Newspaper Demands Writer’s Resignation

The Boston Globe has demanded the resignation of controversial columnist Mike Barnicle after concluding he had stolen someone else’s punch lines and misled the paper about it. The Globe initially suspended Barnicle, 54, for one month without pay after learning that he had used a series of one-liners in his Sunday column that had been lifted from comedian George Carlin’s best-selling 1997 book, “Brain Droppings.” But Editor Matthew Storin asked the 25-year veteran to leave the paper after learning that Barnicle, who claimed never to have read Carlin’s book, had held it in his hand and recommended it on television.