Date: Mon, 5 Nov 2001 10:07:49 -0800 (PST) From: Tim Bousquet <chicoexaminer at yahoo.com>
UGGGH!!!
This is article is irresponsible-- I too received it about twenty times now through various email lists and individual emails, and was outraged by it, so did some elementary research. The article first appeared on Indy Media, here is my post to that web site:
I contacted Jeff Russel, who is with airport security at Bangor International Airport, and asked him about this article. Here is his response:
"Tim:
"Thank you for writing. Ms. Oden's version of events, while certainly exciting, are far removed from reality. We are unaware of any role Ms. Oden's status as a Green may have played. The passenger in question was asked to undergo additional screening (i.e. a hand wand examination) because the manner in which she purchased the ticket triggered a concern under the new Federal screening guidelines post September, 11. She refused to cooperate. It is illegal for an airline to fly an unscreened passenger. Accordingly, the airline denied her boarding. She never got near a plane. She never went through security. No screen, no fly--it is as simple as that. The situation was entirely of her own making. What's sad is that she refuses to admit to and take responsibility for her own inappropriate behavior, looking only for somebody else to blame for her own inability to cooperate with reasonable expectations under the circumstances. 99.9% of people selected are very understanding and cooperative and the process only takes an extra minute.
"Again, thanks for writing to express your concerns and we appreciate your efforts to objectively view the circumstances."
Luis Lingg (the author of the article) really has done a dis-service to Indy Media, which can be a wonderful resource. A fundamental tenet of responsible journalism holds that at least an attempt to contact the subject of an article should be made. It took me less than thirty seconds' worth of a Google search to find Bangor Airport's contact info, and thirty more seconds to fire off an e-mail asking about the allegations. They responded about ten minutes later. I don't think it's asking too much for somebody writing an article with such allegations to at least make the same effort.
As good as Indy Media can be, the two stories that stay in my mind are this one and the story that CNN film footage of Palestinians celebrating in the streets after the World Trade Center attacks was in reality old footage from some previous year. The Palestinian story was as false as the Bangor Airport story, and had the same flaw: the author did not even attempt to contact any one at CNN for comment.
This is Journalism 101, and until submitters to Indy Media start abiding by basic ethical standards, the entire Indy effort will be discredited.
In the meanwhile, we readers will have to act as editors, responding to mistakes when we find them.
** There has been some discussion on the site to the effect of the cops are lying, or whatever, but from my vantage point, the very fact that nobody sought to ask the cops in the first place discredits the article, regardless. And the fact that the Green Party is continuing to distribute this article, without doing any followup, without asking the feds about any alleged political hit list, without trying to find any eyewitnesses of the incident, and so forth-- well, the whole thing is just propaganda, and the truth be damned.
I don't know-- maybe the incident occurred exactly as Odin says it did, but certainly nobody has made any indepedent attempt to objectively report on this.
And, now that I'm emailing this response to everyone who sends it to me, I have little doubt that not one of the people who sent the piece to me in the first place will forward this response to the people they got it from. It's a sad day for Progressives when they have to resort to this sort of behavior.
Tim Bousquet Editor Chico Examiner