PRESS RELEASE:
LIBERTARIAN PARTY of Colorado
Libertarian U.S. Senate candidate snubbed by Rocky Mountain News
"Limited Government – Individual Liberty – Personal Responsibility"FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Aug 13, 2001
CONTACT: Kent McNaughton, Public Information Director, (719) 686-0676
This weekend brings yet another slight to a hard-working and viable candidate of a "minor" political party--BTW: a party that ran more statewide candidates on last year's Colorado ballot (82) than did the Democrats (79).
A frustrated Libertarian U.S. Senate candidate, Rick Stanley, responded to a blatant mis-statement by Denver's Rocky Mountain News that Ted Strickland was the only candidate for U.S. Senate to file with the Colorado Secretary of State.
This may seem a simple matter to be cleared up with a simple "correction" statement. However, the repeated dismissal of the growing strength of third party movements and ideas, we feel, is a disservice to a public that, itself, is more-and-more convinced that "voting is pointless, so why do it."
"What do we have to do to get noticed in the media?" Stanley said. "I've been busting my hump, talking to people, handing out, faxing and emailing campaign literature, attending public events for the last three months. I've supplied the RMN with copies of the required FEC Form 2. Their statement "'Allard would beat his only announced foe, Tom Strickland' is patently false. And they knew it when they wrote it."
John Berntson, chair of the state Libertarian Party said "If the incidents of ignoring our existence didn't fit a pattern, we could understand it. But it's routine. For example, after asking our candidates to submit profiles for the Rocky Mountains News' voter guide, this past election, they printed not one. The voting public who counted on the RMN to provide a decent voter's guide was denied knowing they had choices other than Republican and Democratic candidates until they got to the voting booth. Not to mention that answering their questions was a waste of our candidate's time and effort."
Most of us get our news and political ideas from the popular media. Before really fresh ideas will be brought to the public for debate, the popular media will have had to take a long look at itself and realize it's become hidebound--nothing more or less than house organs for the government and the two major political parties; parties which differ only in how fast the government is to take over every aspect of our lives.Everyday, the public reads the same reground, politically correct news and 'analyses' in the so-called 'news' pages, and--with exceptions here and there--reads the same stultifyingly narrow arguments in the editorial pages.
We're not talking about reporters or columnists being blatantly and irretrievably statist in their outlook. We believe they really are trying hard to get the news out fairly and accurately. We also believe, however--that like most people--they find it difficult to 'step outside the box,' to realize that their world-view is colored by their surroundings and personal history--and that these are limited.
In past times, cities had competing papers, which were often owned by competing political entities. Interested citizens--to find the real story behind the headlines--would buy the available papers, read between the lines in two or more reports of the same story, and decide the facts for themselves.
Press stories often appear to take the side of governmental bodies or the well-connected, but is it not these very people that the press is supposed to watch? To those of us who challenge the status quo, it is difficult enough to be ignored, but when media organs make factual errors to our detriment, whether intentional or not, it is not only discouraging, but damaging to the fabric of the republic.
In the past few months, stories that would have been major headlines with days or even weeks of follow-on reporting, were either not run, or run with such a strong pro-government bias that the real story couldn't be recognized from the fable that was distributed.
Libertarians and conservatives are left wondering where the headlines were about the Tennessee tax revolt that the people won in the last month? How about the Klamath Falls, OR farmers who are still standing up to the Federal government and winning supporters from across the country? Did the press learn not to cross the government in the aftermath of printing the picture of the government thug grabbing little Elian Gonzales, thereby refraining from printing the story of possible gross government malfeasance in the case of Joann McGuckin and her children in Idaho?
Whether a matter of willful dismissal of third-party activity, or simple non-checking ignorance, the Rocky Mountain News was inaccurate in its report that Mr. Strickland's submission to the Secretary of State's Office was the only one there for U.S. Senate campaigns.We hope for a printed explanation from the Rocky Mountain News, with some inward-looking comment about the studied neglect third parties and their ideas receive in the major Front Range print and TV outlets.