Free Republic

Bloggers have been noticing since the Colorado massacre that James Eagan Holmes lacks what is called a “digital footprint”—that is, when one does a normal Google search or even an advanced Google search (using date, filetype, special keywords, etc.) of James Holmes, James Eagan Holmes, or Jimmy Holmes, you get nothing on this individual prior to the shooting. As anyone who has Googled their own name knows, anyone that walks the face of this Earth is found all over the Internet—schools they went to, clubs, social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc. Prior to the shooting, there is absolutely...

An autopsy for an Obama for America campaign staffer who died after collapsing in the Chicago headquarters was inconclusive Saturday. Alex Okrent, 29, collapsed at the Obama headquarters in the Prudential Building on Friday, authorities said. Paramedics gave him emergency treatment before taking him to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 11:45 a.m. on Friday, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office. The autopsy requires further studies before a cause of death can be determined, according to the medical examiner’s office.

An autopsy for an Obama for America campaign staffer who died after collapsing in the Chicago headquarters was inconclusive Saturday. -snip- The autopsy requires further studies before a cause of death can be determined, according to the medical examiner’s office.

A huge story on July 13 was the death of Obama campaign staffer Alex Okrent. Apparently, he had been at Obama’s campaign headquarters in Chicago, fine one minute, dead the next. Witnesses say he collapsed, whereby paramedics were called, and the next thing everyone knows, he’s dead. Young, twenty-nine years old? Mysteriously dies? Nothing to see here, move on… Except… Per the Obama campaign, Okrent had been a staffer going all the way back to Obama’s 2004 U.S. senate campaign—being on staff for eight years. That’s a long time. The guy must have a lot of history. A lot of...

New Book by Former 'NYT' Public Editor Offers Candid Reflections By Greg Mitchell Published: May 02, 2006 12:40 PM ET NEW YORK New York Times editors and reporters had reason enough to be wary of Daniel Okrent after he became the newspaper's first ombudsman in late 2003. Imagine how they might feel now that he is totally off the reservation, and coming out with a book on his 18-month tenure, on May 15, called "Public Editor #1." The book, published by Public Affairs, is largely a collection of his columns during that period, with brief updates, but it also includes...

IT'S time to write Chapter 2 of the public editor chronicles at The New York Times. Recently retired after almost 40 years at The Wall Street Journal, I've agreed to become The Times's second public editor - an outsider dedicated to representing readers and serving as a watchdog over the paper's journalistic integrity. In this first column, I hope to provide a sense of who I am and how I intend to tackle the job. The first public editor, Daniel Okrent, boldly established the genuine independence essential to carrying out the job and elegantly dissected many of the major issues...

It's official -- according to the New York Times itself, what we've been carefully documenting in my National Review Online column and on this blog for more than two years is true: "Op-Ed columnist Paul Krugman has the disturbing habit of shaping, slicing and selectively citing numbers in a fashion that pleases his acolytes but leaves him open to substantive assaults. "...some of Krugman's enemies are every bit as ideological (and consequently unfair) as he is. But that doesn't mean that their boss, publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., shouldn't hold his columnists to higher standards." Thus wrote New York Times...

Re "13 Things I Meant to Write About but Never Did" (May 22): As one of those people to whom The New York Times has become a daily ritual - even in Afghanistan - I say thank you. As should always happen when somebody takes up a new, ill-defined job, you molded it into something valuable and even groundbreaking. And in the end, you signed off with style, class and wisdom. We should all hope to have as much effect on our place of work as you did on yours - and on thousands of loyal readers. (Capt.) JONATHAN J....

THE PUBLIC EDITOR et me offer two statements about this paper's coverage of the conflict in the Middle East. First: I find the correspondents at The Times to be honest and committed journalists. Second: The Times today is the gold standard as far as setting out in precise language the perspectives of the parties, the contents of resolutions, the terms of international conventions.Neither of these comments is my own. The first is a direct quotation from Michael F. Brown, executive director of Partners for Peace, an organization that seeks, it says, "to end the occupation of the Palestinian territories." The...

On April 6 the New York Times published the article, “Sweden Boldly Exposes a Secret Side of Women's Lives.” That article included this description of domestic abusers by Gudrun Schyman: “It’s every man and in every class of society.” The article did not provide a shred of evidence to support that slanderous statement, nor did reporter Lizette Alvarez challenge or dispute the comment. Last week RADAR issued an Alert to contact the Times to request a retraction of that article. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of e-mails, letters, and telephone calls went out to the Times. But public editor Mr. Okrent did...

Last Wednesday, a lengthy Editors' Note on Page A2 scooped a scoop I had planned on the toxicity of scoops. The note addressed irregularities in a March 31 front-page article by Karen W. Arenson, "Columbia Panel Clears Professors of Anti-Semitism." The Times, the note explained, had been given a one-day jump on other media in exchange for its agreement not to "seek reaction from other interested parties." While acknowledging that this was in violation of Times policy, the note said "editors and the writer did not recall the policy and agreed to delay additional reporting until the document had become...

'NY Times' Unveils Expanded Opinion Section By E&P Staff Published: April 10, 2005 11:00 AM ET NEW YORK As promised, The New York Times unveiled its expanded Sunday op-ed section, a move set in motion at least partly by the decision to move the lengthy Frank Rich contributions here from Arts & Leisure. But there are several added angles, as well. For one thing, since the new two-page group of columns runs as a spread, not merely opposite the editorials, the name has been changed from op-ed to “opinion.” The paper has also shuffled columnists with longtime Sunday favorites Maureen...

Gun Shy March 11, 2005Click here to see a picture of OTM reporter John Solomon after shooting sporting clays at the Orvis Sandanona Grounds in Millbrook, New York. BOB GARFIELD: Ever since election day, the media have been wringing their hands over failing to understand how much cultural values mattered to voters. Among the most polarizing issues - gun ownership. Media tend to stereotype sportsmen, collectors and hobbyists as raging gun nuts, and gun owners tend to see media conspiracies to repeal the Second Amendment right to bear arms. OTM's John Solomon went out in the field - literally...

A FEW days after publication of my Jan. 23 column on innumeracy ("Numbed by the Numbers, When They Just Don't Add Up"), Tom Torok, The Times's chief database editor, expressed his strong objections to what he perceived to be a damaging portrayal of his work. I had opened the column with a brief discussion of a story carrying the bylines of Torok and reporter Jacques Steinberg, and then leapt into a discussion of the misuse of numbers elsewhere in the paper. Torok believed, as he said in an e-mail message, that I used their piece "as the lead example of...

The Battle of the (Bush) Bulge: Why Did the 'NYT' Kill Its Story? By Brian Orloff Published: February 09, 2005 1:00 PM ET NEW YORK "It's just as important a story after the election, and they've dropped it," says freelance writer David Lindorff, referring to the alleged bulge under President Bush’s suit jacket during the first presidential debate late fall. Lindorff’s take on how, and why, The New York Times killed a story on the controversy just before the November election gained wide attention this week after it was published in Extra!, a magazine produced by the media watchdog group...