Blatant lies under overtures of loyalty

Melissa Filbin has officially lost my respect. I put in a call to The Battalion yesterday and spoke with Ms. Filbin directly. After asking her what The Batt's motives were in failing to publish a piece on the Deutschbag, Ms. Filbin stated that the story "hadn't developed," and that they were waiting for an "exclusive interview."

After reading the front page of The Battalion this morning, I was livid. How on Earth can an Aggie lie directly to a fellow Aggie? What is going on here? Has The Battalion lost its last shred of credibility as a student-run daily?

In the realm of journalism, if you lie to your public you're lying to the world. If you do that, your no better than chronic plagiarist Jayson Blair, former NYT reporter that habitually fabricated sources and stole material from some genuinely fabulous writers.

So, needless to say I'll be putting in a few calls to The Battalion's office.

What's really sad is that Brian Cain, a former classmate of mine and one-time city desk editor of The Batt, interviewed Deutsch on WTAW. His responses are canned, weak and offer no real justification for his actions. But that doesn't even touch the fact that although Deutsch put in an interview to WTAW The Battalion still didn't pick up the story. Why? I have no idea.

This is all so very sad.

[UPDATE]

Turns out that The Battalion did publish the AP breakdown of the non-Aggie incidident. No local angle, which sucks. I think that there's way too much politics going on at Aggieland's university daily.

Just to get it off of my chest, I think it's ethically wrong to let your own political bias get in the way of the press. If this is Filbin's deal, she needs to seriously learn the tenants of journalism, and quick.

Ms. Filbin may be a political science major, but that has absolutely no indication that she should be making judgement calls about what is news to Aggies and what isn't. Much like Mr. Deutsch shouldn't have been making judgement calls about what scientists, with accredited degrees of course, should disclose about the dangers of global warming or the evidence supporting evolution.