On Tue, 10 Jul 2007 13:54:55 +0000, Tina wrote:

Your note suggests both gross ignorance on the part of the letter writer,
and of the newspaper for publishing such a letter.

I don't know about the second. Consider the story with which this thread
started. The author - and everyone that read the entire dialog in the
newspaper - learned a valuable lesson. A bit of ignorance and
small-mindedness was defeated.

Publishing ignorant letters is an opportunity. Better that then have
those people quietly voting out of their ignorance, no?

Of course, it would be even better if newspapers actually sought answers,
but that doesn't seem to be a part of journalism (with a few exceptions)
anymore. Rather, they tend to just accept what they're told and even
sometimes publish these "facts" w/o any qualification (ie. "fact" rather
than "fact according to ...").

- Andrew