Editing Josh Marshall (section)

===U.S. attorney controversy===

{{2006 dismissal of U.S. attorneys controversy small}}
In 2007, Marshall was instrumental in exposing another national controversy — the politically motivated [[2006 dismissal of U.S. attorneys|dismissal of U.S. attorneys]] by the [[Presidency of George W. Bush|Bush administration]].<ref name="ep-polk-award"/> Marshall won [[George Polk Awards|The Polk Award for Legal Reporting]] for his coverage of the story, which "led the news media" and "connected the dots and found a pattern of federal prosecutors being forced from office for failing to do the Bush Administration's bidding."<ref name="ep-polk-award"/> ''[[Columbia Journalism Review]]'' also credited Marshall's news organization for being "almost single-handedly responsible for bringing the story of the fired U.S. Attorneys to a boil."<ref name='cjr-josh-marshall-plan'/> The ensuing scandal resulted in the resignations of several high-level government officials;<ref name='latimes-blogs-can-top-the-presses'/><ref name='ft-quick-off-the-blog'/> the Polk award in particular honored Marshall for his "tenacious investigative reporting" which "sparked interest by the traditional news media and led to the resignation of [[United States Attorney General|Attorney General]] [[Alberto Gonzales]]."<ref name="nytimes-blogger-prize"/>

After a weekend writer noticed that the [[U.S. attorney]] for the Eastern District of [[Arkansas]] was being replaced with a former adviser to [[Karl Rove]],<ref>{{Cite news| url=https://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/how_talkingpointsmemo_beat_the.php | publisher=[[Columbia Journalism Review]] | title=How TalkingPointsMemo Beat the Big Boys on the U.S. Attorney Story | last=McLeary | first=Paul | date=March 15, 2007 | access-date=September 9, 2007}}</ref> Marshall discovered that U.S. Attorney [[Carol Lam]] was also being asked to resign. Lam had successfully prosecuted [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] [[California]] [[United States House of Representatives|Representative]] [[Duke Cunningham]] on bribery charges and was amid a criminal investigation into a congressional scandal of historic proportions.<ref name='ft-quick-off-the-blog'/> "I was stunned by it," Marshall told the ''[[Financial Times]]''. "Normally, in a case like that, the prosecutor would be untouchable."<ref name='ft-quick-off-the-blog'/>

National newspapers were slow to pick up the story.<ref name='ft-quick-off-the-blog'/> ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' magazine's Washington bureau chief [[Jay Carney]] accused Marshall of "seeing broad partisan conspiracies where none likely exist."<ref>{{Cite news| url=http://time-blog.com/swampland/2007/01/running_massacre.html | archive-url=https://archive.today/20070502211844/http://time-blog.com/swampland/2007/01/running_massacre.html | url-status=dead | archive-date=May 2, 2007 | publisher=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] magazine | title=Running Massacre? | last=Carney | first=Jay | date=January 17, 2007 | access-date=September 9, 2007}}</ref> By the time ''[[The New York Times]]'' first reported on Lam's firing (on page 17), Marshall and his news sites had already posted 15 articles on the story.<ref name='ft-quick-off-the-blog'/>

Two months after posting his accusatory article, Carney apologized to Marshall. "Josh Marshall at TalkingPointsMemo and everyone else out there whose instincts told them there was something deeply wrong and even sinister about the firings...deserve tremendous credit." Carney went on to write, "I was wrong. Very nice work, and thanks for holding my feet to the fire."<ref>{{Cite news| url=http://time-blog.com/swampland/2007/03/where_credit_is_due.html | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070315180450/http://time-blog.com/swampland/2007/03/where_credit_is_due.html | url-status=dead | archive-date=March 15, 2007 | publisher=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] magazine | title=Where Credit Is Due | last=Carney | first=Jay | author-link=Jay Carney | date=March 13, 2007 | access-date=September 9, 2007}}</ref>

For doggedly pursuing the story, [[Arianna Huffington]] nominated Joshua Marshall and the ''Talking Points Memo'' team to the [[Time 100]].<ref>{{Cite news| url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1615198,00.html | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070430102201/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1615198,00.html | url-status=dead | archive-date=April 30, 2007 | publisher=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] magazine | title=The TIME 100 | author=Arianna Huffington | author-link=Arianna Huffington | date=April 26, 2007 | access-date=May 18, 2007}}</ref>