Mar
28
2004

headlines

Today’s New York Times has a perfect example of a journalistic pet peeve of mine: headlines that don’t say anything. An above-the-fold front-page headline reads:

Official Is Said to Recommend Sharon Charge

I had to actually read the story to find out what the headline was trying to tell me.

Israel’s state prosecutor officially recommended today that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon should be indicted on charges of taking bribes from a real estate developer, Israeli news media reported.

The headline has since been changed on the New York Times Web site to something slightly more descriptive:

Israeli Official Recommends an Indictment of Sharon

Still, unless I’d been following the story closely, I still would not have a clear idea of what the headline was referring to. I prefer the Washington Post’s headline for the story, which better encapsulates the issue at hand:

Prosecutor Urges Sharon Be Indicted in Bribery Case
Posted at 2:29 PM in journalism/media

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