If you’ve ever talked to a reporter about “an ad he put in the paper,” you’ve likely been corrected.
Reporters don’t write ads and they tend to be touchy about it. They don’t have anything to do with ads. The ad department is on another floor with a different dress code, a different work schedule and a different set of rules.
Reporters attempt to write fair, balanced accounts of the news. They do not accept money to write a story. They refuse gifts of flowers or samples or discounts.
Editorial writers present the opinions of the newspaper as an institution. They operate independently of the news department, but they don’t take gifts or money either.
Columnists express their personal opinions, but the same rules apply. No money. No gifts.
Ads, unlike all of the above, are paid for by businesses, individuals or organizations to get information to readers. The Post and Courier tries to ensure that the information is accurate and appropriate in a newspaper, but it is a business deal. The customer is buying a product.
During this time of year, when political campaigns are heating up and elections are nearing, readers often question how newspapers go about striving for fairness and accuracy.
- Reporters and editors are responsible for presenting even-handed campaign news. That does not mean each candidate will get exactly the same number of column inches in the newspaper. It does mean taking note of candidates’ different perspectives. And it means similar news stories from various candidates will be handled similarly.
- The editorial board of The Post and Courier researches races, interviews candidates and, usually, endorses candidates on the editorial pages. It does not endorse candidates in primaries.
- The amount and type of paid advertising is up to the candidates and their endorsers.
Recently, Ted Power, a Mount Pleasant Town Council member who was defeated in his re-election campaign, asked for clarification about the newspaper’s policy regarding paid political advertising.
Why was it, he wanted to know, that a group called “Mount Pleasant Citizens Action Committee” was allowed to buy large ads in the paper and not required to publish an address?
Good question. The Post and Courier erred. In South Carolina, it is required that the name and address be included in the advertising so that the sponsoring individual or group can be contacted by mail.
Also, he asked, how much fact checking does the newspaper do to determine whether allegations are correct? Power said that several statements in recent advertisements to support his opponents were misleading if not downright wrong.
Lucy Talley-Chapman, general manager of The Post and Courier, said the ad to which Power referred was not handled according to the department’s policy, which calls for the content to be reviewed prior to publication.
The account executive should have handed the ad over to the representative most familiar with the political ad process. That representative would then see to necessary fact checking.
“This has been a lesson for all of us, and we have taken steps to prevent recurrence,” she said.
Often, she said, political statements can be read different ways from different vantage points.
For instance, the ad said, “At least three of the four incumbents are Democrats or support the Democrat’s agenda.” Power contended the statement was misleading in that only one candidate was a Democrat. Talley-Chapman says she understands how someone could misinterpret the statement but points out that it is indefinite enough to get by. When candidates are trying to sell themselves, voters do well to scrutinize political pronouncements – to look for innuendo and to weigh information from all candidates to determine credibility.
The newspaper’s role is not to suppress information but to disseminate it. Talley-Chapman said she rarely has refused ads, although it is not unusual for the ad department to ask a customer to correct an inconsistency.
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Speaking of mistakes, The Post and Courier aired one about as prominently as possible this week with a front-page headline that said, “U.N. SEEKS FULLER ACCESS IN IRAQ.” The headline writer picked the wording up from the Washington Post story it accompanied. But unless the United Nations wants to sell brushes in Iraq, the headline and story were both in error.
Something is either full or not full. It can’t be fuller or fullest.
The headline was wronger.
