John Podhoretz On Rushing To Judgment

June 13, 2006 -- WHAT do these items have in common?

* Seven Palestinians die when stray military ordnance strikes on a beach in Gaza. Hamas, the terrorist group now running the Palestinian government, declares its nonexistent cease-fire ended. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert expresses his regret and sorrow. But as the days wear on, there seems to be some doubt about the provenance of the weaponry that did the killing. Israeli military officials say they ended their shelling of a Hamas site 15 minutes before the beachgoers were hit.

* America goes berserk when a North Carolina prosecutor declares that some Duke lacrosse players raped a black woman. Three players are indicted. But as time goes on, her story begins to look increasingly flimsy, and the impression grows that the players were railroaded.

* This week marks the publication of Ilario Pantano's vitally important book "Warlord," in which the former Marine tells the horrifying story of his own near-railroading - when he was falsely accused of murder during a successful pursuit of two terrorists in Iraq and pressured to plead guilty to a so-called Article 32 offense that might have resulted in his receiving the death penalty. Pantano refused and was cleared.

Clearly, what we have here, in each of these cases, is a rush to judgment - the presumption of guilt in a situation marked by controversy and the fog of competing claims on the part of witnesses and those accused."

Nah. What we have here is the media, including blogdom, doing what they get paid to do. No successful media outlet has become that way because it sat on it's hands and awaited full disclosure before "reporting" the news. Rumor and innuendo, you see, ARE news, or at least newsworthy, so it's publish or perish. We've become convinced that life is moving too fast to digest it all, so tidbit upon tidbit is heaped upon our plate because the full course meal would require time for assimilation, and that means we'd miss the next bombshell while contemplating our collective navels. Some of us are adults and can separate the wheat from the chafe but no one gets rich today by catering to the adult palate. And even the mature among us rely upon those we trust to provide the real-deal as far as what's-happening-now, and move on without doing any of our own investigations, because who doesn't enjoy a spicy morsel of vitriol when it's directed towards someone we love to loath.

The competition for short attention spans is fierce, and someone working for the NY Post should know that as well as anyone. It isn't a rush to judgment as much as a thirst for entertainment, because, after all, we are all so very very busy and need our giggles and grins whenever we can pause for a moments time to enjoy them.