Re: Daniel Pearl is NOT dead

["Dan Billings" <dib9@gwi.net>]

Reuters is reporting that the body was not Pearl:

http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml;jsessionid=I1SOMRDFJJNZOCRBAEKSFEY
KEEARMIWD?type=topnews&StoryID=566274

CNN has now incorrectly reported his death twice.

It reminds me of the old Saturday Night Live bit about Franco still being
dead.

Or the radio reporter who promoted a story about a local transplant patient
as " (name) not dead yet."  (It really happened.  The person is still on the
air and is a nice guy so I don't want to slam him by name.)

It seems that the news outlets that did not carry the report of Pearl's
death today were the more reliable outlets.

Instead of worrying so much about reporting the news first, they should
worry more about reporting the news correctly.

I also think that this story has received a disproportionate amount of news
coverage.  There are Americans being held hostage today by terrorists in the
Philippines and they are rarely mentioned in the news, while the Pearl story
leads the news.  American business people are often kidnapped in third world
countries around the world, and their stories are rarely covered by the
national media.  I certainly wish Mr. Pearl and his family the best, but it
seems like the media considers the lives of reporters more valuable than
other people.

-- Dan Billings, Bowdoinham, Maine