[Newspoetry] I'd Really Want To Be On A Completed Flight

[Mike Lehman]

Business reporting, as regular, critical readers of the Champaign
News-Gazette already know, is always done with special care for the
interests of business in our community. 

People have grown used to the fact that, for the News-Gazette, news
about unions and environmental regulations is usually only fit to be
buried carefully in the Business & Agriculture page where they hope that
only business people who need worry about such things will read it. 

Every once in awhile, this tendency to view everything the way a
business person would leaves one aghast at the the seeming apathy about
the results of how these stories are presented. Today's (Monday, June 4)
Business & Ag page had a story by Debra Pressey about the reliability of
Trans World Express flights from Willard Airport to St. Louis. 

It seems that TWE is pretty proud of the fact that, in April, 99% of all
their flights were "completed." This is an increase of 2% over their
performance in April 2000. It is left unsaid what "completed" means and
what the consequences of being on a flight that was not "completed"
might be. This is a little scary in the Brave New World of Corporate
Doublespeak that we seem to live in at the News-Gazette. Did the flights
that were not "completed" crash? Did they never take off and the people
on them are still sitting at the end of a remote runway at Willard
wondering why the drinks ran out a couple of weeks ago? Or were they
abducted by UFOs? 

Nothing is really clear about why this is really even news. Even what
kind of news, good or bad, isn't very clear either. I guess it's best
just to talk about the flights "completed," hence successful, than it is
to even speak of what happened on those which were not, somehow,
"complete." 

I'm glad the News-Gazette is keeping a good, impartial eye on all these
businesses in town. I'm sure we can all sleep more easily knowing they
are hard at work keeping a close watch on all the business "success"
that you can stand reading about. 

Link back to Newspoetry can be found at:
< http://urbana.indymedia.org/active/news/display.php3?article_id=1032>

Mike