Linda Lamoned – again and again and once again
June 28th, 2007 by Kevin Dayhoff
On Tuesday, June 26th, 2007, Kim Zetter, a journalist working for “Wired,” broke the story on Maryland State Board of Elections Administrator Linda Lamone seemingly “endors(ing) Diebold machines in marketing materials.”
Re-read the previous sentence. It is important.
When you read her piece, “Maryland Election Official Endorses Diebold Machines in Marketing Literature;” one can easily see that she spent a great deal of time on it, used cultivated sources, investigated it thoroughly, knew the issues and she broke the story. A story all of the rest of the vaunted mainstream media missed in Maryland. She nailed it.
Did you know that she broke the story?
Chances are great that you did not. Everyone is using her work, yet, except for one buried credit, “The use of her statements in the Diebold brochure was first reported Tuesday by wired.com, the Web site for Wired magazine;” the mainstream media and the Maryland blogosphere – for shame – is not giving her credit.
And this is wrong.
And the one credit she did get is buried so far in an article that if you did not know the issues, or care, and did not purposefully look for it – you would have easily missed it as the article in question was not overly forthcoming that the writer used Ms. Zetter’s work; almost paragraph by paragraph… - in the beginning as a springboard…
In the article, Ms. Zetter’s name was not mentioned and the “credit” was so off-hand and casual, the almost all readers would not be aware of all her hard work – and that she broke the story.
On another front, the crazier thing of it all is that if the Maryland blogosphere treats a colleague in this manner how are we to expect the mainstream media to treat us better?
For other posts about the phenomena of on-line journalists working hard and breaking stories or adding insight to a fast moving story; only to have the main stream media pick it up and not properly attribute the material – click on: Media Commentary MSM Give credit where credit is due.
Now – click on: “Maryland Election Official Endorses Diebold Machines in Marketing Literature” by Kim Zetter and then click on: “Election official criticized over ad” by Melissa Harris – and do a side-by-side comparison. Print them out if you need to. I’ll remain relatively agnostic - - you draw your own conclusions.
To Ms. Harris’s credit, she took the story and ran with it. She did a great job diving-in and bringing forth more information to our attention. But why not give Kim Zetter credit for breaking the story in a prominent manner at the top of the story?
And maybe it is not Ms. Harris’ oversight. For all we know perhaps her original copy did appropriately feature the person who did the original work and an editor messed with it.
Some of the additional depth of Ms. Harris’ coverage piques one’s curiosity… For example, the matter of the YouTube video… But that information has been out there for a while and I, for one, am willing to toss it up to the fact that perhaps Ms. Harris decided to give the matter that extra effort – that has been lacking on the part of the institution for which she works, in the past. Ms. Harris obviously worked hard on her piece… where other reporters were more willing to give Ms. Lamone a pass…
In an e-mail exchange with Ms. Zetter, she was extraordinary gracious and professional.
She wrote, in part:
“I'd much rather they write about the subject and not credit me than that they not write about it at all. And the Baltimore Sun reporter did do a good job with her piece.
“What's more, it was only because a number of reporters started calling
the governor's office that he asked the ethics commission to look into
the matter. I'm not sure my blog post alone would have achieved that.”
Methinks that Ms. Zetter is being a bit humble. That said, her professionalism in this context is to be applauded. Many other journalists have not been so magnanimous…
And again, to emphasize - - with the teamwork of Ms. Harris working the story and Ms. Zetter’s initial hard work - things happened. That is the way it should be.
It also would be important for the mainstream media give “the on-line partner” all the credit they are due. In a side-by-side comparison of Ms. Zetter’s story and Ms. Harris’ story, wouldn’t you think that perhaps a few more attributions were in order?
I guess, we should reward Ms. Harris and the Sun for giving Ms. Zetter the fleeting credit they did give her. It’s progress…
Nice work Ms. Zetter – and Ms. Harris…
Moving on to the Linda Lamone matter itself; this is a train wreck.
During the previous Republican administration, the Baltimore Sun was loath to attribute any problems to the darling of the Maryland Democratic Party and the Democratic leadership in the Maryland General Assembly…, Ms. Lamone.
In previous coverage of any number of synthetic (and real) problems during the previous Republican administration, the Baltimore Sun “owned” their coverage. The Sun read like a talking points memo of the Maryland Democratic Party.
Now that challenges persist in spite of campaign promises, many of the articles; on say the hiring and firing of state employees, or the electric rates matter, now feature that “Republicans are saying,” or Republicans charge….” Not that the problems have their “own” legitimacy, as in under the previous coverage of the previous administration…
Delving more into the Linda Lamone train wreck, it will curious as to whether or not she will be held responsible for her alleged job performance issues or for that matter, her conduct on the job. After all, she has been taught for four years that she can do whatever she darn well pleases and the Baltimore Sun and the Maryland Democratic leadership will cover for her and protect her.
Click on “Linda Lamone.” Or read my September 20, 2006 Tentacle column, “Lamoned, again.”
The conduct of Maryland's primary election on September 12 is a national disgrace. We've been "Lamoned!" Linda Lamone, that is. You know - the Democrats' state elections administrator for life.
[…]
You can bet the farm that if the state elections administrator had been appointed by Gov, Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr., there would be screaming from the front page to the last, criticizing the governor and calling for the administrator's head.
[…]
The Sun was quick to say in a September 14 article: "Lamone, for her part, said she was "horrified" by the problems that snarled the start of voting on Tuesday but she attributed most of the problems to the largely autonomous local election boards - especially in Montgomery County and Baltimore - not anything that her office or its staff did wrong."
But then, in the same article The Sun says: "The state Board of Public Works did not approve the final order for all of the necessary equipment until July 26, a vote that was delayed by questions raised by board members Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr., and Comptroller William Donald Schaefer."
Darn it - well, of course. How could we all be so stupid? It was the governor's fault after all.
Remember, Ms Lamone, "appointed by the State Board of Elections with Senate advice and consent," essentially has a job for life as a result of the 2005 Maryland General Assembly's "Linda Lamone - appointment for life legislation." Remember: 2005 SB 444/HB 675: "State Elections Office and State Elections Advisory Committee" sponsored by Sen. Paula Hollinger and Del. Shelia Hixson?
Blair Lee, in a March 3 Gazette column, "Paybacks are hell," puts it into perspective best. He calls to our attention a Sun article of February 21, "Voting-System Debate Colored By Party Politics."
In the article the paper editorializes on a comment by Governor Ehrlich: ''I no longer have confidence in the state Board of Elections' ability to conduct fair and accurate elections in 2006."
The Sun suggests that this "was Ehrlich's shabby attempt at intimidating the board and suppressing voter turnout... and replacing the state elections administrator, Linda H. Lamone, with someone the administration favors."
Mr. Lee writes, "From time immemorial, state law allowed governors to appoint the state elections administrator - the person who oversees state elections. And for decades, Democratic governors appointed loyal Democrats who could be trusted to keep an eye on the party's interests."
"When Ehrlich became governor in 2003, the Democratic legislature changed the rules . now Linda Lamone can only be removed by an 80 percent supermajority of the full elections board and even when removed she keeps her job until her successor is approved (if ever) by the state Senate, controlled by Democrats!
"In other words, at the prospect of a GOP governor the Democrats installed a Democratic elections-administrator for life. Yet, none of this made it into the Sun's story about ''playing politics" with the elections board. Which raises this question: at what point do reporting omissions create an untruth?"
The answer to our problems is to have the United Nations, former President Jimmy Carter - and perhaps representatives from Zambia, Serbia or Thailand - be official observers for the upcoming Maryland general election.
[…]
The Linda Lamone story will no doubt be continued.
Meanwhile, increasingly, Marylanders get their cutting edge and breaking news from the blogosphere. When a journalist picks up a story, most responsible journalists are quick to link and credit the mainstream media covering the story.
We only ask that the courtesy be reciprocated. Is that too much to ask?
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