Right-wing columnist Jonah Goldberg leads his column today (USA Today, 4/6/10):

Congratulations! This is your last week working for the man--at least for this year. The Tax Foundation calculates that Tax Freedom Day for 2010 is April 9, which means that by Friday, Americans will have spent nearly 100 days working just to pay their taxes. If Democrats have their way, Tax Freedom Day will keep getting later and later.

Every year there are journalists swallow this line--and every year, the Center on Budget & Policy Priorities points out that the Tax Foundation's study has serious methodological flaws.  Most  importantly, the group points out that even the Tax Foundation doesn't claim that it's showing how far into the year the typical American must work in order to pay their taxes. As CBPP's report this year puts it:

The Tax Foundation itself acknowledges this issue in a methodology paper accompanying its report, pointing out that its estimates reflect the “average tax burden for the economy as a whole, rather than for specific subgroups of taxpayers.” Journalists and others who report on "Tax Freedom Day" as if it represented the day until which the typical or average American must work to pay his or her taxes are misinterpreting these figures and inadvertently fostering misimpressions about the level of taxes most Americans pay.

News that an arrest may be in the offing in the Chandra Levy murder case--no, it’s not Gary Condit, but a man currently incarcerated for a similar crime--inspires many unpleasant strolls down media's memory lane. But the most unpleasant might be Jonah Goldberg's ode to pack journalism and rushing to judgment (Jewish World Review, 7/11/01; Townhall, 7/16/01 ), where the conservative columnist all but declared Democratic Congressman Gary Condit guilty of murder. Wrote Goldberg:

Technically, it's bad form for journalists to "rush to judgment." We're supposed to carefully weigh and measure every confirmed fact as it comes in. Speculation, gossip and prurient chatter shouldn't play a role in our thoughtful deliberations on the important topics of the day.... Let's give all that rest for a minute.

Having dispatched with concerns over professional ethics, Goldberg graduated to several paragraphs of wild speculation, among them:

I think California Representative Gary Condit had something to do with the disappearance and therefore possibly even the murder of 24-year-old intern Chandra Levy. (Corpses from suicides tend to turn up.) I don't know if Condit said to a shady friend, "Will no one rid me of this meddlesome intern?" Or if he forcefully declared, "Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia, er, I mean Chandra Levy" to his Hell's Angels buddies. But one thing is clear: Condit has not behaved like an innocent man.

Then, after stating that the story would "probably turn out to be a murder investigation--with Condit as a prime suspect," Goldberg reached his crescendo, endorsing pack journalism’s righteous supposition that Condit was the killer:

Normally, I am loath to endorse pack journalism and feeding frenzies, but this time the media is 100 percent right. First of all, this is news. The only reason Condit isn't a suspect in a murder investigation is that this isn't an official murder investigation yet. If or when it does become one, Condit will undoubtedly be a--if not the--suspect. But more importantly, if it weren't for the media pressure, it's unlikely that Condit would have cooperated as much as he has.

Besides, there's foul play afoot, and methinks Condit is wearing some dirty shoes.

As it turned out, of course, there's no reason to think Condit had any involvement in Levy's murder. Meanwhile, Goldberg's sullied journalistic principles (here are some more recent examples) did not hinder the Los Angeles Times columnist and TV pundit from steadily rising in the corporate media. Indeed, they may even have helped.