A Full Frontal Loebotomy

Steno Sue's co-hack, Vernon Loeb, is in deep deep denial:

Loeb dismisses accusations that the military used his paper as an organ for propaganda. "I don't think we were spun at all," he says. "I don't think the Pentagon ever set out to make Jessica Lynch a poster child for battlefield heroism."

Let's go to the record:

"Pfc. Jessica Lynch, rescued Tuesday from an Iraqi hospital, fought fiercely and shot several enemy soldiers after Iraqi forces ambushed the Army's 507th Ordnance Maintenance Company, firing her weapon until she ran out of ammunition, U.S. officials said yesterday.

"Lynch, a 19-year-old supply clerk, continued firing at the Iraqis even after she sustained multiple gunshot wounds and watched several other soldiers in her unit die around her in fighting March 23, one official said. The ambush took place after a 507th convoy, supporting the advancing 3rd Infantry Division, took a wrong turn near the southern city of Nasiriyah.

"'She was fighting to the death,' the official said. 'She did not want to be taken alive.'"

Oh, so sorry, Steno Vern. Thanks for playing our game. Turn in those reporter's credentials and head directly to the Weekly Standard to pick up your presidential kneepads.

And here's Loeb's editor with a quick-and-easy recipie on how to get around that lame multiple sources rule:

But [Loeb] and Post Managing Editor Steve Coll say they have no reason to doubt that their April 3 story accurately reflected the information contained in those reports--even if the reports had inaccuracies. "We had multiple sources because multiple people were reading the same intelligence report," Coll says.

"Uh... I need another source.... Could you hand the phone to someone else and have them say the exact same thing? Thanks muchly!"