Please tell your reporter that a news lead should answer the following questions: Who? What? Where? When? How? and Why?
The answers to these questions are found nowhere in the lead of his article [Alexandria Gazette Packet, June 29, 2017, "Reject Hate"]. In fact, the answers to questions 1 and 6 are found nowhere in the article at all.
An appropriate first sentence might have read: “A Democrat activist shot Republican Congressmen practicing baseball in Alexandria on June 14 and wounded four to include House Majority Whip Steve Scalise.”
Nowhere does the article identify the political affiliation of the shooter or his victims. Instead, we’re treated to an insipid platitude, “Reject Hate,” coined to vilify the very people victimized in the shooting.
A newspaper’s job is to report, not distort.
John C. Kiyonaga
Alexandria