Tuesday, July 16, 2019

More News and Tribune gimcrackery: 336 words about the importance of voters listening, two of which are not "Mark Seabrook."


The Jeffersonville newspaper's editor wants you to know that governor (and now candidate) Eric Holcomb is coming to town.

Column: Listen up, voters, by Susan Duncan (Tom May's Evangelism Primer 101)

He’ll fit right in at the Clark County Fair this evening, crunching the grass with his trademark boots as he shakes another hand. Those are his constituents, after all, and would-be voters he’s courting.

He is Indiana’s top elected official, Gov. Eric Holcomb, who is seeking re-election in 2020. The public announcement of his intention was made Saturday, as his words echoed off the walls of the hallowed Knightstown gym, where parts of the famed-film "Hoosiers" was shot.

Duncan also wants you to know that Holcomb has lots of money.

Holcomb has more than $6 million in his political war chest, more than any previous governor at this point in his re-election bid, according to the Holcomb for Indiana campaign.

Duncan dismisses as unnewsworthy NA Confidential's surveys of Jeff Gahan's campaign larder -- but I digress.

At this point, Holcomb appears likely to win a second term as governor, but the campaign season is a long one. Now’s the time to listen closely to what the candidates have to say — not about their opponents, but about the future of Indiana.

It's a perfectly valid sentiment, and because Duncan has informed otherwise absentminded readers that Indiana's governor is named Eric Holcomb, we know exactly where to look and to whom we should be listening.

Then it gets weird.

Tonight, Holcomb’s bringing his message first to the fair and then to the Calumet Club in New Albany, where he’ll be talking with Republicans and stumping for the GOP mayoral candidate. Republican or Democrat, we all should listen to what the governor has to say, and to his opponent. Only then can we make informed voting decisions.

Gahan's name appears on a daily basis in Duncan's newspaper, and as we've noted oft times before, many of these mentions come from various advertisements bearing Gahan's image; they're all campaign ads at root, though most are paid for by taxpayers.

But Duncan cannot bring herself to identify the "GOP mayoral candidate," who is Mark Seabrook. That's a de facto cheap shot, isn't it? The sentence might have made informative, reading: "GOP mayoral candidate Mark Seabrook, who is challenging incumbent mayor Jeff Gahan."

Recall also that neither the News and Tribune nor the City of New Albany will divulge how much money travels in the newspaper's direction for Gahan's myriad, thinly-veiled campaign ads.

Note to candidate Seabrook: It may be time for the ol' fruit basket envelope so as to preclude the potential unpleasantness of an ink-stained kvetch.

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