Music of the Day: Dave Koz, Wake Up Call

As you no doubt know, Google has a “news” link that you can click on to check up on world events, politics, sports, and (of course) entertainment stuff. Today, during a brief lull at the slaughterhouse, I checked the news and found this little item on Reuters.

Here’s the headline: “Fidel Castro attacks McCain and Bush in column.” Okay, I thought, that’s grist for the blog-mill—a communist dictator and decades-long oppressor of his people attacks our president and the Republican nominee for the presidency. This is a good thing. Attack away, Fidel—it can only help Mr. McCain with any thoughtful segment of the American electorate.

So, I started reading the article; here’s the first paragraph in its entirety: “Cuban leader Fidel Castro blasted Republican presidential candidate John McCain for his criticism of the Cuban government this week, saying McCain had shown why he finished near the bottom of his class at West Point.”

Ahem. Yes.

The fifth paragraph reads this way: “McCain, in his book ‘Faith of My Fathers,’ admitted that he was among the last five students in his course at West Point,” Castro wrote. “He’s showing it.”

Ahem, again.

Next paragraph: “Castro previously stepped aside in July 2006 following intestinal surgery but still writes periodic columns.”

Finally, at the bottom of this little item in Reuters, in a brief parenthetical, this appears: “Reporting by Jeff Franks; Editing by Bill Trott).”

What could have happened here? Let’s review: Senator McCain did not attend the United States Military Academy at West Point; he attended the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis.

While Mr. McCain freely admits in his book Faith of My Fathers his low class ranking at graduation, only someone who hasn’t really read the book would think that Mr. McCain attended West Point. Writing “columns” for the Communist Party newspaper Granma apparently requires no actual research or fact-checking when one is a former dictator; apparently the “editors” at Granma didn’t know the difference between West Point and the Naval Academy or they were too frightened of Fidel to tell him of his mistake. That may explain a lot about Granma, but it doesn’t explain the two dudes who work for Reuters, the reporter Jeff Franks and the editor, Bill Trott. Apparently both took Fidel’s word on Mr. McCain’s military education, which says a lot about both of them and Reuters. Why wouldn’t either the reporter or his editor do five minutes worth of research to check the veracity of the former dictator’s statements? Furthermore, why wouldn’t either the reporter or the editor know enough about the Republican nominee for the presidency to immediately spot this error? Is anyone at Reuters paying attention?

WARNING: Next time you read a story from Reuters, beware—fact-checking and accuracy may not be part of the article.

AJ

TO LIVE IN FREEDOM’S LIGHT IS THE