Davy vs Goliath

[MichaelHarris]

The New Republic vs The Weekly Standard and Fox may cause some fury. One of the three has to be lying, I sure hope it's not The New Republic. I can see the Army coercing a retraction and then leaking it to the Likes of Fox and The Weekly Standard, that's the new operating norm.

You would have to believe that after the "Glass Incident" at The New Republic they would be uber fact checkers. I certainly hope so. Confused? Blame the media, this is how two sides tell a story:

From a Fox website:

" The Weekly Standard has learned from a military source close to the investigation that Pvt. Scott Thomas Beauchamp -- author of the much-disputed "Shock Troops" article in the New Republic's July 23 issue as well as two previous "Baghdad Diarist" columns -- signed a sworn statement admitting that all three articles he published in the New Republic were exaggerations and falsehoods -- fabrications containing only "a smidgen of truth," in the words of our source."
Probably and unnamed source.

From The New York Times:

"Yesterday, The New Republic posted another note on its Web site saying its editors had spoken to Major Lamb and asked whether Private Beauchamp had indeed signed a statement admitting to fabrications. “He told us, ‘I have no knowledge of that.’ He added, ‘If someone is speaking anonymously , they are on their own.’"
Not an unnamed source.

If a statement has not been signed then Fox and The Weekly Standard should be held accountable for their mis-statements. We can question Maj. Lamb in the Times article, what we can't do is question the unnamed source in the Fox and Standard report. Hiding behind unnamed sources is not journalism, it's fraud.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/08/washington/08diarist.html?ref=media

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,292367,00.html