Thursday, January 18, 2007

Comments erased at N&O

The Raleigh N&O, the paper that said Precious was a "victim...of sex crimes," is now in Watergate cover-up mode.

Just as Nixon and his top aides refused to release full, unedited transcripts of the Oval Office tapes, the N&O is refusing to release a full transcript of its Mar 25 anonymous interview, significant portions of which the N&O now admits it deliberately withheld from readers and media back in March.

However, yesterday Drescher did respond at the Editors' Blog to a reader’s question about the N&O’s ampersand. He detailed its history, usages and colorations in various sections of the newspaper. I posted on what Drescher did ("The N&O precious ampersand")and linked to his post.

Readers, including now retired North Carolina journalist Bob Wilson and myself, commented on the thread. Bob's and my comments were erased. Melanie said they were erased because they off point to John's ampersand opus.

You can read my comment in this JinC post. Here’s Bob’s comment:

Surely this is a joke. Drescher wastes electrons on the color of the N&O's ampersand, yet ignores calls for the paper to come clean in the Duke lax affair. Nero would understand.
Yes, Drescher’s fiddling while he and Melanie should be coming clean on why the N&O set out to frame the players.

If Melanie and Drescher did that, Bob wouldn’t have had to make his comment, and they wouldn’t be feeling so burned.

Anyway, I’ve left another comment on the same thread. Let’s see if this one is approved by the Editors’ Blog’s Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice:
Dear Melanie and John:

What a colorful post you two MSM journalists created out of just about nothing! Who says Journalism School is a waste?

And it was nice of you, John Drescher, to tell the inquiring reader the history of the N&O's ampersand and its many colorations.

What should we look for next?

Should we expect a story reporting on the N&O's use of ampersands when it suppressed the news of the players’ cooperation with police?

Is there any chance N&O readers will see the headline below with three ampersands in three different colors:

N&O RETRACTS MAR. 25 STORY & APOLOGIZES TO LAX PLAYERS, FAMILIES & COMMUNITY?

What colors do you think would be appropriate for the ampersands in this headline:

N&O & PRECIOUS & NIFONG & GOTTLIEB & HYMAN & ADDISON NOW DISAGREE WHILE AWAITING FEDS?

I hope you two MSM "First Amendment" journalists don’t decide you have to delete this comment.

I’ll check in tomorrow.

John in Carolina

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks to John and Bob Wilson, someone is monitoring the newspaper coverage in Raleigh and Durham. Your readers are grateful.

Anonymous said...

N&O - Ruth is a terrible writer and delusional. All of you seem to think if you say it long enough, your version of the facts will be true. Ain't happening - a new day in reporting has emerged and you have missed the train.