Web of Iniquity

A valuable lesson to be taken home from your LakeCountyEye's political-hack handbook: don't bother putting up a website for your candidate. No voter ever looks at them; websites are more trouble than they are worth. For operatives who must produce a website, then don't show anything more than your candidate's name, photo and a clicky widget thingy for taking donations. The only people looking at your website are your opponents. The only time the press looks at your website is when your opponents contact them to complain about something on your website.

Case in point: Dan Seals, the 10th Congressional District Democratic candidate. Seals has a website packed with items, including endorsements. The website claimed a Daily Herald endorsement for Seals, but it wasn't obvious that the endorsement came for the February primary.

Republican operatives seized on this, naturally, and wanted action from Herald. Now these sort of boo-boos occur on every website -- webpages tend to get posted and then forgotten. Seals's Republican opponent, Robert Dold claimed a similar Chicago Tribune endorsement on his webite -- and it wasn't obvious that the endorsement came for the February primary.

Still, it looks like the Herald printed the story pretty much as it was handed to them by the Republican Operatives ...

Dan Seals was misleading voters by including a portion of a Daily Herald endorsement as part of a rotating gallery of information on his campaign home page, according to a blogger who follows the action in the 10th. The endorsement came during the Democratic primary, as Seals dueled two other candidates.
Endorsement claim raises issue in 10th District

Predictably EllenOfTheTenth cried foul ...

For some reason the Daily Herald is receptive to bogus attacks peddled by Republican activists and operatives.
Daily Herald hatchets Seals; Illinois Reason shows the hypocrisy

And IllinoisReason cried foul ...

Larry Falbe, conservative blogger at Team America and perennial Democrat-hater, apparently convinced the Daily Herald to publish an article criticizing Dan Seals for still having the old Herald primary endorsement on his campaign homepage.
IL-10: Daily Herald carries water for Bob Dold

And the CapitolFaxBlog couldn't resist getting in on the fun ...

Props to Larry [Falbe] for pushing that story into the mainstream, but the Daily Herald reporter and Larry should've both looked at Republican Bob Dold's website before they launched into their attack on Dan Seals.
Dear Daily Herald: How hard would it be to click over to Dold’s site, too?

Your LakeCountyEye however is puzzled by this last statement. Falbe isn't a reporter. Any political-hack is under no obligation to report both sides of a story. With regard to the Herald reporter, the CapitolFaxBlog ought to know that print-media reporting in a local/small market is nowadays probably an occupation half a rung above Internet blogging. Where the typical Internet blogger at this moment is watching the Cartoon Network and eating peanut butter ice cream from the carton.

So, does anyone really expect a Daily Herald reporter to do anything more than write up a story pretty much as it was dictated over the phone?