Free Republic

For the past three months, Jonah Lehrer, science journalist, author of three books, and (former) New Yorker staff writer has been under siege. In mid-June, he was accused of recycling his old work and publishing it as new. Since then, a number of accounts assert that Lehrer committed the two mortal sins of journalism: fabrication and plagiarism. Before Lehrer joined The New Yorker, he was one of the premier bloggers at Wired.com; the site still boasts several hundred blog posts he wrote for his Frontal Cortex blog. Quite naturally, when the Lehrer scandal first broke, the editors at Wired.com worried...

At the end of a full report on Friday's NBC Today, based on a Washington Post hit piece that accused Mitt Romney of bullying of a gay high school classmate, correspondent Peter Alexander admitted the story may be false: "NBC News isn't naming the student who was allegedly bullied....Late last night, his sister told NBC News that his portrayal in the Washington Post story is 'factually incorrect'..." Despite that important detail, the network morning show still decided to promote the accusations. At the top of the show, co-host Ann Curry teased: "Prep school bully? Mitt Romney responds to a report...

The day after President Obama endorsed gay marriage, Mitt Romney found himself responding to allegations that as a teenager he taunted a prep school classmate who later came out as gay.

A blog purportedly written by a gay woman in Syria, which described life in Damascas amid the current political unrest, has been revealed to be a hoax. A Girl Gay in Damascus gained a worldwide readership and was closely followed by news organisations. But the true author has now come forward - Tom MacMaster, an American man studying in Scotland. Many Syrian activists have reacted angrily, accusing him of trivialising or even harming their cause. "One day if I'm kidnapped by my government, many readers won't care because I could turn out to be another Amina," wrote one Lebanese blogger....

...“Paula Brooks,” editor of Lez Get Real since its founding in 2008, is actually Bill Graber, 58, who said he is a retired Ohio military man and construction worker that had adopted his wife’s identity online... Brooks’s identity came under suspicion after news broke that a woman called Amina Arraf on the blog “A Gay Girl in Damascus” might not really be a Syrian lesbian. Over the weekend, as journalists, bloggers and fans of Amina hunted for clues to the identity behind the blog, Brooks came under review as a possible suspect. Liz Henry, a Web producer at BlogHer.com, questioned...

Newsweek intentionally left out Obama from the list (that he would save the world.) And no surprise, 3 of the 10 are Republicans (or maybe more.)

You know you've made it when you're in the dictionary. But you know you've made it in a humorous way when you appear in the Urban Dictionary. UrbanDictionary.com, which tracks pop culture terms, has added one more: Scozzafavaed. Referring to Dede Scozzafava, the moderate Republican assemblywoman who pulled out of New York's District 23 race and threw her support behind the Democrat. To be "Scozzafavaed", as defined by UrbanDictionary.com, is to be "Purged of moderation, e.g., within in a Congressional district." It can also mean "Inadvertently revealed internal chaos, e.g., within in a political Party." As an adjective: "Doomed due...

Limbaugh is going to change the name of the team from the Rams to the Nappy-Headed Hos..Rush Limbaugh might one day own the St. Louis Rams. Hell, sometimes these column thingies write themselves. The only thing that could make this news even more fantastic is if in his first two acts as owner Limbaugh traded for Donovan McNabb and made Jesse Jackson the head coach. Followed by Ann Coulter's hiring as general manager. My head exploded after hearing this Limbaugh news. How exactly will Limbaugh address the team after he purchases them? "I just want to introduce myself and say...

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The source link is to the comment section at Hotair. This link is to the referenced questionaire http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32843690/ns/health-health_care/

I was reading the Chron’s piece about Sheila Jackson Lee’s town hall, when something caught my eye: One supporter, Dr. Roxana Mayer, a physician who does not live in Jackson Lee’s district, praised the reform plan for overhauling a broken system. “I don’t know what there is in the bill that creates such panic,” she said. In this video, Mayer claims to be a general practitioner, eliciting applause and even a hug from Queen Sheila: I’m not sure why, but something didn’t smell right. So my colleagues and I did a little digging, and wouldn’t you know it? Roxana Mayer...

Here's a story I talked about while recording a guest host spot on Raisin' Hale (for my good friend Tabitha Hale) on RFCRadio.com last night. Michelle Malkin explores it today with some bonus material. The free press in the United States once stood for something. The Constitution ensured its freedom so it could act as a vigilant watchdog for the citizens of this country. The classic modern example is Watergate, of course. An unhinged, dishonest president thoroughly abused his position and would have gotten away with it had it not been for the efforts of two newspaper reporters. That's the...

SAO PAULO, Brazil — In one murder after another, the "Canal Livre" crime TV show had an uncanny knack for being first on the scene, gathering graphic footage of the victim. Too uncanny, say police, who are investigating the show's host, state legislator Wallace Souza, on suspicion of commissioning at least five of the murders to boost his ratings and prove his claim that Brazil's Amazon region is awash in violent crime. Police also have accused Souza of drug trafficking. "The order to execute always came from the legislator and his son, who then alerted the TV crews to get...

An attorney for Sarah Palin has delivered a letter threatening legal action against an anti-Palin blogger who was the source of a divorce rumor that the attorney for the former Alaska governor called "categorically false." Publication of the letter at a Web site that repeated the rumor has uncovered circumstantial evidence that the anti-Palin blogger "Gryphen" is a kindergarten teacher at an Anchorage elementary school.... CNN stringer/anti-Palin blogger Dennis Zaki published ... a copy of a letter from Palin attorney Thomas Van Flein, ordering "Gryphen" to retract the allegations -- calling them "complete fabrications, false and defamatory" -- or face...

The New York Times has removed photos from its website that appear to have been digitally altered. From Fishbowl NY Editor & Publisher noticed that the New York Times had taken down a slideshow of photos by Portuguese photographer Edgar Martins that had appeared in this Sunday's magazine depicting abandoned house construction projects in the wake of the financial crisis. Now, instead of the gallery online, there is a short statement from the paper: "The pictures in this feature were removed after questions were raised about whether they had been digitally altered." It's unclear who made the original allegations of...

Sometimes you just have to laugh out loud at those who consider themselves to be "conscious, enlightened, and progressive". HawaiiReporter: "The University of Hawaii has confirmed that from January 2008 to May 2009, the editor, Kris DeRego, made up the names of 21 sources in his articles and quoted eight people identified as students who were not enrolled at the time the articles were published." Akamai readers will remember that the Honolulu Advertiser endorsed DeRego for Board of Education in 2006. After semi-naked pictures emerged of Mr DeRego with airbrushed wings emerged on the internet, he was defeated by John...

On April 21, the Business and Media Institute's Dan Gainor testified before the House Judiciary Committee's Courts and Competition Policy in a hearing on "A New Age for Newspapers." As MRC's Tim Graham wrote on April 22, the hearing was spurred by the steady drumbeat of newspaper closings around the country, and calls from some Democrat lawmakers to bail out and subsidize the newspaper business. While others testified on newsprint business models and the impact of the Internet, Gainor's statement to the subcommittee highlighted liberal bias as a major factor in the industry's decline. "The concept of a journalist as...

According to a report in the New York Post the venerable New York Times is much worse off financially than anyone predicted.

Retired military analysts are reacting with outrage that the Pulitzer committee awarded one of its prestigious prizes for a story discredited by an independent investigation, special correspondent Rowan Scarborough reports.

Most consumers use these sites to get cash—though usually at less than the gift card's face value—or to swap for other gift cards that can be used to buy food and other necessities. But others are approaching shoppers directly, gift cards in hand. I experienced this firsthand while scouring the stores for bargains a few days after Christmas. A woman approached me in a department store, asking if I could use a $25 store gift card to buy the sweater I was holding in return for cash. She said she had recently lost her job and needed the money. When...