The Scrutinator

Hugh Hewitt's column in the Weekly Standard, A Cover-Up Is a Cover-Up, brings together disparate recent scandals in major American institutions to show that there are some startling similarities. The CBS News Memogate scandal fits the bill.

LARGE AND POWERFUL INSTITUTIONS do not react well to internal scandal, especially when that scandal threatens to erode a central pillar of the institution's authority. The first reaction will almost inevitably be denial, followed by various efforts to isolate and minimize the scandal, to protect leadership, and then to adopt only such "reforms" as are forced upon it. Genuine accountability and reform typically only accompany a crash so spectacular that no one can persist in the cover-up.