KOB-New Mexico, are you kidding me?

[Brain Cramp]

I just watched this story (link below) about a police officer who died while traveling with the President's motorcade in New Mexico yesterday.

Is it just me, or does this story play like a SNL news parody? Everyone talks with such high drama in their voice. Phrase such as "He was protecting the life of the President of the United States when he died" and "Someone else drove by ... PRESIDENT BUSH" and "The first to die in the line of duty." the camera shows up a close-up of the tree which looks like little more than a sappling. KOB did more to blow the facts of this story out of proportion than to give any sense of what really happened. Perhaps the officer was incapacitated by a medical condition before running into the tree or perhaps he was distracted by something and rode into the tree accidentally. He certainly didn't die because he was protecting the president.

After watching this story, I now know why the public thinks anyone in the media is not to be trusted, but rather, should be the subject of ridicule and disdain.

Check it out for yourself. (http://kob.com/article/stories/S178235.shtml?cat=500)

[TopRamen]

To be constructive here, I will say that JV's delivery seemed a little forced. He doesn't sound like that when he anchors. The writing is no worse than most of the local news packages I see nightly. I suppose I am being a little on the nice side because I know what's expected of reporters in that market. It's incredibly sensational and I can see it's the same as when I was there 9-10 years ago.

[Consider This]

Originally posted by Brain Cramp:

Check it out for yourself. (http://kob.com/article/stories/S178235.shtml?cat=500)I'll pass, thanks. There's enough melodramatic delivery of empty words in my market. I don't need to watch New Mexico's.

Too bad. I don't know how many reporters ruin potentially great stories by overdoing it -- delivery, writing, combinations thereof. Don't tell me how the story is supposed to make me feel. If you have to do that, you're not telling the story properly. Get out of the story's way and it will hit me much harder than if you try to force feed me its emotions.

[Big City]

Originally posted by Brain Cramp:
the camera shows up a close-up of the tree which looks like little more than a sappling.WTF video are you watching? That tree appears to be at least a foot in diameter. Drive your CAR into it at speed and see what happens.

[News Is Broken]

My takeaway from this is: In New Mexico, even the cops are lousy drivers. Who the hell hits a tree?! It's not like the damned thing jumped in front of the guy!

Sigh... I'm just sayin'.

[Clever Login Name]

At least they didn't treat it like TIME magazine did ...

Bush Motorcade Kills Cop
Monday, Aug. 27, 2007 Article

(ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.) — A police officer in President Bush's motorcade crashed his motorcycle and died Monday, less than a year after a crash in Hawaii killed another motorcycle officer accompanying the president.

The 40-year-old Rio Rancho officer, whose name was not released pending notification of relatives, crashed at the Albuquerque airport at a point where a road enters an underground parking garage, said Trish Hoffman, a spokeswoman for the Albuquerque Police Department. He was pronounced dead at an Albuquerque hospital.

Bush had been headed to the airport after attending a fundraiser for Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M.

Hoffman said the one-vehicle crash is under investigation and "it's way too soon" to pinpoint a cause.

"Any time there is a presidential motorcade, the officers, that's part of their job, they drive at a high rate of speed," Hoffman said.

Photographers and reporters in the presidential motorcade said the officer's motorcycle appeared to be nearly destroyed, and the officer was on the ground, being helped by an emergency medical technician.

The officer, who leaves behind a wife and two teenage children, had been with the Rio Rancho Police Department since 2005 and worked with campus police at the University of New Mexico before that, Hoffman said.

A Honolulu police officer, Steve Favela, died in November when he and two other motorcycle officers crashed while part of a presidential motorcade traveling across Hickam Air Force Base.

[The Mockingbird]

This is pretty typical KOB, demonstrative Liveshot by the numbers.

But seriously, nice read, Richards.

[tom servo]

That reporter needs to learn how to write, and he needs to read his own story so that he realizes that information included in the pkg should probably not be mentioned as having just been learned in the tag. (re: Bush's sympathy phone call.)

[tralala]

I'm confused, is Time saying that Bush is responsible for those deaths because he selfishly has a motorcade (as all presidents do)? That is a little weird.

Edited to add--that headline "Bush Motorcade Kills Cop" actually makes it sound like the Motorcade committed murder. Really bad writing choices here.

[ August 31, 2007, 12:51 AM: Message edited by: tralala ]