Wednesday, May 28, 2003

I am a recent transplant to beautiful Fayetteville. The two items I have relied upon to help me and my family settle in here are the county map and the weekly newspaper The Citizen. I have usually avoided the regular columns in newspapers and newsmagazines but recently browsed certain columns because of the currency of their topics.

Last Wednesday, I read John Leo's column on diversity and the consequent lies and incompetence of one of its beneficiaries, Jayson Blair. The latter is said to have filed submissions essentially fabricated and plagiarized from other journalists. His problems started long before The New York Times but he was finally caught and dismissed by this authoritative newspaper. Many people, journalists and non-journalists, African-Americans and non-African-Americans, have condemned Jayson Blair. Some have attempted a rationalization of Blair's actions. Amongst these is John Leo, who is also a contributor to US News & World Report.

According to John Leo, Blair and his actions are a consequence of the attempt to create a diverse employee pool at The New York Times. This simplistic explanation is both mischievous and myopic. Mr. Leo has not offered an explanation for the 1998 dismissal from The New Republic of the journalist Stephen Glass, then 25 years old.

Glass also filed fabricated submissions. Unlike Jayson Blair, Stephen Glass deliberately intended to harm a lot of people through these fabrications.

There have also been fabrications by non-journalists. The former speaker of the House of Representatives recently misrepresented some facts pertaining to Mr. Walter Mondale. At the time, the latter was running against a Republican for the senate seat of the late Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota. At least one commentator who quoted the former speaker later regretted not having all the facts.

This same former speaker had charged that then-President Clinton did not hold discussion(s) with him during their flight to/from the funeral of Yitzak Rabin, assassinated prime minister of Israel. The White House released videotape(s) that contradicted the former speaker.

A student who also works at a local newspaper in Toccoa, Ga., recently confronted the president of his college [about] a false claim on the president's resume. The latter responded that was an error by a secretary which would be corrected promptly. This student made his discovery public but was chided by a number of locals for not doing the "Christian" thing, that is, letting sleeping dogs lie.

A college administrator indicated that the president would not have gotten the job if this discovery had been made earlier. A similar discovery cost a good football coach his job at Georgia Tech and the prospective job at the University of Notre Dame. There have been professors/coaches who returned students' grades for nonexistent courses.

These individuals, like Jayson Blair, equivocated, fabricated and outright lied! These individuals are not African-Americans and were perfectly qualified for their jobs. They did not get there through a diversity program. Please, Mr. John Leo, write more objective and intelligent columns.

Ifeacho A. Awachie, Ph.D.

Riverdale