LAT trashes Blackwater again

LAT reporter Paul Richter writes this morning that everybody always knew Blackwater was bad but they took the easy way out and ignored the problem. The story is based partly on anonymous or fictitious sources and partly on the testimony of a woman named Janessa Gans who Richter describes as an official in Iraq for two years. What that means is any one's guess. However, a little Googling indicates that she was a political officer in the U. S. embassy in Baghdad from 2003 to 2005, apparently a relatively low-level position. It also indicates that she is an activist, an opponent of U.S. policy in Iraq, an opponent of Israel and a proponent of Jimmy Carter's views on Israel, Palestine and perhaps everything else. A news article based on testimony of a partisan like Janessa Gans ought to include testimony of equal weight from a partisan on the opposite side of the issue. Otherwise, the article must be considered opinion instead of news and should appear in the opinion pages of the newspaper.