Beware of Stories that Match Your BiasLiberals and conservatives alike are pretty good at spotting phony stories that are put out by the other side; where we are in danger of being duped is with stories that fit our pre-existing biases. The
Commissar came out pretty good on the American Center for Voting Rights story; he was the first center-right blogger to catch onto the fact that the ACVR was just a Republican front group trying to steal a few headlines.
The reason I bring this up is the
embarrassing story of Kodee Kennings, the little girl whose poignant letters to her dad serving in Iraq turned out to be a complete fiction.
The Daily Egyptian, Southern Illinois University's student-run newspaper, today will admit to its readers that the saga - of a little girl's published letters to her father serving in Iraq - was apparently an elaborate hoax perpetrated by a woman who claimed to be the girl's aunt.
In fact, the newspaper will report today, the man identified as the girl's father was never in Iraq, and it was the woman who apparently wrote the letters and regular columns that were published under the little girl's name - and even impersonated the girl in telephone interviews.Here's the "suits the bias" part:
Over the months, columns written by Kodee started to become a regular feature on the paper's editorial page. The columns, titled "Kenningsology," talked about her childhood, her newfound friends at the Daily Egyptian, her father, and even President Bush:
"I'm rily mad at you and you make my hart hurt,"' she purportedly wrote in one published letter to the president. "I don't think your doing a very good job. You keep sending soldiers to Iraq and it's not fair. Do you have a soldier of your own in Irak?"That was why the New Republic got stung a few years ago with the
Stephen Glass incident; because the stories Glass wrote, as wild as they were, suited the biases of the editors who published them. Ditto
Julie Amparano of the Arizona Republic.
Update: I like
this guy's take on the story.
Marathon Pundit has
run some stories about
moonbattery at Southern Illinois University in the past.
