MSM Taking Hits From Its Own

[Annie]

Nope, not on Rather, but on Reuters: via: http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2004/09/17/canwesterrorist040917.html

Newspapers accused of misusing word 'terrorist'
Last Updated Fri, 17 Sep 2004 23:09:40 EDT
OTTAWA - Canada's largest newspaper chain, CanWest Global, is being criticized over its use of the word "terrorist" in stories about the Middle East.

The owner of the National Post and dozens of other papers across Canada is being accused of inappropriately inserting the word into newswire copy dealing with the Middle East, thereby changing the meaning of those stories.



One of the world's leading news agencies, Reuters, said CanWest newspapers have been altering words and phrases in stories dealing with the war in Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Reuters told CBC News it would complain to CanWest about the issue.

The global managing editor for Reuters, David Schlesinger, called such changes unacceptable. He said CanWest had crossed a line from editing for style to editing the substance and slant of news from the Middle East.

"If they want to put their own judgment into it, they're free to do that, but then they shouldn't say that it's by a Reuters reporter," said Schlesinger.

As an example, Schlesinger cited a recent Reuters story, in which the original copy read: "...the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which has been involved in a four-year-old revolt against Israeli occupation in Gaza and the West Bank."

In the National Post version of the story, printed Tuesday, it became: "...the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a terrorist group that has been involved in a four-year-old campaign of violence against Israel."

then there was this, that Reuters had done:
http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110003791

BY JAMES TARANTO
Thursday, July 24, 2003 2:38 p.m.


A Mugging in Reuterville
On Tuesday we noted that Reuters had published an anti-American screed about the Jessica Lynch story:

Jessica Lynch, the wounded Army private whose ordeal in Iraq was hyped into a media fiction of U.S. heroism, was set for an emotional homecoming on Tuesday in a rural West Virginia community bristling with flags, yellow ribbons and TV news trucks.

But when the 20-year-old supply clerk arrives by Blackhawk helicopter to the embrace of family and friends, media critics say the TV cameras will not show the return of an injured soldier so much as a reality-TV drama co-produced by U.S. government propaganda and credulous reporters.

It turns out even the byline was a lie. Reuters attributed the story to Deanna Wrenn, who we later learned is a reporter for the Daily Mail, an afternoon paper in Charleston, W.Va. Out of curiosity, we went to the Daily Mail's Web site and read Wrenn's account of Pfc. Lynch's homecoming. It reads nothing at all like the Reuters piece:

Jessica Lynch looked and sounded great, residents and visitors said after she rode through town on a Mustang convertible.

But many wanted to get a longer glimpse of the 20-year-old Army private they consider a hero.

"She looked absolutely beautiful," said Angie Kinder, who came from Huntington with her two girls, Grace, 4, and Caroline, 1. "I expected her to look worse."

The piece continues in this vein, without a hint of Reuterian anti-Americanism. In a column in today's Daily Mail, which the paper generously permitted us to reprint, Deanna Wrenn explains what happened. She submitted a story for Reuters that was quite different from the one the "news" agency actually printed. The lead sentence: "In this small county seat with just 995 residents, the girl everyone calls Jessi is a true heroine--even if reports vary about Pfc. Jessica Lynch and her ordeal in Iraq."

Some unknown writer or editor simply created an entirely new story, reflecting Reuters' anti-American views, and stuck Wrenn's name on it. According to Wrenn, the only similarly between the Reuters dispatch and what she filed was a single quote, which disappeared entirely in later versions of the story--though those still carried Wrenn's byline.

"Apparently, when Reuters asked me last week if they could use my byline, they weren't talking about the story I wrote for them last week. They were talking about a story I never wrote," writes Wrenn. "By the way, I asked Reuters to remove my byline. They didn't."

Now, wire-service stories often are collaborations between many reporters and writers; a single byline doesn't necessarily mean the putative author is responsible for every word of the story. If Reuters had stuck to simply reporting the news, this would not be a scandal. The problem is that, especially since Sept. 11, Reuters has been practicing opinion journalism, imbuing much of its reporting with a strong anti-American slant.

Well, it's a free country. If Reuters wants to publish anti-American propaganda, that's its right. But doing so under the guise of news is dishonest, and attributing it to a reporter who does not share Reuters' views is outrageous. At the very least, Reuters owes Deanna Wrenn an apology.