Standard-Examiner: First Time Candidate Raises Most Money for Ogden Council Race

The Std-Ex embarrasses itself on a major story yet again

By Curmudgeon

Just when I start to think the Standard-Examiner is improving its news reporting and editing, it embarrasses itself again on a major story. This time, it's Ms. Lewis's story on campaign donations in Ogden's City Council races

Certainly the topic merits a story. And identifying the candidates [Mr. David Phipps among them] who are raking in the most money from special interest groups like the Northern Wasatch Association of Realtors [NWAR] is appropriate. As is asking a spokesman for the NWAR why it has given Mr. Phipps [and two other candidates] four-figure donations. As was asking Mr. Shroeder why he was donating to the candidates.

But only Mr. Phipps was allowed to state why he thought the realtor and developer lobby was shovelling so much cash his way. [He says it's because he's so independent he will work to end divisiveness in city government.] That segment of the story reads like an out-take from Mr. Phipps stump speech to civic groups. Does Reporter Lewis include his opponents' opinions about why people are donating to them? No.

Then it gets worse. Lewis writes: "It was important to Phipps that he not run just because he supported one side or the other, but to make the decisions he felt were best for the city." That's reported as straight fact, not Mr. Phipp's claim about why he is running. Straight fact. Where the hell were the SE's news editors when Lewis submitted her story? Did none of them point out that the sentence as written makes it Ms. Lewis's conclusion [and therefor the SE's] that Phipps is running as an independent to do only what's best for the city? Did no editor of remind her [News Writing 101] that such would be proper for an editorial, or a column, but has no place in a campaign news story? Did it occur to no editor to add a "he said" to the sentence? Where the hell were the news editors? Did none question the propriety of interviewing only Phipps about why he was running and getting large cash donations, while asking none of his opponents why they thought people were giving to them?

Lewis also reports Phipps claiming "he declined contributions from a few politically-charged groups or people, saying he didn't want them to feel like they had control over his decisions." Oh, really? And what "politically charged groups or people" were they? We don't know. Did Ms. Lewis ask? We don't know. Did Phipps refuse to say? We don't know. Hard to believe a reporter who got at least a C in News Reporting 101 didn't ask him who he refused money from. Harder still to understand why, if he refused to answer, the story didn't report that he refused to answer.

Evidently, the SE has tasked Reporter Lewis with covering the Ogden Council campaign. Since her grasp of basic political reporting standards seems... well, let's just say not as robust as it ought to be.. some crusty cynical old green-eyeshade cigar smokin' news editor who's been around the political block a time or two needs to be assigned to read what she submits during the campaign, to prevent embarrassments like today's story from landing on readers' front porches.

One final point: apparently Mr. Phipps thinks the NWAR is not a "politically charged" special interest group. At least that's what he told Reporter Lewis, who apparently did not press him on the matter. This leads, I think, to only two possible conclusions: (a) Mr. Phipps is so Pollyanna naive that it would not be prudent to place him on the Council or (b) Mr. Phipps was being disingenuous in trying to slip the NWAR past Reporter Lewis as some kind of a-political public spirited group, and that Reporter Lewis was so Pollyanna naive as to let him get away with it.