IN a report in The Australian yesterday (“States revolt on health plan”, Page 1) NSW Premier Kristina Keneally was quoted as saying state bureaucrats were “livid” over lack of consultation on health reforms, and that their first hint of the reforms was the cancellation of bilateral discussions. In fact, these comments were not made by Ms Keneally but by a senior official who did not wish to be named.

On Thursday, The Washington Times published an Op-Ed column by Dr. Gilbert Ross, medical director of the American Council on Science and Health, headlined, “When senators play doctor.” Dr. Ross has written for USA Today, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Times previously. Dr. Ross did not disclose to The Times that he had been convicted of Medicaid fraud and, for a period of years, lost his license to practice medicine. Had The Times known these facts, we would not have published the column. Link

An article published in the edition of January 18th 2010 referred to James White and his departure from AIB s corporate banking team in London in the context of a serious property fraud allegedly perpetrated in AIB by Achilleas Kallakis.
We accept that James White had no involvement whatsoever with Mr Kallakis, the management of the Kallakis property portfolio in AIB or any alleged fraud committed in AIB or elsewhere. We are happy to confirm that the departure of James White from AIB was entirely unconnected to these matters and that James White was headhunted from AIB by his current employer.
We unreservedly apologise to James White for the embarrassment and distress caused to him by this article. Link

UC San Diego turmoil: Sandy Banks’ column in Saturday’s Section A about anger over racial incidents at UC San Diego stated that President Obama’s father was Nigerian. The president’s father was from Kenya. Link

In an item in Amy Jenkins’s column last Saturday, ‘One big happy family three separate houses’ (27 February 2010) Amy Jenkins wrote that Helena Bonham Carter and Tim Burton live in two separate houses next to each other and that the nanny and two children live in a ‘third house in the same street’. In fact the house which the children and the nanny live in is next door to the parents’ houses and the three houses are interconnected. In fact the entire family live together in a single hoe that is fashioned from three adjacent former artist’s studios.The comment that this arrangement is ‘not so much eccentric as chilling’, is unfounded and we accept that Helena Bonham Carter is a caring mother and apologise to her for suggesting otherwise. Link

Samuel Beckett and his (future) wife Suzanne were not hunted by the French resistance during the second world war (Obituary of Barbara Bray, 5 March, page 37): they were hunted members of it. Link

Robert Pattinson: A Smart List item in Sunday’s Calendar section about actor Robert Pattinson said that “Remember Me” was his first nonvampire role. It should have added “since he filmed ‘Twilight.’ ” Link

TV Newser offered this transcript of an on-air correction from Wolf Blitzer on March 5:

We had a graphic on the screen that said “department of jihad” followed by a question mark and many of you tweeted me that you found that graphic to be offensive. I agree, it was. The graphic referenced a video produced by Liz Cheney’s organization “Keep America Safe.” Their video features those words on screen questioning the loyalty of justice department attorneys who had previously worked on behalf of Guantanamo detainees. CNN had no intention of suggesting that the Justice Department supports terrorism. Lawyers at the Justice Department are patriotic Americans and we certainly regret any confusion that may have been caused by our graphic. Link

Thanks, Daniel!

*Correction March 8, 2010: The headline of this post original and incorrectly referred to “Wold Blitzer,” instead of Wolf Blitzer. It has been corrected. Thanks to Marty for spotting this embarrassing typo. And then Charlene pointed out the fact that I had also misspelled the bearded one’s last name (“Bitzer”). (Turns out Mark caught that one as well.) An impressive bit of work on my part.

We lost our sense of proportion when stating how many people there are in the world without access to banking services who could benefit from mobile money technology. It is of course around a billion people, not a million as we stated (20 February, p 20).

A story on a new TV series called The Bridge incorrectly suggested there was a campaign by the Toronto police union head to tackle crime and corruption inside higher command. This is not true and we apologize to the Toronto police for the suggestion. Link

First they had the exclusive (!) that Chief Justice John Roberts was “considering” stepping down:

John Roberts, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, is seriously considering stepping down from the nation’s highest court for personal reasons, RadarOnline.com has learned exclusively.

And then RadarOnline.com had the exclusive (!) that he wasn’t:

Despite considering resigning from the U.S. Supreme Court, Chief Justice John Roberts will stay on the bench, RadarOnline.com has exclusively learned.

Above the Law has been on this from the beginning and believes the rumor originated in a Georgetown Law class:

We stand by our primary claim that this gossip arose out of Professor Peter Tague’s criminal law class at Georgetown Law, in which he tried to teach his students a lesson about the credibility and reliability of informants. But we would like to retract one aspect of our earlier coverage. We wrote:

Note the timestamps on the Radar posts. The first one came out at 6:10 a.m., i.e., the Pacific Time equivalent of 9:10 a.m. Eastern time. The retraction came out at 6:36 a.m., i.e., the Pacific Time equivalent of 9:36 a.m. Eastern — shortly after Professor Tague let his class in on the joke.

We now believe that the time stamps on the Radar post bear little or no relation to reality…

They go on to detail the time stamp issue and admit that some of their work on this false rumor includes an element of speculation. But, as noted above, they stand by their claim. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times and NPR also have stories.

Visual Effects Society: An article in Monday’s Calendar about the winners of the Visual Effects Society’s eighth annual VES Awards said that “Avatar” had been nominated in 11 categories. The film received 11 nominations in seven categories. In addition, the article said that “District 9″ won for outstanding composting in a feature. It won for outstanding compositing in a feature. Link

Thanks, Eric!

Lilith’s astrology column for the week starting March 6 was wrongly published last weekend. We are republishing it today. The Herald apologises for any sense of deja vu readers experience this week.

Stuart Gulliver, head of global banking and markets at HSBC, was paid £9.8m last year, rather than the £15.3m stated in yesterday’s paper. We apologise for this error.

In our article on January 15, “I’m too scared to go shopping on my own admits police chief”, we reported on a dispute over comments published in the Police Review about Peter Vaughan, the new Chief Constable of the South Wales Police. The Police Review reported that Mr Vaughan had said, in an interview with them, that he could not now do his own shopping for security reasons.

We have been asked to point out that the Police Review have accepted that Mr Vaughan did not say this, that they have apologised to him for their misunderstanding and any embarrassment they may have caused due to the regional and national media picking up or commenting on the story. Link

Update March 6, 2010: The Times (U.K.) also published this correction/apology:

A report and leader (“Danger, what danger? The police chief who says he just can’t pop into Tesco any more” and “Shopping Maul”, January 15) referred to comments reportedly made by Peter Vaughan, the Chief Constable of South Wales Police, about his personal security in an interview with Police Review. We now understand, and accept, that Mr Vaughan did not make those comments and note that Police Review has apologised for its mistake. We are happy to correct the record and apologise for any embarrassment caused.