Jackson Free Press

This is an interesting piece over at Politico talking about media bias (and/or the lack thereof) in the coverage of the McCain and Obama campaigns. Politico is talking about its own coverage, which was not included in a Pew study that pointed to twice as many positive stories for Obama vs. McCain in the mainstream media.

There have been moments in the general election when the one-sidedness of our site — when nearly every story was some variation on how poorly McCain was doing or how well Barack Obama was faring — has made us cringe.

As it happens, McCain's campaign is going quite poorly and Obama's is going well. Imposing artificial balance on this reality would be a bias of its own.

In general, I agree with the premise that this would be a artificial balancing -- that's something of a guiding principle here at the JFP. When you "balance" the truth with fiction, you do a disservice to the reader.

Here's what's interesting about their premise, though, particularly as it directly relates to Politico:

Reporters obsess about personalities and process, about whose staff are jerks or whether they seem like decent folks, about who has a great stump speech or is funnier in person than they come off in public, about whether Michigan is in play or off the table. This is the flip side of the fact of how much we care about the horse race — we don't care that much about our own opinions of which candidate would do more for world peace or tax cuts.

While that's also true and insightful, it's interesting that Politico has been rather guilty of focusing on horse-race over substance as well -- perhaps to the self-perpetuating point of occasionally balancing narratives or seeking out new criticism of both candidates in order to float their own relevancy.

I mean that with tons of love and affection -- Politico is often an engaging read during this political season. And there's no doubt that everyone loves a little horse race coverage.

But it's worth noting that the site's Politics '08 landing page has NO link to anything that suggests "on the issues" or even a fact-check. Top headlines right now on that page are: "Race Gets Gritty in South Florida," "Obama Has Firm Lead in Colo., Pa.," "Why McCain is Getting Hosed By the Press," "McCain Needs to Win Left-Leaning Florida" and "Is Sarah Palin Preparing for 2012."

That's fine. Politico can be all horse-race all the time if that's what pays the bills. You might as well argue "E" out of existence. But when journalists really stop to consider what and how their coverage is skewing, it might be worth noting that coverage includes the issues, platforms and stances of the candidates should count for something. To us, it's part of the civic responsibility of being a newspaper. And when you've got the resources to pour into more issues coverage...why not try it?