Read This And Try Not To Puke

This self-serving, unctuous ream of twaddle about Jayson Blair by Sridhar Pappu in The New York Observer, dated May 26. Well, if you can actually stomach to read it all, let me know how it ends. I couldn't get any further than this:

.... Colleagues noticed him falling apart. Mr. Blair did not hide his torment well. In January 2002, he checked himself into the Realization Center, a clinic in Manhattan, where he spent six hours a day for two weeks.

"Drugs and alcohol were definitely a part of my self-medication," he said. He characterized himself as a "former total cokehead."

But he said he didn't know what drove him to it.

"Is the problem the substance you pick up, or do you pick up the substance because of the environment you're in?" Mr. Blair asked. "Was I too young? For a newspaper reporter's job at a great newspaper, maybe not. Was I too young for a snake pit like that? Maybe." ....

He doesn't know what drove him to drink and drugs? How about being an underqualifed schmoozer put into a position way over his head, with high visibility and therefore lots of responsibility, because of his race? I think that would do it.

Apparently, Sridhar Pappu has never heard of "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me". Or, in this particular case, "Fool me 7,832 times, shame on you; fool me yet another time, go ahead and call me blockheaded stupid". Blair is still spinning little short stories; why any newspaper wants to publish them, or why anybody would believe any part of them, beats me.

(Thanks, Rich.)

Lane Core Jr. CIW P — Wed. 05/21/03 03:23:30 PM
Categorized as Media.