Conventional Wisdom

The Democratic National Convention is a local story for Denver, and its newspapers are covering the news with convention front pages in addition to their regular front pages. Monday's editions gave hints of what to expect this week.

VP in the Early Morning

It’s hard to keep a secret.

The Obama campaign did an extraordinary job this week keeping tightlipped on Barack Obama’s choice for a vice presidential nominee. That was until early this morning, when word came that the choice was Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware.

The news leaked to the media after midnight on the East Coast. The Associated Press filed a story, quoting a Democratic source. And The News Journal of Wilmington, Del., text-messaged its subscribers and posted the news on its Web site. Because the first deadline for its printed edition had passed, The News Journal’s front page only indicated that the choice might be Biden.

The Obama campaign, which had said it would announce the choice by text-messaging supporters, was left to do text-messaging of its own after 3 a.m. E-mail alerts didn't reach some supporters until the afternoon.

Because of the timing, definitive news on the choice made front-page headlines only in Western time zones. The Los Angeles Times, The Oregonian of Portland, The Salt Lake (Utah) Tribune and The Seattle Times, among others, had the news.

New Sun Rises

A newly redesigned Sun of Baltimore has made its debut. The Tribune newspaper followed in the footsteps of sister newspapers the Orlando Sentinel and South Florida Sun-Sentinel, both of which changed design this summer.

A reader guide said the Baltimore redesign included a four-column layout and more readable (although not larger) type. A new nameplate added "Baltimore" in what the newspaper said was an increased commitment to local news.


New design

Previous design

From History

Today in history: Aug. 21 marks the 40th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, ending the country’s democratic reform movement called the Prague Spring. Hospodarske Noviny and Lidove Noviny in Prague, Czech Republic, mark the anniversary, and Mladá Fronta DNES also in Prague reprints a photo from the time and refers to a special magazine.

Slovakia was once a part of Czechoslovakia, and Alexander Dubcek, who led the Prague Spring, was a Slovak. With those ties, SME in Bratislava also noted the anniversary in photo and text.

Clever Satire or Tasteless Humor?

That's the question the National Post of Toronto asked about the cover of the New Yorker magazine that depicts Barack Obama as a Muslim and Michelle Obama with an AK-47. "'Absurd' cartoon offends," the Post's subhead said. The cover also made the front page of the Buffalo (New York) News, which said: "New Yorker cover depicts fear-based attacks on Democratic candidate, wife." The News invited comments on the story on its Web site. Was the New Yorker cover just Big Apple humor? The New York Times notes today that there has been little humor about the candidate for president. "Want Obama in a Punch Line? First, Find a Joke."

Newspaper in the news

Yesterday's announcement by Chicago Tribune Editor Ann Marie Lipinski that she was resigning made today's front page. "Editor who shaped Tribune steps down," the headline said.
Lipinski, joined the newspaper as an intern from the University of Michigan, called the newspaper "the love of my life."

Photo: Real or embellishment?

Distributed by Agence France-Presse

Distributed by AP

Newspapers including the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, The Denver Post and The Boston Globe published on their Thursday front pages a photo of four missiles being launched in a test by Iran. The photo was first made public by the media arm of the Iran's Revolutionary Guard.

Now there are questions about whether the photo was manipulated. Agence France-Presse, which distributed the photo, has retracted the image.

In a story on its Web site, The New York Times posted an illustration of how the photo could have been changed with the use of photo-editing software. A photo distributed by The Associated Press shows three missiles being launched. The other photo, which was published in the large U.S. newspapers and in An-Nahar in Beirut, Lebanon, shows four.

Agence France-Presse was quoted as saying the fourth missile “has apparently been added in digital retouch” by Iranian state media “to cover a grounded missile that may have failed during the test.”

Today, Iran Daily published a photo of the missile testing, along with a story headlined "Preparing for Defense." Also on the Tehran newspaper's front page was a look at "extensive coverage by the regional and western media" of the missile testing. The Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune have small images of the real photo with references to inside stories about the manipulation. "Iranian missile photo appers to be faked," the Chicago Tribune said.