Monday, February 27, 2012

February 27, 2012

Fox News has amused us with its self-mocking slogan "We report, you decide." Some news media, however, take it to heart, and extend it, following a practice of "we report, superficially, you draw any conclusions." I’ve mentioned stories on extreme weather which manage not to refer to climate change. The local media provided another example on the 22nd.
A nine year old boy took a loaded gun to school, where it went off, apparently while in his backpack. An eight year old girl was seriously wounded. KING-TV reported on the incident, on two successive evenings, without any comment on the absurdly easy access to firearms and without even asking how the boy got hold of the gun. The problem wasn’t lack of time. It’s true that KING has reduced most news reports to a few seconds, consisting of badly written summaries badly read. However, when it wants to — and it always wants to when there is a disaster — the program can allocate a longer segment to a story; it did so with the shooting.
Tonight NBC News reported on another school shooting, again without comment or question as to our oversupply of deadly weapons, and aired a report on rising gas prices without asking why they are going up.
This is carrying "just the facts" a bit far.

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