Questions for Obama
The N&O's public editor, Ted Vaden, discussed that paper's coverage of a visit by Barack Obama to Fayetteville last week. He mentions that the N&O solicited questions for Obama from readers, three of which were posed to the candidate by the N&O's longtime political reporter.
I have mixed feelings about that. It's great to give readers more ownership of the coverage, and their questions were good ones. But that also meant that Christensen had less time to ask his own questions.
I don't know about you, but in a fly-by interview with the possible next president of the United States I want the questions asked by a 30-year political reporter.
I know this is preaching to the choir, but I was thinking/hoping we were beyond deferring to the superior question-asking of the 30-year vet. (Hmmm...I'm a 30-year vet.) Fortunately, the news leadership at the N&O is. Senior Editor Linda Williams said:
Why should the professional journalists be the only people who get to decide what questions are important? I think we're beyond the point where just journalists get to decide what the important questions are and who gets to ask them.
With that sentiment in mind, Obama is coming here on Wednesday. I don't know that we will get an interview with him, but if we are, what questions should we ask?
And given that Clinton is coming somewhere in North Carolina on Thursday -- her camp is not saying where -- the same goes for her if she comes around here.
Comments (3)
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I also read Vaden's comments, and I was under the impression that he had wished that Rob Christensen had more time to develop the story.
So do I.
Readers can and should submit questions and be heard, but think about what the outcome would be if that became more of a goal than relying on the reporting ability of an experienced reporter?
Ask Linda, or Ted Vaden, or John Drescher, or yourself, or anybody who has been around newsrooms for the better part of the past two decades, which would be better: Asking readers to submit their questions about mental health reform, or unleashing Pat Stith to do an investigative story?
(For the unitiated, Stith makes Mike Wallace of 60 Minutes look like a Sunday school teacher. The mere mention of his name has caused heart palpitations and cold sweats for North Carolina politicians for the better part of three decades)
If I am reading this correctly - and I hope that I am not - then a senior editor at the News and Observer has just advocated publicly that Rob Christensen step aside and hold his tongue so that reader questions can take center stage.
If that's so, then that's sad.
Posted on March 24, 2008 3:02 PM
That's not the way I read it. I read it as saying that coming up with good questions for a presidential candidate is not solely the purview of a seasoned reporter. Ted acknowledged that the questions posed by readers were good ones so what's the problem? (I doubt that Linda would have had Rob ask "dumb" reader questions.) I also inferred that the reader questions were added to Rob's questions, not taking the place of Rob's questions.
I am not -- and I doubt Drescher would -- propose substituting questions for a Stith investigation.
Posted on March 24, 2008 3:12 PM
I agree that the media should try to utilize readers as much as they can in the reporting of stories. However, there are interview formats and stories that are more appropriate for that than others. If a reporter has the opportunity to sit down with a political candidate for an hour and discuss a range of topics, I see no reason why reader questions cannot be submitted. A good example of providing a platform for the reader is our 10 Plus column that includes one reader-submitted question. Those columns are put together days or weeks in advance. At political rallies (often times just photo ops for the candidates) reporters have two to three minutes, if that, to ask questions and it is like striking gold to find reader-submitted question with enough clarity, relevance and/or depth to make it into print or that is phrased in a way that allows the candidate to answer it on the fly. Also, what happens if the story changes mid-stream at the event (i.e. the candidate makes a major gaffe or major policy announcement, a rowdy spectator gets arrested, etc.)? Some questions may become less of a priority under those circumstances.
Posted on March 25, 2008 3:42 PM