Standard Mischief

OK, yup, I’m really on the ball here. Most people seem do to this stuff before the new year is out. Oh well.

Best Beer to bring Backpacking.

The requirements of a good trail brew are that it must come in cans, so you can crush it and carry it out, and must taste good, even if it isn’t ice cold. The idea here is to bring yourself just one can to drink and relax with at the end of the day’s hike. At one and a half pounds per 12 ounce can, I’m not gonna lug a 12-pack very far.

I nominate Yuengling’s Black and Tan, in a can. A mixture of Yuengling Premium Beer (40%) and Dark-Brewed Porter (60%). Yum.

Worst Brazenly Obvious Bias in a News Story.

That would have to go to ABC news for the headline “White Supremacists Riot in Toledo, Ohio” (where the neo-nazi people weren’t the rioters).

Originally when I discussed this, Jacqueline cautioned me about the old saying “don’t see malice when stupidity seems to explain things just fine”. and OK, I’m willing to do that, but when you combine the headline with the tagline;

Headline – “White Supremacists Riot in Toledo, Ohio”
Tag line – “Mayor of Toledo, Ohio, Declares Emergency, Sets Curfew After Hundreds of White Supremacists Riot”

and then you look at their so called “correction”:

Headline – “Emergency Declared After Anti-Nazi Riots”
Tag line – “Ohio Mayor Declares Emergency, Sets Curfew After White Supremacists’ March Turns Violent”

and then you notice that someone reading that still could wind up confused, not to mention the fact that they failed to admit in the revised story that their first headline was wildly misleading. At this point, you start to wonder about their “pure as wind driven snow” totally unbiased objectivity.

And then you notice that the picture they included with the news story does seem to show some kind of disturbance, but it wholly fails to convey exactly who is doing the rioting.

And then you notice that the incorrect story is still available on the server almost three months later, and you start to think things like perhaps they really are totally unbiased, except of course for White Supremacists, who clearly don’t deserve the same level of truthfulness in the media as more mainstream groups do.

All well and good, but when I run across blunders such as this, I would think that the media peoples would bend over backwards to show that they were unslanted, objective reporters. Perhaps they should publish a correction that looks something like this.

Headline – “Nazi March Peaceful; Counter-Protesters Riot”
Tag line – “Mayor of Toledo, Ohio, Declares Emergency, Sets Curfew After Hundreds of Counter-Protesters Riot”

By JOHN SEWER Associated Press Writer

(Notice of Correction. ABC news has corrected the headline of this story from this earlier version. We sincerely regret any confusion generated by our mistake)

TOLEDO, Ohio Oct 16, 2005 – Protesters at a white supremacists’ march threw rocks at police, vandalized vehicles and stores and cursed the mayor for allowing the event…

To do otherwise, and you fully deserve any standard corporate munge anyone tries to affix to you, (i.e Always Broadcast Communism) and whatever reputation that comes along with it.

Favorite thread that I participated in on another blog

“…We had to fight to get a season opened on the black bear that’s a problem in the panhandle. It was being opposed by a bunch of eco-freaks that have never been outside the beltway. People who order sustainably harvested wooden measuring spoons made by real third world people who get paid a living wage, from out of an overpriced catalog so they can feel like they live close to the earth. Then they have an absolute heart attack when the first bear of the season is taken by a 8 year old girl. Are they afraid she’ll do a drive-by shooting next week?…”

Best Cerebral Discussion in a Thread on another Blog

JJ and I rant on about Alexander Hamilton. Should we have have followed his advice and never enumerated any rights in an effort to keep the federal government weak and limited, or was he a closet monarchist, proposing disaster?