The Detroit Free Press says it has "disciplined" Mitch Albom for fabricating events that didn't happen in his April 3 column. Albom's editor, Leigh Hutton, declined to say exactly what the disciplinary action entailed, but we can imagine:

To: John X. Miller, Detroit Free Press ombuds
From: Leigh Hutton

We've had a long talk with Mitch and we have disciplined him for fabricating events that did not happen making erroneous assumptions in his column.

First, we made him sit in a corner and think about what he had done, and informed him that there would be no Internet privileges for a week--not even to check his Amazon rankings.

We also disciplined four other people who had some role in allowing Mitch's column to go to print. Mitch was told to look in one direction and the other four were told to look in the other. And if we heard one more word out of any of them, we were taking the Lexis-Nexis away, and they wouldn't get it back until Mitch turns 48.

This must be what they mean by "bending over backwards not to fire Albom."

[via Romenesko]