Kurtz: We goofed, but no correction
Rathergate.com
Filed under: General— Kevin Craver @ 10:59 am
In journalism, what good is it to admit an error if you refuse to run a correction and set the record straight for your readers?
Just when I thought I’ve seen every crazy thing from the MSM playbook, Washington Post media writer Howard Kurtz just wrote a new page. He admits that the newspaper goofed by sending out a first draft of the GOP “talking points memo” story, but the Post will not run a correction:
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It turns out that The Post’s news service put out an early version of the March 20 story – published by numerous other papers – that said the talking points, which touted the Schiavo case as a political opportunity, were “distributed to Republican senators by party leaders.” GOP congressional leaders say they never saw the document, whose author remains unknown. Post reporter Mike Allen, who was unaware the news service had distributed the earlier version, said last week that the paper was careful not to say it was “a Republican memo.”
Kate Carlisle, the news service’s managing editor, says Allen’s report was sent out at 9:07 the night before and “we weren’t notified that changes had been made to the story after we got it.”
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This validates the theory posed by Michelle Malkin, Powerline and others that the Post sent out an early version before a sharp-eyed editor or two concluded that the evidence did not suppport the memo’s authorship and distribution by Republican leaders.
Okay, fine. But a mistake is a mistake, regardless of how it came to be. So will a “newspaper of record” print a few corrections to fix the record? Apparently that’s too much to ask:
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Despite criticism from bloggers, and Allen’s request for a correction, Carlisle said no correction was warranted. Late Friday, the news service sent out an “advisory” saying: “The version of the article published by the paper did not specify the authorship and noted that the memo was unsigned. The authorship remains unknown.” The advisory did not retract the assertion that “party leaders” had given out the memo.
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First off, Mike Allen has cleared his good name here at Rathergate.com. He realized that a goof was made, and he is asking for a correction to be printed. Trust me, that’s big for a journalist – aside from physical injury, the worst feeling I can describe to you is a correction in my newspaper that leads with, “In a story by Kevin Craver …”
So the WaPo will not correct the record, and it is advising its member newspapers that the story that ended up running in the Post was not wrong. Not good enough. In fact, that’s awful substandard.
To review, the Post not only goofed in the early version of the story, but committed a number of errors along the way:
1) Despite the copout that the story did not run in the Post’s pages, two Reuters stories ran on the Post’s website claiming that the memo was written and distributed by the GOP. One of the stories explicitly stated that it got the information from The Washington Post. Both stories were still available as of Friday, but have apparently been removed.
2) Kurtz committed an error in his column of March 30 in which he defended what the newspaper did – despite Allen being unaware of the earlier draft being posted on the Post’s wire service, his statement that “We simply reported that the sheet of paper was distributed to Republican senators and told our readers explicitly that the document was unsigned, making clear it was unofficial. We stuck to what we knew to be true and did not call them talking points or a Republican memo” is inaccurate.
3) Howard Kurtz’ column of March 25 incorrectly identifies the memo as a “GOP talking points memo.” That cannot be proven, and Kurtz admits as much.
So it appears that pride trumps accuracy at the Post. We’re not asking for a full-page, front-page retraction. Is it really too much to ask for a tiny correction totaling two paragraphs to be nestled in small type in the paper’s corrections section?
Newspapers to this day wonder why people don’t call in anymore to point out errors. The staff of The New York Times wonders who no one bothered to call the newspaper regarding Jayson Blair’s many fabrications. The answer is simple, and now even louder and clearer thanks to Kurtz: What good does it do?
UPDATE: Kurtz’ Q&A is in progress at this moment. I quickly fired off the following:
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The Post’s Web site did indeed print the errors regarding the GOP “talking points memo” that you explain in today’s column. They are no longer available on your site, but the Post did indeed print the erroneous information in an electronic format. Also, today’s column contradicts what you and Allen said in your last column. Don’t you think the Reuters stories on your site and your inadvertent column error last week both merit corrections?
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UPDATE 2: A reader from Ft. Belvoir, Va. asked about the Post’s memo reporting. Kurtz essentially answered with “read the column.” I think that’s the best we’re going to get today:
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Ft. Belvior, Va.: Please address the discrepancy between the memo story that appeared in the print edition of the Post, and the version distributed through various wire services with the byline “The Washington Post” instead of a specific reporter. The wire service reports specifically claim the memo was distributed by Republican leaders, which differs significantly from what the Post printed. Thank you.
Howard Kurtz: I address this in my column today. The Washington Post’s news service, which sent out an early version of the story, has now moved an advisory correcting some, but not all, of the Post reporters’ story that appeared in a number of other newspapers but not in The Washington Post.
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