Archive: Opinions

EditorialAs an editor I get to choose what goes into my newspaper.  My e-mail box is loaded with press releases, especially as the political season heats up.  Like everyone else, I'm excited that Presidential election season is almost over, and am counting down the days on campaigncountdown.com .  In the meantime I have to decide which press releases to use and which to divert to the cyber-trash.

As you might expect, incumbents send notices of things they are doing, or things they have done.  Challengers often don't have that record to rely on, but they can tell voters what they would do instead of what the incumbent has chosen to do.

All of them send releases accusing each other of all kinds of heinous acts.  This political season the challengers are sending many more releases telling how heinous their opponents are, while the incumbents are tempering those with press releases on what they have actually done and plan to do.

In fact one of the challengers that Lansing voters will decide on has only sent slams, with not a single press release on what he would actually do if elected.  That puts him at a disadvantage as far as this newspaper is concerned, because I won't publish these slams no matter which side they come from.  As an admittedly naive editor I want to know what people stand for and I want to know the reasons they think I and others should vote for them.  I'm not interested in why they think I shouldn't vote for their opponents.  Consider the source -- of course they think we shouldn't vote for their opponents!

When a candidate tells me that their opponent is doing the wrong thing I want to know what they think the right things is, and I want some details on how they think they will accomplish it if I vote for them.  I want the glass that's half full, not half empty.  While I understand that accusing a political opponent of everything possible is a part of the game, to me it is not the whole game.  I won't vote for one guy just because I don't like what the other guy did.  I want to have some assurance that the guy will do better.

Ultimately I don't publish the slams, because I don't think anyone knows any more about the candidates whose campaigns send them to me than they did before they read them.  They muddy the issues.  And I don't think passing on this muck does my readers any favors.  In my opinion part of a newspaper's mission is to clarify things so that readers are well informed about real things, not accusations and heresay.

I am not naming names, because this publication does not endorse political candidates and I think that could appear to be an endorsement -- or the opposite.  I try hard to keep my personal politics out of the newspaper, even on the editorial page.  I don't think my politics should matter to the news, the things people do that affect our community's life.  But I won't publish these slams unless they come from a trustworthy source that is verifiable, and when they come from a political opponent I have to admit that I simply ignore them.

Unfortunately that has meant that one candidate in particular has gotten almost no coverage at all in this newspaper.  I haven't had any notice that he has visited here -- he may have done -- I just didn't hear about it.  If he did and I had I would have interviewed him to try to get the scoop on what he stands for and what he would do.  In the absence of that I have to assume that he doesn't think our town or this newspaper is important enough to bother with in this election.  And the problem with that is that those of us who live here don't get to make an informed choice.

----
v4i41