For over a century, the New York Times has used the slogan, “All the news that’s fit to print.” This catchphrase was created by the owner, Adolph S. Ochs, in 1896 to distinguish his newspaper from others that published lurid and inaccurate stories. The intention was needed because, quite frankly, we depend on media sources to learn what is happening in the world, and we want to believe it is the truth.
However, there is another factor that rarely gets much attention. Some incidents certainly have an important impact, yet, for some unknown reason, they fade away. My particular thorn goes back to the attack on the US Embassy in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012. That attack on that particular date was surely not a coincidence. And of all places that the USA should be on high alert, it would be Libya, formally ruled by dictator Colonel Gaddafi for over 40 years, who was assassinated in 2011.
My wife Debbie worked as the health unit nurse for the US Embassy in Riga, Latvia, from 1995-2006, and that building complex was a fortress, lessons learned from the takeover of the US Embassy in Tehran, Iran, in 1979. My wife got to know one of the women who was trapped there as a hostage for 444 days. Everyone knew the dangers, so how did that horrible event happen in Benghazi?
Under President Obama, Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State when the Benghazi attack took place, resulting in the death of four US government personnel, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens. This was the first death of an ambassador in half a century. When Clinton was brought before the US Senate to question how this occurred, she famously remarked, “What difference, at this point, does it make?’ Apparently, she was right because, after this, Benghazi was a dead horse.
Because of the sixteen Montoursville Area High School students and the five chaperones who died in the Boeing 747 crash on July 17, 1996, just 12 minutes after it took off from JFK Airport in New York City, there is a continual interest in that tragedy in our area. Unfortunately, the rest of the country does not have the same passion. There has been strong evidence that it was a US Navy missile test gone wrong, but not surprisingly, this “lacked evidence.” It is still a painful mystery for those in our area but dismissed by the rest of the country.
There are many other mysteries. Thirteen US service members and roughly 170 Afghan civilians were killed at Kabul International Airport on August 30, 2021, the greatest loss of American life in Afghanistan in ten years. Why did the US pullout turn out to be such a disaster? Ancient history, apparently…
Closer to home, what about that historic Supreme Court leak? On May 2, 2022, an unprecedented leak from a document of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito revealed that the court was privately poised to overturn its landmark decisions establishing a constitutional right to an abortion. The Supreme Court was “sorry” over the event, but “sorry” doesn’t cut it. For two centuries, the Supreme Court’s secrecy has been legendary and necessary. It astounds me that this issue has dropped out of sight.
And let’s go to the White House and try to learn who brought the cocaine found in the lobby area of the West Executive Avenue entrance to the White House on July 2, 2023. The FBI and the Secret Service investigated, and (wait for it…) “the investigation is closed due to a lack of physical evidence.” Move along, move along. There is nothing to see here.
And much closer to home, whatever happened to Lycoming County’s coalition on dangerous drugs? A decade or so ago, Lycoming County President Judge Nancy Butts and Shea Madden, Executive Director of West Branch Drug and Alcohol Abuse Commission, came up with a tremendous idea to help stop the drug problem in our county. From this came the Heroin Task Force, which has committees for various organizations with volunteers from faith-based, law enforcement, medical, business, and all areas of society.
For several years, this was a tremendous ground-pounding operation, with well over 100 active volunteers and a real impact on the drug issues in our area, such as awareness events and disposal locations for expired or no longer needed drugs. But then, it apparently got too popular, and the more important people redesigned it, establishing a paid director and renaming it Project Bald Eagle. I was one of the ground-pounders and asked everyone in our task force if they knew where the name Project Bald Eagle came from or, for that matter, what it had to do with drug abuse issues. No one knew; it was obviously above our pay grade. Less than a year later, the whole thing fell apart.
Perhaps that story will be told someday, but like the others on this list, I somewhat doubt it. All the news that’s fit to print sometimes has the print faded away.
