The Baltimore Sun (BS) stepped up its long running assault on Maryland Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend in a front page editorial published in its Sunday editions [December 19, 1999].
The BS editorial, written by staffer Michael Dresser, attempts to blame Townsend for recently-reported criminal assaults on juvenile criminals by guards at so-called "boot camps" maintained by the state. Dresser charges that "the abuses occurred on her watch" and that "the beating, slamming and manhandling continued for months after she was alerted to the problem."
The BS continues to crow about its latest "megaturd"--a term used by writer Dave Barry to describe a series of newspaper articles about a supposed crisis, designed to win journalism contests.
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On the surface, it may seem like the BS did the public a service by exposing the assaults. But did it? A promising juvenile justice program has been needlessly destroyed, rational discussion about a complex problem has been stymied, and now the political career of a rising young politician is being threatened by the Sun's campaign for a Pulitzer Prize. The BS sent a reporter to the camps, who witnessed illegal assaults on the juvenile criminals housed there. Did he try to intervene to stop the assaults? No. Did he report the crime to the police, as any citizen is required to do? No, again. Did he go to the proper authorities so they could take appropriate action? You guessed it: no. What didthe BS reporter do? He went back and wrote articles, then held them, timing publication to maximize the political damage it would do to the Lieutenant Governor as she begins initial stages of her campaign for governor. The result? Instead of guards being fired, prosecuted, and jailed for their crimes, an entire program has been destroyed. And who benefits? The BS, as it builds on its reputation as a ruthless political power unequaled in the state of Maryland. The lesson: no one had better dare cross the path of the mighty BS. |