Noticed this story yesterday, from the Denver Post:

The president of the Cheyenne County school board allegedly dumped a pile of horse manure on the counter of the newspaper in Cheyenne Wells on Wednesday.

Publisher Joyce Escudero’s son Gary, who witnessed the dumping, said it happened after school board President Sam Mitchek read a front-page story in the weekly newspaper, published Wednesday, that was critical of him.

But then today I saw the follow-up story:

The pile of horse manure next to the headline “Public Denied Right to Comment” is a “personal affront” to the citizens of Cheyenne Wells, publisher Joyce Escudero said Thursday.

Escudero said she wants school board president Sam Mitchek, who admits he dumped it on the counter of the Range Ledger on Wednesday, to personally clean it up and issue a public apology.

An unrepentant Mitchek explained his actions in a telephone interview: “I felt what has been published lately has been a bunch of horse manure and that is why I went and got some.”

Asked if he felt he set a good example for youngsters, the school board president thought for a moment and said: “It probably doesn’t set a good example for kids in the school - but it lets them know I stand up for the school.”

Hold on — it’s a day later, and the newspaper is still waiting to clean up the manure? It’s day-old crusty poop now?

I’m all for standing on journalistic principle, but please, Joyce Escudero, clean up the poo! For the children!

22 November 2002

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Joshua Benton

Joshua Benton is the director of the Nieman Digital Journalism Project at Harvard University, among other things. Before that, he was a staff writer and columnist for The Dallas Morning News. (More.)