WaPo Shows Where Editorial Priorities Lie

By Matthew Sheffield | April 18, 2012 | 15:36

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The Washington Post's treatment of two different cases of journalistic malpractice make clear how the paper's editors view slandering Republicans. It's not a fireable offense. But plagiarism is.

Here are the basics: Washington Post reporter Elizabeth Flock wrote a web post last year falsely accusing Mitt Romney of using a Ku Klux Klan slogan in his campaign speech. This was not a case of a mistake -- it was clear from the get-go that Romney did not use the KKK slogan, as the video of the speech incontrovertibly showed -- but Flock wrote a web article saying he did. It was a lie, intended to paint Romney as a racist. In doing so, she violated about half a dozen of the Society of Professional Journalists' Code of Ethics.

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The Washington Post's reaction? It posted a correction, apologized to Romney and fired Flock.

No, wait, that last part didn't happen.

Instead, the paper's editors allowed Elizabeth Flock, self-exposed liar and race-baiter, to continue to write for the Washington Post.

But no longer. Because Flock did something that, to the Washington Post, is worse than slandering a presidential candidate with a naked lie. She pilfered a few paragraphs from another writer at another news organization. She was caught, and suddenly she no longer works at the Post, which called her plagiarism "a significant ethical laps and not in keeping with our journalistic standards."

Plagiarism violates only one tenet of the Society of Professional Journalists' Code of Ethics, not half a dozen.

So now we know the rules of the game as far as journalistic standards and professional ethics at the Washington Post:

Slander a Republican presidential candidate with inflammatory, racialist lies, and you get to keep your job.

But steal from another news organization and you're gone.

Dishonesty when it comes to slandering Republicans gets only a mild rebuke from the Washington Post's editors. But dishonesty involving theft of the work of other members of the mainstream media - colleagues - oh, no. The Washington Post can't tolerate that at all.

Update: An Agence France Presse report sheds a little different light on the two incidents involving former Washington Post writer Elizabeth Flock. The AFP story says:

A Washington Post writer whose blog posts triggered editor's notes for "serious factual errors" and what was described as a "significant ethical lapse" has resigned from the newspaper. Elizabeth Flock, 26, told AFP that she resigned on Friday before the Post published a second editor's note about her work and that she was not pressured to quit. In December, an editor's note was posted above a blog post by Flock titled 'Mitt Romney is using a KKK (Ku Klux Klan) slogan in his speeches.'

"This posting contains multiple, serious factual errors that undermine its premise," the editor's note read. "Mitt Romney is not using 'Keep America American,' which was once a KKK slogan, as a catchphrase in stump speeches, as the posting and headline stated," it said. "Romney actually used a different phrase, 'Keep America America.'"

The most recent editor's note stated that a Flock blog post had made "inappropriate, extensive use of an original report by Discovery News and also failed to credit that news organization as the primary source for the blog post. "This was a significant ethical lapse and not in keeping with our journalistic standards," the editor's note said. "We apologize to Discovery News."

As the AFP report notes, the Post does not comment on personnel issues, so we are unable to determine the exact circumstances of Flock's departure. And while I used the word "plagiarism," it appears the Post doesn't view her actions as intentional plagiarism, but rather a matter of failing to properly attribute the material. Perhaps that failure was a simple mistake on Flock's part.

It is also is quite possible that Flock, in her role as a blogger for the Post, did not intend to depict Romney as a racist in that incident, but rather made an error or failed to properly check the information before posting it.

While the motive or reason for Flock's sloppy work in both cases is of central importance to the reporter, they are incidental to the wider issue of media bias at the Washington Post.

These incidents raise questions that the Post ought to answer.

Does the Washington Post view the improper usage of material from another source as a more serious offense than publishing false material that slanders a Republican presidential candidate? It certainly appears that way - after all, Ms. Flock was not fired after posting information slandering Mitt Romney, but she was not retained after using material from a rival news service without attribution, even though, on the scale of ethical lapses, slander is a more serious offense than failing to properly attribute the source of information.

Also, did anti-Romney bias lead the Post to allow the slanderous-but-false story to make it onto their website? Presumably, Flock has an editor or supervisor, who allowed the false, slanderous information to make it onto the Post's website even though it was rather easily shown to be false with a few moments of simple research. This suggests the paper has rather lax controls when it comes to information that makes a Republican presidential candidate look bad, rather than treat it with the kind of careful journalistic scrutiny it deserves.

While Flock says she resigned and was not fired, it seems clear that the Post was not displeased by her departure -- it is all-too-happy to let Flock take the fall here. It is easier to do that for the Post to admit they are, at best, lax in the practice of fair and accurate journalism, or, at worst, so infected by anti-Romney bias that they eagerly rushed the slanderous-but-false story onto the web without insisting first that it be fact-checked and factual. On such an explosive issue as an allegation of racism against a presidential candidate, the Post owed its readers the strongest of efforts to ensure that the article was accurate and fair, and it owed its young blogger the highest level of professional oversight to make sure the report was fair and accurate.

Instead, whether due to innate anti-Romney bias or sheer lack of professionalism, they gave readers a slanderous report and then let Elizabeth Flock take all the blame.

Readers, and Flock, deserved better.

About the Author

Matthew Sheffield is the creator of NewsBusters and president of Dialog New Media, an internet marketing and design firm. Click here to follow Matthew Sheffield on Twitter.

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Comments

More Liberal racism

Submitted by needle on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 3:50pm.

It has been apparent for quite a few years now that the Liberal media's regard for Republicans, Conservatives, Tea Party people, etc.tracks remarkably closely with a lot of Southern white folks' attitudes towards blacks a century ago.

Not only are Liberals ugly bigots, but they are way reactionary.

- Looking forward to the self-annihilation of the Manipulated Stories Machine.

But...

Submitted by rockyracoon on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 3:56pm.

Will she win a Pulitzer Prize for her efforts. Heck it wouldn't be the first time a liar at the ComPost won one.

Facts are like kryptonite to the liberal.

The paper fired her for the

Submitted by ForeverOnTheRight on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 4:09pm.

The paper fired her for the simple reason, they could be sued for plagiarism. But for slandering Rommney the world of liers, aka MSM, would rally around them and do what they do best lie about Romney and make him look bad.

Right is never wrong, Left is never right.

Are you kidding

Submitted by John21 on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 4:49pm.

Are you kidding me!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The U.S. propaganda media, the Obama Public Relations firms (NYT, WaPo, MSDNC, NBC, and CNN) have standards?????

They must be extremely low judging by the results of course since they are liberals the standards just says that they must follow the DNC talking points or the liberal agenda, right?
It gives them the permission to tell these lie right?
It allows them to make these wingnut accusations without facts, evidence or truth, Right?
It justifies all of the stupidity that they encourage, Right?
They really have standards written down somewhere, voluntarily, are they actually meant to be followed or only followed by non-liberal news organizations.

They really have standards written down somewhere, standards that people of honor would actully obey.

REALLY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I find that amazing but they were probable written when honest people wanted to be reporters not just the political hacks of today

OK... We do not have an open thread but this may be fun

Submitted by The_Barrel_Guy on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 8:16pm.

In fifty (50) words or less, please complete the following phrase taken from this article:

"... journalistic standards and professional ethics at the Washington Post mean _____"

We must fight to win every battle for liberty... The enemy needs only win once!

Exactly...

Submitted by Rukus on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 9:20pm.

Squat.

_____________________________________________________________ I'm not too drunk to dance! It's just that people keep stepping on my hands!

Let me try

Submitted by Cool Arrow on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 9:26pm.

journalistic standards and professional ethics at the Washington Post mean any number of liberal submissive, receptive positions as illustrated in magazines published by Larry Flynt.

There is no such thing as

Submitted by dr-go on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 4:59pm.

a Society of Professional Journalists' Code of Ethics because it was abandoned years ago.

What are "ethical laps"?

Submitted by Blonde on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 4:57pm.

"a significant ethical laps and not in keeping with our journalistic standards."

How very odd....ethical laps. She should have been fired for her lapse of judgment, vis-a-vis journalistic ethics.

Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)

C'mon B...

Submitted by The_Barrel_Guy on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 8:35pm.

Why would you expect WaPo to actually have proofreaders who understand that she wasn't running laps around the truth?

We must fight to win every battle for liberty... The enemy needs only win once!

Democrats Are Disgusting

Submitted by Rikki_Doxx on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 5:10pm.

The KKK was formed by Democrat's in the South to intimidate Republicans first, then branched out to Blacks, Catholics and Jews.

An Abbreviated Round-Up of Gross Incivilty in Obamaland

Submitted by berlet98 on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 5:36pm.

An Abbreviated Round-Up of Gross Incivility in Obamaland

We all want to be civil, right?

Just last year, with the deepest sincerity, our president implored Americans to engage in more civil discourse, to be more tolerant of disparate opinions and less confrontational, to “sharpen our instincts for empathy,” and to search our souls for answers to America’s disunity following the shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords.

Either many of Barack Hussein Obama’s rabid supporters didn’t get that civility memo or they interpreted it as a veiled call to arms since they immediately ratcheted up their uncivil, vile, mean-spirited invective after the president’s Tucson speech in total disregard of his heart-felt appeal.

Almost three years later, with a national election looming, Obama’s armies have taken to even more reprehensible rhetoric and, to supplement their words, have launched an unprecedented wave of deadly violence.

Cynics like Robin Leach foolishly think the president of the United States craves that gross incivility and mindless violence serve as tools to create civil unrest and a possible race war to help pave his way to a second term. He may be right.

A few selected instances reflecting the ratcheting but precious little soul-searching:

. A tourist in Baltimore was assaulted by a black man and, adding severe insult to his injuries, he was beaten, robbed, and stripped naked on a public street by a crowd of blacks who later boasted about the crime they had committed.

. Former world heavyweight boxing champion and disgraced, convicted felon Mike Tyson weighed in on the Trayvon Martin affair by opining that “It’s a disgrace that man [George Zimmerman] hasn’t been shot yet. Forget about him being arrested–the fact that he hasn’t been shot yet is a disgrace.”

. Obama buddy, black Harvard Professor Charles Ogletree, suggested on Al Sharpton’s National Network Convention that whites would be given preference had a black killed a white man instead of the half-hispanic Zimmerman killing Trayvon Martin. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=21516.)

Last night

Submitted by Chaitealover on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 5:49pm.

On O'Reilly, Charles Krauthammer said this was going to be the dirtiest campaign any of us has ever seen. The man knows what he's talking about.

Chai

"You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong." Abraham Lincoln

How will she pay for her

Submitted by sngnsgt on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 7:01pm.

How will she pay for her condoms?? Oh, Boo Hoo. I wonder how much her parents blew on J-school? Somebody call Al Gore. Maybe she can work for that loser.

No mystery!

Submitted by SaguaroJack on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 8:36pm.

It's all about hurt feelings.

Lying about Mittens didn't hurt anyone's feelings. Well, not anyone who mattered.

But plagiarizing a fellow Lefty hurt that Lefty's feelings. Begone, meanie!

You were born American. That's the best break anybody ever got.

Society of Professional Journalists? Now there is an oxymoron.

Submitted by drsamherman on Wed, 04/18/2012 - 9:12pm.

Journalists are not professionals. They have zero public accountability, have constitutional protection which they horrifically abuse and there is zero accountability for the harm they do. Libel and slander laws are quite tilted in their favor and there are ZERO training and educational standards or enforceable codes of conduct for them. It is a line of work and NOTHING MORE.

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