Patterico's Pontifications

3/29/2007

Jack Dunphy Gets Nixed by the L.A. Times — Again

Filed under: Dog Trainer,General — Patterico @ 11:09 pm



Regular readers will recall that, back in October, Jack Dunphy contacted me claiming that he had been blackballed by the L.A. Times. I intervened with Current Editor Nick Goldberg, who assured me it was a misunderstanding, and that Dunphy has not been banned from the paper. Goldberg said that there was a new concern over publishing pieces under a pseudonym, but that Dunphy’s pieces would be considered on a case-by-case basis.

I told Dunphy that I wanted to keep an eye on the situation, and to let me know if he got turned down again. This morning he wrote me to say:

Pat,

I wrote to Nick Goldberg proposing to do a piece about the sham that is the LAPD’s new anti-gang efforts, which to date amount to more meetings, more paperwork, more bureaucracy, and very little else.

Denied. He expressed an interest in running my stuff from time to time, but not right now.

Oh well.

Jack

I find this odd. It’s not as though the paper considers law enforcement efforts to combat gangs to be a non-story. After all, they put a story on the issue on the front page of the California section today.

Then again, that story (L.A. gang prosecutions called overzealous) took the anti-law enforcement, ACLU perspective. You know the drill: bitch about the harm gangs are doing, and then bitch again when law enforcement actually tries to do something about the problem. It’s typical L.A. Times “damned if you do and damned if you don’t” journalism, from the loony-left perspective.

So maybe the editors think anti-gang efforts are newsworthy topics only when law enforcement can be slammed.

Or maybe Nick Goldberg has really banned Dunphy, but is just breaking the news to him very slowly.

We’ll continue to monitor this, and I’ll write Goldberg and see if he’ll explain why he wasn’t interested.

In the meantime, I have told Dunphy that any piece that he considers to be too provincial for NROnline can and should be published right here. Keep your fingers crossed; maybe the L.A. Times‘s loss will be this blog’s gain.

UPDATE: Here is what the paper does consider suitable for its op-ed pages. And Goldberg responds here.

17 Responses to “Jack Dunphy Gets Nixed by the L.A. Times — Again”

  1. I can certainly understand why the LA Times would not want to carry such a negative article. Dunphy should have offered to write about the new flashlight initiative which is set to protect the people from the ravages of the gangs.
    tL.A. Police to Get New Flashlights

    davod (6f3f2b)

  2. I hope the benefit falls to Patterico. But I wonder if some of the turmoil within the Times’ editorial staff may have some influence on the decision.

    MOG (36fd70)

  3. A police officer like “Jack Dunphy” with a policy or standards & practices difference of opinion with his employer has a number of honorable choices available to him. He could appeal to the decision maker. He could go through the chain of command. He could talk to the police board, his city councilman or the mayor to lay out his case.

    The L.A.P.D. is a microcosm of America, and it possesses its share of troublesome, difficult, neurotic people in its ranks. It would be no surprise to learn it has been saddled with a pointless turmoil causing leader like Merrill McPeak, early ’90’s U.S.A.F Chief of Staff. If “Jack Dunphy” is a senior L.A.P.D. commander, he could sit tight, wait for the inevitable command change; loyally, internally, vigorously advocate for and protect the line while mitigating the chief’s errors, just like McPeak’s successor, General Ronald Fogleman.

    If the situation is too difficult to endure. he could retire; seek employment with a better fitting agency. There is nothing more poisonous than to be around people who drain the vitality out of you.

    If the issue is of principle, of honesty and integrity, he could resign and go public.

    “Jack Dunphy” could do any of those honorable things. Rather in the name of “helping” the L.A.P.D., “Dunphy” chooses to act like Kim Philby or Rudolf Abel.

    Has “Jack Dunphy” ever considered that he lost his gig with the Los Angeles Times because the editorial staff concluded they were enabling the vendetta of a disgruntled malicious employee?

    Why do men today admire Eliot Richardson, William Ruckelshaus, A. Ernest Fitzgerald, Georges Picquart, Joseph Petrosino and Frank Serpico? Why will their names and fame live on in the centuries to come?

    Because those men are the genuine article, real “stand-up guys”.

    Ted Monroe (51ace3)

  4. Perhaps Dunphy should offer write about Diane Feinstein’s current ‘ethical’ conflict which seems to be conveniently ignored by the LA Times, but maybe this too would be too negative…

    Dana (71975e)

  5. You know the drill: bitch about the harm gangs are doing, and then bitch again when law enforcement actually tries to do something about the problem.

    Which is why the LAPD is in paralysis, and why middle class people keep moving out.

    Is there any city controlled by the Democrat liberal machine that works? Maybe Chicago?

    Patricia (824fa1)

  6. The L.A. Times story “Gang Prosecutions Called Overzealous” did not focus on the “ACLU” perspective — it began with and quoted the second-in-command of the L.A.P.D. (the other one), the Los Angeles County Office of the Public Defender. How distressing for a Deputy District Attorney who professes to have respect for his opponents in court to blanketly malign the criminal defense bar as being “anti-law enforcement.”

    Oh my, now I might be banned or dismissed for being “personal” again. What a sniping little spin-meister you are. You have a whole blog that focuses on attacking any little flaw in an L.A. Times story, and then you try to get away with a total mischaracterization. Is that really what you think the Public Defenders, Alternate Public Defenders, and criminal defense bar do, Patterico? Are we all ACLU lemmings who are “anti-law enforcement”?

    I’ve worked near and have seen the devastation and misery of skid row. But I’ve also seen the constitutional offenses that occur each time the mayor, Board of Supervisors, or police chief declare one of their endless “wars” there. The jaywalking tickets are not motivated one iota to prevent the pedestrian casualties that the police cite in the article — they are merely ruses, upheld by case law and judges, to search people. After all, how does a homeless suspect win in court against a cop saying that the perp jaywalked? Do you actually believe all of those excuses for probable cause??? If you do, you are either naive or evil.

    nosh (de5a83)

  7. Did my comment get banned?

    nosh (de5a83)

  8. Sorry, I apologize re: banned comment. It was there, then it disappeared for a few minutes and a couple of logins.

    nosh (de5a83)

  9. I ordinarily avoid dialog with commenters, but the opinions expressed by Ted Monroe (no. 3, above) demand a response. His likening me to Soviet spies Kim Philby and Rudolf Abel is an insult for which he has not even a shred of justification. I have demonstrated my loyalty to the LAPD and to the city of Los Angeles, where I was born and continue to live, for more than twenty years. During that time I have risked my life more times than I’d care to recall. I’ve been shot at twice and seriously injured once, yet I nonetheless choose to continue working at the very front in the battle against crime.

    My loyalty, however, does not extend to any individual within the LAPD or the city government. I wrote several columns for NRO advocating the removal of Bernard Parks as chief of police, a position ultimately adopted by the mayor and the police commission. I also advocated the hiring of William Bratton to replace Parks, and while I’ve sometimes been critical of Bratton, I’ve been careful to note that whatever those criticisms may be, the LAPD is in far, far better shape today than would be the case had Parks remained as chief.

    I am not, as Monroe seems to suspect, a high-ranking figure in the LAPD, and Monroe’s suggestion that I make my case with the “police board,” my city councilman, or the mayor suggests an almost childlike naivete on his part. Neither the mayor nor my councilman has the slightest interest in the opinions of someone at my level of the LAPD, and the police commission is headed by a man whose hostility to police officers has been well documented. To my knowledge, only one of the five current police commissioners has ever bothered to solicit the opinions of cops working the street. The rest are content to sit in their offices and rely on the information spoon-fed to them through the chain of command.

    As for the L.A. Times, it was they who invited me onto their pages, and indeed they were satisfied enough with my writing that they ran eight of my columns over the course of two years, even placing some of them on the front page of the Sunday opinion section. I am well aware of the ethical dilemma faced by the editors in publishing pieces written under a pseudonym, and I can only assume that those issues were discussed at length and resolved prior to their opening the door to me. How they came to have second thoughts on the matter has yet to be satisfactorily explained. Given the many revelations about the Times brought to light by Patterico and others, one might conclude that they observe the standards of journalistic ethics only when it’s convenient for them to do so. But in one conversation I had with a Times editor, he acknowledged that I offer a unique viewpoint into the workings of the LAPD, and that that viewpoint would surely be lost if I were to reveal myself.

    Ted Monroe should be assured, as should any others who share his opinions, that I would have no reluctance to stand up publicly against corruption within the LAPD, as indeed I did early in my career. But true corruption is almost nonexistent in the department. Even the Rampart scandal, often described as the biggest scandal in the LAPD’s history, extended to no more than a dozen officers. No, the biggest problem in the department is its bureaucratic inefficiency, on which I will continue to comment from the safety of my pseudonym. I can only continue to deal with the bullets coming at me from the front if I can avoid the knives coming at me from the back.

    Jack Dunphy (833e5e)

  10. The jaywalking tickets are not motivated one iota to prevent the pedestrian casualties that the police cite in the article — they are merely ruses, upheld by case law and judges, to search people.

    So you have ESP, too? Police work is just a thinly veiled attempt to repress minorities…or skid row residents!

    My recent ‘crossing too slow’ violation cost me a $109 fine, but I’m a middle class white woman, so I guess that’s okay.

    IOW, nosh, life is tough all over. Ease up.

    Patricia (824fa1)

  11. First, thank you Mr. Dunphy for your service. There are those who appreciate your risking life and limb.

    To Nosh and the other clueless Lib Ted Monroe, consider the gist of Dunphy’s criticism. That the LAPD responds to political incentives to minimize enforcement to avoid political controversy.

    Which has it’s own problems. Right now the Latino Gangs are conducting ethnic cleansing against African Americans. Deliberately targeting the most defenseless and innocent. Young girls. Old women. Just like in Iraq. Ted Monroe and Nosh got their wish, an LAPD made into a “drive and wave” agency rather than confront and inevitably kill minority criminals.

    Of course the LAT and Nosh and Ted pay lip service to this issue, but when it comes to actually making choices and doing something about it they recoil like the LA Police Commission, Mayor Tony, Najee Ali, etc.

    Food for thought for clueless Westside Liberals. Remember Karen Toshima? What happens when Latino gangs have ethnically cleansed African Americans out of their neighborhoods? Do they magically stay away from the Westside? Emasculating the LAPD inevitably means the whole city ends up like East LA, except for gated communities.

    Jim Rockford (e09923)

  12. Re LAT’s reluctance to publish Jack Dunphy because of anonymity: Do they know his real identity? Are they certain that he is who he says he is? If so, what’s the problem? I don’t know what I don’t know about the newspaper business but I always thought that editors and publishers were the ones to be trusted that they had verified the credentials and veracity of their correspondents and stood behind them. That the reader should make that determination just by knowing the writer’s real name does not make sense.

    nk (95836b)

  13. nk,

    Tim Rutten and Bob Sipchen have both met him. I’m not sure who else has.

    I have met him on more than one occasion, and spoke to him most recently at Cathy Seipp’s funeral.

    Patterico (04465c)

  14. Thank you. So he is not truly anonymous in my opinion. Unless I am wrong that editors and publishers, not readers, are the ones responsible for verifying and certifying the credentials of the correspondent. So the “pseudonimity” thing looks a heck of a lot like disingenuousness.

    nk (95836b)

  15. P.S. (Extremely sarcastically). The LAT, of course, faced the same ethical quandary because it did not name its sources when it revealed the SWIFT program to interdict terrorist funding.

    nk (95836b)

  16. To nk: I edit a small industry newsletter, and I’ve had several authors publish under pseudonyms because what they would like to write about would threaten their jobs were it to be done under their own names. Our policy is that not only do I have to know the identity of the author, but the other two members of our editorial board have to know and approve too.

    I’m certain that a publication as important (and as self-important) as the LAT would insist on a similar policy.

    Matthew Mitchell (8c9fdd)

  17. […] host is far better informed than I am on the goings-on at the Times, and he’s written previously on my on-again, off-again relationship with the paper. Perhaps he’ll have more to say on it […]

    Patterico’s Pontifications » Choosing the Next LAPD Chief: What You Didn’t Read in the L.A. Times (e4ab32)


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