My Yahoo! mail account lists recent AP headlines on the front page. Just in the space of 10 minutes I noticed a key change in a headline. My cache still had the earlier listing, which I was able to take a screenshot of. Here’s the earlier listing of headlines:
Here’s the updated list, with the corrected headline:
Did you catch it? The Associated Press headline redacted “Al-Qaida” in favor of “Militants” in what was formerly called “Al-Qaida: Stop search for U.S. soldiers.”
Apparently a too-truthful headline would hurt the cause of the “Senate … vote on ending war funding” ? since that vote is predicated on the glaringly obvious myth that Iraq is “Bush’s war” and a distraction from the “real” fight against al Qaida. Such a headline would acknowledge the obvious, that al Qaida is in fact fighting U.S. and allied forces in Iraq. Better change it to the less specific term of “Militants,” who could just be “angry Iraqis disaffected by the U.S. ‘occupation’ of Iraq” or whatever. (For people who actually read the article, the first line makes it clear: the “Militants” are indeed an “al-Qaida front group.”)
