NY Times Whitewashes O’Keefe’s ACORN, NPR Video Scams

[NNN0LHI]

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201107280019

July 28, 2011 1:42 pm ET by Eric Boehlert

Assigning a Rush Limbaugh fan and biographer to profile right-wing activist James O’Keefe wasn’t exactly a daring choice by editors at The New York Times Magazine. The fact that the resulting puff piece is a predictably soft retread of O’Keefe’s often-told tale should surprise no one.

What is odd is that the Times would publish such comically inaccurate characterizations of O’Keefe’s adventures in undercover video stings; stings that have proven time and again he’s incapable of telling the truth.

Those are the facts. They are not in dispute. But in the loving hands of Times writer Zev Chafets, O’Keefe is portrayed as an enterprising, muckraking journalist. And in the loving hands of Zev Chafets, O’Keefe is portrayed exactly the way O’Keefe wants to be portrayed.

I realize that’s Chafets’ niche at the Times, to bring his partisan, conservative perspective when writing profiles of partisan conservative media figures, and to do his best to paper over anything unflattering about the subject at hand. That’s what he did with his New York Times Magazine cover story on Limbaugh in 2008. (The super-soft profile helped Chafets land a Ditto-ography book deal.)

[Vinnie From Indy]

1. The NYT has long ago abandoned real journalism

While there are a few voices on the opinion page that speak truth to power, the news reporting side acts many times as a stenographer for powerful special interests.

[Blue_Tires]

2. Yeah, the NYT Mag has been noticibly soft in recent years