Here's the timing. Sunday, May 25. Fr. Pfleger, of St. Sabina Church on the South Side of Chicago, preached at Trinity United Church of Christ. At week's end the first YouTube snippet, in which the visiting priest mocked Obama's opponent Sen. Hillary Clinton, started rocketing around the Internet -- and the mainstream media. Saturday afternoon, May 30, at a campaign stop in South Dakota, Obama announced he had submitted a letter of resignation from the church. (Protestants often join a specific parish by signing a membership book and transfer membership by letter, so the procedure isn't uncommon.) Then on Sunday, May 31 (today) at 10:46 p.m. (Eastern time), Tapper published the new snippet under the headline "Rev. Pfleger: "America is the Greatest Sin Against God." I don't question the accuracy of the snippet. Fr. Pfleger is a well-known firebrand, and, well, YouTube is what it is. Nor did I question Tapper's license to editorialize. His column, a blog, really, is called "Political Punch: Power, pop, and probings from ABC News Senior National Correspondent Jake Tapper." It carries his picture, and that, too, identifies it as an opinion piece.
But I did question Tapper's timing. So I wrote in the comments field:
How, exactly, does this qualify as news since Obama already resigned from the church during yesterday's news cycle?Here's the mea culpa: When I read Tapper's 45-word-long lede, I didn't notice he'd tucked away a reference to "Obama's now former church" in the middle of all the verbiage. So when I wrote my comment, I thought he didn't spell that out till the fifth graf.
Why, exactly, did you not mention his resignation till the fifth graf?
Where are your journalistic ethics?
How, exactly, can I explain this to my students?
Posted by: journalism t\Teacher | Jun 1, 2008 11:42:27 PM
Another reason, I'd say, why we really ought to keep our ledes down to 20 or 25 words.
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