Sunday, June 01, 2008
Domestic anti-Americanism
John Hinderaker notices a peculiar correction in The New York Times:
An article on May 4 about black liberation theology and the debate surrounding the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr, Senator Barack Obama’s former minister, erroneously confirmed a statement by Mr. Wright that the United States has used biological weapons against other countries. There is no evidence that the United States ever did so.
John makes the point that "[t]his usually-unacknowledged sympathy with Rev. Wright's anti-Americanism is, I think, part of the reason why the mainstream press misreported the Wright controversy from the beginning." True enough, but what about the substance of the error? How do you get that wrong? More to the point, how do you get that wrong if you have been alive and breathing in the last seven years, when weapons of mass destruction, including biological weapons, have been an almost-constant topic of public discussion? It is such an idiotic error one is forced to wonder whether the Times has layers of editors after all. Or maybe they just do not check facts that they assume must be true.
6 Comments:
By 
, at
Sun Jun 01, 05:12:00 PM:
rev wright used to be a marine and he helped save a president during the war. I just think that since he retired he turned into a monster and became an american hating person but he also realizes the benefits of having obama as an ex member of his church because now he is going to write a book and make a profit off of obama. Obama and McCain both need to stay as far away from preachers as possible.
sensico.wordpress.com
By 
D.E. Cloutier, at
Sun Jun 01, 06:03:00 PM:
"layers of editors"
Typically:
One editor never reads the papers.
The editor above him is flirting with the new girl in the accounting department.
And the editor above that guy is placing bets with a bookie.
In the old days some typesetter with a 10th-grade education would go to the reporter and ask, "Did you really mean to write this?"
By , at
Mon Jun 02, 12:36:00 AM:
How many hollywed directors are lining up to make a movie about him I HOPE IT BOMBS
By randian, at
Mon Jun 02, 01:43:00 AM:
Error? Surely wishes are more important than facts.
By , at
Mon Jun 02, 10:50:00 AM:
The NYT has a long history of making obscure statements in the midst of an article that are unsupported by the rest of the article or are out and out fabrications, like the statement under scrutiny here. The damnable part of it is that these statements are too often referenced by some MSM type later on to support a column attacking some aspect of the United States or our way of life. Very few readers actually dig in and research the actual article cited, and even fewer would be persistent enough to dig up this lame attempt at obfuscating a retraction. So another tiny little MSM lie is born.
Think of the NYT as a sort of sole contributor Wikipedia of that biased, detached and hyper elitist east coast big city, secure in its own belief that it stands alone as a paragon of righteousness and political correctness.
For some reason I derive great pleasure from fantasy movies where New York is destroyed, devastated or otherwise abused. I just don't know why.
By , at
Mon Jun 02, 09:40:00 PM:
Moody Deep Thinker, thank you for such a succinct and dead-on description of that once venerated newspaper. Now in my mind, thanks to you, the NYT will forever be the Newsprint Wikipedia, only I sort of see it as akin to those 'slam' notebooks passed around in high school where you write down what you think about a certain person, and all your cliquey friends agree with you wholeheartedly.
