Talking Points Memo, the Democratic politics blog run by Joshua Micah Marshall, received a prestigious (within journalism) George Polk Award for legal reporting. TPM "led the news media coverage of the politically motivated dismissals of United States attorneys across the country," said Long Island University, which gives the awards. "Noting a similarity between firings in Arkansas and California, Marshall (with staff reporter-bloggers Paul Kiel and Justin Wood) connected the dots and found a pattern of federal prosecutors being forced from office for failing to do the Bush Administration's bidding."

Marshall is from the Inland Empire. Other California connections on the list of winners released tonight:

Chauncey Bailey was the editor of the Oakland Post who was killed last August while investigating a local bakery's criminal ties. He won the local reporting Polk Award.

Leila Fadel, Baghdad bureau chief for McClatchy Newspapers, receives the award foreign reporting. (She got the job last year at age 25 and is profiled here. McClatchy owns the Sacramento, Fresno and Modesto Bees.)

Charles A. Duhigg of The New York Times gets the award for medical reporting. He is a former Los Angeles Times reporter.

John McPhee, a New Yorker staff writer since 1965, wins the career award. He is the author of, among many other books, the great "Assembling California."

NYT, Editor & Publisher