How Do You Solve A Problem Like Geraldo?

That’s the (paraphrased) question that has come up again and again since Alessandra Stanley’s contested “nudge” column on September 5th. Geraldo demanded a retration, an apology. He said he would sue. The Times stood behind Stalnley and would not be nudged. The blogosphere got into it; the debate swirled on. Last Sunday, NYT Public Editor Barney Calame came out in favor of Geraldo, saying there had been no visible nudge. Yesterday, finally, the Times acknowledged the error and admitted that there had been no nudge, per se.

And so that’s that, except not really, because the New York Times is an important institution and this was an atypical situation. How they responded to it may well be construed as indicative of its institutional attitude towards strict accuracy, admission of fault and responsiveness to public opinion — all issues that remain significant in the wake of the recent scandal involving Jayson Blair.

Geraldo is satisfied with the reversal — barely. He’s not going to sue but as he told the NY Post, he’s not impressed: “[T]he way they did it — the grudging, rude and disrespectful way they did it — still irks me.”

Did the Times fall short? We think so, as we said yesterday and in our response to Calame’s column and cheap shot at Geraldo. We asked a few noted media-watchers for their opinion on how the Times handled it.

PressThink‘s Jay Rosen gave it some PressThought, like so:

The part I found most disturbing was when Calame wrote, “Ms. Stanley declined my invitation to watch the tape with me.” If you are confident in what you wrote, and you wrote it from the footage in the tape, why decline, since he’s going to write about the dispute with Geraldo anyway? There may be reasons we are not privy to, of course. But that bothers me because they’re both risking their opinions if they watch it together.

If Keller is calling it a “semi-close call,” which to me lies in between “not even close” and “close;” if he’s saying, alright, if you wanna get technical, there really was no nudge; and you’ve got Romenesko going with, NYT editor’s note admits no nudge seen in Geraldo’s report, I think they should have published a correction to the review. Calame is clearly astonished that Keller didn’t. Of course, Geraldo threatened lawsuits so that may have something to do with it. And he’s Geraldo, who has never had anything but pariah status among the established press.

Also this “whether” part confused me: “Whether Mr. Rivera gently edged the airman out of the way with an elbow (literally ‘nudged’), or told him to step aside, or threw a body block, or just barged into an opening – it’s hard to tell, since it happened just off-camera.” If it happened off camera, how does Keller know about it? By definition the video only shows what was on camera. And if he saw it in footage that wasn’t broadcast, then he could tell us: gentle nudge, verbal signal, body block. But he leaves it a mystery.” Stanley wrote her piece off the television set, she wasn’t standing there with the relief workers. So where does he get “since it happened just off-camera.” Doesn’t that imply on observer on the scene who saw it?

Regret The Error ‘s Craig Silverman was surprised that the Times ran the correction, though pleasantly so. As we quoted him as saying yesterday, he was gratified to see the Public Editor position having real sway at the paper. He takes issue not only with the NYT’s definition of “nudge” (“some of the most specious hair-splitting since the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal”) but the fact that it was used as the basis for their justification of the entire incident:

It’s shocking Keller basically told Calame that Geraldo’s showboating and pushiness during the segment in question gave Stanley the right to attribute a fake action to him. That’s outrageous. Now look what this has wrought: Many columns, news stories and even TV segments about the dispute, in addition to questions about Stanley’s overall level of accuracy… When you think about it, the Times could have run a short, simple correction just after this happened and everyone would have forgotten all about it. It’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up.

And, finally, Slate “Pressbox” columnist Jack Shafer sums it up:

Bill Keller did the right thing, for which the many assholes who live to torment the New York Times will make him suffer.

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