Tuesday, June 02, 2009

"Media Statistic of the Day"

Slublog over at Ace's puts together a pretty good review of the difference in coverage of the Tiller murder and the murder of the army recruiter:

A little food for thought from Newsbusters:

"At the time of this writing, there are nearly 7,000 references to "George Tiller" in Google News.

There are under 500 for "William Long."


George Tiller, of course, was the Kansas abortion doctor murdered Sunday morning by a man who allegedly had political and religious motives."


William Long was the 23-year-old military recruiter murdered Monday morning by a man who allegedly had political and religious motives.George Tiller dedicated his life to killing fetuses.

William Long dedicated his to killing terrorists.


One story still has 'legs,' the other is yesterday's news. Some priorities you've got there, MSM.
Someone has already commented on Twitter saying Tiller was a public figure, while the soldier was not. Granted, but how often are US soldiers murdered on US soil by a terror suspect?


Update - With this, I'm not trying to condemn one killer while praising another. Scott Roeder is a criminal and nothing justifies the murder of Dr. Tiller.


What bothers me is the willingness of the media to smear the entire pro-life movement based on Roeder's actions while devoting very little airtime or newspaper space to the national security implications of William Long's murder.

Update II - DrewM makes an interesting point in the comments. When Dr. Tiller was murdered, the White House released a statement on Sunday afternoon. As of 11:15 a.m. EST, the Commander in Chief has yet to release a statement condemning the murder of a member of the armed forces by a suspected terrorist.