Yesterday, I noted an AP story on the recent contempt of Congress vote that, well... had a few problems.
In the least troubling of the errors, the reporter -- Laurie Kellman -- misidentified Rep. Jon Porter (R-NV) as a Democrat.
OK, not such an awful mistake. At least, not by itself. And the AP's Director of Media Relations, Paul Colford, e-mailed to point out that the AP had in fact already put out a corrected version of the article.
But Kellman didn't just mislabel Porter. She held Porter out as a Democrat who had protested his own party's actions in bringing the contempt charges to the floor, and as agreeing with the White House's claim that the vote was, in Kellman's words, "unmistakably political."
Democrats did not even spend much energy denying it. One, in fact, even protested the contempt citation by voting "present" rather than yes or no.
Rep. Jon Porter, D-Nev., already had made his stance on the firings clear by calling for Gonzales' resignation, which happened in September. His spokesman denounced the vote as "politically charged tactic by Democrats" and sounded downright Republican by echoing the GOP's calls for the House to get back to debating the president's surveillance program.
Yes. Small wonder, then, that Porter sounded "downright Republican," eh? Being that he is one, and all.
So, what kind of correction did Colford offer for a blunder of this magnitude?
From Paul Colford, AP Director of Media Relations:
You have singled out a story by Laurie Kellman that was corrected yesterday.
That is, you are singling out a version of the story that was withdrawn and then amended yesterday as follows:
Date: 03/01/2008 01:20 PM
BC-NA-GEN--US-Congress-Contempt,1st Ld-Writethru/794
Eds: SUBS grafs 15-16, 'Democrats did ...,' with one graf to DELETE references to Rep. Jon Porter of Nevada, who was incorrectly listed as a Democrat; he is a Republican.
Democrats seeking Bush's impeachment settle for contempt citations
By LAURIE KELLMAN
Associated Press Writer
Ah, they deleted references to Porter, "who was incorrectly listed as a Democrat."
But is that really an honest assessment of the problems with this story? It's really not even an honest assessment of this particular error.
Why delete a paragraph if -- as the correction language implies -- all that was wrong with it was Porter's incorrect listing as a Democrat? Why not just change that little R to a little D D to a little R and be done with it? [Note: See how easy it is, both to make that mistake and to correct it? The mislabeling was the smallest of the problems the article had. Alone, it's a garden variety typo.]
Because Kellman's entire use of Porter only makes sense as part of the narrative so long as she gets the party ID wrong. Changing the party ID isn't enough, because a major tenet of the storyline Kellman was trying to sell evaporates with the correction. With the correct ID in there, the now-deleted paragraph is just completely stupid and embarrassing. The vote was so "unmistakably political" that even a non-existent Democrat cast a non-existent protest vote on it... said a Republican, who was actually the one who cast that vote.
But the article just keeps falling apart from there.
Kellman had set up as her major thesis for the story that the contempt vote was seen as a "proxy for impeachment," and that it had at least temporarily "satisfied" Congressional impeachment advocates.
Her proof? A comment from Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL), who's seeking Judiciary Committee hearings into the possible impeachment of Dick Cheney:
Is Pelosi's ultimatum a suitable replacement for the impeachment proceedings that Wexler and 18 other Democrats demanded in a December letter?
"It is not a replacement. It's not a substitute," Wexler said. "We need to answer the question where are the Democrats? Where is the backbone? The speaker has begun to answer that question."
Hmm.
Is Pelosi's ultimatum -- that is, the contempt citations -- a suitable replacement?
No, says Wexler. It is not.
Title of story:
Contempt Orders a Proxy for Impeachment?
Later changed to:
Democrats seeking Bush's impeachment settle for contempt citations
Paragraphs one and two of story:
House Democrats really didn't expect the Justice Department to present their contempt citations against two of President Bush's top aides to a federal grand jury for prosecution.
But the effort and having a civil lawsuit at the ready as a backup in their fight against the White House over the 2006 firings of nine federal prosecutors has satisfied, for now, some liberals who for a year have wanted much more: Bush's impeachment.
So, you tell me: Did the AP "correct" this thing or not?