Oh, our old friends at WCAX-TV and news director/former Douglas functionary Anson Tebbetts are at it again. Yesterday they aired a 3-minute piece on Wendy Wilton’s flimsy charges against Beth Pearce — and the report seemed to be stacked against Pearce.
First, when I (twice) watched the story on WCAX’s website, it was preceded, each time, by a 15-second Vermonters First ad for Wilton. Maybe that was inadvertent, but it’s absolutely inexcusable.
Then we get to the video. The anchor introduces the piece by referring to “the two candidates trading barbs,” which is not true, because it’s Wilton who’s throwing the mud. Then, Kristin Carlson spends the first 1:35 of her report focused on Wilton’s accusations. In the middle of this, there’s a brief B-roll clip of Pearce — but you don’t hear her, you just hear Wilton slamming her.
During this (by TV standards) endless attention to Wilton, WCAX airs a rather startling claim:
Wilton says her campaign was tipped off to the problems by seven current or former employees who have concerns about Pearce. Channel 3 talked to several people about their worries; none would go on camera.
There’s a nice piece of yellow journalism for you. WCAX repeats a very strong — and very vague — charge from Wilton; WCAX speaks to “several” people (they don’t remember how many?), but can’t get any of them on camera. And reports absolutely nothing about what they might have said off-camera. Were they willing to substantiate WIlton’s charges without showing their faces? Did they want to be anonymous? Did they refuse to say anything? We don’t know; WCAX did not tell us. That’s an abject failure of journalism.
Finally, at the 1:37 mark, after some very specific accusations from Wilton, we get a briefer and less specific defense from Pearce. After less than a minute with Pearce, Carlson returns to Wilton, noting that she has requested investigations by the Auditor and Attorney General.
And that’s about it. A slanted intro; two-thirds of the time spent on the Republican and less than one-third on the incumbent Democrat. Apparently WGOP is alive and well.
Tell me, why do any Democrats give any of their ad money to this station?
Surely you know the answer to that question – candidates buy advertising on the station because it is necessary in order to reach the vast majority of Vermont voters who watch the station – not in order to support the station.
Expecting Democrats to refuse to advertise on a media outlet because of their editorial policies is short-sighted and damaging. Asking them not to speak to TV viewers of popular shows like CSI, Big Bang Theory, NCIS, etc misses the point of buying advertising – those purchases are not made in order to support the station, they are made to get a message out to voters. Any Democratic candidate who boycotted WCAX ad purchases would be making a major tactical mistake.