Michaell Skube tells the N&R's Lanita Withers, "I said what I want to say."

But he's saying something different than what he said before.

Then, a blast contrasting "old-fashioned gumshoe reporting" with "armchair commentary" that could have used more of the former and less of the latter. It was rebutted with force and precision.

Now:"There's a place for gatekeepers, institutional safeguards," Skube said. "Editors will challenge you, as they should. They can be exasperating. They have behind them copy editors. They can be exasperating. ... Those editors will save you from mistakes, too."

Well, yeah. But that's not what the column was about. There's plenty of room for criticism of Skube's editors at the LAT -- how could they have run that piece?

(Warning: the N&R site has just relaunched; it's slow but functional.)

Comments

[The CA]

RE: The new N&R site. I keep getting a java script pop-up. Really annoying.

[Preston Earle]

You wrote "But he's saying something different than what he said before."

Shouldn't that be "different from"?

"Editors will challenge you, as they should. They can be exasperating. They have behind them copy editors. They can be exasperating. ... Those editors will save you from mistakes, too."

[Sue]

Grammar notwithstanding, isn't the N&R piece sorely lacking in what the real issue about this column(s) is/are? Skube let an editor insert something that made his column untrue and we don't know how that happened, really, and then Jay Rosen challenged the accuracy of the Skube/LATimes column completely with facts and reporting borne of research.

The N&R piece seemed to say "there's a controversy" and "Skube doesn't like blogs" and it's an age-old problem. The problem rests now with the LAT editors who haven't answered the most important question:

"Who added blog names to Skube's column; did Skube know about it and say OK?" And finally: Is this journalism?

[Ed Cone]

"Different than" is accepted standard usage, and certainly colloquial usage.

But this conversation raises the point of peer editing, a virtue of the web at which Skube sniffed disdainfully in our earlier conversation.

[Bubba]

Quote from the 05 post:

"Skube says, 'A reporter, if he's worthy of being called one, respects the craft's cardinal rules: accuracy, impartiality, fairness, verification, proper attribution.'"

Relevant link from current headlines......

The truth:

"The next time someone trots out the adage about bloggers not being reporters, we're going to note that reporters aren't exactly reporters these days either."

[JAT]

Amen, Bubba.

Everyone understands that blog cred ranges from platinum to crud. Along comes Skube to assert that newspapers are, in contrast, always golden, despite being up to his ears in examples of tin.