Posted on 09/17/2004 12:53:24 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
More soundings about coverage of the campaign of 2004 . . .
The Laura Bush picture. More than two weeks after it was published, we're still getting comments about the front-page photo we used of first lady Laura Bush during the Republican National Convention.
The photo prompted dozens of readers to complain that it was an unflattering portrait of Bush and, most of the callers and e-mailers contended, it was chosen purposefully to make her look bad.
I think I've developed a pretty keen sensitivity to readers' concerns about photos, but frankly, I was stunned by the reaction.
Interestingly, the internal discussion surrounding convention coverage the night of the first lady's speech was aimed mostly at trying to match the volume and placement of stories -- on the front page and inside the main news sections -- that we had used a few weeks earlier in covering the Democratic National Convention. That's always a challenge, given that other important news can often get in the way of our best-laid plans.
So when the first lady's picture landed on the front page on the third day of the convention, we were closely tracking the kind of front-page coverage we had given the speech by Teresa Heinz Kerry a few weeks earlier.
Then the calls started. Why did we choose that picture? Why not the photo that ran on the front page of USA Today? The Marietta Daily Journal chose a much more flattering photo; why didn't we use that one?
The answer is that the photo we chose was of a much more animated Bush during a key point in her speech, when she was talking about the strength of her husband during the Sept. 11 crisis. The negative reaction it generated in some quarters speaks more to the polarization of the electorate, in my view, and the willingness by some readers to see political bias in virtually every decision made by the media when it comes to this campaign.
The Iraq war toll.
The week after the Republican convention there was heavier-than-usual fighting in Iraq -- on one day. seven Marines were killed by a car bomb, and the next day the death toll among U.S. military personnel passed 1,000. Neither of those stories made the front page.
Those decisions led to criticism that crossed political and ideological lines. The majority of readers who complained felt that by not putting the stories on the front page, the newspaper was attempting to minimize damage to President Bush during a critical point in the campaign.
At least one of those stories should have made its way onto the front page. But the decision not to put either out there was the result of local news and enterprise reporting that we thought also deserved front-page attention. Not to mention a deadly hurricane -- the second of three major storms that have affected the South this season -- bearing down on Florida at the same time.
The CBS documents.
Over the past week or so, as media bloggers on the Internet and mainstream news organizations have called into question the authenticity of the letter "60 Minutes II" used to question the special treatment President Bush allegedly received during his Air National Guard duty, callers and letter writers have asked why the AJC and other news organizations have not aggressively examined the veracity of CBS' reporting. Why hasn't it received the same scrutiny applied to the swift-boat veterans' campaign against Democratic candidate John Kerry's Vietnam service?
I would contend it has. The network's documents and sources -- those that have been publicly disclosed, anyway -- have been closely examined and the findings reported. The same thing happened with the swift-boat veterans. Readers can examine for themselves the credibility of both sources of information and the impact they will have on the campaign.
But the continuing fixation on these incidents from more than 30 years ago makes me ask: Who among us really believes more reporting will determine, once and for all, whether John Kerry lied about Vietnam, whether George W. Bush lied about Alabama or whether Dan Rather just flat-out lied?
October approaches and a few dozen or so major issues facing the nation have yet to get much coverage in the campaign of 2004. Readers, and voters, are still waiting.
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Contact Mike King by e-mail at insideajc@ajc.com, by phone at 404-526-5819, by fax at 404-526-5610 or by writing P.O. Box 4689, Atlanta, Ga. 30302.
If you want real news, the Atlanta Constipation is not the place to get it.
still can't find the pic that was being questioned...anyone point me to it?
What does the photo look like?
I didn't see it.
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