Mark Bowden is a career-long friend of Bill Marimow and John Carroll, going back to their years together at the Philly Inquirer. And Marimow hired him back as a columnist at the paper about a year ago. And, oh, his book was warmly reviewed in the Inquirer by the reporter that Simon accuses of fabrications, and Bowden, in turn, blurbed the fabricating reporter’s book.

Does all the hyperbolic effort to describe Simon’s emotions and allegiances now seem, well, a little hypocritical?