Cover-Up at the Boston Globe
In 1998 I wrote a series of columns (along with the introduction below) about fabrications by Boston Globe columnist Patricia Smith and Mike Barnicle. While I'm doing other kinds of writing now, I believe these columns provide a good model for how media criticism should be conducted in the face of serious wrongdoing, particularly in the way they try to speak truth to power and clarify what was often left confused and muddled.
The last act, in which Mike Barnicle finally resigned, isn't commented on in the narrative.
2011 / Ken Sanes
The Boston Globe has a pattern of concealing
information from the public. It covered up the existence of fabrications in Patricia Smith
columns for a number of years. At the same time, it has been engaged in a years-long
holding action designed to protect one of its star columnists, Mike Barnicle, from
allegations that he invented information and took ideas from other writers.
Unfortunately, the Boston Globe still hasn't come clean with readers. Now it is trying to distract attention from the role of its top editors in concealing the information.
The time is long overdue for a significant change at the
newspaper, both in staff and in the way it defines its mission.
July: Overview
The Present Controversy *
What's Wrong With The Boston Globe And How to Fix It*
July: Details
Patricia Smith's Virtual Reality *
Barnicle and Dershowitz: When Worlds Collide *
Chronology of a Cover-Up
August 6
Mike Barnicle Does It Again *
Barnicle's Borrowings
August 11
The Barnicle Debacle *
Criticism of Globe Intensifying: Quick Notes on
Brill's
Content, Herald Coverage, Letter
* = main stories
You can find other work by me at my Transparency website .
| mediacrit at transparencynow dot com | � Ken Sanes. All rights reserved.