L.A. Times on Domenech Resignation
The Los Angeles Times has a story about Ben Domenech’s plagiarism and resignation, but nothing about his latest post admitting the plagiarism and expressing contrition.
I hope whatever the paper runs tomorrow is current and contains a reference to his latest post. Then again, they might not. After all, Times editors don’t have Allah keeping them up to date.
UPDATE 3-25-06: Nothing on his apology.
It’s not as though his apology cured the problem. Not only had he been a serial plagiarizer, but he was initially dishonest about it. He still deserved to be fired from the Post.
But it’s part of the story that he is now contrite — even though it seems the apology was dragged out of him very reluctantly, when his back was against the wall. It’s only fair to report that the guy has issued a no-holds-barred apology. It doesn’t make matters right, but people should know about it.
The apology was available by 8:15 p.m. Pacific time last night, and was reported on this blog within an hour. Yet even the next day, the Times web site has nothing about it. One wonders if the paper will ever mention it.
UPDATE x2: Commenter JRM says it’s not surprising that the apology was not reported, given its late timing (late Friday evening — the time when virtually everything is ignored). Maybe, as a practical matter, the apology couldn’t have been reported this morning, given the dinosaur speed of newspapers. (That was part of my point: to contrast newspapers’ slow reaction time with the speed of the blogosphere.)
But the apology should be reported at some point to complete the record. It’s just not fair to leave readers with the false impression that Domenech never apologized. If it’s not reported today, it should be in the future.
Also, JRM says the apology was not “no-holds-barred” because Domenech told a big pack of lies yesterday, and didn’t sufficiently acknowledge and address that fact. JRM has a point. But, on the other hand, Domenech did indeed appear genuinely contrite in his apology, and refused to pad it with more rationalizations. That is a positive step, even if the apology wasn’t everything it should have been.
It should be clear that I am not making excuses for this guy. I was one of the very first conservatives to denounce his plagiarism and suggest that dismissal might be appropriate, posting something about it in the early morning hours of Friday. I spent a lot of time and energy last night taking apart his excuse on O’Rourke. I agree with JRM completely on this point:
From the conservative side, it’s vitally important to make no excuses, to participate in no RedState “Yeah, he made a mistake but all the liberals are way worse,” sort of rhetoric, and to admit Domenech is not an honorable person. (If he were now, he would not have lied about O’Rourke and his editors.)
Amen. (Except: I don’t want to talk about what kind of a person he is, but his initial actions yesterday were definitely not honorable.)