Jackson Free Press

OK, this is weird. The Clarion-Ledger posted a story earlier today about the mayor's most recent about-face on public records. Now, it seems, he is mad at The Clarion-Ledger again, and refusing to give them records that have anything to do with his "security." Here's the weird part, though: In the story posted earlier, The Clarion-Ledger said that Melton "retracted a personal apology"; now the story says something quite different, with an extra error to boot added to the already passive-ridden sentence about the "apology":

Melton also said when he called the newspaper Wednesday to apology for requests being denied he was mistaken about what requests had been denied.

So, why did they take out the part about the retraction? Either he did, or he didn't.

This is where it gets even stranger, though.

In the next sentence, we get glimmers of what we're hearing out of the city—that it's Danks fighting the City Attorney's office:

Dale Danks, Melton's attorney, said Wednesday the denial letters sent by the city were "without merit."

This is really turned into a circus now: Melton v. Ledge v. City Attorney v. Danks v. Ledge v. Melton.

Remember the lover's spat analogy? "I love you, I love you not. I hate you. I love him. No, I love her. Do you love me?"

(And, yes, we did print the original story.)

Previous Commentsshow

WLBT is reporting on Melton's retraction in their story, "Mayor Melton Does 180." First he said he was sorry, now Jackson Mayor Frank Melton is taking that apology back. He's also personally denying open records requests from the Clarion-Ledger newspaper about his security detail. I also talked to Mr. Melton this evening, but y'all will have to wait until next week to hear more about that. We have some interesting PDFs on the way, though. Tantalizing enough for you? ;-)

ladd

Jun 9 2006

You've got enough material to write a book about this guy. Call it "The Two Mr. Meltons".

jeff lucas

Jun 9 2006

bad writing on the clarion ledger? Imagine. I once debated a study with Gloria Baldwin Butler. Dumbass (and I mean it) tried to tell me a so called study was a study without a control group or overall group for comparison with the subject group. SO much for higher education. then there are all the sentences that are really prepositional phrases.

Kingfish

Jun 9 2006

I know, Jimmy. But how does this sentence make it into print, even with the apology typo fixed: Melton also said when he called the newspaper Wednesday to (apologize) for requests being denied he was mistaken about what requests had been denied. I'm sorry. This sentence is barely literate. Why don't they simply edit out 90 percent of the passives—that is editing 101. I just don't get it. Of course, you have to do better reporting to write in the active voice; maybe that's why. But, good Lord.

ladd

Jun 9 2006