The Winston Smith Award for Ethics in Journalism ...

... goes to pussykaty the poster to LiveJournal's Journalists community, who has edited out of her original post the mention of her unethical practice of writing fictitious letters-to-the-editor and signing equally fictitious names.

Judging by her LiveJournal userinfo, pussykaty apparently lives either in Birmingham or in the nearby West Midlands, working for an unidentified weekly newspaper.

In the world of Judy Miller, Fox News, and the Washington Times, nobody is going to convene a blogger ethics panel around an issue as small as this one. But it's an indication that the rottenness at the heights of contemporary journalism may well run all the way down to its roots, despite the best efforts of many working journalists who continue to stand for integrity.