News Judgment Anyone?

Saturday wasn't a good day for the front page of the city's dailies. One of two lead stories in the Daily News was was that tired vein of a reporter boards a plane, sends luggage with exacto knives, or gets on a bus looking suspicious. This time one of the tabloid's reporters boarded the city's subways with a baby stroller with no baby, just to see if the cops would pick up on it, and you know what--gasp!--they didn't. Now I guess we're all supposed to be shaking in our boots about how damn unsafe it is to ride those subways if the cops can't even manage to mistake a well-groomed, and fit I might add, woman Daily News reporter for a terrorist. So, you put the paper down and shrug your shoulders, and say "Well, it's a tabloid after all."

Then you turn to the front page of the New York Times, and below the fold is a compelling article on how some of the produce at pick-it-yourself pumpkin patches doesn't actually come from that particular patch. Scandal of Scandals! To make matters worse, here's a reporter who is trying too damn hard to sex up a story:

"Not since 1948, when microfilm hidden in a hollowed-out pumpkin led to Alger Hiss's indictment on espionage charges, has there been such a whiff of pumpkin intrigue."

I kid you not.