Newsroom follies

Here's how I was going to start this post:

"A developer in Charlottetown has jumped into the Nova Scotia election fray. With a new poll out showing that the NDP may be headed for a majority, Richard Homberg has warned Nova Scotians that they businesses may leave the province if they elect an NDP government."

Now Homburg's remarks, as reported on CBC Radio, were ridiculous. He said that he had left Winnipeg on principle after an NDP victory in Manitoba, but then added that his opinion was not political.

Turns out, though, he made the comments last fall. So they were reported, newscast after radio newscast, as the word of a successful (if out-of-province) businessman warning of harm to the economy if the NDP were elected -- just as that began to seem like a possibility for the first time.

What I want to know is, how do you make a mistake like this? Where did the tape of Homburg come from? It's obviously not like a reporter just went out and interviewed him. Somebody had to dig it up from somewhere.

A big-time screw-up.

Speaking of screw-ups, it was pretty amusing last week to listen to newscasts about the guilty plea of a teenage girl on a weapons charge. In newscasts on the hour she was 18; on the half-hour she was 17. Back and forth, back and forth, all day long.