I was beaten to the punch in lamenting the NYT story yesterday about Ned Lamont criticizing Joe Lieberman for criticizing Bill Clinton's conduct with Monica Lewinksy. Tangential enough for you?

The initial NYT piece makes it clear that the paper steered its on-the-record dinner conversation with Lamont to the decade-old scandal. Who cares? It's not as if Lamont is touring Connecticut talking about berets and cigars.

But the pathetic gotcha journalism continues today with--help us all--a follow-up story that Lamont actually praised Lieberman at the time for his criticisms of Clinton.

Isn't this the sort of ginned-up news that was supposed to have been ushered out with Howell Raines?