I've been a frequent critic of the mainstream media's policy against any offering serious coverage (or in most cases, just about any coverage) of smaller party and independent candidates. So I should probably give a tip of the cap to North Country Public Radio's Brian Mann for doing a story dedicated to a smaller party candidate. His piece today focused exclusively on Libertarian Congressional candidate Eric Sundwall and on the more general topic of libertarianism in the North Country. The segment also featured comments from John Warren, main author of Adirondack Almanack and frequent commenter on this blog.
It's no accident that NCPR is by far the best mainstream media outlet in the area. This story (albeit after a lot of hectoring by regional advocates of multipartyism) is another example why. I don't want to overstate things, though. The profile of Sundwall is a good start and should be acknowledged as such. The next step is for Sundwall or any smaller party/independent candidate to be included in ANY story on the issues or race to the same degree to which the Democrat and Republican candidates are included. That would represent what a great many voters and consumers are starving for: truly fair political coverage.
Update: Here is Sundwall's response to Mann's piece.
8 comments:
Already today, on his blog, Brian Mann has reverted to his old ways.
Surprise, surprise.
John, for people in the establishment media, old habits are hard to break. That he would run the profile on Sundwall in the first place shows that demands for quality (and equality) in journalism can work. It just means we have to keep at it.
Friday, 27 February, 2009
So where's Brian Mann's blog? I mentioned Sundwall's positions on my blog yesterday (in "the Siena poll" post). But I don't feel any moral obligation to give him equal time, any more than Brian feels obliged to refrain from taking potshots at Tedisco. It's a free blogosphere.
Bob, my blog does little original journalistic reporting. It's primarily opinion, which is by definition not neutral. Your blog is a mix of journalism and commentary. So if you want to pump up Tedisco or anyone else, that's perfectly fine. Ditto if I want to take potshots at him. Your blog doesn't claim to be an unbiased news outlet and neither does mine. People know this when they read our blogs and judge accordingly.
By contrast, most mainstream media outlets like WAMC and the Post-Star DO claim to be fair and unbiased news outlets. They should be judged by different standards precisely because they claim different standards.
Brian Mann can be found on the NCPR blog. Go to ncpr.org and click on the link for The In Box. Although he's lacking in this one aspect, I still think he does the best reporting in this region.
It may be a free blogosphere, but NCPR is using pubic airways granted by the people of the United States and is claiming the mantel of political reporter. All I'm looking for is balance in identifying all three candidates in reports about the election.
I agree that Brian Mann is one of our best local reporters. Unfortunately he's off base in this exceedingly important case.
But I am not going to plead guilty to biased unfairness. And I don't think, for example, that the Tedisco people are happy about my most recent post.
Relax. You're not on trial, so no plea is necessary.
Post a Comment