Priorities Without Comment

December 3rd, 2003

December 1
The PA legislature spent part of the day debating whether to make the polka or the square dance the state dance, what the state cookie should be and which earth best represents the state. The PA legislature has still not passed a state budget, provided for the funding of the schools or offered any form of property tax relief.

August 18
The Morning Call’s major front page story was headlined “Yearbook vulgarity prompts probe.” The story concerned Easton High School. In the same edition, on page A4, was a report that a Reuter’s cameraman had been killed in Iraq. On page A5, an American soldier was reported killed by Iraqi insurgents.

August 22
The Morning Call’s front page was dominated by a story headlined “3 electrocuted when crane touches Teleford power line.” On page A5 was a small story noting that terrorism was stymying construction in Iraq.

August 28
The Morning Call’s front page devoted the most space to a story headed “Wal-Mart to build hub in Schuylkill.” On page A8 was a story that two more American soldiers had been killed in Iraq.

September 3
The Morning Call’s headline on the front page read, “Biker helmets become optional.” Deep in the paper was the only Iraq story of the day, “Car bomb kills 1 in Iraq and wounds 25 at police station.”

November 20
The prospect that Michael Jackson would be arrested dominated the front page of The Morning Call as well as all of pages A4 and A5. The fact that two soldiers were killed in Iraq that day was not noted.

November 21
Again the Michael Jackson case dominated The Morning Call’s front page and all of page A4. Deeper in section A The Morning Call ran a story titled, “Car bombing kills 7 in Iraq: 3 children slain at school: 1 American killed, two wounded.”

This survey of the Morning Call front page reporting is by no means complete. I simply ran out of library time.
The only story I recall reading in The Morning Call which mentioned a soldier killed or wounded in Iraq by name involved a boy from this area with the exception, of course, of the story of Jessica Lynch’s rescue and subsequent rehabilitation. In fairness, The Morning Call also reported that there was probably less to Lynch’s rescue then met the eye.

The Morning Call devotes an entire section exclusively to sports every day. In addition, sports stories sometimes are placed on the front page. Thus, the amount of sports coverage clearly exceeds by a large multiple the Call’s coverage of the situation in Iraq or practically any other subject whatever.

On CNN, which I usually watch between noon and one, extensive reports, analysis by experts, viewer questions and viewer polling has been devoted to the Scott Peterson case, the Kobe Bryant case, and, of course, Michael Jackson. I estimate that about one third of the air time over the last several months has been devoted to these and other fluff topics. While CNN often devotes airtime to reports on the Iraqi situation, the questions asked the “experts” often seem like they come from two year olds.

News organizations, such as CNN and The Morning Call often defend their editorial selection of the news to report by saying the selection is made on the basis of what they anticipate their viewers or readers are most interested in. They are probably correct. As Shakespear said, “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.”