During the 2008 presidential campaign, journalist Linda Douglass made a splash by quitting her reporting job to go to work for Barack Obama.

As the media business, so heavily dependent on advertising continues to crash (the stock price of the New York Times today dropped below the price of a Sunday paper), journalists are finding a new home in the political world. The Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman will be the director of public affairs for Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. Scott Shepard of Cox Newspapers' Washington, D.C., bureau will be Sen. John Kerry's new speechwriter.

I was prompted to note these journalistic moves when I read this editorial from The Washington Times regarding Sen. Dianne Feinstein's big mouth.

It is true that the Washington Post first reported Predators operating out of bases in Pakistan, and the senator's flak catcher Philip J. LaVelle says that this report was what she was referring to. But there is a difference between making an allegation in a local paper and having the chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence confirm it. After all, her remark was “as I understand it,” not “according to the papers.”

Flak-catcher ... that's funny. If you're wondering what LaVelle did before he was catching flak, you can find out here.