Sunday, March 16, 2008

CNN Headline shows bias

How about the following headline that appeared on CNN on March 14th: the headline, with the red border, delivers the message that Hillary Clinton is misleading the public. Yes, it says "accused", and it has "misleading public" between quotes implying that someone said it. But by reading this title alone - and many people just browse by the headlines - the message is that Hillary is misleading the public. 


However, once I clicked on that headline, here is what I got:

The difference between the two titles is quite clear. Here is my question: why didn't the editor of CNN's main page use the correct headline: "Obama backer takes aim at Clinton's experience"? Was that editor trying to convey his personal political inclination in that main page headline? Or was it just poor judgement? Either way, unacceptable for someone in that position.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Tied to prostitution ring?

How about having the inaugural posting of this blog with a misleading title that was presented initially by the New York Times. Looks like they are doing everything they can to earn the title of the largest sensationalist newspaper in the country. Here is their headline:


What is the meaning of "being linked to a prostitution ring"? To me and others that I asked, the message that this title conveys is that the Governor was one of the organizers, leaders, or something in that category. In fact, he was a customer. So... being "linked" was quite a stretch...
 
The two largest news agencies which distributed the news followed suit:
Here is the Associated Press misleading news title:

And here is the Reuters misleading news title:

from this point on, of course, everybody was spreading the "link". Some, like the Huffington Post, added their own "creative" - the prostitution ring is now Spitzer's ring:

I must give credit to the one outlet that decided to edit the title into something that accurately represented the content. This was Fox News version:


Note:  This blog intends to solely present misleading news and not issue opinions on the subject