Human memory is a tricky thing. Most folks believe their memories are infallible, yet psychologists tell us many factors play a part in our ability to retrieve information stored in our little gray cells.
We can try to remember “i before e except after c” only to be defeated by the memory of an undigested piece of hot dog or of a discussion with the boss that went poorly or of a love lost years ago.
Sometimes we remember things the way we would have wanted them to be and sometimes we remember events as much worse than they were.
From time to time, we are completely unable to remember a factoid or a person or a happening, because the brain’s chief file clerk has misfiled it — like putting a piece of correspondence that belongs under “c” under “g.”
With that explanation, I take up some readers’ faulty memories of how things “used to be at The Salt Lake Tribune”:
* “The Tribune always ran only world and national news on the front page,” one woman (out of 15) complained.
Not true. I have been here for 10 years and The Tribune has always pushed Utah news out to the front page. This goes along with national and our own reader surveys that indicate people buy local or regional newspapers for the local news.
If you want to argue that some important world and national news is left off the front page and relegated to pages deep in the A Section, then you have a point. There are stories — such as the White House admission last week that President Bush’s claim about a nuclear program in Iraq was based on faulty intelligence — that would be candidates for the front page, especially in view of the original coverage given to Bush’s justification for the war in Iraq.
So, yes, perhaps world and national news deserve more consideration in the afternoon huddle when editors decide what will go on the section front of the next day’s Salt Lake Tribune.
But one part of the front page that I expect to see continue is what used to be known in the newsroom as “Column One,” because it ran in the extreme left column of the front page six days a week. It was usually a water-cooler story — one that editors figured people would chat about the next day because it was funny or odd or outrageous. We now run that feature with a label head, “Talk of the Morning,” frequently on the front page, but not always in that left-hand column.
* “The births always used to run on the same page as the obituaries. Now I have to look all over for them,” one reader, voicing a common complaint, said this week.
Trust me, it only seems that way. Birth announcements are run on a space available basis. That means when extra space opens up in the newspaper unexpectedly — for instance when the ad department has overestimated the space they need for obituaries — copy editors flow some of the huge list into that extra space. It seems as though the births are by the obituaries, because frequently that is where extra space appears. It is not planned that way.
On days when birth lists are run in the paper, they are listed in the little index on the front page under “Births.” The staff knows you love the birth announcements, you inveterate Utah scrapbookers.
* “About nine-tenths of the front page on Friday was on [Karl] Malone. What is wrong with you people?” complained one of 22 readers on Friday morning.
As Ross Perot would say, Here’s the deal: Malone became an institution in this state. And, in a state with a relatively small population that actually boasts a professional sports franchise that is not some team’s farm club,
Malone was a big piece of the landscape. His change of teams will have an effect on the Jazz and on life in general in this state, where he seemed to make most folks color-blind.
He’s not going to be on the front page forever, so cool your jets.
Right or left: One reader wrote an e-mail that said: “Your paper has gone too far to the right. I’m out. When you cover issues, try at least to present facts objectively. The slanted selection of editorials and articles shows what you want readers to know and [more importantly] what you don’t want them to know.”
Earth to reader: Since Dean Singleton took over as publisher of The Tribune, the editorial page has taken a giant step to the middle or moderate side of the political spectrum, from a position that used to be so far right that it could be described as slightly to the left of the political position of Attila the Hun. Facts go on the news pages; opinions go on the editorial pages. That is not going to change.
This week’s stats:
Number of readers who called about the size of type in stories: 5
Number of readers who say The Tribune puts too much junk in the paper: 17
Number of readers who think the reader advocate needs a makeover: 3
Number of readers who believe The Tribune does a poor job of covering national and world news: 22
