SI's Pete Thamel illustrates everything wrong with journalism today

I'm so thoroughly disgusted with all this Manti Te'o/Notre Dame/fake girlfriend garbage today. I read through Sports Illustrated's Pete Thamel's article with the full transcript of his interview with Te'o.

What disturbs me most is that, despite red flags, Thamel proceeded with the story and just "left things out" of his article if he couldn't corroborate certain facts.

I realize this isn't Watergate, and we aren't dealing with a matter of national security. But, most people in this country get their "news" and "facts" from "journalists" such as Pete Thamel. If we can't rely on them to do their actual jobs, which is to report FACTS, not just some interesting story, then we are in real trouble.

(By the way, Thamel has won a Pulitzer Prize and also writes for The New York Times. Hasn't the Times already had enough of bad reporting and/or plagiarism?)

Some of the "facts" that Thamel couldn't corroborate:

• Whether the alleged girlfriend even attended Stanford, much less graduated.
• No funeral notices or obituaries after her alleged death.
• No record of a car accident or drunk driving arrest after her supposed accident.

If Thamel had written this piece for my University of Florida basic reporting class, that's three "fatal errors" right there. (Fatal errors were actually factual errors, but we lost 50 points for each. One factual error was the difference in passing or failing the assignment.)

Pete Thamel, you would have just earned a -50 on this assignment if you had been a college student.

The fact that Sports Illustrated is even allowing this guy to try and justify his work is beyond me. At this point, TMZ is looking far more reputable and legit than Sports Illustrated.

But, let this be proof for you, folks: do not just take as fact anything you see in/hear on the news or read on the Internet. You will look like a fool!