I am confident that we were all paying attention to the how our major sources of information reported on the two demonstrations in DC on the war.
The KC Star was, I am sure, typical of editorial decisions else where in the country.
The two stories were balanced in the following ways:
both were on page two, both had a picture, and both took up exactly the same size. Both stories from Knight-Ritter, the Star is a Knight-Ritter paper.
Typical on-the-one-hand versus on-the-the-hand journalism.
And, of course, that is the problem.
I cannot find the stories as they appeared in the print versions on the web. So, here are the headlines and first paragraph.
Sunday, September 25, 2005
`Not one more should die'
Washington -- Tens of thousands of anti-war activists rallied Saturday near the White House, hoping to catalyze opposition nationwide and force a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.
Monday, September 26, 2005
Supporters speak out
Washington -- Iraq war veterans and families of soldiers killed in action gathered Sunday at the National Mall in a small but boisterous display of support for American troops and the war.
100,000 plus people for one and 400 people (acknowledged later in the the second one). The lede of these two say everything about being "fair and balanced."
I have been in contact with the readers' representative of the Star about this. He told me
Thank you for writing. You're among a few people who complained about the
play of those two stories. I'll forward your message to the editors in
charge of making those decisions.
That liberal media is doing a great job in being fair and balanced.