The Norwich Bulletin has this editorial, explaining that the newspaper’s policy is to invite all ballot-listed candidates to appear before its editorial board. The editorial also says that the media in general should treat all ballot-listed candidates equally, and that candidate debates should include all such candidates. The Norwich Bulletin is one of the two biggest newspapers in eastern Connecticut, and has existed since 1796.
I appreciate how the Norwich Bulletin has been fair to all candidates. It’s fascinating that they published an article on Paul Passarelli’s U.S. Senate run way back in February 2011. I helped get him on the ballot this year. He and Dan Reale are good people who I’ve corresponded with who deserve consideration by all applicable voters.
Ironically, a letter published in the Norwich Bulletin three days before this latest editorial is by an irate voter, Donald Francis of Brooklyn, CT, who doesn’t like either of “the two nominated candidates for U.S. Senate.” Obviously, there are more than two, but he didn’t know that.
The Norwich Bulletin isn’t alone. The Day, a newspaper in New London, CT, invited Libertarian candidate Marc Guttman to a public debate they sponsored that took place at the start of this month but he was unable to attend.
Historically, the News-Times in Danbury, CT was fair to alternative candidates for state representative and state senator, at least. I remember in the late 1990s / early 2000s when they published interviews with all the candidates and whenever there was a Libertarian, Independent, or Concerned Citizens candidate they’d often give an equal amount of space in a column next to the D and R columns. Also, they used to print the actual ballots in the newspaper, showing all the parties and candidates, a few days before the election.
Typically a newspaper covers a candidacy to the extent there is an accepted perception that particular candidacy might be victorious. The idea that the reader is only interested in that, or that anything further isn’t news because it isn’t transparently connected to victory is bad journalism. Inferior campaigns need to be covered to put the contest in context, politics and public debate in context.
Kudos to the Bulletin.