Glenn Greenwald: Jeffrey Goldberg's fabrication on NPR

[meegbear]

This is really quite strange. Yesterday, my inbox began filling up with email telling me that Jeffrey Goldberg had gone on NPR and, when asked about my critiques of his Atlantic article on bombing Iran, claimed I had "retracted" part of what I had written. When I read the first couple emails, I assumed the emailers had heard it incorrectly or were mischaracterizing Goldberg's remarks, because not only had I never issued any retraction of those criticisms, but I never wrote anything remotely close to what could possibly be misconstrued that way: I never even hinted that anything I had written was inaccurate, because it wasn't. I was reasonably sure that even Jeffrey Goldberg wouldn't simply fabricate such an event of that significance and announce it as fact on NPR as a way of discrediting a critic. But sure enough, once the audio was posted by NPR and I listened to it, I found -- genuinely, perhaps naïvely, to my amazement -- that what the emailers described is exactly what happened.

A caller asked Goldberg about the glaring contradiction between what he wrote in 2002 and his current Iran article regarding the efficacy of the 1981 Israeli air strike on Iraq -- a contradiction first flagged last week by Jonathan Schwarz, amplified on two consecutive days by me, and affirmed by several others who understood the contradiction the same way, including Harper's Ken Silverstein. After Goldberg responded to the caller (the caller's remarks begin at 43:30), the program's host, Tom Ashbrook, specifically asked Goldberg about my Salon article where I raised that contradiction:

GOLDBERG: . . . . I think (the caller's) just misreading the article.

ASHBROOK: Glenn Greenwald, I think, was writing about that in his--

GOLDBERG (interrupting): Yeah, but then he retracted it once I pointed out the mistake.

Ashbrook then asked Goldberg about another part of my critique and Goldberg responded: "I think of Glenn Greenwald as a humor columnist, so I'm not really going to respond. If you look at Glenn Greenwald and what he stands for, he despises all mainstream journalism and attacks every journalist who reports something he disagrees with ideologically." That last part is fine with me: just some run-of-the-mill, angry, accusatory rhetoric toward a critic. But going on NPR and claiming that I "retracted" part of my criticism of his Atlantic article -- when I never did anything remotely like that -- is anything but run-of-the-mill; it's pathological.

Last night, I emailed Goldberg, told him I intended to write about this, and asked him to point to what he was talking about, since I am quite sure no such thing ever happened. He responded by acknowledging that no such thing had happened and apologized gracefully enough ("You're right, I'm wrong. My apologies"), but then -- assuming I'd be writing about this -- went to his blog and preempted it with a backhanded admission of error (cleverly titled: "Glenn Greenwald and Saddam Hussein") which essentially distracts attention away from his total fabrication by accusing me of refusing to retract a false charge ("I mistakenly said that I thought Greenwald had retracted a particularly dumb charge leveled against me . . . Glenn sent me an e-mail in which he noted that he had not retracted the charge, even after I pointed out to him that it was false.").

<snip>

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/08/20/goldberg/index.html

[meegbear]

1. kick

[gratuitous]

2. Goldberg's such a self-serving little chunk of offal, isn't he?

Here's the rule: If you tell a lie on National Public Radio, you go back on National Public Radio to apologize. You don't get off by sending a "private" e-mail to the person you lied about, and then gripe because your victim revealed your apology. But Goldberg will be back on some show somewhere, spouting off as if he knows two things, and the people who invited him on will nod in agreement and thank him for his "insights."

[depakid]

3. If only that were still the rule

and enforced.

[Supersedeas]

4. but will NPR do some journalism and correct the record--or let the lie stand?