MONA CHAREN ON JAYSON BLAIR

MONA CHAREN ON JAYSON BLAIR, on the spiffy new Washington Times Website:

I don’t believe for a minute that the New York Times is populated by racists making life bitter for black journalists. But if the accusation were lodged against the Bush administration or Citibank or Fox News, who doubts that the New York Times would believe it and broadcast it to the world? So how do you like them apples, Howell Raines?

Much ink has been spilled over the question of whether Mr. Blair got special treatment because he was black. Columnist William Raspberry, among many others, has argued that many white journalists have committed similar transgressions. Very true. But there has never, to my knowledge, been a case in which a white reporter was repeatedly reprimanded for errors and mistakes but nonetheless promoted and given plum assignments. You need not be a mind reader to guess that editor Howell Raines is determined to see black reporters succeed