The Star cannot be held responsible for the lack of correct reporting from the West Virginia mine site.
The officials there should have withheld any news until they were certain. The news people on site should have investigated before broadcasting. Ditto for the wire services.
More than that, in my opinion, the lobbyist story should have remained the center article. The death of the miners was tragic, but every day many more are dying in Iraq.
The lobbyist story is extremely important to the whole nation and needs to be front and center.
Dana Neilon
Olathe
When the church bells rang and family members wept with joy, reporters from such infotainment networks as FOX, CNN and MSNBC ran with unconfirmed facts and interviewed everyone they could find in Tallmansville, asking the friends and family members of the missing miners to talk about the miracle.
Then these same networks pointed their cameras at these very same people, prompting them now to express not only their grief but also their anger at the mining company for its tragic delay in providing accurate information.
The recent tragedy of the Sago mine explosion and the death of 12 men was (and continues to be) compounded by what now passes for broadcast news journalism.
There would be very little human drama in it, but how about some stories that offer basic facts and lead readers and viewers to explore and consider their significance? Perhaps a story that explores the increasingly cooperative relationship (what many would call outright collusion) between big business and the Department of Labor and other federal watchdog agencies.
Scott Saylor
Mission
