Did Michigan’s Booth Newspaper Co. Coordinate An Editorial Attack Against Grassroots Recall Groups in June?

The FCC recently came out with an extensive report concerning the state of American media. In the Executive Summary, FCC researchers write:

Yet, in part because of the digital revolution, serious problems have arisen, as well. Most significant among them: in many communities, we now face a shortage of local, professional, accountability reporting. This is likely to lead to the kinds of problems that are, not surprisingly, associated with a lack of accountability—more government waste, more local corruption, less effective schools, and other serious community problems. The independent watchdog function that the Founding Fathers envisioned for journalism—going so far as to call it crucial to a healthy democracy—is in some cases at risk at the local level….While digital technology has empowered people in many ways, the concurrent decline in local reporting has, in other cases, shifted power away from citizens to government and other powerful institutions, which can more often set the news agenda.

Accountablity reporting. Investigative journalism. Muckraking. Pick your term. The bottom line is that according to the FCC research, the lack of accountability reporting is leading to some serious problems in our local communities, beginning with a shift of power away from citizens to government and the businesses that invest in the campaigns of local politicians.

In Michigan, Advance Publications owns a number of newspapers including, Advance Newspapers, Booth Michigan, The Bay City Times, The Flint Journal, The Grand Rapids Press, Jackson Citizen Patriot, Kalamazoo Gazette, Michigan Business Review, Muskegon Chronicle, The Saginaw News, as well as AnnArbor.com. Booth claims its net readership on Daily/Sundays at 1.47 million, a total of 1.3 million households, or almost 40 percent of the total population in Michigan’s Lower Peninsula. Of course, that Booth number includes AnnArbor.com and its purely fictional claim that its product reaches 69 percent of all adults in Washtenaw County—a claim based on paying a company to phone survey a few hundred county residents.

In the past few days, three Booth Michigan newspapers editorialized that the recall effort launched against Republican Governor Rick Snyder is misguided, wrong, and unnecessary.

On June 5, 2011, the editorial board of the Kalamazoo Gazette weighed in with its opinion concerning the merits of the current recall efforts in an editorial titled, “Political recall efforts just divert us.” That editorial argues:

Recalls are an option for the people when the circumstances involve corruption or wrongdoing. But it’s not an appropriate response when a legislator has to make a tough decision.

Our state legislators are having to make quite a few tough decisions. It’s a pretty good bet that the reason these decisions weren’t made before is that their predecessors lacked the political will and, in some cases, the sheer gumption to do what needed to be done….The most appropriate time for citizens to change the officials they choose to represent them is during an election. And the most appropriate place for them to make those choices is at the ballot box.

On Friday June 10, 2011, the Jackson Citizen-Patriot published an editorial titled, “Editorial: Cast your vote against more recalls.” The editorial goes on to argue:

There is a need for the recall process. There are occasions where elected officials need to be booted out — or at least be threatened with that possibility — if they have broken the law or flaunted basic ethics.

That is not happening now. These recall attempts stem from controversial votes on taxes for seniors and school funding. Those are debatable choices, but not egregious acts.

What this creates is the perpetual campaign, a never-ending push to punish elected officials. It isn’t about holding them accountable; it is trying to tear them down at every turn between elections.

In the end, backers of recalls are doing themselves no favors. They cheapen the political process and turn off people who already feel elected officials put public opinion over good policy.

You don’t like your elected official? Fine. You have a way to remove that person. Vote in the next election.

On the same day, June 10, 2011, in The Muskegon Chronicle, there was an editorial titled, “Results vs. politics: Recall effort focuses state on wrong thing.” In that piece, the paper’s editorial group writes:

You don’t like the emergency financial manager law, contact your lawmaker. Suggest something different, find a compromise. Run for office.

And in 2012, make sure more than 40 percent of registered voters cast their ballots in Muskegon County….Recalling Snyder refocuses the state on politics instead of working toward solutions. Voters should evaluate Snyder at the end of his four-year term not in the middle of his first year.

The attacks took a different, more insidious form, as well. On May 23, 2011 reporter Chris Gautz of the Jackson Citizen Patriot posted this piece, “Mike Nofs faces recall attempt over pension tax; should he be booted?” The piece purports to ask the question, then present opinions of the paper’s readers. However, the “opinions” are little more than posts by anonymous people, presumably readers of the paper’s site. Then, two weeks later, we have the Flint Journal’s piece posted on June 13, 2011 titled, “From the Comments: Petition Drive to recall Snyder gets mixed reviews.” This piece, as well, purports to present “mixed” opinions of the paper’s readers about the recall effort and the group spearheading that effort. The “opinions” included, like those used by Chris Gautz, are little more than posts by anonymous people, presumably readers. With comments attributed to screen names like “revel4us,” “geek4903” and “grime,” it’s lazy journalism at its worst, the opposite of “accountablity reporting.”

Has no one at The Flint Journal or Jackson Citizen Patriot heard of IP address spoofing, or political dirty tricks that include paying people to post comments to news sites?

Having multiple newspapers owned by a single company, each with (ostensibly) independent editorial control, come out with editorials (and “reader opinions”) that seek to undermine a grassroots political movement is a symptom of a very serious problem identified in the FCC’s report. That the editorials came out the same week, and in one instance on the same day, and employed virtually identical arguments (recalls should only be launched to punish “egregious” acts), and suggest virtually identical redress (“run for office” or better yet, simply “vote”), suggests a single media company controlling the news agenda.

Cindy Fairfield edits the Muskegon Chronicle. When asked about the similarities between the editorials and the timing of the editorial in her paper and the one in the Jackson Citizen-Patriot, Ms. Fairfield replied via email that, “We have an independent editorial board so I have no idea what the stance was on the recall issue in other newspapers, including those in Booth. Neither do I know what reasoning the other newspapers used in their editorials. Our position was that Gov. Snyder was elected on his platform, has stuck to his platform and an elected official shouldn’t b be judged on how he or she has done based on only 6 months in office.”

The editor of the Kalamazoo Gazette also responded to questions about the similarities between the editorials and the fact that the three pieces appeared within days of each other. Rebecca Pierce wrote via email, “The Kalamazoo Gazette has an independent editorial board and our position on recalls has been consistent over many, many years. We had no idea that Jackson or Muskegon wrote on this topic, let alone what they had to say about it. Since the subject of recalls has been in the news, it’s no surprise that others chose to write about it.”

The anti-recall editorials published in the The Grand Rapids Press, Jackson Citizen Patriot, Kalamazoo Gazette, and Muskegon Chronicle could, perhaps, identify southeastern Michigan as a geographical area where a sharp decline in accountability reporting has led to a shift in power away from citizens. Combined, the editorials represent a serious attack against a grassroots recall effort on the part of a media company to the benefit of powerful political and business interests.

Thus far, neither the Bay City Times, Saginaw News nor AnnArbor.com have published editorials that attack the efforts of the groups/individuals working to recall Governor Snyder and the 20 Republican legislators targeted by other recall efforts.