With Critics Like These...

With critics like the temporally challenged David Niewert, Glenn Reynolds has nothing to fear - the latest attack relates to Glenn's coverage of the Francisco Nava assault hoax at Princeton:

Same with Glenn Reynolds, who as TRex notes fell for the hoax with a link Saturday, in which, among other things, he offers the following insights produced by the story:

I guess it's part of the growing climate of fear in America.

I wonder if this will get the kind of attention that politically-reversed assaults would get?

But even better is Reynolds' lame defense once he cottons to the hoax:

STILL MORE: Andrew Sullivan seems to regard this as an "Insta-Embarrassment." But there's no embarrassment in correcting an error as soon as you're aware of it. That's something that Andrew, and his friends at The New Republic, should have figured out already.

Erm, no, the embarrasment, Professor, lies in the fact that at the time you posted this information, the reports revealing it to be a hoax were online and readily available (the Daily Princetonian report was up at 8 p.m. Friday; yours went up at 11 p.m. Saturday, more than a full day after the hoax was reported). All you'd have needed do before weighing in with incendiary rhetoric and wild accusations about a "climate of fear" was Google his name; the story would've come right up.

Geez, I googled the story on Saturday and there was no Daily Princetonian report of a hoax.  On the other hand, when I go to the Daily Princetonian today, the site still says it is Friday, Dec 14.  My guess is that they are updating stories but not being hyper-diligent about updating their timestamps.

But Mr. Niewert does not need to take my word for it - let's look through the link he helpfully provided to TRex; reading down a bit we come to this:

The truth comes out!

PRINCETON TOWNSHIP — An alleged assault on a Princeton University student about two miles from the Ivy League campus Friday night was fabricated, police concluded after a follow-up interview of the self-described victim Monday morning.

That TRex link takes us to a story datelined Monday, Dec 17, and reports that the police determined the assault to be a hoax on Monday morning.  But darn that Glenn Reynolds for not noting that on Friday night!  What kind of a sorry Future-Pundit is he, anyway?

Or as an alternative, if actually perusing the posts to which he has linked is too much effort, Mr. Niewert could have followed the Sunday Insta-links to  Princeton resident Fausta's blog - that, and the PJM story make it pretty clear that, as of Friday, the hoax notion was unconfirmed, but developed over the weekend.

I have no doubt Mr. Niewert will promptly clarify and correct his post as appropriate, as an example of leadership by example [and he did - not quite quickly enough to spoil my fun, but let's say, quickly enough to put a slow leak in my balloon.  Geez, no stonewalling and denial?  I blame the season...]

Takeaway: Google - not for the unwary!

MORE:  The Times joins in:

A Princeton University junior who claimed to have been beaten by two men in black ski caps for his conservative views admitted on Monday that he made up the attack, according to Princeton Township police officials.

Comments

[kim]

Come back tomorrow!
==============

[Appalled Moderate]

TM:

Stick with the NYT or other old media. They take forever to correct, giving you and your commenters hours of fun.

As for me, I'll just remained puzzled about the significance of any of this.

"Incendiary rhetoric"? Is Niewert on umbridge-enhancing drugs?

[Sue]

He may have apologized to Glenn but he stands by his criticisms. By gum and by golly.

[Patrick R. Sullivan]

Niewort is still a Bush-was-AWOL true believer and is defending Dan Rather.

[clarice]

Well, with a record for perspicacity like that, who can argue with the man?

[Topsecretk9]

You know, T-Rex's been under a rock in that swamp he was in for so long he must not realize how late to the game he is and how ignorant this make him look:

Don’t these little effete Right-Wing college punks have anything better to do? Like enlist in the military, maybe?

Ten extra points to the commenter that comes up for a name for this alarming new syndrome, Martyrhausen by Proxy or whatever we end up calling it. I’m guessing since no one on the Right has ever had an original thought in their entire benighted lives, we can expect more and more of these types of incidents.

Alarming New? Because he missed all these " little effete Left-Wing college punks" with nothing better to do than create their own hate crimes

Calif. Professor Charged with Hate Crime Hoax
Reuters – Monday April 26, 2004

GWU student fakes hate November 5, 2007

Police: Alleged Gay-Bashing At Marin High School A Hoax

A 17-year-old top wrestler at an area high school here faked a series of gay-bashing incidents that prompted a police investigation, authorities said.

The rash of gay-bashing incidents at Tamalpais High School was the work of a student gay leader who claimed she was the victim of hate crimes, according to Mill Valley Police Capt. James Wickham.

The teen, who heads the school's Gay-Straight Alliance, admitted to authorities that she was the perpetrator of the incidents, which included vandalizing her own car with derogatory graffiti, police said.

for the short list. Oh and the mother of all hoaxes, the one invented to cover for 25 Bloody Mary's:

Air America Host Mugged, 'Right Wing Hate Machine' Instantly Blamed (Update: No Mugging, Just Leftist Hate Speech)

Does T-Rex even know about google?

[David Neiwert]

Of course, Tom, I see that you neglect to address the larger point of the post -- that Reynolds' correction, such as it is, doesn't address the fact that, having fallen for a hoax, the points he made on behalf of that hoax might be suspect as well. Reynolds rarely if ever does this -- he'll just post a link to nonsense with a brief comment, then when the inevitable correction comes, he just says "oops!" without explaining how the entire thesis is now in shambles.

When I make a mistake -- and of course, like everyone else, I make them -- I try to make sure my readers understand how it affects my argument. In this case, I made clear that the accusations that Reynolds had failed to double-check the veracity of Rava's story were groundless. But the rest of my commentary was accurate, and I stand by it.

[David Neiwert]

Incidentally, Tom, it certainly appears that you posted this in spite of being fully aware I had corrected the post already -- and then you added the update parenthetically at the bottom. You http://www.haloscan.com/comments/davidneiwert/1294509465018728657/#300112>posted so in my comments at 10:30 am PST. This appears to have gone up at about the same time.

That seems less than entirely honest to me.

[GMax]

Fake but Accurate lives on! Keep speaking truth to Power dude! And stick it to the man! Does that make you feel better ?

BTW since your thesis was Reynolds should have checked a story hoax report, that was apparently not evident to him and others until 48 hours is your whole commentary in shambles?

Quick back to the Truth to Power manta!!!

[Rick Ballard]

Another busted ironometer...

Congratulations, your self righteous sanctimony is way bigger than anyone elses. Give yourself a hug.

[clarice]

Quit messing with this turkey, Rick, we've a real live scandal developing on the Hill thread!

[Barry Caro]

As an opinion writer for the Princetonian, just an update about how our date stamps work. Our last print issue prior to winter break came out last Friday. Therefore, our webpage lists the date as that Friday. However, the individual web-only updates to the story get their own timestamps. for instance, the story fo the asault only made it into the paper on Saturday, so it is listed as "web update dec. 15". Hope that helps clear up the issue of timing, because even a cursory glance at our main page would show that the articles revealing this to be a hoax weren't published until the 17th and 18th, and only an idiot would conclude otherwise.

[GMax]

OH David, did he just call you an idiot? Of course you can say that its only an opinion but he did give the facts as an insider for forming such an opinion. Hurts dont it?

[MayBee]

When I make a mistake -- and of course, like everyone else, I make them -- I try to make sure my readers understand how it affects my argument.

What's funny is that you don't trust your readers to figure out how it affects your argument on their own.

[Rick Ballard]

"only an idiot would conclude otherwise."

One should never exclude mendacity through the assertion of idiocy as the "only" possible cause. One might even toss in "abysmal ignorance" in lieu of idiocy.

I know it's a tough call but a journalist can't really use absolutes without fleshing out the argument beyond simple assertion.

[TM]

Incidentally, Tom, it certainly appears that you posted this in spite of being fully aware I had corrected the post already -- and then you added the update parenthetically at the bottom. You posted so in my comments at 10:30 am PST. This appears to have gone up at about the same time.

That seems less than entirely honest to me.

Boy, for a guy with your track record of keeping track of when things happened, that is a pretty gutsy near-accusation. Can't we just agree that you have zero credibility as to simple sequencing and cause/effect and move on?

FWIW, I left a comment at your site, came back and posted this, checked your site, noticed the UPDATE and left a second comment acknowledging it. (I also recall making an interim check and noticed the Fausta rseponse, and even looked up "Rusty Shackleford", but you had not appeared at that point. And somewhere in there I took time to move a bookcase.)

I was actually curious to see whether you simply deleted the whole post (and was guarding against same by posting here) - incredibly, I have heard of such things happening, but never with you. Hey, am I giving you grounds for an accusation of bad faith? Why not pretend I accused you of deleting posts in the past, even though I am explicitly *not* doing that. Live large.

And since this post is not even timestamped, I can't wait to see your evidence of my dishonesty. Fabricate away!

As to my failure to laugh out loud at your "larger" point - yeah, when the premise collapses I tend to disregard the conclusion.

However, I am still searching for my own larger point. Let's see - Glenn links to a bum report and corrects it as soon as the news breaks - bad; Niewert writes a complete fiction and corrects it as soon as someone actually reads it a bit carefully - good.

Puzzling. But I know there is a theme there.

[TM]

Re the Princetonian and this:

Hope that helps clear up the issue of timing, because even a cursory glance at our main page would show that the articles revealing this to be a hoax weren't published until the 17th and 18th, and only an idiot would conclude otherwise.

Far be it from me to oppose the notion that Niewert is an idiot, but...

The Google Cache for the Daily Princetonian has a different look from the front page as I now see it on their website - if someone could save screen shots that would be great [I have now done that], but basically, in the new format stories are headed "Web Update" with a clear date under it; in the Google Cache, I see the same headlines, but no dateline. And what I see in the Google cache now is what I saw live this afternoon.

Good for them for changing the format; bad for them for pretending this is not a new change.

[David Neiwert]

Excuse me, Tom, but if you're willing to discard the entire contents of a post because of a single error in my case, then why aren't you willing to do the same for Reynolds?

You dismiss my points because you claim the "premises collapsed" -- even though they in fact haven't, since the chief premise was that Reynolds made sweeping condemnations of the academic environment based on a story that turned out to be a hoax. But apparently, the fact that Reynolds' premises indeed collapsed entirely bother you not one whit.

I'd say you've got a double standard working there, buddy.

[Tom Maguire]

I'd say you've got a double standard working there, buddy.

I suppose that's better than having no standards at all. So regale us - are you seriously reading the full string of Reynold's post on this topic as saying "Well, the underlying incident was a hoax but I stand by my "Climate of fear" conclusion"?

Reynolds is not pretending that this incident supports his argument; you have not yet had that epiphany.

I guess it is a race between you and Dan Rather. Tough to handicap...

On a related issue - do you care to stand by your insinuation that I posted dishonestly in calling attention to your sloppy research? If so, is that based on any actual evidence, or is it simply a useful, albeit random, ad hominem?

Or do you want to concede that point while insisting my behavior validates some larger vision of dishonest righties, or whatever your current fantasy might be?

FWIW, my notion of say-anything lefties has not exactly been taking a beating today.

[Uncle Pinky]

I see that young Neiwert has come to justify.

Did'ja follow the links in Reynolds' post. If so, you could hardly honestly claim that:
Reynolds made sweeping condemnations of the academic environment based on a story that turned out to be a hoax

Did he use one (later determined to be...hoaxy) example to illustrate?
Yep.
Did he update as soon as he was made aware of contradictions?
Yep.
Will you update your post re Hume once I've pointed out in your comments that you have mischaracterized his reporting? It's been a couple of hours and you haven't updated yet, so I pasted in a bit from the transcript. He certainly didn't make any sweeping generalizations, just reporting and re-reporting.

I'd say you've got a double standard working there, buddy.

Precious.

[Cecil Turner]

You dismiss my points because you claim the "premises collapsed" -- even though they in fact haven't, since the chief premise was that Reynolds made sweeping condemnations of the academic environment based on a story that turned out to be a hoax.

Dude, you really ought to recognize the hole and quit digging. Your "point" was about the postulated "climate of fear" and the insufficient basis for claiming one:

And about that rhetoric: Doesn't the fact that you used a hoax to demonstrate the existence of a "climate of fear" sort of, um, undermine your thesis?

The only problem with this brilliant observation is that Glenn's point was fairly obviously irony, in which he mocks the tendency of leftists to claim the administration created a climate of fear in such diverse topics as: the war on terror, Iraq, and global warming . . . and notes no similar tendency to respond to a report of such when the shoe's on the other foot. Your point was rather silly before the time stamp error . . . and it ain't getting any better with the retelling.