All the News that’s Fun to Print

At the Washington Independent Dave Weigel – Delaware’s finest* – has an entertaining piece on some of the differences between the British and American attitudes to journalism. The occasion for this rumination is the departure from DC of Tim Shipman**, formerly the Sunday Telegraph’s man in Washington, who is returning to Blighty to be Deputy Political Editor at the dear old Daily Mail. Weigel’s piece is suitably entertaining, but perhaps my favourite bit was this:

That isn’t the view of Democrats who have been burned by the Telegraph’s stories. “They use anonymous sources to a degree that makes you wonder if they actually have them,” said Bob Shrum, the retired political consultant who managed the presidential campaigns of Al Gore and Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.). “I would have murdered someone from the Kerry campaign if they talked to the Daily Telegraph.”