A fine example of why you can't believe everything you read.

[Shainie]

I'm sure many of us like to read newspapers or news magazines, and then discuss with others what we've read, taking the information for fact.

I like to read Newsweek while I eat lunch. One part I pay particular attention to is the "Editor's Note" or "Corrections". There have been some doozies! I don't remember the exact story, or the exact correction, but one time there was something like "We reported that Mr. X killed 2 people his 2 daughters stood trial. We regret our mistake in reporting, Mr. X was never convicted of Murder, and he has no daughters". I remember taking the article home to my DH because I couldn't believe how crazy it was!

Anyway - in the April 14 Newsweek is the following Editors' Note: In "Fanning the Flames: Cheney's Halliburton Ties", Newsweek implied that Vice President Dick Cheney may have used his influence to award government contracts to his former employer, Halliburton, and its subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root. Newsweek has no independent evidence to support this implication, and we regret making it. We also reported that Cheney "hasn't entirely severed his financial ties" to Halliburton. As a Cheney spokesperson noted in the item, the vice president receives deferred compensation but has no financial stake in the future of the company".

In the April 7 issue, here is the Correction: In "The Arrogant Empire", we said that Saddam gassed 60,000 of his own people in Halabjah in 1986. In fact, the gassing was in 1988, and killed 5,000 (though it wounded thousands more). NEWSWEEK regrets the error.

I wonder how many "discrepancies" get by without being pointed out? People read it, take it as fact, and then don't see the correction.

I guess that's why I learned to take everything with a grain of salt, and unless I've seen it with my own eyes, I won't truely take it as fact.


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[3tbear]

You really can't take things literally these days. To actually put in print that Saddam had that many people gassed, and then to retract the statement in error is just unbelievable.

I read the Wall Street Journal daily, and I've even seen retractions in that paper.

[pandybat]

And if only the retractions were as in as plain a sight or in as big a print as the original story......

[AtlantaGAL]

Yeah, print publications tend to bury their retractions where probably half the readers never look.


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