Milwaukee J-S, rock on!

Spurred on by a segment on Bill Moyers, I finally read a series by the paper on chemicals in plastics that ran last year. Holy sh-t, that was great, hard-nosed, sift-thru-the-BS journalism. In case you missed it, as I did, the JS tracked down glaring incompetence by the EPA in not truly testing for chems that upset enzymes, could lead to cancer. EPA was supposed to start testing during the Clinton years... and still haven't. EPA has cited studies that say there is no danger. So, in the spirit of old-school reporting, the JS sicced its on own reporter tracking down all these studies -- broke down method, results and who paid for the study. Found (surprisingly!) that studies that say there is no danger were largely done by the companies making the damned things.

First, I wish all newsrooms had balls like this -- willing to dedicate staff and money for long periods for serious issues like this. Mine, when it was still running, never would have.

Second, I wish we could mandate that every man, woman and child watch the Moyers segment. Clear case in which without print journos, this story never would have been done. Broadcast certainly would never have devoted so much time and energy chasing this down.

 

thanks for the heads up, i will track it down

when we're all gone, which could be like in a few days, this sort of reporting will not get done

 

Did Garry Howard write the piece?

 

LOL

 

I know not of this journalism piece you speak of Killick, but I do like your avatar!

 

Here's the web index for the series...

http://www.jsonline.com/index/index.aspx?id=305

I think this is what the J-S won a Pultizer for.

 

Nope. It was for an investigation into abuses in the Milwaukee County pension system.