Slate, Franklin Foer, and Michael Kinsley (An Itch I Cannot Scratch)

Note: Transferred from: Old site

By David Edenden.

It is just over nine years ago that the paragraph below was published in the on-line news magazine, Slate. I immediately sent a correction to the writer Franklin Foer (who is currently editor of "The New Republic") and then editor Michael Kinsley, to no avail. In the past 9 years, I have made a nuisance of myself sending letters to almost everyone at Slate including "Corrections", "Kaus Files", "Explainer" etc, plus I posted this letter to Alt.News.Macedonia. I no longer receive confirmation emails from Slate, so I think that I must be blocked by the "spam" filter.

A few years ago, Howard Kurtz, media critic, of the Washington Post, was amazed to learn that during the "Jason Blair affair", no one, who was quoted by Blair, called the New York Times to report that Blair's articles were complete fabrications, and that they had never met the man. Their reason was that it would do no good to contact the Times, because nothing would be done. I believe that Kurtz' comment was "incredible".

Well Howard, this coming April 27th, 2007 will be the 10th anniversary of this article and I intend to publish a reminder that this article will not, as I expect, have been corrected.

This is an itch I cannot scratch.

Eastern Europe
By Franklin Foer
Sunday, April 27, 1997

Macedonia (-3.2 percent growth; 50 percent private. Democracy relatively strong: free elections, though minority groups claim oppression.) Though Macedonia avoided the Balkan War, ethnic tensions and instability are a problem. Last year, the country's liberal, pro-West president was seriously injured in a car-bomb attack. A Greek minority demands that Macedonia, with its ethnically Albanian majority, be absorbed into Greece.

Response:

THE LAST LINE WITH 15 WORDS, HAD THREE ERRORS, IT SHOULD BE REPLACED BY:

An Albanian minority (23%) demands that Macedonia, with its ethnically Macedonian slav majority (67%) be changed from a unitary state into a "confederation" of two states with their respective ethnic majorities. Macedonian slavs fear this would be the first step to the partition of Macedonia and the creation of a "Greater Albania". Greece demands that Macedonia change the name of its country, its Macedonian language and Macedonian Orthodox Church because Greeks
feel that "Macedonian history" belongs to Greek heritage.