The more I learn about the Oregonian’s endorsement of Ron Saxton for governor, the screwier it looks.
Sunday the Editorial Page Editor, Bob Caldwell, revealed that he alone made the call on the Saxton endorsement, even though a majority (six) of the ten-member board leaned toward Kulongoski.
So this is Screwy Factoid #1. The gubernatorial endorsement of the state’s largest newspaper should have said, “Bob Caldwell favors Ron Saxton for governor.” One guy, one personal opinion.
Instead, the editorial ended with:
It is a leap of faith to endorse a former school board chairman over a sitting governor. If all was well, we would recommend that voters re-elect Kulongoski. But the times demand a fresh look at Oregon’s problems and Saxton brings an open, independent mind to the task. We recommend that voters select him as their next governor.
We? There’s no “We”! There’s “Me,” Bob Caldwell. If a vote had been taken of the editorial board members, it would have been 6-4 in favor of Kulonogoski. Or, since one of the six was a wishy-washy supporter of the incumbent, 5-4 with an abstention.
Kings and queens get to refer to themselves as the royal “We.” And editorial writers can, too, as Wikipedia points out, when he or she is a spokesman for the publication. But in this case Caldwell was speaking for a minority of the editorial board.
This should have been revealed in the endorsement, not after the fact. In today’s Oregonian, letter writer Helena Wolfe tells it like it should have been:
It was shocking to learn that the endorsement of Ron Saxton by The Oregonian editorial board came down to the personal preferences of Editorial Page Editor Bob Caldwell, even though the board narrowly favored Ted Kulongoski (“So, who made the Saxton decision — and who did not,” Oct. 22).
Given the close split among board members, abstaining from endorsing either candidate would have been the more responsible action for the newspaper to take.
As things stand, Saxton now has a soundbite to use in his advertising, and Kulongoski’s stance has been irreparably damaged. The Oregonian should have just presented the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate and honestly told the public that the board was too divided to make an endorsement.
My Screwy Factoid #2 cost me $2.95 to discover. This is how much my VISA card got charged to obtain an archived file of an October 10, 2004 Oregonian piece by the public editor, “How the choice was made to endorse Kerry.”
But it was worth three bucks to read about how the editorial board’s presidential endorsement process worked two years ago. Some excerpts:
No vote is taken on endorsements; instead, Caldwell looks for a consensus to emerge and makes the call. In 2000, five members had pushed for Bush. But three of those five, including Caldwell and Rowe, were supporting or leaning toward the Democrat this time. Only Stickel and columnist David Reinhard ended up arguing that the newspaper should endorse Bush.
…Stickel [the publisher] was disappointed by the decision but says he respects it. Although he could have overridden the choice, he considers that foolish. “Why would you have an editor of the editorial board, why would you have six associate editors, if you’re going to sit there and tell them what to do?” he says.
Good question.
I wish Bob Caldwell would have asked it of himself before he overrode the gubernatorial preference of a majority of the editorial board. What’s foolish for one overrider is foolish for another. Stickel was smart enough to recognize that an endorsement based on one person’s personal opinion is meaningless.
Which, we now know, the Saxton endorsement is.
[I’ll include the full 2004 article below, thereby getting more of my $2.95 money’s worth.]
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