Mike Barnicle

He didn't exactly quote the Carlin jokes as written, but they were essentially the same jokes. I think it's the nature of humor that once a joke is told, it can be told by anyone else without necessarily being credited. I mean, somebody had to have written the "chicken crossing the road" joke, but nobody ever gets credit for it. I think his suspension was only appropriate because of the Patricia Smith thing. If they did nothing about it, every self-victimizing special-interest freak in New England would have been dragging it through the press ad nauseum (Smith is black, which is only an issue because the Boston lefties have made it one). What she did is totally different than what Barnicle did. She made up people and quotes out of whole cloth and passed it off as journalism. Barnicle paraphrased a George Carlin joke or two and failed to say "oh, by the way, those were George Carlin jokes." Sloppy, yes, but still a big difference. If their respective positions were reversed, Barnicle would have been fired (just like Smith was in reality), but no one would have batted an eye at Smith's use of the jokes. Racism in the name of avoiding the appearance of racism; now there's irony for ya...

***Oh, an issue I didn't mention: when first asked, Barnicle lied and said that he had never read the book (it was later proven he had). This certainly calls into question the man's character (same kind of thing that applies to Clinton/Monica) but it really has no bearing on the Globe's decision.

He certainly should be suspended, but what he did is NOTHING like Patricia Smith's situation. Sure, he re-used some one-liners - I won't even get into whether he did it knowingly and intentionally, let's say he DID. That is NOT the same as completely INVENTING people, situations, and stories that you pass off as true journalism. If Ms. Smith wanted to write novels, that should have been her vocation. Presenting fiction as human-interest reporting is, in my mind, way further down on the ethical scale than revamping some one-liners. And the whole black/woman thing is completely irrelevant, IMO. It's a red herring.

I'm sick of hearing about it. ... I think that stealing a joke is just not a big deal.

how about I don't care? I don't read the paper, I don't trust the media. plagiarizing (copying without reference ) is far different from outright fabrications. people seem to be ignoring this in the race issue(and there isn't a race issue). I will agree that he should be fired. in school you fail if you plagiarize, in work you should be fired.

He was asked to resign just as Patricia Smith was but he said no and then entered into a discussion with the Globe and this resulted in the suspension. Patricia Smith agreed to resign. I do think that he used friendships at the Globe to keep his job but he has been there for 29 years so that should count for something. I think that what he got was appropriate for what he did.

Interesting, Almost all the commentors have said what Smith did was worse than what Barnicle did, yet so far 4 people have checked the "He hasn't been punished as harshly as Patricia Smith because he's a white male" option. Any comments from someone who chose that?

...is a big doofus and should be taken out and shot and then never mentioned again because I am sick of hearing about him. Patricia Smith should be taken out and shot too. And then all the other "journalists", but only after we're finished with the lawyers.

I think he wasn't punished as harshly as Patricia Smith because more people read his column, and he brings in more money to the Globe. *** upon reading others' comments I think I don't know enough about the situation.

This is a pretty serious thing he is accused of doing. I cannot imagine anyone with half a brain thinking they could get away with outright plagerism. And for him to have said he didn't read the book & then they proved he had even reviewed it, or whatever, he is having a serious memory problem. Then again, and I don't know the guy, I have seen people so arrogant that the rules don't apply to them. If he worked for me I would certainly tell him he would be out the door if it ever happened again...truth is, I would probably be out the door, too, if he did it again. He might have a medication problem no one is aware of. Also, the embarrassment is probably enough punishment.

Just think of all the free publicity George Carlin is getting. If it wasn't an intentional lie (as Patricia Smith's evidently was) he should make a public apology to Carlin and hopefully the media people will find something interesting to talk about....naaaaaaaaa.

He's always been a pretty lousy writer and journalist- the plagarized article was bad, but hardly his worst. On the other hand, I believe that Ms. Smith actually made up data for her column. Hmmm...which to penalize more? At least she was creative. JOKE! No, really, I think she abused her position in a more serious manner.

To add to what steve said, it's also the case that he is in the position he's in (a twenty year veteran of the Globe, with a long-time readership) in part because he is a white male, so that also plays into the preference issue. Twenty years ago you had to be a white man to get a column in the Globe. Patricia Smith should have been fired for what she did. So should Barnicle. Patricia Smith should be using her amazing writing talents in other genres than journalism. Barnicle...well he might be able to write better copy for the Jordan's Furniture ads.

He should have been summarily beheaded.

I'm not familiar enough with this to have an opinion... and I dislike insular questions such as this.

I feel very strongly about this incident so I'll try to be rational about my explanation :) Patricia Smith was warned repeatedly not to make up people and situations in her columns. She continued to do so anyway. And she was fired for it. Mike Barnicle *once* put up some jokes he got from a friend as his article because he was feeling lazy. The jokes, it turns out, were from a book that he'd promoted (along with 14 others) for 3 minutes on a TV spot. I don't remember jokes I've read!! It was sloppy of him, but this is FAR different from deliberately lying continuously when you've been told not to. I accept that he was suspended, but it's ridiculous that more could have been pushed for.

Anyway, it's all moot now - Mike just quit because of an article he wrote on two cancer patients a few years back. No word on what exactly he thought about it or if he just gave up. I should also point out that this information was all on NPR - this is a national story involving journalistic ethics, not a local political story.

His suspension wasn't long enough. I don't think that he should have been fired. I think he needed something more than a slap on the hand though. ***After the new allegations, it's good he resigned.

I did check the "white male" option, but I don't think it's a direct effect; I think that he hasn't been punished as harshly as Patricia Smith because he has far more vocal defenders with an outrageous sense of entitlement, and I think that he has far more vocal defenders with an outrageous sense of entitlement because he is a white male. And as a Globe subscriber myself, I called the Ombudsman and told him that I thought they should FIRE HIS ASS!! ***Ron--it's fairly common knowledge that Barnicle has also done EXACTLY what Patricia Smith did; a few years ago Alan Dershowitz sued the Globe for it, claiming that Barnicle had simply made up quotes that he attributed to A.D., and the Globe settled out of court and gave A.D. money, which at least indicates to me that they felt they didn't have a case. *** Details, in case anyone wants them: Barnicle published a column in 1995 telling a heartwarming little story from the Boston Children's Hospital about the families of two young cancer patients. The Reader's Digest wanted to reprint it, so they asked him for help with fact-checking, which he declined to provide. So they tried to look into it, but couldn't find any corroboration that such an event might have occurred. They alerted the Globe (recently), which asked him about it, and he said that no, he didn't know the names of the people in the story; he'd gotten the whole story from one of the nurses there. (He told the Globe that he got it from her over dinner, but told WCVB-TV that he got it via a Globe phone bank operator, meaning it wasn't even second-hand but third-hand.) He does not recall this nurse's name, nor does he have notes on it, but the column that he eventually published contains a long passage purportedly from the letter sent by one of the principals of the story to another. This passage appears between the printing icons that look like paired apostrophes, the ones that look like this: " We call them "quotation marks," and in a newspaper column they are supposed to indicate quotation. It seems clear that there was no way that Mr. Barnicle, who does not claim ever to have met the senders or the recipients of the letter, could have quoted a long passage from it, so he obviously MADE CRAP UP. A charge which he denies. And now you know.

i have to count plagiarism as a lower crime than fabrication, especially when you take intent into consideration

plagarism is wrong and unlawful.....I'd get kicked out of college, sent to court, and I think it's a 5 year minimum in jail. It's hard to avoid plagarism though...I'm sure these exact words are printed somewhere in this world, and if stealing a couple jokes and making them available to the public is a terrible thing then I'm satan!!!

just another example (like USA TODAY) of modern journalism being meaningless/worthless/value-less.

Since the links are dead, there isn't enough info for me to comment.