Left I on the News

The Bush Administration isn't the only one responsible for trying to create false linkages in the public's minds, like the non-existent linkage between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda. Here's page 3 of today's San Jose Mercury News:

For those who can't read the headline, and none of you can read the stories, let me explain. The main headline, spanning the page, reads "Eight in custody for British attacks." And in the right-hand column there's an article about those events, subheaded "Connection to Al-Qaida Suspected." But in the left-hand column, also subheaded and in larger print no less, we read "U.S. official suspects tie between Iran, radicals" and a "sub-subhead" reading "Militants confess to link." But the "radicals" and the "militants" in that subhead have nothing to do with the events in Britain described in the main headline and the right-hand column. The left-hand column is a completely different story (the one in which the U.S. has escalated its allegations that Iran is arming and training groups in Iraq).

Clearly, the editors of the Mercury News intended the reader to link these two stories in their minds. There is a "super-headline" reading "Terror around the world" which is no doubt their justification for this juxtaposition, but that can't possibly excuse what they've done here. Disgraceful.