Print Media Outperform Broadcast Media

Given that I can't even spell umbrage this morning, I probably have no business calling real journalists to task. I am also loathe to give the sometimes-smut-peddling Sioux Falls newspaper (which I shall quixotically continue not to name even as I grudgingly cite it) props for good journalism. But I offer one comparison that shows the print media still beat the broadcasters:

On KELO last night, Don Jorgensen reported that Congress is giving the State Fair $250,000 to "make improvements to the Beef Complex and the Hippodrome" [Don Jorgensen, "State Fair Gets Federal Money," KELOLand.Com, 2007.07.14]. That money will be in addition to the $750,000 approved by the state legislature to keep the big show afloat this year.

Naturally, I got to wondering which of our Congressional delegation managed to slip the words "Beef Complex" and "Hippodrome" into federal legislation. KELO gave no indication of who was responsible for this high-priority legislation or even in which bill we could find this pork -- er, important infrastructure investment.

Peter Harriman ["Senate Bill Would Give $239M to S.D. Projects," that objectionable Sioux Falls paper that runs smutty advertisements, 2007.06.14] clarifies things this morning. First of all, the federal grant is not a done deal. The money for the State Fair is part of $2.2 million for community development projects that is part of a $239 million Senate Transportation, Housing, and Urban Development bill that cleared the Senate Appropriations Committee Thursday and now faces a vote before the full Senate. Senators Johnson and Thune praise the money (even Republicans like federal spending when it comes to their voters). The article says that both Johnson and Thune requested $800,000 for the Children's Home Society, but it does not clarify which of our men in Washington actually wangled the quarter million for Huron.

Still, the Harriman article does a much better job than the Jorgensen report of telling us which legislation might make this money possible. Harriman also gets the facts straight, making clear the money is still working its way through Congress (so don't go splurging on spackle and screws just yet, Susan Hayward!). Jorgenson's report drifts along toward the content promised by its headline and lacks specifics.

All media are prone to style over substance -- we're all shouting for readers' attention. But TV news is perhaps most subject to it, since it can literally shout in our living rooms to draw our attention away from the newspaper or the boiling pasta on the stove. In this case, we see the print media doing its job, giving us much fuller answers than TV will to the good old Who, What, Where, When, and Why.