"Two suspects were captured and one was being sought in nearby woods, officials said. State and local authorities are searching for the suspects with helicopters and dogs. "

Hmm, maybe the ones they caught escaped again...

I did see on "Celebrity Jeopardy" a few years ago a group of news reporters/anchors who finished the first set of questions with two red (negative) scores and a zero. The second set wasn't much better-- only one of them broke a thousand. (And that's CELEBRITY Jeopardy, where they dumb down all the questions.) I remember being utterly unsurprized. And these are the people we get our news from... No wonder they say, "Don't believe everything you see on TV".

the occasional typo .. well, I'm with Gillian - it makes me cringe (though I lack her experience in hunting the dratted things). I get over it.

what I very strongly object to is reporting without facts. To pick a huge story from the recent news - Virginia Tech. Reports of weapons used were all over the map. What the heck ever happened to "Rifle" or "Pistol" - it's as though announcing the calibre of the weapon in some way improves the veracity of the story.

Further, on the same incident, the lunatic was referred to as "A Chinese citizen, here on a student visa". Which, we know now, is flat wrong - in both particulars. What ever happened to <i>checking the facts</i>??

Lest we think too fondly of the 'good old days', let us not forget the glory days of American News: Yellow Journalism.

Or the heavily censored news of WWII (achieved with the cooperation of the press).

Or the days of the sentence fragment.

(Sorry, Gillian)

All in all, there is no broadcast news program worth my time. There is almost none on paper, to boot. I think the base problem is that all these organizations have shifted the focus from *news* to market share. Yes, market share is important - without it the organization dies. But accuracy and honesty are being sacrificed on the altar of the almighty quarter, and this is a BAD thing.

Not being a journalist, I do not recall for sure, but aren't there organizations out there that are supposed to self-regulate the industry? I don't see them doing much good on the national level.

As a result, any trust I may have placed in large news organizations in the past is now vested in my dogs. I read 2.. *2* papers - one printed here in the states, one from overseas. For real news, I turn to the internet. The river is a lot wider, but it's also a darnsight deeper.

Lack of details also points out when the reporter is not interested in facts.

Now, here's an article that takes a person, tied to a controversial topic, and gives almost no facts. Sounds more like buzzword bingo than anything else.
(My intent is to discuss the style of the article, not the topic)Al Gore's green home improvements
The city of Belle Meade, Tennessee, had blocked his application until new rules were approved unanimously late Tuesday,
This is the main topic of the story, but my beef is they never said what the new rules were?
And side topic information has absolutely no detail
33 Panels, what type (water, electric, etc)? What are they capable of? That will tell me if this is a token gesture.
already buys enough energy from renewable energy sources such as solar, wind and methane gas to balance 100 percent of his electricity costs
I don't have a clue to what they are saying here (probably the reporter doesn't either). I think it's the use of the word "balance"

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Numbers are not case sensitive. (me)

With a breaking story, often they will just edit the current story to update it, not necessarily making all the associated changes (as when the number of fugitives is reduced to one, and the rest of the article should refer to them in the singular rather than the plural).

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

ToSeeked!

<runs to check off item 37 of my list of 50 things to do before I die...>

ToSeeked, ToSeek, in the same thread on the same page.
Could be a candidate for ToSeek cubed, no wonder your list went down.

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Numbers are not case sensitive. (me)

though only if you view 40 posts/page Would that be a ThreeSeek ?

ToSeeked!


(Some things are acceptable to check off the list in virtual-mode )

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PW -- Plant Whisperer

Shoe left at accident scene helps police


From what I see, the only reason for this story is the flowery references to Cinderella.

The fact that he returned to the scene all bloody looking like he was in an accident, and the van was registered to his address, wasn't enough to convict him?

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Numbers are not case sensitive. (me)

Circumstansial evidence. Now, finding a man that just "happens" to wear a particular shoe size, now that's fool-proof detective work! I mean, how many men have the same size shoe?

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I'm like one of those idiot savants...well, except for the savant part.

Not to mention the infamous Bruno Magli shoe incident from many years back that helped to convict someone in the court of public opinion, but did little in the actual court.

Nope - it wouldn't be - and shouldn't be. Maybe he was mugged a mile away and his van stolen.

However, the described "clues" do give the police probable cause (as if any more were needed). They may opt to conduct DNA tests on the shoe - if no other DNA is found, it's pretty conclusive that he was wearing it when it came off the fleeing man's foot.

But the shoe was only one thing in a series of clues. If the shoe were the only clue (as the reporter makes it sound), then we would have the same issue of "my shoes were in there when it was stolen".

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Numbers are not case sensitive. (me)

Are clothing, including our shoes, are full of our DNA. Still, a smart lawyer would be able to argue that only proves that the man actually wore the shoe, at one time, not necessarily at the time the crime was committed.

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I am Mugs, of the Alien clan of Usa, Nordamerica, a Terran, of Sol. A human.

Whoever says "perception is reality" is daft. It's merely an abstraction, and often not a very good one.

You seem to be taking my post too seriously. Also you seem to be working under the false tv-land assumption that DNA evidence is easy, quick, and cheap to examine. The testing facilities have huge back logs of evidence to examine, and a simple leaving the scene of an accident case would be put way behind the murder and rape evidence. I'd be willing to bet that they won't even bother to try and secure DNA evidence in a case like this. If there's blood on the shoe they might match the blood type to the driver, a much cheaper, faster, and simlper test. But DNA? Only if David Caruso is heading the investigation.

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I'm like one of those idiot savants...well, except for the savant part.

Not bad reporting, but bad headline writing:

In the Chicago Tribune, there an article about the Democratic candidate debate.

The headline reads:

"Democratics criticize Iraq in 1rst debate"

I guess the headline writer was trying to save space, but it sounds like the candidates criticized the country, whereas in fact they were criticizing the US administration's policy on Iraq.

This kind of thing seems to happen a lot.

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As above, so below

When I was working in a national park there was a two page article on poaching seasonally dropped antlers. SEVEN times it referred to a 'cash' of antlers monitored to nab some poachers. I stopped cringing after #4 and started counting.
I guess it passed the spell check, but you think someone would have taken English before journalism.

Then there are the meteorologists on the weather that say "It will be 'twice' as cold next week."
Don't they study Kelvin in 'weather school'?

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'Sir........, I don't like these numbers.'
'Then hire somebody that can change them!'
("`-/")_.-'"``-.,,
\. . `; -._( );, `)
(v_,)' _ )`-. \ ``'`
_.- _..-/ /((.'
((,.-' ((,/

Sorry for being off topic, but it reminds of the joke about an old Russian woman who allowed a rebellious Czechoslovakian soldier to hide in her house, but the man was discovered, and the woman was arrested. What was the crime: "caching a bad Czech."

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As above, so below

And just now, I noticed a new headline on Yahoo, that says that a 95-year old woman is going to become the "oldest college graduate". I think they mean the "oldest new college graduate," because there must be a number of other people over the age of 95 who are in fact college graduates.

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As above, so below