31 May 2005

And in other news

An AP story titled Plane Carrying 4 Americans Crashes in Iraq leads off this way:
The U.S. military nearly set off a sectarian crisis Monday by mistakenly arresting the leader of Iraq's top Sunni Muslim political party, while two suicide bombers killed about 30 police.
While the article goes on to mention the plane crash, it seems that the arrest of the Sunni leader (a mistake, yes, but "mistakenly" — I have my doubts) might have made a more appropriate headline. After all, it may well lead to the deaths of many more than four people. Better yet, why not write two articles?

Update: The lead has now been changed to:
Four American and four Italian military personnel were killed in separate aircraft crashes, military officials said Tuesday, and Iraq's prime minister condemned the U.S. arrest of a top Sunni political leader.