Theory: Old media tends to craft institutional morality tales out of individual failings. They draw broad lessons from silly scandalous stories to distinguish themselves from tabloids.
For a serious journalist, an indiscrection can’t be wholly personal. It has to be publicly meaningful, or else why report? They have to turn soft news to hard news.
Example: Ford and Lohan compulsively lie, so a Globe columnist concludes that truth has disappeared and twitter has ushered in a Dark Age of accuracy.
Please, columnists, leave these stories to Ben Mulroney.
