I am really surprised that an organization such as PR Watch would present such a one-sided synopis of the recent article in Vanity Fair. Do a cursory check of the facts and you will see that the authors were mistaken more often than they were correct.
Editor & Publisher's Greg Mitchell [http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003546497 follows up] on the Gordon / Iraq / unnamed sources story:
If you wrote an extremely high-profile article for the most influential newspaper in the land that subsequently was widely criticized for its utter reliance on anonymous sources, would you produce a followup five days later, also based on unnamed sources?
... Gordon opened [http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/15/world/middleeast/15timing.html his story today] with this: “One of the questions posed by skeptics about the Bush administration assertions about Iran’s meddling in Iraq is why the charges are coming to light only now, when American officials say the shipment of lethal weapons from Iran to Shiite militias was first detected several years ago.”
Gordon then aimed to quiet the skeptics, citing only the following sources: “American officials”…. “one military official”…”military officials” …”American officials”…”American military officials.”
Dear Anne,
Good points. Generally speaking, businesses grouse at regulations, but Philip Morris is the leader and sees regulations as a way to freeze their lead.
As I understand, the 440,000 figure for cigaret-related deaths includes about 6,600 children’s deaths due mostly to their parents smoking around them, including during pregnancy with them en utero.
I hope that we don’t get another bill like the ban that got ads off radio and television that came back to bite us when states tried to regulate other advertisements. When states pre-empt local laws, then a lawsuit could have negated the state law, and people would have been unprotected. Even grandfathering in local laws don’t protect them, for lawsuits can kill them, and the people have no way to pass new ones.
But Congress favors laws that apply across the board to all the states, and state legislatures like laws that apply to all the subdivisions of the state. Now, that is fine when the law is GOOD. It is not fine when the law has holes and actually protects the tobacco companies from state or local regulations.
It sounds like the bills are weak enough for Republicans to vote for them. Uh-oh, bills that tobacco companies and Republicans favor?
D. Gordon Draves, President
Georgians Against Smoking Pollution
Care to name some specific errors?
I am really surprised that an organization such as PR Watch would present such a one-sided synopis of the recent article in Vanity Fair. Do a cursory check of the facts and you will see that the authors were mistaken more often than they were correct.
Editor & Publisher's Greg Mitchell [http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003546497 follows up] on the Gordon / Iraq / unnamed sources story:
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