For those who wisely avoid the news, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was convicted on 4 counts today including obstruction of justice and perjury. He is in line for a prison sentence of 2-3 years, although he promises to appeal (even if the convictions stands he'll never go to jail...gotta love those presidential pardons!)
Of course, most people don't care about this at all, they didn't care about it when it broke 3 years ago and they don't care now that it's over. The trial hasn't really received much media coverage (especially on 'On The Record w/ Greta Van Susteren' where they managed 0 mentions of it during the 6 week trial), because news coverage is seeker-sensitive, giving us what they think we want, rather than what actually matters (For instance, the AP upheld a self-imposed ban on Paris Hilton stories last week (which, ironically, became quite the story itself over the weekend), proving that they can in fact not write about her if they so choose), but I'm not going to go on lamenting the state of journalism and information dissemination again (and, again, I pose Neil Postman's question, what is "information", anyway?).
Back to Libby, media watchdog group Media Matters for America has crafted their own "Dishonor Roll" for media misinformation about the Libby trial, and it looks like they name just about everybody who covered it:
Time magazine and former Time magazine correspondent John Dickerson
The Washington Post Editorial board & editorial page editor Fred Hiatt
The Washington Post op-ed page and Outlook section editors
Washington Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward
Headline writers
Media writer Howard Kurtz
Ombudsman Deborah Howell
Columnist Richard Cohen
ABC News senior national correspondent Jake Tapper
The Associated Press
Fox News Washington managing editor Brit Hume
Fox News chief Washington correspondent Jim Angle
Fox News chief political correspondent Carl Cameron
Fox News host John Gibson
Maj. Gen. Paul E. Vallely, former Fox News military analyst
Fox News senior judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano
Weekly Standard Executive editor, Fred Barnes, during appearances on Fox News
Weekly Standard Editor William Kristol, also during appearances on Fox News
Hardball with Chris Matthews
Host Tucker Carlson
Situation Room host Wolf Blitzer
Senior national correspondent John Roberts
Nationally syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak (bonus)
Nationally syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, during appearances on Fox News
Vanity Fair columnist Christopher Hitchens
Former Nixon speechwriter Ben Stein
The Washington Times editorial board
Former deputy assistant attorney general Victoria Toensing -- and everyone who gave her a forum
Former Motion Picture Association of America president and Johnson White House aide Jack Valenti.
Judging by this list, maybe it's better that it didn't get that much coverage, if even those who attempted to discuss it professionally couldn't get it right. So I guess I should really say thanks....but I won't.
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