Rick Hampson

Coverage of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's death and life was relegated to below the fold at USA Today this morning (pictured here; the paper stopped posting front-page pics two years ago).

Three items above the fold (excluding left-side teases to coverage of other stories) were considered more important that the Iron Lady's passing: "Remembering Annette Funicello"; a "Duplicate programs waste billions" item about wasteful government spending (useful, but it's not as if we didn't know this already); and to top it off, a 6x6 photo from the first half of the NCAA men's basketball finals, the result of which the paper was unable to report because the game ended after its publication deadline.

While USA Today editors shunted to page 5A a 15-paragraph article on how the Occupy movement has worn out its welcome in many major cities, today's front page featured a 47-paragraph puffy profile on how "'Occupiers' [are] not cut from the same cloth."

"Occupy's membership is a coat of many colors" that "includes the foreclosed, the uninsured and the homeless" as well as "college students with poor job prospects and college graduates with no way to pay off their student loans," noted USA Today's Rick Hampson.

According to Rick Hampson in what is apparently an analysis piece in Monday's USA Today, the Occupy movement has a violent "fringe," which constitutes just a "fraction" of those involved.

Well, he's right about it being a "fraction," except that said fraction is a lot larger than he apparently believes. The USAT writer also attempts to perpetuate the Occupy Oakland myth that its November 2 "non-violent 'general strike'" was absolutely peaceful until "some masked anarchists broke off from the main protest." Here is some of Hampson's harrumphing:

"The Civil War still divides Americans, especially at a time when some in the Tea Party movement talk of states' rights and secession; when many states are rebelling against federal initiatives such as the health care overhaul; and when America's changing demographics make some nostalgic for a society in which white Christians were more dominant."

That's how USA Today's Rick Hampson went out of his way to smear conservatives in his  February 17 story -- "Across the South, the Civil War is an enduring conflict" --  devoted to examining how commemoration and/or celebration of the Confederacy during the 150th anniversary of the Civil War in the South is a divisive political issue.