A nightmare is a wish your heart makes?

Our local liberal rag, The Boston Globe -- owned by the faltering "newspaper of record," the New York Times -- is washing its paw in embarrassment over publishing a story this week about a seal hunt that never took place. Baby and Tiny would never, of course.  These cats will hunt.

"A Boston Globe freelance writer fabricated large chunks of a story published this week, the newspaper said on Friday in the latest incident to embarrass the U.S. media," reports Reuters [via Michelle Malkin]:

The Globe, which is owned by The New York Times Co., said it stopped using writer Barbara Stewart because of a story that ran on Wednesday about a seasonal hunt for baby seals off Newfoundland -- a hunt, it turns out, that had not taken place.

The story datelined Halifax, Nova Scotia described in graphic detail how the seal hunt began on Tuesday, with water turning red as hunters on some 300 boats shot harp seal cubs "by the hundreds."

And speaking of international news services, did you hear? 'Couldn't find the link and don't know for sure whether it was Reuters or A.P. (will update if and when*), but there was an internal memo yesterday tearing management's hair over the unprofessionalism of the news-reporting performance of said organization. Even they are starting to get it?

Just for fun:  We're enjoying a MalkinLanche thanks to Michelle's adding a link to our recent Sy Hersh post, which she lists at the end of her post under "More recent fake news from the professionals."

*Update: Thanks so much to reader Old Grouch ('love that handle) for confirming it was Reuters whose self-flagellating, "eyes only" memo got mistakenly distributed to thousands of employees and the immediate world:

Reuters, the news agency which bars its reporters from using the word "terrorist" in stories, is in turmoil following an e-mail from its global managing editor lamenting "terrible quality problems'' at the wire service.

They're the ones whose global head of news declared -- in another internal memo -- post 9/11 that "We all know that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter and that Reuters upholds the principle that we do not use the word terrorist. To be frank, it adds little to call the attack on the World Trade Center a terrorist attack." To be frank, Mr. global head, it adds little to call you a professional.

Comments

[TigerHawk]

I never got a MalkinLanche. Congratulations!

[Sissy Willis]

Cool, huh?

[goomp]

I guess we can say that the current generation of MSM journalists are not of the "greatest generation"

[Old Grouch]

"...don't know for sure whether it was Reuters or A.P."

It was Reuters. (Story at " http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=43780 ") The same folks who managed to run a report last thursday of two non-existant bus bombings in Israel.

[John Anderson]

I've never been there, and I've never hunted harp seals, but "shot harp seal cubs" should surely have caught someone's eye. OK, it is not the Globe - or even the Times - which fatuously asserted [paraphrase] "all items must pass scrutiny by four edtors" but surely if I (and many others) found that, well, questionable, someone should have caught it before it went to print. Too mesmerized by the "rivers of blood" [now there's an original phrase] to notice, I suppose.