Isn't there an election this year?

I could have sworn there was......but in the month since I decided to keep track of the Whig's coverage of the Zinga-Hare race, there have been no stories to keep track of. None.

What's going on?

Well, a weakness in campaign coverage that not just the Whig, but most local (and many national) media experience.....letting campaign events dictate coverage. So, if neither Zinga nor Hare come to Quincy, the campaign doesn't get any coverage. But that's not how campaigns should be covered! The press shouldn't let the candidates drive the agenda....they should identify the public's agenda, and let that drive their coverage.

On a related note on the subject of provinciality.......

The Whig lays claim to being a regional newspaper......hence the Deborah Gertz Husar and Ann Pierceall stories from far-flung points about interesting news of home canning and thumbtack collections. But when you get right down to it, in the pages of the Herald-Whig, Quincy is what counts, and the Quincy point of view is what matters. Witness the coverage of the scheme to generate power from the lock and dam stations. Nowhere in the H-W's coverage was there any consideration of how the cities of Canton and Hannibal might react to Quincy claiming the right to generate power from dams that are much, much closer to them than to Quincy......in Canton's case, right at the city itself. Wouldn't a regional newspaper have contacted Hannibal or Canton officials for some comment?