You just can't make this stuff up.

Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez tells a baldfaced lie, which also sucks in the New York Times hook, line, and sinker. Seems they can't be bothered to do even the simplest of fact-checking when a Democrat is involved. Trochilus of Trochilus Tales has the story:

That is what appears to have happened to New Jersey Democrat Senate Bob Menendez on Wednesday when he assured a Jewish group in New York that he fully endorsed the Senate candidacy of Joe Lieberman in Connecticut.

He then turned what could have been just a mildly embarrassing gaffe, into a full-blown compound blunder, when he also derisively told the gathering that Tom Kean Jr., who was going to be following him in speaking to the group, would try to tell them that he (Menendez) supports Ned Lamont, implying that they should not fall for the Kean trick.

The trouble was that Menendez does not support Lieberman. And he does indeed support Ned Lamont! Or, at least he did both before and after he spoke to this group!

Political junkies, and perhaps even mildly disinterested observers, may recall that Bob Menendez heartily endorsed the candidacy of Ned Lamont back at the beginning of August, when Lamont won the primary.

Read the whole thing at the link above. The story about the NYT blunder and their phony correction is pretty funny. Hat-tip to Hugh Hewitt for pointing to this post.

Speaking of the NYT and "All the news that's fit to misprint," you've probably seen how their crack management has turned their recent acquisition, the Boston Globe, around. The Globe had been one of the most profitable large-city papers - at least until the NYT company took over; now they are posting losses.

And, as The Florida Masochist points out, the putrid stench from Pinch Sulzberger's once-proud newspaper extends all the way to Florida. One of their other properties is the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, where TFM spotted this hidden away halfway down the page:

Herald-Tribune corrects photo with Foley story: The Herald-Tribune published the wrong photo with its story Thursday identifying the priest who may have sexually abused former Rep. Mark Foley.

The photo was not of Anthony Mercieca, the Malta priest who Foley's lawyer says abused Foley.

The Herald-Tribune took the photo from a section about Mercieca on the Gozo Cathedral Public Library web site. The Associated Press in Malta reports the man in the photo was a librarian.

Source at link above. Nice goin', there, fellas! I bet that poor librarian is just delighted to have been identified as a child-molesting priest . . .