Monday, January 18, 2010

One-Year Anniversary of the Great Bates Backdown

Just about a year ago, Tulsa blogger and Urban Tulsa Weekly columnist Michael Bates blasted the Tulsa World for playing fast and loose with its circulation figures.

Among other things Bates charged that the newspaper had not been audited by the Audit Bureau of Circulation for nearly a decade and that the paper's circulation was 20 percent higher in 2005 than it was in 2006. 

The World was not amused, filing a libel lawsuit against UTW and Bates. Urban Tulsa quickly retracted these and other charges, but Bates did not—at least at first. On his blog, Batesline, Bates stood behind his column.

By mid-February, however, Bates capitulated. He admitted his mistakes and the lawsuit was dropped.

In his "To whom it may concern letter," Bates included some very interesting words and phrases regarding his column, including these: "numerous errors," "false," "regret and retract," "unfounded," "inaccurate and misleading," "incorrect," ""absolutely no evidence," "false and inaccurate," and "retract those incorrect statements."

That's quite a list.

1 comment:

Tulsan said...

Just in case 'Man of the West' doesn't show up in a timely manner for this observance, here is a ritual obeisance...

AT is a mere shadow of the greatness that is Bates! Bates is the one-eyed man in the Country of the Blind! All hail Fred Thompson, too!