Rolling Stone Redoux -- what they really meant to say

Were it not for a few sets of loose lips, including those of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the true motive behind Rolling Stone magazine's article might be the topic of the day.

The point of the article, I would posit, is that no one but America wants this war. The more important question is why?

In the first paragraph, RS says, "McChrystal is in Paris to keep the French, who have lost more than 40 soldiers in Afghanistan, from going all wobbly on him."

In journalism how we frame numbers is very important -- terms like "more than" and "less than" can shape how we see a story. When you write that the French have lost "more than 40" soldiers it suggests a sort of "holy cow, more than 40?" response. RS would have served the reader better by simply writing ...