Same Memo, Different Views

One of the great things about the Internet is the profusion of source material. On any given story, a search engine-enabled news reader can choose differentg sources for the same sgtory. This often gives a semantic glimpse into spin on a story.

Commenting on the story about the political war between the State of Louisiana and the Feds, stories told of the memos being fired all over the universe. It's interesting to see how the different organizations portrayed one such memo.

On CNN.com:

For the state's part, Blanco's chief of staff Andy Kopplin e-mailed employees September 4 saying they needed to get national supporters to say "that the federal response was anemic" and asked them to point out budget cuts to levee programs.

In the New York Times:

"We need to keep working to get our national surrogates to explain the facts - that the federal response was anemic and had been shortchanged by budget cuts and avoiding responsibilities like protecting Louisiana levees and wetlands," Mr. Kopplin wrote in one e-mail message a week after the storm hit.

To me, the CNN version seemed to imply a creepier Kopplin who seemed more into manipulating the press. The NY Times version seems more like a frustrated public servant.

I don't have time to expand this idea, so I'll just post this. Maybe someone else can run with it, like a college kid looking for a goood term paper subject.