It's Official! The Lights Are On At The LA Times - But No One Is Home!

Now I have done a lot of nagging about headline writers at the LA Times and the even worse ones on the website - who write headlines that contradict the content of stories. I have also mentioned the pissed off LA Times writers who regularly inform me of their unhappiness with headlines appended to their stories which distort what they have written.

So you would think that someone... anyone... would have started to check to see if there is any correlation between the stories and the headlines.

But no!

Earlier today, I felt an on-line headline had gotten the spirit of a story wrong, even before I saw the print headline today...

This time - not only is the on-line headline clearly at odds with the story - but it is also dramatically different from the PRINT edition's headline. Now to refresh your memory from my previous post:

Someone decides to risk their life to bring down a major drug cartel... so what do you call them?

Hero? Man of conscience and courage? Or informant, if you do not want to make a value judgement?

Cali drug cartel's betrayer tells his story

But here is the print edition headline says of him:

THE MAN WHO TOOK DOWN CALI

A member of the drug cartel's inner sanctum risked his life to lead U.S> agents to the kingpins. Today he's in hiding, a marked man.

A little different than calling him a man who 'betrayed' a drug cartel....