Well, the big stink in the press today is ‘how did the media start circulating reports that the 12 miners had survived and one died, when actually, the opposite was true?‘ I have one of those “happy newsâ€? Chronicles, but for once I won’t blame them for getting it wrong; every news organization in the nation had it wrong. Steven Den Beste says that it’s a reporter who misheard it and spread the bad info, but he doesn’t source that. On the other hand, the Chronicle says, per the W.Va. governor CEO of the mining company:

Hatfield said the erroneous information spread rapidly when people overheard cell phone calls between rescuers and the rescue command center. In reality, rescuers had confirmed finding 12 miners and were checking their vital signs, he said.

When you find someone dead, how do you confirm they’re dead? I mean aside from Mystery Men “I don’t think he’s going to pull through!â€? level of trauma. You check their vitals. So, someone overheard the rescuers following procedure by checking vital signs, and jumped to a conclusion: “Oh, they must be alive, if they’re checking vitals!â€? Which anyone might do, but obviously someone was in a bit of a hurry to spread the news. But I can’t just fault the press for this one. Part of the company disaster plan should be to designate one person as the official spokesman, and make it clear to the family and press that all news comes from this person, and only this person. The families have to be told, “Don’t listen to the press. It’s not real unless this person says it.”

Updated after the fold:

Update (01/04 – 6pm): h/t to DemLog via PajamasMedia: “In a post of 7:36 a.m. E.T. this morning, the Washington Post explained how the wrong news got put out that 13 trapped coal miners in West Virginia were alive. The story was that a rescue worker yelled out over a speakerphone that rescuers had found the miners and were checking their “vital signs,” which all the listeners took to mean the miners were alive. The mine officials took two hours to clarify and make sure all the miners except one were in fact dead.”

Update (01/05 -4pm): More news out now — The initial fault does indeed lie with the company. Someone in or near the command post heard the part about checking vitals, and phoned their relatives–who were at the church where the relatives of the trapped miners were holding their vigil and waiting. So that person spread the false news, and when people finally asked the company reps at the church, they said they were hearing the same rumors but had no confirmation. A very bad job of controlling the information flow, combined with press irresponsibility. Apparently no one back at the command post knew about the leaked information, so they failed to quash it in time.

It’s not like you can depend on the press to exercise restraint or do something sensible, like go back to the source and get confirmation. (All those layers of editorial oversight and fact checking just get in the way anyway.) Personally, I find that being on the hook yourself is a powerful motivator to check your facts. Only pain beats embarassment as a teaching tool. (Note the correction above?)

As I said, the Chronicle isn’t to blame for this (other than being a part of the general media frenzy), but I’m afraid that’s the only break they get from me today. The rest of the front page is a joke. The top news in the whole city is that a football team somewhere else in Texas is playing in the Rose Bowl? Excuse me for thinking that sports is, well, sports. Not news. Gosh, if it weren’t for the DeLay hit piece, nothing else would have appeared above the fold. I call it a hit piece because Michael Hedges, of the Chronicle’s Washington bureau wastes no time tying DeLay’s name to the Abramoff scandal, featuring it prominently in the second paragraph. Even though there is ZERO known evidence linking the two. In fact….

Right next to that article is another, which deserves the moniker “hit piece� so much more. The Chronicle breathlessly informs us that the Abramoff investigation “could spell more trouble� for DeLay’s aides… but not because the Justice Department has added to their indictments. Oh wait, the Justice Department doesn’t have any indictments against DeLay or his aides, does it? That’s just Ronnie Earle and his blue-light specials from “Grand J-Mart.� Come to think of it, the JD hasn’t said anything about indicting DeLay’s aides. Or even said that they’d found evidence indicating that Abramoff was linked to DeLay’s aides via unethical activities. No, the Chronicle has devoted valuable front-page space to have a staff writer tell us that the dastardly Abramoff knew the aides to the House Majority Leader, and in fact, “cultivated relationships� with them!

Um. Wait. Let me see if I have this correct… the Chronicle felt that I needed to be told that an influential and highly-connected lobbyist (a career in which your value depends on how many VIP rolodexes your name appears in) spent years and money as he “cultivated relationships� with the most powerful politician in the House. And that this “could mean� bad news to DeLay’s aides.

How exciting. Stop the presses. This is truly earthshaking news.

Thermonuclear fusion “could mean� that the sun is hot, but I don’t waste time thinking about it. On the other hand, if I wanted to caution a child about getting a sunburn, I might point out that even 93 million miles isn’t a wholly safe distance to be from a nuclear furnace. So, why did the Chronicle expend valuable space to point out the obvious? Where, exactly, is the “new� in this “news?�

“Inquiring minds want to know.”

–Ubu Roi