Less than a week after demanding the resignation of star columnist Mike Barnicle, The Boston Globe backed down and instead suspended him for two months without pay.
Barnicle also agreed to reduce his outside work, which includes appearances on Boston- area TV and on the cable network MSNBC, though the amount of the reduction remains unclear.
The columnist, who had refused to submit his resignation, also apologized to the news staff.
In announcing the paper’s decision to the news staff and later during a press conference, the Globe’s editor, Matthew V. Storin, said he may have been hasty in asking for Barnicle’s resignation last Wednesday after his Sunday column was found to include jokes very similar to those in a book by comedian George Carlin.
Barnicle said he didn’t knowingly lift the jokes from the book, and the paper suspended him for one month without pay. A few hours later, the Globe asked Barnicle to resign after a local Boston TV station showed a video clip of Barnicle recommending the book.
The flap surrounding Barnicle follows closely the forced resignation of another high-profile Globe columnist, Patricia Smith, who was found to have made up quotes and characters in a number of columns.
Questions centering on whether the paper endorsed a double standard regarding Smith, who was forced to resign, while Barnicle was not, were raised by reporters during the paper’s announcement to the news staff Tuesday.
