About a week after the election Elisabeth Bumiller spoke at a panel discussion of the election coverage. During it she held up David Rosenbaum's factchecking as a good example of the kind of "really good journalism" we're going to be seeing in the NYT now that they've learned their lesson from helping BushCo get his war on and getting several thousand people gravely wounded and killed.
Be sure to read all of what MediaMatters.org has to say about the latest effort from Rosenbaum as he sort of covers the Istook affair. Here's the intro. All links are at MM's site:
In a November 22 New York Times article titled "G.O.P. Says Motive for Tax Clause in Budget Bill Was Misread" -- about a provision inserted into a $388 billion omnibus spending bill that would allow the chairmen of the House and Senate appropriations committees to view federal tax returns -- reporter David E. Rosenbaum failed to verify claims made by people he quoted and omitted key pieces of information relevant to the story, including the exact language of the clause in question. While Rosenbaum filled in some additional details in a follow-up article on the subject published on November 23, he ignored contradictions between the two stories and failed to point out that an unverified claim made by a Republican committee staff member he quoted the previous day was, in fact, false.
Really good!
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