The Knucklehead of the Day award

Today's winner is Tom Baldwin, a reporter for the Times of London. He gets the award for the following.

A direct descendant of George Washington was held last night in a New York jail, facing extradition to France on charges that he beat a man into a coma with a bottle.

John Augustine Washington V, a history student at Oxford University, is accused of smashing the bottle over the head of Colin Hall, a fellow American, on July 24 in a bar in the French resort of St Tropez.

Mr. Baldwin doesn't waste time in making a mistake, he does it in the very first sentence. George Washington fathered no children with his wife Martha. A direct descendant would be a person who can trace back his family tree to George Washington.

Then who is John Augustine Washington? This AP article clarifies the matter.

America's first president, the general who led the colonists to victory in the Revolutionary War, had no children of his own, but his brother, John Augustine Washington, did. John Augustine Washington V is described in court papers simply as a "descendant" of the Founding Father, and in newspaper accounts as an "ancestral nephew." He has appeared on several educational television shows, including the recent Discovery Channel series "Greatest American."

A nephew is not a direct descnedant. A check of the court papers and a two minute internet search could have told Mr. Baldwin the truth, but apparently he either wanted to slime George Washington or is just too incompetent to do the merest fact checking. I'm guessing the later but it don't matter, Tom Baldwin is today's Knucklehead of the Day.

Hat tip- Florida Cracker
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