Would that...

The Rapid City Journal featured a 1,900 word front page piece yesterday with 10 childhood pics and an oversized headline "Portrait of Elijah" (if memory serves, the headline the day after 911 wasn't that big). I'm wondering when they'll do a "Portrait of Chester Allan Poage," his victim.

They followed up the next day with a couple of features on “how sad” and depressed the murderer Page is.

The Argus also recently featured a big article featuring an interview with Gov Rounds which basically challenged his pro-life commitment with his refusal to grant clemency to the murderer Page, in addition to several other articles about "how rare" an execution at Page's age is, how "Page himself could stop this," and similar fare.

Would that South Dakota’s newspapers were as concerned over the 800 innocent children being butchered in the womb each year in South Dakota.

Would that South Dakota’s newspapers were as concerned over the millions of innocent children butchered in the womb since 1973.

Would that South Dakota’s newspapers had been so concerned over the state-sanctioned murder of a disabled woman in Florida named Terri Schiavo.

None of these children, nor Terri Schiavo, hurt anyone, yet South Dakota’s newspapers are pulling their hair out in the hopes of saving a man who tortured his own “friend” in a freezing streambed for several hours before brutally killing him so he could steal his “friend’s” property.

Is justice such an outmoded concept that we've sunk to this low?

If nothing else, I guess it’s nice to see South Dakota’s newspapers make it clear where their priorities lie…