Freeper-type hoax exposed (dead soldier and little girl)

[blitzen]

http://www.kentucky.com/mld/kentucky/news/breaking_news/12477693.htm


"Over seven days of reporting, the Tribune learned the real story, one of elaborate fabrications and lies intricately spread out over two years. There is no soldier named Dan Kennings. The charming girl people came to know as Kodee Kennings is someone else entirely, a child from an out-of-state family led to believe she was playing a part in a documentary about a soldier.

Using role players, including an employee of a local Christian radio station, the woman at the center of the hoax spun a remarkable wartime tale so compelling it grabbed the hearts of young journalists, university faculty members and readers, and left them blind to the possibility it could all be a ruse. There appears never to have been a monetary motive. In fact, the reasons behind all the lies remain unclear.

The tale began in 2003 when student reporter Michael Brenner was handed a letter from a 7-year-old girl saying she saw an anti-war protest on the Southern Illinois campus and it bothered her because her dad was a soldier. Brenner e-mailed the little girl, and as he learned more about her situation decided to tell her story."

[LincolnMcGrath]

1. Front Page Freeper B.S.

Nominated

[brentspeak]

2. Bizarre

Hard to say if this is a Freeper-type thing or something else entirely. Was Brenner, the student reporter, in on the hoax, or was he just a complete sucker, like the parents of the little girl apparently were complete suckers? Or was the entire thing completely run by this Jamie Reynolds character? In any case, quite an elaborate hoax.

[blitzen]

5. true, can't say for sure...but it has all the signs n/t

[kbm8795]

23. There is still motivation for this missing.

If Brenner isn't involved, (and I have questions about that) then this Reynolds is either some extremely unbalanced person or had some kind of agenda in perpetrating this hoax over two years.

Brenner has questions to answer, too - if this story was being followed for TWO years, he should never have relied exclusively at first on emails. Moreover, Ft. Campbell is only about a two hour drive from Carbondale - I would have thought at some point a reporter/photographer would have wanted to take a journey to check more out about the kid's story.

The fact that for over two years no one appeared to verify a single aspect of this story is very suspect. True, they could have been duped by the occasional newsroom visit, but when this became a campus and community-wide concern, even student editors HAD to know they needed to cover their butts with facts. This also doesn't speak well for our community newspaper, who could have done all this fact-checking on their own and never bothered.

[Rich Hunt]

33. no lie

It's astonishing that he took those messages at face value.

[insane_cratic_gal]

42. Brenner is just as guilty

At the end of the story it goes on to explain that Jamie was also a student or graduate from the Southern Illinois school of journalism.

student reporter Michael Brenner he works at Southern Illinois student newspaper.
"Hastings refused to speak with the Tribune, saying through Brenner - who had graduated in 2004 and was living with his family in West Chicago - that she wanted to shelter Kodee from the media."

"(jamie) She said, and the Tribune confirmed, that she was a broadcast journalism student at Southern Illinois. She graduated in 2004, putting her there alongside the very people she was deceiving."

Just seems suspect. It is possible that Jamie is off her rocker, but for nothing to be verified, the whole story for 2 years (and he was editor too! during part of this) to not be checked out! It would take 2 to pull it off.

[salin]

45. zealous acts to promote all things bush

have been motivations for bad acts all over the place. Though in this case it appears that Brenner was trying to create a name for himself.

[LincolnMcGrath]

3. .........Christian Radio Station Employee.......

There is more to this story DUers.

Lets get on it. Anyone want to guess the political leanings of those involved in this 'made for media' whore-fest.

[Cocoa]

21. they did not elaborate on that station employee

I agree, there's something there...

[kbm8795]

24. Well, since I'm here and a grad student

who knows many of the j-school faculty, I'll do some nosing around.

Yes, there should be more about that christian radio station employee. My guess is that they helped organize that memorial service, complete with the religious-oriented photos of the fake military father.

It is going to be very interesting seeing how our wingnut community newspaper handles this story - or if, as usual, it ignores any news that might expose conservatives as deceptive.

The student paper is supposed to publish an apology - my guess is that they'll either have that in tomorrow's edition or Monday's at the latest, before too many other media outlets pick this up and publish it. If it's in tomorrow, I'll post a link here.

[Cocoa]

25. can you get paper copies of the past newspapers?

the university's website has scrubbed the articles, which I would think would be a journalistic no-no.

But they can't scrub paper copies...

[kbm8795]

26. Hmm....the library and the department library

should have some archives, particularly since this was all in the last two years. I'll check the library tomorrow, though it's being renovated.

Interesting that they would have scrubbed their web site already - they must realize this is possibly the biggest embarassment any publication of any kind could ever have. . .period.

Do these kids have any idea how this makes the J-School degrees here suddenly almost worthless? Until this blows over, they've not only put their school in an ugly spotlight, but the faculty and students aren't gonna look too good to employers for awhile now either.

[jsamuel]

37. make sure if anyone gives you trouble, tell them covering it up makes it

worse... 'cause it does...

[kbm8795]

70. Oh, they won't cause me trouble

I started my PhD in their department, and moved to another department for reasons they perfectly understand.

Besides, I have my own M.A. in journalism from another university. I'll be checking the library today and dropping by a couple of professors' offices.

[MADem]

72. Did you try the WAYBACK MACHINE????

http://www.archive.org/web/web.php

[silverweb]

4. What a very weird story.

I'm still trying to figure out what the point of the whole ruse was. Maybe it started out as an anti- anti-war kind of thing and the psycho doing it was having too much fun to quit?

Totally weird.

:crazy:

[Pirate Smile]

7. Me too. I read it quickly and thought

:wtf:

[katinmn]

6. 5th Nom. Why am I not surprised they are making up these "feel good"

stories.

Why do they love war so much? Why do they hate the Iraqis?

[Supersedeas]

81. expect some HIGH grade propoganda with these POLL numbers

[Nothing Without Hope]

8. The GOP BS mill can churn out these little TV plots forever. There have

been so many of them already - why should we believe ANYTHING that was not reported by someone we trust? No one beholden to the Bush cartel can be trusted without independent corroboration - we've already known that and this is just another example of it. Of course it was deliberate.

This is a very fascist, Orwellian thing to do. Lie lie lie - play on the emotions and the sense of national pride - it makes the proles feel good. Newspeak takes the place of facts, which might be inconvenient. Control the channels of public communication totally and you can manipulate the proles like white mice in a psych test.

It was not desirable that the proles should have strong political feelings. All that was required of them was a primitive patriotism, which could be appealed to whenever it was necessary to make them accept longer working hours or shorter rations. And even when they became discontented, as they sometimes did, their discontent led nowhere, because, being without general ideas, they could only focus it on petty specific grievances. The larger evils invariably escaped their notice. --George Orwell, 1984

[punpirate]

9. I googled the name of the...

... woman mentioned in the story, and this is, indeed, a very strong case of either fraud or terrible fact-checking. This is from SIU's own student newspaper from one of its Fall `02 issues. Reynolds was interviewed by the paper about parking tickets:

"Jaimie Reynolds, a senior in radio-television from Marion, is more disappointed about the higher ticket fee. But the changes will motivate her and other students to be more aware of their parking behavior, she said."

http://newshound.de.siu.edu/fall02/stories/storyReader$50

So, she was a senior in '02 and was in a field of study associated with Brenner's.

Sounds as if the Tribune staff wasn't doing too much fact-checking, either....

[kbm8795]

27. This is getting curiouser and curiouser. . .

Yes, she was in broadcast journalism, and Michael was obviously print - the departments are located in the same building next to each other. While it isn't necessarily positive they would have shared the same classes, I wouldn't call it unlikely, either.

I also wonder how she could appear with that child so frequently in a department and student newspaper with so many student employees in the halls and the offices and no one would recognize Reynolds as a fellow...and..now, former student? This is another burning question.

[insane_cratic_gal]

43. apparently she graduated in 2004

according to the article and confirmed from the Tribune.

That puts her and Brenner in the same graduation class, from the same school and field.

[crispini]

10. Wow, weird!

Very interesting....

[Cocoa]

11. that student reporter got quite a lesson

oops!

reading further, it appears he may very well have been in on it.

regarding "no monetary motive," I wouldn't be too sure about that...

[PatrioticLeftie]

12. This is just the type of thing they'd do

Spin an entire web of lies for their own gain

[Beam Me Up]

13. Jaimie Reynolds is one twisted young woman in need of professional help.

n/t

[kbm8795]

14. Holy CRAP!

I'm at SIU-C! ! ! I cannot believe this happened here. . !

[kitkat65]

19. Go Salukis!

I graduated 1988!

:toast:

[kbm8795]

22. I'm a PhD student here in Speech Comm.

but my MA is in journalism, from another university. Guess it's a good thing I transferred - this is going to look VERY bad.

[Cocoa]

15. I found one of the hoax stories

no real 10-year old would spell this bad.



http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:A9MRjSV0T4oJ:newshound.de.siu.edu/voices/stories/storyReader%242152++site:newshound.de.siu.edu+kenningsology&hl=en

Kenningsology is back


Kodee Kennings
Kenningsology


Gus says: To read more about Kodee go to:


American refugee and 50 minutes of hell


Editors Note: Due to popular demand, Kenningsology, which ran weekly in the summer, is back. It will run every Thursday featuring the thoughts of 8-year-old Kodee Kennings, including a mini-update on her condition and the latest on her father, Dan Kennings, and his experiences in Iraq. For those not familiar with Kodee's story, follow a link on the dailyegyptian.com voices page for background.
Kodee has been doing well since the Knoxville incident (see website) and continues to adjust to life away from her father, Dan Kennings, who is stationed in Mosul, Iraq, with the 101st Airborne Division.

According to some of his friends, morale is not particularly high, but he takes solace in letters and phone calls home. Calling home is rare for Kennings. It costs him $2 a minute.

(For anyone wishing to send Dan Kennings letters, his e-mail address, which he is able to check periodically (weekly if he?s lucky), is [e-mail].)

He called the DAILY EGYPTIAN a few days ago and said he is doing fine. He sounded upbeat, though he desperately wants to leave Iraq. It is a situation he will never get used to.

"I wouldn't say I'm used to it," he said of the volatile situation surrounding him. "I'd say I'm kind of immune to it, but not used to it."

He had called the DE wanting to talk to the people his daughter regularly interacts with because he knows, as we all do here at the DE, that Kodee is no stranger to the SIU Communications Building.

She has become a normal part of life in the DE newsroom, regularly calling and dropping by. Kodee started a Nerf-gun war in the newsroom a few weeks ago that lasted more than an hour, one of many things she has done to keep the newsroom light-hearted. She wrote the following Kenningsology on the DE:

-The D.E.



The D.E. is a newspaper. It is the bestest newspaper and I like it. Lots of people work for it and they are rely smart. They make the paper every say but not weekends.

I have a hole bunch of frends at the D.E. They are Michael, Jens, Jack, Lance, Zack, Jerry, Ethan, Adam, Amber, Geoff, Shane, Moose and Todd.

Michael use to rite sports but traded it in for being the editor. He's the boss of the newsroom. He's kind of like the Vise Presadent. He just comeands and fixs storys. He wins awards.

Jens and Zack rite about football. They get to sit in the press box rily high up so they can see all the game. Then they rite about what they see and use rily big words. They got a vocabulary that's genyus.

Ethan rites about golf. They should give him something else to rite because golf is boring.

Todd has sports editor job. He makes the jernailists rite. Adam covers volleyball. They lose a lot so his stories are always the same.

Jack makes people give him mony. He sells space for adds and then wants mony. He keeps the paper a flote becus its free. Jack rites a colem and tell people his way of thinking. He use to be a soldier.

Lance is the general manager and hires people. He antekes (Kodee's word for critiques) the newspaper every day and finds mistakes. I don't think he finds many becus Michael still has his job.

Jerry is Jack's boss. He takes the mony to the bank.

Moose (Moustafa) is a guy. He rites about September 11th. He rites other stuff to.

Geoff used to rite but quit. He has to many jobs and a girlfriend. He's not French thow. (Kodee believes anyone with a girlfriend will eventually French kiss her, thus becoming French.) He's a copy editor and he looks for mistakes. He's also a kind of boss.

Amber is a girl riter. She ries lots of stuff. She rites about drugs.


These views do not necessarily reflect those of the DAILY EGYPTIAN.

[leftchick]

48. No ten year old would talk like that

"bestest"? This is so obviously fake.

[TrueAmerican]

85. Yes, the person writes

like a member of free republic.

[sunnystarr]

16. There's a more complete story at the Daily Egyptian

http://newshound.de.siu.edu/fall05/stories/storyReader$114

Among the interesting details I read, I couldn't believe how far they took this:

In summer 2004, Trovillion, posing as Dan Kennings, visited the Daily Egyptian newsroom, thanking the staff for taking care of his daughter while he was in Iraq. He walked through room, shook hands and hugged staff members. Trovillion said Reynolds paid him "about $100" to appear in the Daily Egyptian that day. Reynolds insisted he was not paid. Both said the two met through her cousin.

their mia culpa at:
http://www.dailyegyptian.com/fall05/index.html

[Cocoa]

18. how far they took this...

they had a freaking memorial service. :wow:

On Saturday morning, cars began pulling into the gravel parking lot of a one-story American Legion hall in Orient, Ill., about 30 miles northeast of Carbondale. Hastings and Kodee got out of a red Grand Am, the little girl wearing an Army uniform shirt that hung down to her knees.

People inside the memorial service said both Hastings and Kodee were in tears. A video showing Dan Kennings in his fatigues speaking with a group of children at a church was playing, and there was a scrapbook filled with pictures of Kennings straddling a tank cannon or huddling with other soldiers.

[salin]

35. so much more going on... her parents claim they were duped

into thinking reynolds was making a film - a "documentary" (didn't I read that) about a soldier's daughter... er - hello - where were the cameras when she was making calls to the station (was reynolds always there at the home when they made the calls?) How did Reynolds meet the family, through brenner ?

What a odd, odd story. I really feel bad for those who were emotionally manipulated by these people - esp those so manipulated to attend a fake memorial. ugh!

[salin]

38. just read further - they really are naive or dummer than rocks

regarding the parents - keep letting their child work on a film which is filmed entirely by "hidden cameras". Let child keep going back - and only after two years wonder where the film was? And then respond when a "new group of students want to film a finale" per the death of the "father." What? Still can't get past the belief that all actors would be used in a documentary... that is - fiction was being created. What kind of parents are this naive or this stupid? It is hard to believe they were not complicit - but at least in the linked above article, they really sound outside of the loop (which includes finger pointing between Reynolds and Brenner). wow.

[kbm8795]

29. Holy CRAP! ! !

You can bet the faculty are having fits about this. . .and again, the facts in the D.E.'s article still have a bunch of holes. Who wrote those letters from Kodee? This is still way too fishy, and there's more to this. . .

[jillan]

17. Funny how this comes out A.C. not B.C.

After Cindy

not

Before Cindy

suspicious:puke:

[Richard Steele]

20. Some trolls just can't keep it contained to the internets.

I hope a few million-dollar civil suits keep
her out of circulation for awhile.

Also, no doubt some NASTY criminal charges
could stem from her use of the little girl in this hoax.

[Miss Chybil]

28. Another right wing PR stunt.

They just can't rely on the truth to get them through anything, can they?

[ComerPerro]

79. When the truth doesn't support your assertion, or isn't grand enough

just lie and invent a new reality.

They have been doing it for years. But this instance is really stunning.

[eridani]

30. The very, very worst part--

How in the name of heaven could anybody do this to a little kid's head?

On Thursday, after nearly a week of reporting, the Daily Egyptian learned that the girl is 10-year-old Caitlin Hadley. Her parents are Rich and Tawnya Hadley, who met Reynolds in Tuscola. The Hadleys said they believed Reynolds was making a documentary with their daughter about a girl named Kodee Kennings and that they had become close friends with Reynolds. Rich Hadley, who is pastor of Montpelier Church of the Nazarene, said Reynolds had even stayed at their house.

He said he is considering seeking a restraining order to keep Reynolds away from the family.

Hadley said his daughter is having trouble coping with the situation.

"She's very sad. She will just burst into tears out of the blue. At one point she turned to me and asked, 'Did Jamie like me?'" he said.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

31. How on earth could they let their little girl travel for hours unattended

with a couple they didn't even know?

Unreal!

[salin]

36. and put a real kid in a documentary (eg she is now a fake kid

doesn't that defy documentary) - and never wonder why there were never any cameras? She (kid) supposedly makes all sorts of calls to the paper - is Reynolds always at her parents house during these calls? WIth cameras? I can't see how this happened without the parents being a part of it.

[ScreamingMeemie]

39. That was the first thing I thought of...they should start off with being

angry at themselves. I think they aren't telling the whole story here.

[salin]

40. they were told the "documentary" was ALL being filmed by hidden

cameras.

Turnip Truck dumb/naive or complicit?

The op story makes me think the former (while on shorter read I at first thought the latter.)

[salin]

41. my guess

is the figured it was political in nature (eg promote war and shame anti war folks) and went along with it - I mean clearly it wasn't a documentary. I think they allowed themselves to be duped - and in doing so let their passion for the drama (per pro war) that they put their child in great danger. Fools.

[oldcoot]

82. Good question

You would think that with all the missing kid stories, they would be a little more careful with the safety of their daughter.

[Joanne98]

67. Rich Hadley WHO IS A PASTOR!

[charlie]

68. Oof. I missed that

Here he is. Is that Kodee?

[charlie]

71. Looks like it's her

This is Kodee.

[Generic Other]

32. What a strange story. What on earth motivated her to do this?

To try and make anti-war folks feel guilty? Sick.

[brentspeak]

84. I'm not sure about that

It could even be the opposite, as this fake letter written by Ms.Reynolds posing as the little girl suggests:

"I'm rily mad at you and you make my hart hurt,"' she purportedly wrote in one published letter to the president. "I don't think your doing a very good job. You keep sending soldiers to Iraq and it's not fair. Do you have a soldier of your own in Irak?"

But my guess is that the hoax isn't political, but just the product of a psychologically-unsound person's mind.

[Usrename]

34. Disgusting the things some people will do..but where's the original

story? Can we email them and and get them to post it NOW!!!

It's NEWS! ! ! Aren't they a journalism school? Or just another training ground for right wing media wannabes.

I mean this scam fell apart last week and we get:

"The tale began in 2003 when student reporter Michael Brenner was handed a letter from a 7-year-old girl saying she saw an anti-war protest on the Southern Illinois campus and it bothered her because her dad was a soldier."

Journalism? Horsepuckey, this is propaganda, pure and simple.

There training a whole new generation of facist propagandists up there, and they think it's a game.

How can they so casually abandon truth, justice, and the American way?

[DoctorMyEyes]

47. Google Cache of Original

link

anti-war protesters are "bad people"

[salin]

49. good find

and ... wow. Reading that - I would think his motivation is a combination of trying to get some attention - and some rw zealotry. Pretty elaborate from the getgo.

[charlie]

51. Google cache of DE's Kennings articles

http://www.google.com/search?q=kennings+site%3Anewshound.de.siu.edu&btnG=Search&num=20&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

[salin]

53. check the second one out

lists an email address for the fake soldier. Couldn't that be traced back to see who had that addy?

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:A9MRjSV0T4oJ:newshound.de.siu.edu/voices/stories/storyReader%242152+kennings+site:newshound.de.siu.edu&hl=en

[charlie]

56. Here's a lady who got burned by her nephew

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:6ZTDE1mPDEcJ:ibepiglet.diaryland.com/+%22dan+kennings%22&hl=en

Claimed he knew the family and was forwarding her the stories.

LOL. Look at how she feels today:

http://ibepiglet.diaryland.com

[salin]

59. Yow!

these are the things that shake us out of complacent believing all that we read. Maybe this will help her grow - of course she just thinks it is the "fat slob" Reynolds to blame and focus the anger upon - suggests that this won't be a growth moment.

[salin]

55. these are rich!

another part of the hoax - a wife of another soldier:

I was never lonelier than when I watched the love of my life walk away from me in tears. I can still remember the way the night smelled, the look of tan uniforms against a dark background, how the buses looked and how Staff Sgt. Dan Kennings hugged me and put his arm around Dj and walked up to the building with him. I can still remember Kennings promising to bring him home to me, and how much that promise meant. I drove away that night feeling like I was leaving my life behind.

snip

Shayla Goldsmith

proud wife of a 101st Airborne Soldier


http://newshound.de.siu.edu/voices04/stories/storyReader$487

btw - :hi: Always great to see you!

[charlie]

57. Look at DoctorMyEyes' post below

Shayla and DJ Goldsmith look to be real:

http://www.google.com/search?num=20&q=%22Shayla%20Goldsmith%22

Add impersonation of a real military family to this crew's scams?

Happy to see you, Salin! :hi:

[salin]

60. how the heck did they pull that off?

and why were they going so far with this ruse? Nutty.

[charlie]

63. Strange, innit?

Each one of them put themselves into real life situations where they would be pounded into grease if their marks found out. Including the actor who supposedly did it for a mere $100. I think maybe all of them are more deeply involved than they're letting on.

[salin]

64. that is more likely a scam that a political operation

(that I would often speculate towards) is that it is so localized - it doesn't reach out much beyond Carbondale.

[Usrename]

91. From "There are Monsters Under My Bed"

She has also become quite an entrepreneur, building up a sizable stack of cash.

[newyawker99]

69. Hi Usrename!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[Usrename]

90. Thanks for the welcome

:toast:

[charlie]

44. They were astroturfing too

Check out this phony letter to the editor.

'Freedom don't come free'

...snip...

I was never lonelier than when I watched the love of my life walk away from me in tears. I can still remember the way the night smelled, the look of tan uniforms against a dark background, how the buses looked and how Staff Sgt. Dan Kennings hugged me and put his arm around Dj and walked up to the building with him. I can still remember Kennings promising to bring him home to me, and how much that promise meant. I drove away that night feeling like I was leaving my life behind.

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:BY400p_MhlgJ:newshound.de.siu.edu/voices04/stories/storyReader%24487+kennings+site:newshound.de.siu.edu&hl=en

[salin]

46. that is from the duped newspaper

don't know that it got much wider until they pulled their grand finale (per the memorial service) and the Chicago Tribune came to town and debunked it within days.

[DoctorMyEyes]

50. Good catch!

How much bullshit did this woman write? How many names?

On edit:

I googled "Shayla Goldsmith" and it appears that she and her husband are real. WTF? Did this hoaxer use her name to sign a fake letter? Curiouser and curiouser...

[charlie]

54. I would guess so

Otherwise their audacity crept into the realm of suicidal, sending an actor to a base as soldiers were reporting for duty. I'll vote the letter is a hoax.

[DoctorMyEyes]

58. I think so too

having an "actor" on hand to comfort wives? Puhleeze! Not too mention the conspicuous absense of the brave sgt kennings IN Iraq???


Check out this lovely piece of hackery:

link

[charlie]

61. Lol. Ol' Jack scared "Kodee" with his soldier's voys (voice)

Jack (Piatt) has a soldier voys. He sounds like my dad. Sometimes he yells at me and it sucks.

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:ij3dT8grbToJ:newshound.de.siu.edu/voices/stories/storyReader%242276+kennings+site:newshound.de.siu.edu&hl=en

[salin]

62. scamming for money?

she is trying to raise money to bring him home (on leave). Wonder if/where the "fundraising" was occuring and who was behind it.

[charlie]

65. Another Kaycee Nicole, perhaps?

http://www.rootnode.org/article.php?sid=26

I watched that one happen in real time. It was a doozy.

[salin]

66. sounds like it became an obsession

pretty sick.

[Usrename]

93. She has also become quite an entrepreneur,

building up a sizable stack of cash.



http://newshound.de.siu.edu/voices/stories/storyReader$2276

[sniffa]

52. this is confusing

but it's earLy and i'm stiLL drinking coffee.

:hangover:

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

73. Chicago Tribune photos of the key players

Ten-year-old Caitlin Hadley played the part of Kodee Kennings, daughter of fictional soldier Dan Kennings. (Tribune photo by John Smierciak)


The supposed father and daughter pose before Kennings' fictional deployment to Iraq. Both say they were duped into believing that they were playing parts in a movie. (Family photo)


Jaimie Reynolds of Marion, Ill., went by the name of Colleen Hastings and claimed to be the guardian of 8-year-old Kodee Kennings. (Photo for the Tribune by Roger Darrigrand)


Student journalist Michael Brenner published unedited notes that 8-year-old Caitlin, posing as Kodee, wrote about her fictional father. (Daily Egyptian photo)


Ten-year-old Caitlin Hadley sits with her real parents, Richard and Tawnya Hadley, in Marion, Indiana. (Tribune photo by John Smierciak)

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

74. Quote from Trib story left out of wire version

-snip-

The woman involved used an acquaintance to play Kennings, going so far as to take him and the little girl to a church in Detroit this spring, where they spoke to a group of children inspired by their story.

The acquaintance--Patrick Trovillion, a registered nurse from Marion--said he was led to believe he was playing a cocky soldier in a legitimate movie. He was shocked to learn Thursday night that it was a farce and that his character had died.

"This really chaps me a little bit," Trovillion said. "That ain't no way to treat our armed forces."

-snip-

full story (may require free subscription)

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0508260251aug26,1,6836162.story?page=1&coll=chi-news-hed

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

75. so it is in msm?

[SheWhoMustBeObeyed]

78. It's in the Trib version n/t

[salin]

97. The hoax was broken by msm...

the "death" apparently caught the attention of Trib folks who travelled from Chicago downstate to Carbondale - but within days of digging around found it was a hoax - and were the ones who exposed the hoax.

[charlie]

76. More creepy details coming out

But in hindsight, several staffers said Thursday, the girl was painfully shy in person, and would seldom talk. Yet when she called the newsroom on the phone, said current student editor Zack Creglow, "she talked so much that we'd pass the phone around the newsroom."

"That part creeped me out so much last night that I couldn't sleep," Creglow said Thursday. "No one really knew what Kodee's voice sounded like, she was so shy (in person). Now it looks like it was this woman (on the phone) talking in a little kid's voice."

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/metroeast/story/3109F1F7B6512D6A862570690017E0E4?OpenDocument

[Hekate]

96. This is sounding more and more like a really sick con-job

ewww

Hekate
#Why won't the Chickenhawk cross the road?"

[salin]

98. ew... I was wondering, however,

how they convinced the girl and her family, who of course were silly enough to believe this was a "documentary" filmed entirely by hidden cameras, to make these calls. Creepy creepy.

[LincolnMcGrath]

77. Kick

[skygazer]

80. This is what's wrong with "journalism" today

There seems to be no effort on the majority of reporters behalf to check sources, verify stories, dig into anything at all. This is why Bush can get away with so much because none of the people who report on him do any of that - they simply take whatever he or his talking heads say at face value. What use is a free press if the press is not doing its job?

[HereSince1628]

87. Hoax and fabrication are longstanding in the American Press

It spans the history of America from Ben Franklin to Judy Miller.

I'm disappointed that my alma mater was used. I am glad my son, who is a broadcaster, in Marion Illinois didn't get caught in the mess.

[Kire]

83. Brenner + Hastings = Kennings

what a bunch of WASP's

[Kurovski]

86. "the reasons behind all the lies remain unclear."

Maybe it was merely to "catapult the propaganda"?

Finding out who was ultimately behind all this could be a good story for any reporter.

It might turn out to be of broader national interest.

[kbm8795]

88. I agree

and I don't believe that the whole story has been told yet. There are way too many holes in this tale.

[tandot]

89. Oh, no! Don't tell me that Republicans would make up shit to appeal to our

PATRIOTISM!

Those Bush-loving, Bush-supporting, War-loving, bomb-and-kill-brown-skinned-people-to-pieces-people, would never make up crap. Propaganda is what Hitler used...brown-shirt, Bush-loving, "patriots" would never come up with shit like that.

[LincolnMcGrath]

92. bump

[Cats Against Frist]

94. Wow.

I guess I feel a bit of glee, as I worked for three years at Illinois State's Daily Vidette -- and the Egyptian was one of the rival newspapers, at ICPA. If only it had been "The Daily Northwestern..."

Anyway, I imagine the kids at the paper -- they're totally freaking out. We would have -- I remember that one of the candidates in a student election publically accused us of bias -- and it was like the freaking world ended. We would have had a collective pants-shit, if something like this happened.

I cannot believe that all these people were "duped." Some crazy-ass story.

[Hekate]

95. It was a "Noble Lie" (gack, p'tui)--here's the philos. underpinnings

There's a philosophical concept called the Noble Lie that goes back to Plato's "Republic" -- needless to say Neo-Cons find it attractive, as do religious extremists. The Neo-Cons in DC are disciples of Leo Strauss, who "was a great believer in the efficacy and usefulness of lies in politics."

A quick google for "concept + Noble Lie" got me to two essays you might find interesting.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PDF http://opendemocracy.net/content/articles/PDF/1549.pdf

ww.openDemocracy.net
The nasty truth about the noble lie
Ali Hossaini
17 October 2003

The long walk to freedom takes place across language. What happens when words are abused by power, cheapened by war, or corrupted by media? This philosopher-TV executive surveys OpenDemocracy's debate on journalism and war, and asks whether George Orwell's dystopian vision of thought-killing "Newspeak" has been realised in contemporary American journalism....
SNIP
All is fair in war
There was a time when war meant an armed conflict
between two nations. War was an existential threat,
and called for extraordinary actions that range from
killing enemies to killing the truth. Even politicians
remind us that "truth is the first casualty of war",
harking back to Plato's doctrine of the "noble lie".
Noble lies run headlong into journalistic ethics, which
are based on the opposite principle: that society works
best when based on truth. How do we decide which of
these principles is right? There's no magic formula for
ethics, so I would argue that the answer depends on
your political preferences. There are no givens in life,
but by unpacking some of these issues, we can define
the proper role of journalists, particularly in times of
war. Orwell's famous novel is helpful here because war
was a permanent condition of Oceania. MORE>

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PDF http://opendemocracy.net/content/articles/PDF/1542.pdf

www.openDemocracy.net
Noble lies and perpetual war: Leo Strauss, the neo-cons, and Iraq
Danny Postel
16 October 2003
Are the ideas of the conservative political philosopher Leo Strauss a shaping influence on the Bush administration's world outlook? Danny Postel interviews Shadia Drury, a leading scholarly critic of Strauss, and asks her about the connection between Plato's dialogues, secrets and lies, and the United States-led war in Iraq.
SNIP
What was initially an anti-war argument is now a matter of public record. It is widely recognised that the Bush administration was not honest about the reasons it gave for invading Iraq. Paul Wolfowitz, the influential United States deputy secretary of defense, has acknowledged that the evidence used to justify the war was "murky" and now
says that weapons of mass destruction weren't the crucial issue anyway.....By contrast, Shadia Drury, professor of
political theory at the University of Regina in
Saskatchewan, argues that the use of deception and
manipulation in current US policy flow directly from
the doctrines of the political philosopher Leo Strauss
(1899-1973). His disciples include Paul Wolfowitz and
other neo-conservatives who have driven much of the
political agenda of the Bush administration. SNIP
The deep influence of Leo Strauss's ideas on the
current architects of US foreign policy has been
referred to, if sporadically, in the press (hence an
insider witticism about the influence of "Leo-cons").
Christopher Hitchens, an ardent advocate of the war,
wrote unashamedly in November 2002 (in an article
felicitously titled Machiavelli in Mesopotamia) that:
"part of the charm of the regime-change
argument (from the point of view of its
supporters) is that it depends on premises and
objectives that cannot, at least by the
administration, be publicly avowed. Since Paul
Wolfowitz is from the intellectual school of Leo
Strauss, and appears in fictional guise as such
in Saul Bellow's novel Ravelstein, one may
even suppose that he enjoys this arcane and
occluded aspect of the debate." MORE>

The actual interview follows this introduction.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bottom line: A lie is no lie if it serves God/the greater good/the power-elite's belief that they know better than anyone else which ends justify which means.

The person or persons who perpetrated this fraud may have gotten carried away with the praise of others and their own feelings of importamce (as in the case of the journalist who wrote fictional accounts of child-heroin addicts). That's the most charitable point of view.

Or, she (or they) were followers of the Noble Lie, and believed they knew better than their readers what "truth" should be presented about servicemembers and their families.

Either way, they don't belong in journalism, but will probably find the work environs of Faux News congenial.

Hekate

#Why won't the Chickenhawk cross the road?#

[smurfygirl]

99. this is all pretty disturbing

and sick and twisted. What the hell is wrong with people?