Crime Report, 7/28/05

I just typed the words "July 28" into the search feature on WashingtonPost.com and this is what I got:

• Crime Report, T17, Prince Georges County, Maryland
• Crime Report, DZ14, Metropolitan Police Deparment, Washington, D.C.
• Crime Report, VA22, Fairfax County Police, Virginia
• Crime Report, VA31, Alexandria Police, Virginia

And that was within the first page of listings under this search.

How come we can't save the bad news for the end of the search listing? Why can't we put the good news at the beginning?

I was watching the news the other evening and I counted nine stories in the first five minutes of broadcasting that were about violent crimes committed in our area that day.

I remember, when I lived in Austria, people were appalled to hear that a murder a day in D.C. wasn't uncommon. (This was back in the late 80s/early 90s, when the drug trade was out of control in this city and the mayor himself--Marion Barry--was snorting cocaine, thereby exacerbating the problem.)

Would it be so hard to flip the news around and highlight the positive aspects of the day? Probably not, because as they say in the news business, "if it bleeds, it leads."