People tell me all the time that The Denver Post isn’t bothering to cover local elections, like State House races, for example. I usually defend The Post by saying that the paper has to set priorities, and just how many local elections are there in the metro area? A ton.

And besides, the newspaper does provide online resources with lots of info about local candidates. In an interview in Feb., Post Political Editor Curtis Hubbard told me that The Post may provide more coverage of local political races in its YourHub supplement. And this seems to be happening, though I haven’t looked at the YourHub coverage in a systematic way.

So with space for local elections at such a premium, it’s a surprise to see stories about State House races in The Post, like today’s piece about three pimaries for House seats.

But the piece was a major disappointment with a focus mostly on minor squabbles and sparring among candidates–without single serious local issue spotlighted.

The article covered the District 4, 5, and 9 State House races.

The coverage of the District 4 race focused on whether Dan Pabon got special treatment. No evidence was cited by The Post, though it reported that complaints had been lodged but no verdict rendered; a Democratic spokeswoman “feared” that the caucus results might have to be tossed.

The portion of the article on the District 5 race centered on a hostile email exchange between a Cristina Duran supporter, not affiliated with Duran’s campaign team, and candidate Jose Silva.

As for the District 9 portion of the article, it focused on a dispute over whether a Republican party official should have pointed out that one candidate was on probation for a petty offense of disturbing the peace.

I think fights among candidates are important for voters to know about. How they are handled by candidates is illuminating.

But with so little ink available for these races, and no money or serious judgment calls involved yet, I think the focus for The Post, especially for the print edition, should be on the issues. And god knows there are many at play at the Legislature, including education, the budget, the environment, and many more. Next time, pick a couple issues tell us where the candidates stand.

 

If you read today’s Denver Post editorial about the draft “Modernization of Elections” bill, you’d be excused for thinking the bill is dead for this session.

The editorial discusses the draft bill mostly in the past tense–and argues that it should be taken up next session, with modifications.

The first sentence of the editorial reads:

“An interesting set of election reforms that merited consideration has been shelved at the Colorado legislature.”

Actually, the bill has NOT been shelved for this session, according to a reliable source.

And something else you wouldn’t know from reading The Post today: County clerks support the draft bill. More on them later.

A March 28 Denver Post article offered a misleading tidbit that I should have pointed out earlier.

I’m not referring to the headline of the Post article, which was bad enough. It read “Markey a Polarizing Force in the 4^th Congressional District.” The article wasn’t about whether Markey was “polarizing.” It was about her vote on health care, so a headline related to health care would have been more meaningful.

But more serious is something the story left out.

Discussing the responses to Markey’s vote for the federal health-care bill, The Post reported:

Fred Vierra of Cherry Hills Village lives outside the 4^th Congressional District but sent Republican congressional candidate Cory Gardner [who’s opposing Markey] a $1,000 donation.

“You can thank Betsy Markey’s health care vote for this check,” he wrote last week in a note to the campaign.

From reading this, you could easily think Vierra’s $1,000 donation is money Gardner wouldn’t have gotten if Markey had opposed the health care bill.

But you need to spend five minutes on the Federal Election Commission website to discover that Vierra is a well-known Colorado GOP donor, who regularly gives to candidates outside of his district of residence and outside of our state.

In fact, Vierra gave $2,000 to Marilyn Musgrave in 2005 and again in 2006. Before the health care bill was twinkle in Obama’s eye, Vierra gave $1,000 or more to Sam Brownback of Kansas, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, John Thune of South Dakota, former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, former Montana Senator Conrad Burns, and others, all Republicans. He gave $55,000 to John McCain in 2008. In Colorado, in addition to Musgrave, he’s given big money to Republicans Wayne Allard, Mike Coffman, Rick O’Donnell, Jane Norton, Bob Schaffer, Tom Tancredo, and others. The list goes on and on. It’s pretty amazing, really. Type “Fred Vierra” on this page of the FEC website.

Especially because The Post included the contextual detail that Vierra “lives outside” of Markey’s Distrct, The Post should have informed us of Vierra’s status as a national Republican donor living in Colorado.

A phrase like “Vierra, who gave over $400,000 to Republican candidates across the country since 1998-” would have done the trick. Or even something like, “Vierra, a well-known Republican donor in Colorado -.”

Of course, it’s possible that Vierra wouldn’t have coughed up $1,000 for Gardner if Markey had opposed the health care bill.

But still, Vierra’s history of donating should have been mentioned, to give us a full picture of what’s going on here…-and to let us decide what to make of it.

Not only us, but news media as well. Here’s what I mean:

After The Post ran the article with the anecdote about Vierra’s $1,000 check, a Post reader, Ann Westmeyer, sent Gardner a clipping of The Post’s article, a $25 check , and a note that read, “Again, you can thank Betsy Markey’s healthcare vote for this check,” according to story on The Post’s political blog, The Spot.

Westmeyer’s note stated that she also lived “outside the district,” according to The Post, which unfortunately quoted its own story about Vierra’s $1,000 check, again omitting the information that Vierra is a major Republican donor statewide and nationally.

And guess what happened next? This two-part story, about Vierra’s check and The Post’s article that another donation to Gardner, was picked up by the Washington Post today in an article headlined “In Colorado, health-care debate reverberates in congressional race.”

The Washington Post recounted The Denver Post’s story, reporting:

After the health-care bill passed, a voter from outside the district sent the Republican’s [Gardner’s] campaign a contribution with a note: “Please thank Betsy Markey for this check.” When The Denver Post wrote about it, another voter sent a copy of the article along with a donation to Gardner’s campaign with a note: “Again, you can thank Betsy Markey’s health-care vote for this check.”

That’s how the news media feed on themselves to build a narrative (Angry voters donating to unseat a congresswoman.). Unfortunately, in this case, a piece of the foundation of the narrative is partially rotten, lacking critical context.

After 23 quoteless weeks, The Denver Post ran a direct quotation from Jane Norton today.

Norton’s quoted words, which appear to have traveled from the Senate candidate’s mouth into reporter Lynn Bartels’ ears, in a two-way conversation, were first these:

“Coloradans are incredibly passionate because the direction of the country is wrong. The overreach of the federal government is absolutely unprecedented.”

And then these:

“I am a conservative. That’s who I’ve always been.”

The Post’s article referred to Norton’s newsworthy statements of late–shadowy stuff that should have been in the newspaper previously, but was left out.

For the first time, The Post reported that Norton called Social Security a Ponzi scheme and that she accused the Obama administration of caring more about the rights of terrorists than the lives of American citizens. It also mentioned her proposal to eliminate the Department of Education, which The Post had already reported but which her spokesman previously refused to discuss with The Post because he was asked about it on a “holiday,” 

That’s a huge step forward. Now Post reporters should query Norton about her basis for believing these things–and her other extreme ideas, including her reported support of a flat tax or national sales tax, which would amount to a major overall of the U.S. tax code.

The Post should ask where Norton how her thinking evolved on these issues.

Today’s Post article pointed out that Norton and the GOP Senate contenders are “driving as far to the right as possible in hopes of rallying the base and appealing to the Tea Partyers.” While some think Norton, who openly attacks Planned Parenthood, is trying to hide her right-wing beliefs, The Post’s article today argued that Norton “has to battle the perception she’s the establishment candidate.” This perception is fueled by her support from “powerul D.C.-lobbyist brother in law Charlie Black and others in the capital,” including Sen. John McCain, today’s Post article stated.

 

 

 

I’ve been lambasting The Denver Post for not talking directly with Colorado Senate Candidate Jane Norton.

And I was ready to lambast The Post again this afternoon, after reading its coverage of last night’s caucuses and the Colorado Senate race. Neither Jane Norton nor Michael Bennet were directly interviewed.

Instead, The Post’s article stated that U.S. Senate candidate Jane Norton’s quote came from “prepared remarks.” And Michael Bennet’s quote came from “a release.”

This was a major political event–and you’d expect The Post to interview the major candidates directly or–at least–to tell us that the candidates declined a request to be interviewed.

But I asked Post reporter John Ingold, who wrote the caucus article along with Jessica Fender, about the story, and his response provides a window into the complicated world that reporters operate in–versus the simplistic one occupied sometimes by a media critic.

Both Jessica and I tried last night to get live comments from the candidates themselves. (It was a bit of a complicated process because we needed comments for the first-edition story before results were in, then we needed new quotes for the final-edition story after results were released.)

 In the mini-chaos of the evening …• both for us and the candidates …• we weren’t always able to get direct quotes. I can’t say for the candidates we didn’t speak to whether that was a conscious choice on their part, but we ultimately felt it was better to use prepared statements from the candidates themselves rather than live comments from their spokespeople. Of course we would much, much rather speak directly to the candidates. 

As for why we didn’t say that we tried and failed to get live comments from the candidates, I didn’t feel it was worth the space in the story to make that point. We had only 25 inches to cover a lot of ground on three significant contests, and we had to do it on a tight deadline. To the extent readers are inclined to draw a distinction between direct comments and prepared statements, I think the story provided them with enough detail to do so.

So in this light, I can see why the controlled information by Bennet and Norton (statements and news releases) was used in the newspaper, and the approach makes sense. I also understand why Ingold and Fender did not write that the candidates “declined comment.” It sounds like the candidates never really declined the interview request, but neither did they make themselves available. So the reporters went with what they had. That’s what happens on deadline. Ingold rightfully didn’t want to speculate about the candidates’ motives, but it looks like they were just manipulating deadline-driven journos.

The Post’s piece on the caucuses and the Senate race last night did include direct quotes from Ken Buck, Andrew Romanoff, pollster Floyd Ciruli, and political analyst Steve Welchert.

It’s still a mystery to me why The Post hasn’t quoted Norton, directly in a two-way conversation, in 23 weeks. Her releases and spokespeople have been quoted in 13 articles.

But I’m thinking this will change as the campaign gets going.

Bennett has been quoted directly, about campaign matters, in 12 articles in a two-way conversation with reporters during the same period, with his last quote on campaign matters appearing seven weeks ago. His releases and spokespeople have been quoted in 12 articles.

Andrew Romanoff has been quoted directly in 13 articles, and three quotes have appeared from releases and spokespeople.

 

 

I’ve gotten some dumb “breaking news” items from The Denver Post over the years, but one of today’s “breaking-news” emails was up there among the dumbest.

The subject was, “Breaking News: GOP assails Dems on approach to health bill”

Here’s the text:

WASHINGTON…-Republicans are assailing Democrats over their plans to push massive health care legislation through the House without a direct vote.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday that “anyone who endorses this strategy will be forever remembered for trying to claim they didn’t vote for something they did.”

Read more at DenverPost.com.

If that’s breaking news, then what isn’t?