D-G Reports Onion Spoof on ‘Fixin?s’ As Real Story

On the front of its June 26 food section, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported that the U.S. Department of Agriculture had added a new food group called “fixin’s” to the USDA Pyramid.

“We recommended five to eight servings from the fixin’s group, which includes such hearty sides as coleslaw, mashed potatoes, steak fries, baked beans and macaroni ‘n’ cheese,” Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman was reported as saying.

The report carried the byline “Arkansas Democrat-Gazette wire services.”

The D-G apparently got the article from The Onion, a satirical and humor newspaper that is circulated in five cities and is available on the Internet at www.theonion.com. The Onion made up the story and posted it on its Web site on June 12.

Frank Fellone, the D-G’s deputy managing editor, said he was “pretty danged sure” the story came from a legitimate newspaper wire service, but the D-G was unable to find such a wire story to support that claim.

The only other large publication to mistake an Onion article for real journalism was The Beijing Evening News in China, which published an Onion story last month saying the U.S. Congress was going to quit if it didn’t get a new and nicer capital building in which to work.