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ABC on women and guns
An ABC affiliate has run a short story on women and guns. The script mis-spells Sandy Froman's name at one place, but it's interesting to note the spin. It's slanted somewhat, as you'd expect (quotes Sandy on sporting use of guns by women, then quotes Brady Campaign on gun dangers without giving any other side. Still, it's quite an improvement over media treatment of ten years ago, when they either would have cited Brady alone, or at best have tried to depict the NRA side as the babblings of neanderthals.
I can remember an event circa 1980, when a Washington Post reporter wrote a story on NRA's citation of ATF abuses (which were quite serious back then). He investigated 3 or 4 cases, and before the story ran told the NRA person he'd interviewed that he'd be happy when the story came out.
When the story did run, each case had essentially two paragraphs: (1) NRA says this was an abuse but (2) ATF tells us the real truth, it wasn't. The NRA person called the reporter back.
The reporter explained that each was originally written as (1) NRA says this was an abuse (2) ATF says it wasn't and (3) I investigated it personally, and in one case it's a toss-up and on all the rest NRA was right. For instance, when there was a dispute over why a judge made a ruling, the reporter called the judge and the judge was willing to talk, the case being over, and confirmed NRA's version of why he did it.
But when the story went up to the Post editors, they cut out all the reporter's investigation and findings, and converted the ATF side into the revelation of the real truth.
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