By Scott Sullivan
Editor
Oops …
We are all heirs to being human. Divine is another matter. Last week’s front page had not one but two stories sharing misinformation based on errant sources.
As a journalist I can get away with, “I guarantee it is true they said it; I can’t guarantee what they said is true.” That happens routinely when I quote different sides on political, legal or other matters. For the sake of balance, that’s what I should do.
What I shouldn’t is assign more credence to source documents — public meeting minutes, police reports and such — than they’re always due. Like assuming draft planning commission minutes — as was the case with the Dunes Resort story last week — don’t misspell razed “raised.” They were withdrawn later.
My only dog in a fight, such as is, is get things right. If I don’t, I am eager to correct misinformation as soon as possible. Hence the corrections/clarifications on Page 1 this week.
Please forgive. It’s part of the err I breathe.
And Bloops
When Purdue made history becoming the first NCAA men’s basketball team to lose a Sweet 16 game to a No. 15 seed, it confirmed a March Madness fatalism baked into my diploma.
Then I read the Universe Today story about Perdue (sic, we get no respect) astronomers discovering two supermassive black holes — my favorite things — orbiting other and doomed to collide someday.
This particular pair, Purdue professor Matthew Lister says, are 8.8 billion light years away and weigh 100 million suns each. When they merge or collide they’ll release a massive amount of energy in the form of gravitational waves, causing space ripples in every direction plus matter oscillations as the waves pass through.
Lister — who per his vitae specializes in active galactic nuclei, astrophysical jets and shocks, quasars and BL Lacertae objects, narrow-line Seyfert I galaxies and very long baseline interferometry — presumably knows his stuff. At Purdue I specialized in beer.
So there I was doing further research at the Pullman Tavern and mourning about how Purdue tanked against the St. Peter’s Peacocks when who should walk in but U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia).
“I hear your caucus won’t have Fred Upton to kick around anymore,” I told her.
“That RINO!” she spat. “He voted against my president!”
“Trump was lots of people’s president,” I said. “Just not enough to win re-election.”
“What?” she cried. “He won in 2020 by a landslide!”
“Upton doesn’t buy that,” I said. “He represents my district.”
“Loser!” Greene shouted. “How did your team do against the Peacocks?”
I was going to ask her how Trump did against Joe Biden but thought it was better to change subjects. “What’s with you calling fellow Republicans Mitt Romney, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski ‘pro-pedophile’ because they voted for Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson?” I asked.
“KBJ is pro-pedophile too! All Democrats and RINO moderates should be shot!”
“With Covid vaccines?
“That would that make them worse zombies yet!”
“Your obsession with pedophilia is inspiring,” I told her. “Think Fred will have time now to introduce me to his niece?”
“What do you see in Kate Upton you don’t see in me. I’m blonde too.”
Too dumb to be, I thought. Must come from a bottle. Speaking of which … “Bottom’s up,” I told her, hoisting an Old Milwaukee.
In walked Prof. Lister. “Boy, that Peacock game sucked,” I told him.
“Yes. But now we are fanning our feathers with new clues about how the universe started.”
“You guys always say that.”
“We always want more grants for research,” he said.
“I thought Jewish space lasers started the universe,” said Marjie. “Wait, that was California wildfires. Wait, God really started everything!”
“In seven days or one?” I asked. “Genesis gives different accounts.”
“Neither contradicts science necessarily,” said Lister. “You’ll get a Big Bang out of this. In the beginning there was nothing, just darkness.”
“That’s really something,” I said, “per the Dark Sky articles in our newspaper.”
“With a boom,” he went on, ignoring the ignorant, “the universe expanded from an initial state of high density and heat and has kept enlarging.”
“Into what?” I asked.
“Infinity.”
“You’re saying that pre-existed?”
“Finding binaries,” he went on, “helps us understand how galaxies formed and have black holes at their centers.”
“What about Purdue Pharma, hotshot?” Greene said.
“Has nothing to do with the university or universe,” Lister answered.
“Purdue peddled Oxycontin!” she charged.
“Whose biggest fan was Rush Limbaugh,” I said.
“He should be on Mt. Rushmore,” she sighed “What about Perdue Foods factory-farming chickens, pigs and turkeys?”
“Different spelling,” said Lister.
“Not per the Universe Today,” Greene replied. “What about David Perdue running for governor of my state?”
“Trump wants the incumbent gone for not supporting his false election claims, but polls show Perdue losing anyway,” I noted.
“Georgia doesn’t in football,” she bragged.
“But we always do,” I sighed.
