According to John Leo, Blair

and his actions are a consequence of the attempt to create a diverse employee

pool at The New York Times. This simplistic explanation is both mischievous

and myopic. Mr. Leo has not offered an explanation for the 1998 dismissal

from The New Republic of the journalist Stephen Glass, then 25 years old.

Glass also filed fabricated

submissions. Unlike Jayson Blair, Stephen Glass deliberately intended

to harm a lot of people through these fabrications.

There have also been fabrications

recently misrepresented some facts pertaining to Mr. Walter Mondale. At

the time, the latter was running against a Republican for the senate seat

of the late Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota. At least one commentator

who quoted the former speaker later regretted not having all the facts.

This same former speaker had

charged that then-President Clinton did not hold discussion(s) with him

during their flight to/from the funeral of Yitzak Rabin, assassinated

prime minister of Israel. The White House released videotape(s) that contradicted

the former speaker.

A student who also works at

a local newspaper in Toccoa, Ga., recently confronted the president of

his college [about] a false claim on the president's resume. The latter

responded that was an error by a secretary which would be corrected promptly.

This student made his discovery public but was chided by a number of locals

for not doing the "Christian" thing, that is, letting sleeping

dogs lie.

A college administrator indicated

that the president would not have gotten the job if this discovery had

been made earlier. A similar discovery cost a good football coach his

job at Georgia Tech and the prospective job at the University of Notre

Dame. There have been professors/coaches who returned students' grades

for nonexistent courses.

These individuals, like Jayson

Blair, equivocated, fabricated and outright lied! These individuals are

not African-Americans and were perfectly qualified for their jobs. They

did not get there through a diversity program. Please, Mr. John Leo, write

more objective and intelligent columns.

Ifeacho A. Awachie, Ph.D.

Riverdale