"Giving opinion a bad name" is something that Malkin has done for a long time. To this day, I get nauseous when I think of one of her columns in the Daily News 10 years ago, when she wrote in disparaging terms about Tikkun editor Michael Lerner, annointing him Hilary's guru (because Mrs. Clinton quoted something he had written), making fun of his beaded yarmulke and implying he should go back to New York where he belonged (even though he spent half his time in Oakland).

Malkin, author of "Invasion: How America Still Welcomes Terrorists, Criminals and Other Foreign Menaces to Our Shores," makes much of LeDuff's ethnicity and that he got into the New York Times on a "minority internship." She also published the following, the day before Jesica Santillan died last Feb. 21 of a botched heart-lung transplant at Duke: “We cannot ignore the tough public-policy questions in Jesica’s case that the sob-story writers at the New York Times prefer to paper over: When resources are as scarce as the supply of voluntarily donated organs notoriously are, why shouldn’t U.S. citizens get top priority? If Jesica recovers from the second heart-lung transplant, will any federal immigration authority have the guts to enforce the law and send her and her family home?” Which leads me to the conclusion that she is either an unapolgetic racist or is gunning for the NYT, or both.

Malkin's transplant article is here. Yes the Jessica story is tragic. But, lots of things are tragic, and sometimes we need to make difficult choices.

Is the NYT covering the people who are still waiting for organs because a citizen of another country illegally crossed our border in order to get organs that could have gone to a U.S. citizen? Read the article for all the other costs Malkin discusses, and consider the following quote from Milton Friedman: "It's just obvious that you can't have free immigration and a welfare state."

As for LeDuff, Malkin's article mentions another case which - if the naval officer is telling the truth - is a bit beyond the L.A. River piece.

Plus, since when did Cajuns become a Protected Class? Does this mean no one can diss Carville
anymore?

I guess Jayson Blair's transgressions are bad because he did them "over and over again," while Charlie LeDuff isn't as pathetic because he's only done something like the following on fewer occasions:

"In September, author and columnist Marvin Olasky reported that LeDuff attributed fake quotes to a naval officer in San Diego to fit the reporter's antiwar agenda." (From Malkin's column)

Kevin R writes: "But why let the facts stand in the way of a naked NYT smear."

What an apologist for slob reporters and sloppy newspapers (yea, uh-huh, they really screen out biased writing)!

Jayson Blair must be snickering "s-u-u-uckers."

Regarding Jesica and transplant medicine: tens of thousands of Americans die each year waiting for organs. Clearly, the system we have in place serves very few. That there are more "illegal" organ donors than those of similar status waiting for organs is beside the point. My belief (clearly not shared by Malkin who, though her xenophobia might lead one to believe otherwise, is not Native American) is that hoarding leads to scarcity, not plentitude. Santillan's death drew a line in the sand, and people decided where they stood; one sent an anonymous $50,000 check, another, a shit-smeared dollar bill with a note that said, "Get those people out of my country."

> My belief (clearly not shared
> by Malkin who, though her
> xenophobia might lead one to
> believe otherwise, is not Native
> American)

Malkin is (gasp!) Asian. Actually since Native Americans are theorized to have traveled to this part of the world via the Bering Strait, and have genetic traits closest to Asians, she's probably more closely related to so-called natives than Euro-Americans are.

And I love all the people who yell "xenophobe" so freely and easily, as they in the next breath conveniently tell their real estate agents to avoid looking at potential residences in, you know, "that" part of town.

Heh heh...Nancy Rommelman is about as far away from xenophibic as it's humanly possible to be. And not just because she's probably in Portland right now, or headed there, unfortunately for those of us who live and read in LA.

And far away from xenophObic, too!

Charlie is a credit to this nutball business. He's not sucking up the smoke from bureaucrats' asses; he's trying to tell the stories of the people who are usually ignored.
My understanding is that it's our job to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. Charlie gets that.
We've all borrowed from other sources at one time or another. What pisses me off in particular is the scary possibility that news stories will now resemble the credits on a big-budget Hollywood feature: "The story was written by I.M. A Reporter, line edited by E.D. Itor, given extra reads by I. Juanamercedes and U. Donpaymeenuff and copyedited by M.Y. Jobsucks."