By: Joe Strupp It looks like the rivalry between the St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press and the Star Tribune of Minneapolis has reached another level.
Consider the online petition against conservative Star Tribune columnist Katherine Kersten, which demands her firing. Among the 240 signatures on the Web petition as of Thursday afternoon is that of David Hanners of the Pioneer Press, according to Minnesota Matters.
The petition accuses Kersten of 'journalistic malpractice' for her columns on the majority-Muslim charter school Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy, which reportedly resulted in threats and additional security at the Inver Grove Heights elementary school, Minnesota Matters reports.
When the Web site sought out Hanners for comment, he e-mailed: "Granted, asking another newspaper to re-consider a columnist's writing is a grave step and one I don't take lightly."
Still, he adds, "on a professional level, when Kersten does stuff like this, it reflects upon all of us who have to go out there day after day and try to get people to talk to us for stories. Oftentimes, the reading public doesn't differentiate between columnist and reporter; even 'sophisticated' readers like the guys at Power Line refer to her as a 'reporter' in their defense of her. Folks tend to lump us all into the same pile, and our jobs are very different.
"While columnists should be granted wide latitude in expressing opinion, they -- like reporters -- have to maintain fidelity to facts. They can't make them up and they can't burn them beyond recognition to fit some pre-determined view."
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