Who Could It Be Now?

• Once when I was covering the first Bush White House, I was in The Times’s seat in the crowded White House press room, listening to an administration official’s background briefing…At first [Judy] leaned against the wall near where I was sitting, but I noticed that she seemed agitated about something. Midway through the briefing, she came over and whispered to me, “I think I should be sitting in the Times seat.”

  It was such an outrageous move, I could only laugh. I got up and stood in the back of the room, while Judy claimed what she felt was her rightful power perch.

• She never knew when to quit. That was her talent and her flaw. Sorely in need of a tight editorial leash, she was kept on no leash at all, and that has hurt this paper and its trust with readers. She more than earned her sobriquet “Miss Run Amok.”

• Judy told The Times that she plans to write a book and intends to return to the newsroom, hoping to cover “the same thing I’ve always covered – threats to our country.” If that were to happen, the institution most in danger would be the newspaper in your hands.

From the Times: “‘You’d open a drawer, looking for a pen or Post-it notes, and it would be full of dirty socks,’ recalled Karen Patton Seymour, a former assistant United States attorney who tried a major case with him. ‘He was a mess. Food here, clothes there, papers everywhere. But behind all that was a totally organized mind.

From the Post: “Chuck Rosenberg, U.S. attorney in Houston, said Fitzgerald’s doggedness is legendary.

‘Pat takes the same approach to all his cases. He works them harder and knows them better than any soul on the planet,’ Rosenberg said. ‘I’ll sometimes ask Pat a question about something in my district. Not only will I get an e-mailed answer dated at 2 o’clock in the morning, but it will go on for three single-spaced pages.’

(Hmmm…Sounds just like…Whitewater/Monicagate?)

“This is not so much about Scooter Libby and Karl Rove. This is about the fact that the President didn’t tell us the truth when we went to Iraq, and all these guys involved in it, it’s a huge cover-up. That’s what they’re in trouble for. The deed that led to it is an attack on the President’s dishonesty over the Iraq question. This is all — came to pass because of Joseph Wilson…”