"My response was that a stellar journalistic investigation of a true incident would have killed just as many. The point being: Would AppyPappy then laud such reporting?"
That's messed up.
You report the truth. The truth will always have consequences, that's part of life.
But if you report a lie that you made up or didn't bother to fact-check, then the consequences are on your head.
Yet you are trying to equate the two, as if telling the truth or a lie makes no difference if the outcome is the same.
That's a case of moral relativism gone wild.
"Yet you are trying to equate the two, as if telling the truth or a lie makes no difference if the outcome is the same."Makes no difference? Let's just say that it's irrelevant in this case.
The story killed those innocents, not the lie. If the story were true, they'd be just as dead.
The tragedy isn't the lie (though the lie compounds it). The tragedy is that the story (or non-story) was even published. That was irresponsible on Newsweek's part.