An article in today's New York Times runs under the headline, "Among the Poor, Sympathy for the Families of Sept. 11." The article reports, "People at the Momentum AIDS lunch program, which had to close two Monday meal programs last week because of city budget cuts and a decline in donations, also wondered about the distribution of government money. They said that AIDS has become almost invisible, particularly in contrast to terrorism. The media virtually ignored World AIDS Day, Dec. 1, said Dawn Bryan, the group's executive director."
If these people think AIDS has become "almost invisible," they must be living in isolation. The New York Times, for instance, last month ran an enormous series on AIDS in South Africa. The articles appeared on November 25, 26 and 27. At least one of the stories started on the front page, and one of them was 2700 words long. The lead article in the national section of today's New York Times runs under the headline, "San Francisco AIDS Debate Leads to Criminal Charges." And between November 27 and today, the Times ran dozens of other articles about AIDS.
One could say it is not the Times's fault for passing along the complaints of the AIDS lunch-program people, no matter how unfounded the complaints are. But there comes a point at which complaints are so unfounded that when a newspaper passes them along without noting how unfounded they are, the newspaper's own credibility takes a little dent in the process.