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January 31, 2006

Ours vs. Theirs

OURS:

Connecticut Post, Jan. 27, 2006
"New trial frees innocent man"
By Daniel Tepfer
Staff writer
___BRIDGEPORT -- For more than five years Alfredo Vargas sat in a prison cell, professing his innocence to accusations he molested a 4-year-old girl.
___On Thursday, a Superior Court jury in Vargas' second trial believed the 65-year-old synagogue caretaker and found him not guilty of first-degree sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor. They deliberated less than two hours.

THEIRS:

The New York Times, Jan. 29, 2006
"Penniless Man Wins Allies and Acquittal"
By Peter Applebome
___Sometimes, amid its florid theatrics and Dickensian arcana, the legal system dispenses justice. Sometimes it dispenses something else. And sometimes it does both to the same person.
___Consider what happened to Alfredo Vargas.

Make what you want of it. I'll refrain from comment. --Ed

Posted by edcrowder on 5:28 PM | Comments (254)

January 5, 2006

Hate the media?

One of the 'blogs I check regularly is Arianna Huffington's Huffington Post. On Wednesday, following the mining tragedy in West Virginia -- and the whiplash of hope and tragedy it generated -- she led her blog with a posting, "Why Do People Hate the Media?"

What was interesting was not her self-serving thrust -- that the mainstream media ("MSM" in blogolese) screwed up by reporting that 12 miners had been found alive while skeptical bloggers were the ones asking tough questions -- but the reaction it spawned.

If it's any indication of how the general public feels, the answer to her question must be "yes."

It's ironic because after a wave of genuine scandals have tarnished the media in recent years (e.g., Jayson Blaire), in this case most of the mainstream media got it wrong doing things right.

We certainly fall into that category. Our lead story Wednesday was, "12 Miners Found Alive."

We'd been tracking the story all day, of course. And as of Tuesday evening, it seemed that the story was that one miner had been confirmed dead. But then unconfirmed -- and inaccurate, as it turned out -- reports began ticking over the AP wire that 12 miners had been found alive. The night staff struggled mightily with what to do, but decided to play it safe and go with the one-dead story.

Then the governor of West Virginia made a statement that appeared to confirm 12 people were found alive. That clinched it.

About two hours after we put the paper to bed, the real story came out.

What's interesting about the public reaction is the media appears to be taking much of the heat for the families' anguish. One Huffington poster lamented the media's addiction to "grief porn." It would be a fair criticism, but on the ground in West Virginia, a runaway cell-phone rumor mill beat us to the punch.

Posted by edcrowder on 12:11 PM | Comments (1734)