‘92 Democratic Candidates
I sense that we are in for another national political campaign of dull and meaningless news reporting.
On Sept. 16, the Los Angeles Times carried long stories on the presidential candidacies of Sen. Tom Harkin and Larry Agran. Harkin launched his campaign without saying anything. The story was worth four paragraphs that should have said he announced his candidacy, and made no policy statements. But The Times encouraged political vacuousness by printing a long story of drivel.
In the same issue, The Times ran three columns on Larry Agran, a candidate with a specific and unique platform. His policy proposals got two paragraphs (Nos. 13 and 14), and most of the rest of the story was about the fact that he isn’t widely known. (He isn’t unknown to those who have been paying attention.)
Both stories concentrated on the candidates’ chances of nomination and election. Why not tell us what they stand for (if anything) and let us decide what their chances are?
Spare us another campaign of reporting what the polls say.
ROBERT SOLLEN
Santa Barbara
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