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[Phys-L] Re: Warning: Don't ask for Library loans on Political Topics



Bruce writes:

This Morning December 24th, the Boston Globe reported that the story about
the young man who reported that Homland Security visited him over a book
he received from interlibrary loan was not true.

Yet another example of the end justifies the means. Report something (of
course the student is not identified), acquire a lot of great publicity,
(Ted Kennedy even used this story in his rambling attack on George Bush
and the renewal of the patriot act) rile up the political
"diatribists", then report the truth when it will not receive any
attention.....

It will be interesting to see if the bloggers who jumped on this
story have enough integrity to update their readers on this new
development.* In my, perhaps biased opinion but one based on pretty
careful study of both sides, the left wing blogosophere has a FAR
better record in this regard than its right wing counterpart. In any
event, it's also worth noting that the mainstream press was very
careful not to pick up the story.

With regard to this:

[Brian Whatcott]
They very properly did not identify the student in question. (Why
on EARTH would Bruce think this significant??)

[Bruce Esser]
Perhaps there never was a real student. Without the identification
of same the suspicion exists that this was another wonderful
fabrication for political/economic purposes. Conceived by the
demoncrats. executed by uber leftist professors (redundant yes i
know), reported without any fact checking by the blue states press
and dedicated to the proposition that any story that demonizes the
republicans is a fair story even if it is not true.

I thought I understood that Bruce had read the report in the Boston
Globe. If so, he couldn't easily have missed the fact that, very
early on in that story, it says, "The Globe interviewed [the student]
Thursday but decided not to write a story about his assertion,
because of doubts about its veracity."


* As I was putting this message to bed, I visited what is generally
considered to be the premier liberal blog site, Daily Kos, and found
this item <http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/12/24/31717/786>.
I must say, it makes me proud to be a liberal.

And now, I too hope we can get back to physics.

--
John "Slo" Mallinckrodt

Professor of Physics, Cal Poly Pomona
<http://www.csupomona.edu/~ajm>

and

Lead Guitarist, Out-Laws of Physics
<http://www.csupomona.edu/~hsleff/OoPs.html>
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