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How to Further Reduce Credibility with an Apology
11/21/2002

OK. Here's the picture. All you liberals can go ahead and chuckle, and then I'll tell you where the problem lies.

Done? This picture ran nice 'n' big on the front page of the Chicago Tribune. Associate managing editor for photography Bill Parker claims that he thought the picture captured Bush's happiness with all that has gone his way recently. Right. If this is true, Mr. Parker better have a side career as a web-slinger because he's obviously a dim bulb when it comes to comprehending the possible implications of images.

But we'll let that go because Parker's just covering his tail, and his boss, likely having been an admirer of the choice, is willing to let him. Public editor Don Wycliff, however, is another story. Wycliff apparently thought it best to write an "apology" because he realized that the numerous emails of reasonable tone indicated that the paper had been caught in its bias by more than:

the usual strident hyperpartisanship of those pro-Bush zealots who live to hate Clinton and find evidence of media bias. The zealots probably relished "that picture" because it confirmed their conviction that the media are against them.

Huh. Strange thing to put in an "apology" for having been caught in such media bias. Interesting that the French syndicate that spread the picture reported that it was not used by USA Today, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Baltimore Sun, or the Los Angeles Times, all of which are favorite digging grounds of those "pro-Bush zealots." You know where the picture did find interested papers? In Canada. In the United Arab Emirates. In Nigeria.

But speaking of zealotry, here's the meat of Wycliff's column:

Ultimately, of course, this is not a matter of numbers, but of judgment and taste. And this is an instance, I believe, in which the readers have it right. Try as I may to read "that picture" as Parker did, my gut tells me it amounted to a Page 1 editorial in which George W. Bush was being labeled an idiot and a clown, unsuited to the presidency.

Like how he got that "an idiot and a clown, unsuited to the presidency" in there when he could have just said "portrayed in an unfavorable light"? To me, that sounds a bit like saying, "I'm sorry I told you how stupid you are." Can you imagine a newspaper editor having such contempt for his readers... not to mention the leader of his country?

Yeah, so can I. And it's a shame. Such is the stuff of tabloids.

(via The Spoons Experience)

Posted by Justin Katz @ 11:34 PM EST