On Sept. 13 Stars and Stripes ran a story headlined: "Another casualty of war: Iraqis' waistlines." A pickup from the Los Angeles Times, its premise was that because of sectarian violence, Iraqis largely had remained indoors, did not exercise and ate too much. Hence, there was a growing problem of obesity in the war-ravaged country. Most of the story was about a single obese man, a 25-year-old, former photo supply store owner named Haider Kareem Said. He weighs 495 pounds. A photo showed him smiling broadly, over a very rotund body.

Something about all this troubled a reader, Sgt. Stephen K. Bozich, who messaged me: "[The story] is supposed to represent what, exactly? If it is journalism, then please inform me exactly where our individual definitions of the term differ." He noted that the story as it appeared in Stripes did not say whether Said was obese in 2003."If Mr. Said was indeed obese prior to the invasion, then what exactly is the point of the story?" Bozich asked.

The Stripes story was a truncated version of the L.A. Times piece. The original made clear that Said was obese earlier. He had weighed 295 pounds on a 5-foot-4 frame. And he told the Times reporter that "even as a child he had a weight problem, something he attributes to loving food and hating exercise." Score one for Sgt. Bozich. 

In fact, the original story, before Stripes edited it, didn't back up its theme much. Only one other overweight person was named, Said's uncle, who said he had gained 65 pounds. And it said that an Iraqi surgeon who performs gastric band surgery "would not discuss the reason for Iraqis' growing weight problem beyond saying that they eat too much unhealthy food and don't move around enough." 

The story illustrates the dangers of editing syndicated articles too sharply, especially those that could have used a little more meat on the bones of their contentions.