The Laughing Wolf

Wag The Lynch Still Won’t Die

I awoke this morning to the joy of finding on a local news station that is usually much better than this, to find the Wag The Lynch story getting play as a credible news story. The focus has shifted a bit, to claiming that the soldiers were offered keys and the Iraqi’s stating that none of what was done was needed, and over the top, but it is still the same old drek.

Being in a Pre-Caffine grumpy mood, I just called the station and asked why such a thoroughly discredited story was being given straight play. I gave the person I spoke with several sites to start digging, beginning with Winds of Change and ending here.

The only thing I can suppose is that they took this story straight from the national feed and that no one at the station pays much attention to international news, much less the blogsphere. That does not surprise me much, for what I remember at most places was an intense interest in local and big stories that could break your way to a larger station/newspaper/etc. Outside of a specific beat, most reporters and broadcasters are extremely uninformed unless the news happens to fall into a hobby or other area of strong interest for them. On a somewhat mean note, if you really want to see a general assignment reporter freak, try talking science to them.

I hope that the station really will do some digging on this, and maybe learn a bit in the process. Maybe they will learn how this ridiculous story came to be, and why it should die a quick death. Maybe they will learn about blogs and the new media that is fast rendering a lot of traditional media obsolete – or at least held to the standards it professes to uphold. Maybe they will learn that it is sometimes, even in the face of deadlines and other pressures, a good idea to check the national feed.

Who knows. All we can do is hope, and see what happens.

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