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Over the span of a few hours, the New York Times changed its leading article headline about five times today. I noticed, because Telexer kept notifying me. It’s interesting to see the process of a headline (and article) taking shape: going from sloppy to somewhat decent, all the headlines add to the story.

A pity I didn’t copy the first headline – but when shortly afterwards the second came along, I did:

Eastern Europe Awaits Decision on Missile Shield

BERLIN — The Obama administration is expected to announce Thursday that it will shelve plans to deploy its controversial anti-ballistic missile shield in Eastern Europe, a move that will be welcomed by Russia but deeply regretted by Poland and the Czech Republic, two key American allies.

Which I copied and sent on by e-mail, commenting on it:

…weird wording by the NYT, imho. News sources here pointedly noted that the plan was initiated by Bush – making it instantly less admirable to keep pursuing it The NYT makes it sound like *Obama* is planning something controversial. No mention of Iran – not Russia – as the original Bush era baddie, as did sources here. And I doubt that Poland really is “key ally”. And “shelved” apparently means “scrapped”; …maybe it is still very early in New York, and it’s only the interns working…

Not even mentioning the fact that a lot of people in the Czech Republic weren’t happy at all with the proposed system on their soil.
Then, I think it was the 4th update, the headline became:

U.S. Is Said to Shift Plans on Missile Shield in Europe

BERLIN — The Obama administration is expected to announce Thursday that it will shelve plans to deploy its controversial anti-ballistic missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic, a move that will be welcomed by Russia but deeply regretted by the two American allies.

…and I commented on that as well, snarking:

Much better! …I still take issue with the little word “its” in “to deploy its controversial shield” – Bush’s! NOT Obama’s!

I thought it was extremely sloppy copywriting, almost suggesting Obama to be the owner of a controversial plan – that’s sloppy when he’s getting so much flak from teabaggers etc at home.

But just a bit later, there was yet another headline:

White House to Scrap Bush’s Approach to Missile Shield

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration plans to announce on Thursday that it will scrap former President George W. Bush’s planned missile defense system in Eastern Europe and instead deploy a reconfigured system aimed more at intercepting shorter-range Iranian missiles, according to people familiar with the plans.

and… my comment:

I tell you, they are reading my mail! NYT: take note – it’s supposed to read “Obama to scrap controversial Bush plan” – simple and to the point. OK? Try again please?

Well… CNN listened, sort of. They headlined it: “Obama scraps Bush-era missile defense for new plan”

Here’s the final NYT article – two pages, ….four contributing editors.