The Audit

Audit Notes: Hardly a Nick, European Fallout, Shopping for Ratings

By Ryan Chittum   May 24, 2010 at 06:25 PM

I wrote this morning that the financial-reform bill is like taking a firebug's matches away and leaving him with his... More

Bloomberg Investigates a “Double Irish” Corporate Tax Scheme

By Ryan Chittum   May 24, 2010 at 04:31 PM

A tip of The Audit's cap to Bloomberg, which had an excellent investigation last week on a big way corporations... More

WaPo Gives Dodd the Tick-Tock Treatment

By Holly Yeager   May 24, 2010 at 01:15 PM

Washington newsrooms don’t generate too many tick-tocks these days, and that’s too bad. As a bare-bones version of the form... More

The Times on What Financial Reform Really Means

By Ryan Chittum   May 24, 2010 at 12:07 PM

Binyamin Appelbaum of The New York Times has the smartest take I've seen yet on what the impending passage of... More

Audit Notes: Pretty Pensions, Private Equity Walks, Payday Lenders Skate

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2010 at 07:17 PM

Kudos to the Times’s Mary Williams Walsh and Amy Schoenfeld for a corker of an exposé on six-figure pensions larding... More

Mostly Muddled Coverage of the Housing Market

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2010 at 05:50 PM

How optimistic should we be about the housing market? After reading press coverage of April's mortgage stats, you'd be forgiven... More

The Journal Reveals Another Facebook Privacy Gaffe

By Ryan Chittum   May 21, 2010 at 11:30 AM

The Wall Street Journal gets a nice Facebook/MySpace privacy scoop this morning, reporting that the sites—particularly Facebook—send along personal-identification information... More

Audit Notes: A-hed Hed, Deflation, BW or BBW?

By Ryan Chittum   May 20, 2010 at 07:42 PM

Headline of the Week goes to The Wall Street Journal for this A-hed: In England, Buying the Farm Can Be... More

Audit D.C. Notes: WaPo on Where the Lobbyists Are, NYT on Whistleblower Buyouts, a Senator Says Too Much

By Holly Yeager   May 20, 2010 at 03:10 PM

A wise editor once told me that good journalism is the stuff that readers cut out and stick on the... More

All the Banks in Georgia

Small-bank failures are child’s play in a too-big-to-fail world

By Ryan Chittum   May 20, 2010 at 01:46 PM

It's a good idea to point out that small banks are failing, too. This is hardly a news flash, but... More

Is Washingtonpost.com Forgetting About Its Congress Page?

By Holly Yeager   May 20, 2010 at 12:53 PM

If you woke up Thursday wondering what was happening with the financial regulation reform bill in the Senate, the Congress... More

Audit Notes: Not-So-Goldman Advice, One Source Stories, Facebook

By Ryan Chittum   May 19, 2010 at 09:43 PM

Bloomberg reports that even though Goldman Sachs, along with other banks, won on every day at the dog tracks last... More

Tribune Investigation Finds Mercury-Laced Skin Creams

By Ryan Chittum   May 19, 2010 at 09:07 PM

A terrific investigation today by the Chicago Tribune discovered high levels of mercury in skin-whitening creams on shelves across Chicago.... More

Judis Delivers a Tea Party History Lesson

Paul’s Kentucky victory prompts new coverage of the movement

By Holly Yeager   May 19, 2010 at 03:34 PM

Rand Paul’s victory in Kentucky has brought new energy to the Tea Party crowd—and prompted a flurry of coverage of... More

The New York Times’s Devastating Goldman Piece

Morgenson and Story unload on the bank’s conflicted business model

By Ryan Chittum   May 19, 2010 at 11:18 AM

The New York Times goes long on the conflict machine that is Goldman Sachs. It's a devastating synthesis of what's... More