Pretty amazing to watch the New York Times cover the Jayson Blair story. As a former weekly reporter who was told by one too many dailies, we won't even consider talking to you without five years of daily experience, I find the ease with which he found himself going from intern to full time reporter a little disturbing. Jealous? Bitter? You bet your ass.

But given that, I'm still not sure I would have used the analogy of "a huge black eye" to describe the current situation. Even Safire's column today uses it. Until the contradictions in this story are cleared up, and someone offers a reasonable explanation for why a person so obviously in need of firing wasn't, I'd think the Times would be a bit more careful with the words it uses.