Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Bad Editorial Decision

The Washington Post should be mildly embarrassed for referring to Chapo Guzmán as "a billionaire cartel boss".* It is famously difficult to prove a negative, but there is no credible evidence whatsoever of said status (at the very least, none in public), and one of his closest confidants recently said that the designation was "nonsense". In allowing the description to slip out, the Post makes its readers less enlightened, which is to say, it does precisely the opposite of what a newspaper should.

*Of course, Forbes should be far more embarrassed, having initiated the stupidity in 2009, but if Forbes jumped off a bridge, one would hope that the Post wouldn't follow.

2 comments:

malcolm beith said...

you trust El Mayo to tell the truth about how much he and Chapo are worth? come on Patrick, I definitely expect more from you, even if i can't expect more from the Post :)
I think it is safe to value Chapo at 1 billion or more though. If you factor in all his properties, weapons, drug plantations, planes etc, he's gotta be worth a billion easy.

pc said...

RE Mayo, yeah that's true, his denial in and of itself doesn't mean much. As to whether or not Chapo has a billion dollars, I don't think it's inconceivable, but the explanations offered by Forbes that I saw were not credible, they seemed made up after the fact. If people are going to be casually throwing that label around, I think it should be based on something a little more concrete.