As regular readers may know, Virgil Goode is the congressman in this district. Tom Perriello will be his Democratic opponent.
The Southside Messenger is a typical local publication -- several dozen dot the district -- reporting on issues of local import and interest. Two things about it caught my eye, however.
First, it uncritically reprints Virgil Goode's constituent newsletter, Goode News for Fifth District Virginia (get it?), every week (as do many of these publications).
Second, it launched an attack on Tom Perriello last week, albeit not by name, accusing him of "nasty dirty disgusting politics" and dodging "moral accountability."
The charges were bogus, but the combination of unfairly calling out Perriello while publishing Goode's newsletter was too much for me.
(more on the flip)
Here is the link to the original editorial:
http://www.southsidemessenger....
(Note: Link may not operate after April 18).
This juxtaposition of this editorial with the Goode News also highlighted a real problem not just in VA-05, but in other rural Virginia districts, and throughout the country as well. While we are all information junkies surfing the Web and arguing the factual nuances of candidates and their positions, most voters do not do this. only a minority of voters get information online. And for those who do, websites tend to be self-selecting -- we gravitate to sites with worldviews and opinions similar to our own.
Blogs are great organizing tools, but insofar as Southside voters are concerned, RK might just as well be written in Sanskrit.
Had I been a paying subscriber to Southside Messenger, I would have immediately cancelled my subscription in protest. I toyed with the idea of actually subscribing in order to cancel, and while I found the idea amusing, I didn't think it would do much good beyond turning into a semi-funny story for friends who already knew I would do something idiotic like that.
So I wrote a letter. In truth, I did not expect the Southisde Messenger to publish my letter, because I assumed the publication was in the tank for Virgil, but I figured I might get some mileage out if their hypocrisy.
Here is what I wrote:
When our Representative, Virgil Goode, sent a letter to us a year or so ago about a newly elected congressman's use of the Koran at his swearing in, it brought unkind national attention.While some of us might have agreed with Congressman Goode's feelings on the situation, few of us harbor the kind of prejudice that his statement made it seem like to outsiders. Many of us familiar with Congressman Goode over the years, even someone like me who is 180 degrees opposite from him politically, didn't take it all that seriously.
"That's just Virgil being Virgil," we said.
As it turns out, Congressman Goode apparently wasn't taking himself too seriously, either. Indeed, the congressman from Minnesota about whom Goode was speaking, Keith Ellison, recently spoke about the incident to his hometown newspaper, the Minneapolis Post [Sic. Should be Minnesota Pst, or MinnPost]."I understand ol' Virgil,'' Ellison laughingly told the paper. "He's what you call a panderer. I don't mean that in a bad way. It's just the way he does things. If he thinks his constituents want him to behave in a certain way, that's the way he's going to behave. He didn't know me from a can of paint when he said all of that stuff.
"He's never apologized to me, but that doesn't matter. Sometimes, people say something, but then they look you in the eye in a way that says, 'I didn't mean all that stuff'."
However, Congressman Goode's latest edition of Goode News, his constituent newsletter, is not so easily dismissed as "no harm, no foul."
The April 9 issue concerns illegal immigrants. Congressman Goode contends that illegal immigrants are responsible for some 9,200 homicides and drunk driving deaths in the U.S. every year.
Goode cites the work of fellow Congressman Steve King, who reasons that since 28% of all federal prisoners are illegal aliens, illegal aliens must have committed 28% of all crimes.
While some extremist anti-immigration groups defend King's reasoning on this matter, his facts and methodology have been debunked by virtually every knowledgeable observer who has looked at them, a fact easily discovered by about five minutes of research on the Internet.
King and Goode's assertions are absurd on their face. In fact, most recent studies, such as those by the Immigration Policy Center in the Spring of 2007 and Harvard sociology professor Robert Sampson in 2006, find exactly the opposite to be the case -- that foreign-born individuals are much less likely than their American-born counterparts to commit crimes and land in prison. And this is true for every age category and in every ethnic group.
Illegal immigration is a serious issue in the United States, one that needs serious debate. People feel very differently and very strongly about this issue. I respect that disagreement and I respect people who have deeply held, thoughtful positions different from my own. It is what democracy and our Country are all about; our ability to freely discuss these issues makes our nation stronger.
But I am sure that all of us agree that constructive debate cannot be based on inaccurate information. It doesn't matter which side of the issue you stand on; if the ground on which you stand is weak, then you will fall over.
By providing us with obviously incorrect information in his newsletter, Congressman Goode does neither us or, frankly, the cause he himself is pursuing, any good.
And what does it say about how our congressman thinks about us? He knows us better than cans of paint.
In a recent editorial, this paper decried a news release from an unnamed candidate for office about Virgil Goode that it deemed to be at odds with the facts. The editorial stated, "Not only should every voter be offended by these tactics, every news source should be more offended. I would have felt better if there had been a disclaimer on the release. 'To: reporter or editor, because I know you are biased in my favor or are too lazy to check the facts, I am submitting this self-serving, lying press release. Please publish it free of charge because I also know your readers are too gullible and lazy to check the facts for themselves.'"
Well, if we should be offended by an alleged "self-serving, lying press release" from a candidate, then how should we feel when we get the same thing from our elected representative?
And to add insult to injury, it is our own tax dollars that pay for this.
We'll see whether this paper puts its actions where its principles are. The Southside Messenger regularly publishes Congressman Goode's constituent newsletter. Will it offend its readers by publishing this week's demonstrably false "Goode News?"
Or will it stand by its principles and not publish information it knows to be false?
And will it explain to it readers why?
Well, I was wrong.
The Southside Messenger not only published my letter in full, but it published another letter pointing out the factual inaccuracies of its initial editorial.
Further, it published a second editorial that, while it did not dial back its unjustified criticism of Perriello, at least placed its earlier opinion in some context that recognized the dishonesty of Virgil Goode. Among other things, they wrote:
Character is the only single issue that can affect my support. A candidate who lies to or attempts to mislead me in an effort to gain my support will always lose my vote.
Here is a link to the second round of editorial material:
http://www.southsidemessenger....
So, I drew a few general lessons from this:
1. Kudos to the Southside Messenger for publishing letter material critical of their editorial statements.
2. Blogs are great. It is also important to take the information we learn from, and energy we draw from, the debates here and move it beyond the blogs in other media (this is not a lecture -- I am working hard on doing this myself).
3. There is discontent in this district, and a hunger for honest leadership and constructive solutions rather than Virgil Goode's scapegoating.
4. I choose to believe that there is more to elections than identity politics and that ideas do matter. Those who determine that Tom Perriello will simply walk in the footsteps of earlier, unsuccessful candidates in this district, are wrong. That's not to say Perriello will win -- there is an election to be fought. Rather, those who simply argue that on the basis of his party affiliation or his home in Albemarle, he cannot win, are living in the past.