If you go to the Daily Herald’s website this morning you’ll find that their feature story is entitled “Trial Mystery: How did this guy ever get elected twice?” Said title being superimposed over a photo of Rod Blagojevich. Click through to the story and you will be treated to a scathing review of Blago’s character, intelligence and work habits, freshly revealed to the Daily Herald via wiretap tapes being played at the trial. You know the trial of which I speak? The one occurring years and years after the two elections they are talking about.
Early on in the story we are offered a solution to this mystery:
The answer is an only-in-Illinois mix of luck, skill, blind partisanship, scandal fatigue and the power of money.
Well, I’d like to offer up for the Daily Herald’s consideration a quarter with which to buy a clue as to another possible factor that might just have contributed to the mysterious behavior of voters in electing this guy twice:
Failure of traditional media to do their jobs.
I can see why the Daily Herald might be resistant to the idea that had they and their cohorts committed a little journalism during the elections in question, possibly even a little investigative journalism, rather than just spewing for the public statements from rival campaigns, poll results from various pollsters, visuals from campaign appearances, and endless repititions of partisan “experts” slicing and dicing both candidates talking points, and then actually, oh, reporting that to the voters, those elections might have turned out differently.
I hold out little hope that the Daily Herald, or their cohorts in traditional media, will anytime in the near future suffer an ephiphany in which they recall that part of their purpose for existing is to inform the public. And no, that is not just an “only-in-Illinois” issue.
Traditional media is too busy schmoozing candidates like Blago for all-important access, not to mention too busy assailing those damned bloggers for not adhering to the “journalistic standards” they like to blather about, to discover, much less report to voters, anything remotely resembling useful information. Unless it’s years after the fact and involves a juicy and scandalous trial that might just help them sell a few papers that is.
So, yeah, I’m not gonna hold my breath on the press dealing in relevant information in a timely manner. But if I stumble across a “Most Ironic Newspaper Story of 2010” contest what I will do is gladly nominate this Daily Herald piece. It’s a real winner.
Tags: Daily Herald, Illinois, journalism, Rod Blagojevich, traditional media, voter behavior
