Bad journalism of 2004

Times media critic David Shaw on Sunday ran his list of the year's worst journalism moments. His top 10 include Dan Rather's use of fake memos for a "60 Minutes" report on President Bush, the New York Post headline screaming that John Kerry had picked Gephardt for VP, and overreaction to Janet Jackson briefly baring a semi-naked breast during the Super Bowl halftime show. The only hometown gaffe Shaw commented on was the much-talked-about Times' editing of the term "pro-life paean" in a Mark Swed opera review to "anti-abortion paean"—and the subsequent multiple corrections needed to explain that Swed had no role in the gaffe and that "Die Frau Ohne Schatten" had nothing at all to do with abortion.

Also: Times reporter-turned-blogger Ken Reich falls into the trap of responding to stupid anonymous comments on his website. If you welcome anonymity on a blog about media, you're sort of asking for stupidity. He retorts well, however, to a nut who wrote that "news media is made up of draft dodgers and traitors."