The Maupin coverage
I'm not going to take the Enquirer to task for its coverage of the Matt Maupin funeral. Many people are asking why now, why is the Enquirer devoting so much space and resources to this when there have been local soldiers whose deaths didn't even rate the front age.
I've been critical in the past of the Enquirer's lack of interest in the war. It's the biggest journalistic sin this paper has committed in the recent past. For most of the past five years, you could read the front page of the Enquirer and not realize the country is at war. The Enquirer has to be one of the few major dailies in the country not to have sent a reporter to Iraq. The editorial board's attention to this was has been infrequent, immature, ill informed, cowardly and just wrong.
Is the Enquirer trying to make it up in one fell swoop, packing into a week the coverage they've failed to present in the past? Maybe. But set that aside.
Have any of the critics of the Maupin observance been to a single other funeral? In how many other cities across the nation has there been an opportunity like this, for ordinary citizens to stand with their hats on their hearts as the casket of a fallen soldier passed by? If there's one funeral President Bush should attend, it's this one.
If you're against the war or for it, don't pass up this opportunity to honor Matt and the 4,360 other brave Americans who've given their lives in this war. Go to the visitation or the ballpark, or watch it on TV, think of those Americans and ask, as an American citizen, if you've been as involved in this war as you should have been. I know I haven't.
I've been critical in the past of the Enquirer's lack of interest in the war. It's the biggest journalistic sin this paper has committed in the recent past. For most of the past five years, you could read the front page of the Enquirer and not realize the country is at war. The Enquirer has to be one of the few major dailies in the country not to have sent a reporter to Iraq. The editorial board's attention to this was has been infrequent, immature, ill informed, cowardly and just wrong.
Is the Enquirer trying to make it up in one fell swoop, packing into a week the coverage they've failed to present in the past? Maybe. But set that aside.
Have any of the critics of the Maupin observance been to a single other funeral? In how many other cities across the nation has there been an opportunity like this, for ordinary citizens to stand with their hats on their hearts as the casket of a fallen soldier passed by? If there's one funeral President Bush should attend, it's this one.
If you're against the war or for it, don't pass up this opportunity to honor Matt and the 4,360 other brave Americans who've given their lives in this war. Go to the visitation or the ballpark, or watch it on TV, think of those Americans and ask, as an American citizen, if you've been as involved in this war as you should have been. I know I haven't.
posted by Newsache at 7:28 AM
5 Comments:
Bullshit. What about that Ohio based regiment that lost 20 or more folks all in the same week? WhereTF was George Bush then?
This thing with Maupin is nothing but cheap recruitment tricks. What freedom did Maupin die for? The freedom to be searched as you enter his memorial?
Screw Bush. Screw the Enquirer. Screw the War.
You're drunk deborahgirl. You can't even cite what unit you're talking about. Do us a favor, crawl back into your soiled bed and stay even more miserable for a while.
I have to be able to cite the unit number in order to remember and actually give a damn? Wow. Just wow.
The Enquirer has locked onto this as it does any major event. It's always good at covering events and at covering breaking news and news that's already been broken - they used to call it "swarming" and they have it down pat as they should have 180+ years- but not at breaking news itself.
Overall, as Newsache points out, the paper's war coverage is pitiful. It's coverage of other war deaths of locals has been average at best. The Matt Maupin story offered a chance for the paper to dig deeply into what happened to him and by doing that to illuminate the war as a result.
The paper could have diverted money spent to send sports reporters/columnists all over to cover events already being covered by wire services or money spent to send a reporter yet again to Portland to write about their trolleys or money spent to send a critic on yet another CSO tour of Europe (talk about a boondoggle) and used it to send someone to Iraq to follow this story, as well as to tell the stories of other area people who are there.
Instead, it's let the story slide ... until the family received news and announced it. Then the paper covered it. This pattern was repeated time and again.
Will the paper learn something from this and decide on a new strategy for covering the war from here on out? Doubt it. Not unless readers make their voices heard.
Our sons, daughters, wives, husbands, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, uncles, aunts and friends are being killed over there, when will the Enquirer, and its readers, truly care?
Lois Lane
i have a badge with the pic of Matt on in that I received in August of 2004 at the Anderson firemans festival...I have kept it on my window cill above my kitchen sink all of these years. i had the privlegde to stand and observe Matt's comming home parade on ST Rt 32, as it passed by my street. I waived to Mr. Maupin as he was waiving to us all from the window of the limo behind the hearse carring his son home. I have one loved one home from Iraq (a victim of an Ied explosion) and One loved one in the desert fighting for us as I type. I pray for all of our young men and women who courageously fight for our freedomes and hope that they all return home safe and sound....
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