genetic screening, coupled with a social expectation that we're all entitled to the perfect child — whatever that might be — makes stories such as Harmon's, and the work of the parents she portrays, more important than ever.

The Obama difference

To quote Alex Beam, I write this with my head, not my heart. I don't have a dog in the 2008 presidential hunt. But I'm mystified by Beam's assertion in today's Globe that Barack Obama is this year's version of Howard Dean, Paul Tsongas, Bill Bradley and Bruce Babbitt.

Dean, Tsongas, Bradley and Babbitt were all utterly without charisma; Dean and Bradley came across as rather unpleasant fellows to boot. Tsongas, Bradley and Babbitt got a big boost from media types who were suckers for their cerebral, moderate politics. (Yes, Bradley ran as a liberal in 2000, but that wasn't his reputation as a senator.) Dean was the darling of the netroots, but actual voters never warmed up to him.

By contrast, Obama oozes charisma. His campaign's biggest asset, by far, is himself. Members of the Beam Quartet were small-timers trying to break into the the big time. Obama is a big-timer who may not quite be ready.

Obama may or may not be chosen as the Democratic presidential nominee. But if he's not, it certainly won't be because he's suffering from Howard Dean syndrome. And unlike the Beam Quartet, if Obama falls short, I suspect he'll get another chance somewhere down the line.

The Times' misleading account

Not to keep flogging the equine carcass, but I'm puzzled by this passage in today's New York Times account of the Herald libel case. Times reporter Pam Belluck writes:

In February 2005, a jury found [for] the judge after testimony about some inaccuracies in the articles and statements from two of Mr. Wedge's sources that instead of "tell her to get over it," Judge Murphy might have said "she's got to get over it," a compassionate statement.

Two points, both drawn from my Phoenix report, written during the 2005 trial:

1. Depending on how you count, Herald reporter Dave Wedge had either three sources or one — but definitely not two — for his assertion that Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy had said of a teenage rape victim, "Tell her to get over it." Wedge at the time claimed three. But it turned out that he had one eyewitness source, then-prosecutor David Crowley, who, in turn, told Wedge's other two sources, then-district attorney Paul Walsh and Walsh's spokesman, Gerald FitzGerald.

2. More important, Belluck takes it for granted that if Murphy had actually said "She's got to get over it," then that would be "a compassionate statement." Not necessarily. Murphy's lawyer, Howard Cooper, certainly tried to make that case, and the Supreme Judicial Court bought it in its decision yesterday. But there was plenty of evidence cutting the other way, too.

For instance, Crowley, in his pretrial deposition, said he found "She's got to get over it" to be an "insensitive" statement on Murphy's part. At the trial, Crowley — obviously a reluctant witness — testified that Wedge had gotten the "gist" of Murphy's quote correct.

Walsh himself testified that Crowley was upset enough by Murphy's "get over it" statement to tell him about it. "The particular words didn't make any difference to me.... Mr. Crowley was none too happy about the statement, and neither was I," Walsh said.

Finally, as I noted yesterday, a Globe editorial, citing "prosecutors," reported that Murphy had said of the rape victim that she had to "get over it" and criticized Murphy for acting "as if rape were somehow one of the bumps on the road of life." Clearly the Globe's editorialist didn't believe it mattered whether Murphy had said "tell her to" or "she's got to."

It's too bad the Times missed these distinctions, because the story makes it appear that Wedge, by botching part of the quote, had deliberately transformed a compassionate statement into one that was demeaning toward the victim.

Yes, that is what the jury found and the SJC affirmed. But there was just as strong a case — stronger, in my view — that the "tell her to"/"she's got to" dispute was a distinction without a difference. And if Wedge knew or strongly suspected that what he was reporting was false, as the "actual malice" standard requires, then Crowley and Walsh committed perjury. Just to be clear: I don't think they did.

Statements from Purcell, Wedge

Boston Herald publisher Pat Purcell on the Supreme Judicial Court's decision to uphold a $2.1 million libel award against his paper:

We are disappointed with the Supreme Judicial Court's relentlessly one-sided view of Dave Wedge's reporting on a public controversy within the judicial system, and are unwavering in our complete confidence in Wedge's journalistic skills.

In one of his threatening letters to me, Judge [Ernest] Murphy correctly predicted the Herald had "zero chance" that his colleagues on the bench would side with the Herald rather than one of their own. Wedge accurately reported what his longstanding sources told him and no shred of evidence exists, as Justice [John] Greaney alleged in his opinion, that Wedge altered the quotation provided by his trusted sources.

While we are deeply troubled by the SJC's decision, it will in no way affect our newsgathering operation and we will continue to bring readers thorough and relevant enterprise stories and public criticism of judges.

Dave Wedge's statement:

I vehemently disagree with the SJC's decision. As I have since the beginning of this case, I continue to firmly stand behind my reporting on these stories. Any insinuation by anyone, including the SJC, that anything in any of the stories on Judge Murphy was fabricated is completely reckless, irresponsible and untrue and is not borne out by the facts of the case.

Quick comment: Purcell goes too far. Wedge had one source, not "sources," and that source, former prosecutor David Crowley, testified at the trial that he believed Murphy had said "She's got to get over it," not "Tell her to get over it." Greaney made much of that difference in his opinion.

However, as I've said repeatedly, I don't think Wedge fabricated anything, Greaney's opinion notwithstanding.

Sticking with Blogger (or not)

Recently I made a promise: As soon as the semester was over, I'd start looking into switching Media Nation from Blogger to WordPress. Now I'm not so sure.

Being more interested in blogging than fiddling, I naturally signed up with WordPress.com rather than trying to install the full version of WordPress on a server somewhere. I experimented a little — you can see the very minimal results here.

But the documentation seemed practically non-existent, and, in poking around, I found this: "You cannot edit any template directly.... You cannot add or remove any html to any theme. This is for security reasons."

Well, now. So much for making the type a little bigger, switching from justified to ragged-right or, for that matter, adding the code that makes Media Nation part of the Boston Blogs network.

Maybe I'm missing something. Right now, though, my inclination is to try to deal with what I don't like about Blogger — especially the comments system — without switching. If anyone has some hand-holding advice, that would be appreciated as well.

The Herald wasn't alone

The Boston Herald's reporting on Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy may have been egregious, but it was hardly the only news outlet that ran stories on Murphy's perceived leniency.

Dave Wedge and Jules Crittenden's first Herald story on Murphy, "Murphy's Law," appeared on Feb. 13, 2002. (Crittenden's contribution was not an issue in Murphy's libel suit.)

Here are a few examples of what others were saying before, during and after the Herald weighed in.

From the Associated Press, Feb. 9, 2002:

A Superior Court judge has come under fire from prosecutors after he released three accused rapists without bail, and gave probation to a man who admitted raping a 14-year-old girl.

Judge Ernest B. Murphy, who began his rotation in New Bedford this week, placed Dean McSweeney on eight years' probation Tuesday, after McSweeney admitted to twice raping his friend's 14-year-old sister and holding up a Mansfield motel. Prosecutors had recommended a 7- to 10-year sentence.

"Rapes, robberies, bails, it doesn't matter," Bristol District Attorney Paul F. Walsh told the The Standard Times of New Bedford. "He doesn't care. He's gutless."

Murphy also released without bail a Fall River man charged with raping a young girl, and overturned bail rulings allowing two other accused rapists, including one man accused of raping a 13-year-old girl at gunpoint, on personal recognizance.

From the Boston Globe, Feb. 11, 2002:

Prosecutors in New Bedford are fuming over the rulings of a judge who recently released without bail three alleged rapists, one of whom had eluded police for more than a year. Superior Court Judge Ernest B. Murphy also gave a probation sentence to a man who pleaded guilty to raping a 14-year-old girl, said Bristol County Assistant District Attorney Gerald FitzGerald....

"The word is out," FitzGerald said. "When Judge Murphy's on the bench, the gates are open. The drawbridge is down."

In fact, FitzGerald said, "If he knew that Ernest Murphy was sitting on the bench, it would be enough to bring Whitey [Bulger] back home."

From The Standard-Times, Feb. 12, 2002:

NEW BEDFORD — A man accused of raping a 15-year-old New Bedford girl was released without bail yesterday, the fourth such ruling by Superior Court Judge Ernest B. Murphy in seven days.

A District Court judge had ordered Lance Bovill, 28, of Mattapan held on $75,000 bail after allegedly raping a girl he met on a local telephone party line.

Judge Murphy, who was blasted by prosecutor Walter J. Shea last week for being "the worst person in a black robe I have ever seen," overturned that bail, saying he believed the man would return for trial.

"Whether or not she was really raped, or whether she made it all up is not for me to decide," the judge said yesterday. "I'm ruling on the bail statute, and I'm familiar with the bail statute."

From the Associated Press, Feb. 14, 2002:

He [Murphy] created a furor among prosecutors and victim's rights advocates earlier this week when he released on bail a teen-ager accused of planning a Columbine-style rampage at New Bedford High School.

"Clearly, there's a pattern here," [Bristol County District Attorney Paul] Walsh said. "Everywhere I go, people are shaking their heads at these decisions.

"The compassion always seems to come down on the side of the defendant," he said. "We're not here just to hope that defendants cure their ways ... there are some people getting hurt out there and punishment has to be factored in."

Mansfield Police Chief Arthur O'Neill has called for Murphy's resignation. Several relatives of victims whose cases were heard by Murphy said they plan to file complaints against him with acting Gov. Jane Swift and the Commission on Judicial Conduct, which investigates allegations of misconduct against state judges.

From the Associated Press, Feb. 18, 2002:

A 14-year-old rape victim said on Monday that she "will never be free" after a judge sentenced her attacker to eight years probation and allowed him walk out of the courtroom.

The sentences for Dean McSweeney and other accused rapists have become the center of a controversy over New Bedford Superior Court Judge Ernest B. Murphy, whose rulings have sparked outrage from prosecutors.

"Other victims are going through the same thing I am, because Judge Murphy chose to free their attackers, too," the girl said at her home not far from where McSweeney lives. "Judge Murphy made me feel like I was guilty, and that Dean was the victim. Dean walked out of the courtroom a free man. I will never be free."

From The Standard-Times, Feb. 19, 2002:

MANSFIELD — A 14-year-old rape victim said yesterday that she "will never be free" after a judge sentenced her attacker to eight years probation and allowed him walk out of the courtroom.

The sentences for Dean McSweeney and other accused rapists have become the center of a controversy over New Bedford Superior Court Judge Ernest B. Murphy, whose rulings have sparked outrage from prosecutors.

"Other victims are going through the same thing I am, because Judge Murphy chose to free their attackers, too," the girl said at her home not far from where McSweeney lives.

"Judge Murphy made me feel like I was guilty, and that Dean was the victim. Dean walked out of the courtroom a free man. I will never be free."

From the Boston Globe, Feb. 19, 2002:

A 14-year-old rape victim yesterday said a controversial judge's decision to spare her attacker prison time and release him to his home within a mile of her Mansfield house has left her fearing for her safety....

"I will have to look over my shoulder for the rest of my life," she read from a prepared statement. "I looked to Judge Murphy to help and support me to get over this by putting Dean McSweeney behind bars where he belonged. Instead, he's right down the street.... All because Judge Murphy felt more sympathy for Dean than he did for me."

The next excerpt — from a Globe editorial published on Feb. 22, 2002 — is particularly interesting. Note that the writer concludes that Murphy's alleged "get over it" quote is demeaning, without regard for whether Murphy said "She's got to get over it" or "Tell her to get over it." Also, the writer attributes the quote to "prosecutors." Did someone at the Globe get that quote from Walsh's office? Or did the Globe simply pick this up from the Herald? Anyway, here it is:

In recent weeks Murphy released four accused rapists without bail after more-experienced district court judges had set significant bail. His decision to give a probationary sentence to a man who admitted to raping a 14-year-old Mansfield girl has created a barrage of criticism related both to Murphy's sentencing judgment and judicial temperament. According to prosecutors, Murphy stated that the victim should "get over it" — as if rape were somehow one of the bumps on the road of life.

Now, I'm not saying that these excerpts are no different from what the Herald reported. To my knowledge, no one has questioned the accuracy of any of these stories. (On the other hand, if Murphy never said the teenage victim should "get over it" in a demeaning way, then the Globe editorial is wrong on precisely the point on which the Herald lost.) The Herald's reporting, by contrast, was plagued with errors.

But I can't help but think that Murphy, under intense pressure, lashed out at the Herald not because he had been wounded so much more grievously than he had by the other news outlets, but because it set off an enormous public outcry.

SJC upholds Herald libel verdict

The state's Supreme Judicial Court, in a strongly worded opinion, has upheld a $2.1 million libel verdict against the Boston Herald. In March 2005 the Herald lost a suit brought by Superior Court Judge Ernest Murphy, who'd been characterized by the Herald in 2002 as a "wrist-slapping judge" who had "heartlessly demeaned" victims of crime — most notoriously, by allegedly saying of a teenage rape victim, "She can't go through life as a victim. She's [fourteen]. She got raped. Tell her to get over it."

Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly reports the decision here, and reproduces the text of Justice John Greaney's decision here.

Greaney's view of Herald reporter Dave Wedge is pretty devastating. Under the U.S. Supreme Court's 1964 Times v. Sullivan decision, Murphy had to prove not only that what Wedge reported about him was false and defamatory, but that he had acted with "actual malice" — that is, that he knew what he was reporting was false, or that he showed "reckless disregard" for whether his reporting was true or false. Greaney writes that Murphy met that standard:

Wedge's lack of candor on the witness stand strongly supports the inference that he deliberately attempted to mislead the jury. Although disbelief in Wedge's testimony alone is not sufficient to sustain a verdict for the plaintiff, we are satisfied that the evidence we discuss below would warrant a jury's finding of actual malice by clear and convincing evidence. There is an abundance of evidence that, taken cumulatively, provides clear and convincing proof that the defendants either knew that the published statements found by the jury to be libelous were untrue, or that they published them in reckless disregard of their probable falsity.

I've written before that I don't think Wedge committed "actual malice." Though his reporting was sensationalistic and riddled with errors, I'm convinced he believes to this day that Murphy said the teenage rape victim should "get over it," and that he believes Murphy said it in — well, a heartless, demeaning manner. Wedge's one eyewitness source, former prosecutor David Crowley, testified during the trial that Wedge had captured the "gist" of Murphy's meaning, even though it was more likely Murphy had said "She's got to get over it" rather than "Tell her to get over it."

But, at least according to Greaney, that's not relevant — if Wedge got the quote wrong, then it's up to the jury to decide whether he got the "gist" of Murphy's meaning correct. Greaney writes:

The defendants assert in their brief that, "[h]aving noted that Crowley testified that the 'gist' of the 'get over it' statement was accurately reported in the Herald ... the trial court needed to go no further." This assertion is a misstatement of the law. A statement is false, for purposes of libel, if there has been a "material change in the meaning conveyed by the statement." This determination is one for the jury, and not for a witness, to make.

Also interesting is Greaney's application of Harte-Hanks v. Connaughton (1989), a U.S. Supreme Court decision in which a libel verdict was upheld because a newspaper's editors were found to have deliberately avoided interviewing a source and considering other evidence that might have cast doubt on a story in which a local candidate for office had been accused of corruption. According to the decision, such a failure constituted "reckless disregard," since it showed that the paper's editors had harbored serious doubts as to whether what they were about to publish was true.

Wedge failed to interview two defense lawyers who were present when Crowley supposedly heard Murphy say that the victim should "get over it." At the trial, both lawyers testified that they never heard Murphy say anything remotely like what Wedge had reported. But did Wedge deliberately avoid interviewing them, which would constitute "reckless disregard"? Or did he simply not bother, which would not? Greaney:

When substantial doubts have been raised as to the veracity of a reporter's information, the purposeful failure to investigate known witnesses may be proof of actual malice. The evidence, clearly and convincingly, supports the inference that Wedge included the "tell her" quotation, which not one percipient witness had confirmed, to convey the impression (false) of callousness. The evidence equally clearly and convincingly supports the determination that Wedge purposely did not seek to interview any of the percipient witnesses who would have contradicted the alleged facts in his article.

To me, the bottom line is that Wedge allowed himself to be used as a conduit for the Bristol County district attorney's office, whose officials were out to get Murphy because they believed — genuinely — that he was too lenient. It's the sort of spoon-fed, prosecutor-driven journalism that news organizations practice all the time, although usually with greater accuracy than Wedge managed that day. But it certainly doesn't mean Wedge believed his sources were lying to him. Quite the opposite, I think. From Wedge's point of view, what could be more natural than interviewing prosecutors and reporting what they'd said?

I hope Herald publisher Pat Purcell appeals the SJC's decision in the federal courts. Absent deliberate falsity or something close to it, harsh reporting on how a public official performs his official duties should never lead to a libel verdict, no matter how flawed that reporting may be. With all due respect to Justice Greaney, I think Wedge believed he got the story right at the time. Under the "actual malice" standard, that should be sufficient.

Update: David Kravitz, a lawyer, writes about the decision at Blue Mass Group, but his response to a comment of mine is especially valuable. Kravitz thinks Greaney wrote with an eye toward keeping this out of the U.S. Supreme Court (as Kravitz points out, the only federal court that can take an SJC appeal) by rooting his opinion as closely as possible in the facts of the case, while steering clear of anything that would suggest he was questioning precedents or theory.

With money, John

From today's New York Times story on BostonNOW, whose editor, John Wilpers, is soliciting contributions from local bloggers:

Mr. Wilpers said he wanted to compensate bloggers but was still considering the best way to do so.

And I love this line: "Also appealing to bloggers is that they retain ownership of their submissions even after printing. They have not, however, received money from the paper for their work." Such a deal!

Roger and out

I'm not a Roger Clemens-basher. I wish he'd never left the Red Sox. But now that he's signed with the Yankees, I've got to hope that he's trying to push his incredible career one season too far. Here are his stats from last year. Pretty good for an old man, but he averaged just a hair under six innings per start. Think that's going to work out with the Yankees' bullpen?

Pelosi's helpful visit

Did you catch this, from the New York Times coverage of Condoleezza Rice's meeting with Syria's foreign minister?

... Ms. Rice took the time to telephone [Nancy] Pelosi before heading to Egypt this week, though Bush administration officials did not say whether Ms. Rice told Ms. Pelosi beforehand that she planned to follow her footsteps.

"She wanted to hear from Speaker Pelosi about her discussions with the Syrian president," a senior State Department official said, adding that that the call centered on gathering information about Ms. Pelosi's trip, not further condemnation for making it. Ms. Rice, he said, "didn’t want to poke her finger in her eye or anything."

No, indeed. And in a rational world, Dick Cheney would now apologize for trashing Pelosi, whose visit may turn out to be very useful to the White House. Then again, we don't live in a rational world, do we?

No right-wing rag

One of the great myths of journalism is that the Wall Street Journal is a conservative paper. To be sure, its editorial page is the most relentlessly right-wing and conspiracy-obsessed in the country. Its editors' indifference to the truth was memorably cited in the suicide note of Vincent Foster, an associate of Hillary Clinton's who'd become caught up in the non-existent "Clinton scandals."

But the Journal's news pages are run completely independently from the opinion operation, and are widely regarded as the pinnacle of careful reporting and graceful writing. Barney Kilgore, who virtually created the modern Journal, is even credited with inventing the "news feature," a form that we take for granted today.

As for politics, a 2005 UCLA study found the Journal's news operation to be more liberal than that of any major U.S. media outlet, including the New York Times. Now, I don't know about that. But, clearly, when you hear someone say that it doesn't matter if Rupert Murdoch wins control of the Journal because it's already a right-wing rag, you can be sure that person doesn't know what he's talking about.

But why would Murdoch interfere with the Journal if he's successful in his bid to purchase the paper and its parent company, Dow Jones, for $5 billion? Doesn't he know that the Journal represents the gold standard in American journalism, and that he'd be crazy to mess with it?

Uh, get real. No, he might not be drag its news coverage to the right, or turn it into a screaming tabloid like his New York Post. But the reason he's willing to pay so much for it is that he thinks he's smarter than its current owners, the Bancroft family. And, in fact, he probably is smarter than the Bancrofts, if by "smarter" you mean better at maximizing its economic potential. Why should he spend $5 billion just to leave it alone, especially if he is firmly convinced that he can make it better?

In an interview with the Times today, Murdoch makes it clear that he can't wait to start interfering with the Journal. He thinks the stories are too long. He thinks the news section should feature more political coverage. He would consider starting a Journal-branded weekend glossy magazine. He insists that he's not planning deep cuts, but adds, "I'm not saying it's going to be a holiday camp for everybody." Oh, no. You can be sure of that.

If Murdoch is successful, it would be a disaster. And, at this point, it looks like he stands a good chance of pulling this off.