MICKEY KAUS notes that the L.A. Times says it’s still looking for dirt on Arnold, and asks:

Do reporters usually say they are investigating damaging charges before they are proven? It seems permissible to me–but if a Times reporter announced that the paper was investigating unspecified ‘potentially damaging’ but unproven charges against, say, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, I suspect the editors of the Times might come down somewhat hard on him. …

Well, that’s because John Carroll isn’t obsessed with getting Pelosi the way he was, according to Jill Stewart, obsessed with Arnold. Apparently, though, it wasn’t just pre-election hysteria, as the spirit seems to continue. Such obsessiveness is likely to harm the L.A. Times more than Schwarzenegger, if recent experience is any guide. Carroll should remember where Howell Raines’s Ahab-like obsessions landed him.

Note to Carroll: When Susan Estrich is calling you a partisan hack for the Democrats, maybe you should think about whether you really are acting as a partisan hack for the Democrats. . . .

Meanwhile James Lileks is Fisking some L.A. Times sleight-of-hand on another topic. Apparently the LAT doesn’t understand that quotation marks are for, you know, things people actually said. Hmm. Is the LAT in the hands of Dr. Evil now?

UPDATE: Read this, too.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Gerard Van Der Leun has more thoughts.