Comments on: What Happened Under Doug Bruce’s Golden Dome Yesterday?

By: Richard Valenty

Richard Valenty — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 21:57:06 +0000

Nuanced? Thanks Cara, I re-read the story as suggested, but I'd really like to see how you could claim with a straight face that the following quotes were shots at Bruce and not at the media:
"And, the media just can't resist his nasty quips and jabs"; "that mob of TV and print reporters who proceeded to chase him around the building," "whether TV heads and the Capitol press corps will play along" with ignoring Bruce; or that the state officials would surely "far prefer the media to focus on issues of substance."

Each quoted statement, as you will notice, is made up of "media" or "TV/print" followed by an action by the media. And oddly enough, your story included no mention of online news sources or bloggers writing plenty of stuff about Bruce's comments or actions -- apparently it was only the news sources that send their digital data to printing presses as well as to the Internet?

So, feel free to suggest after I called you out that I missed your nuanced "point," but I still think your post was full enough of unfair slams on the media to warrant comment. Also, I remain quite certain that at least the print media has covered plenty of issues of substance this session that weren't Bruce-dominated, even though I might agree with some of the posters on this thread who want more or better non-Bruce hard news from the mainstream.

And Wendy, surely you noticed that part of my challenge to Confidential was to get you to also quantify how many stories had been written about non-Bruce issues to establish some sort of ratio? Sure, there have been hundreds of mainstream Bruce stories, but from how many sources? How many basic duplications?

By: Wldflower

Wldflower — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 20:06:33 +0000

Dougie at the Dome Actually, it probably works the other way, When I see a Bruce story, I am interested and I read the article and take in the other info re protecting tenants from landlords

consumer rights, health issues...

Without Dougie's lead-in I might think ho hum, legislators, and not read the story. So his name helps get people interested in the legislative process of government.

This is unlike the Britany stories, where there is no additional info about anything but Britany.

By: Wendy Norris

Wendy Norris — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 19:24:43 +0000

for comparison's sake I searched Google News from the date range July 11, 2006 (our launch date) through today:

There were 370 stories written about Mr. Bruce in the traditional press.

Just sayin'.

By: Cara DeGette

Cara DeGette — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 19:12:11 +0000

Column inches Richard,

Yes, we have broken many stories about Rep. Bruce, stories that I am proud we have been the first to report.

In no way do I suggest that the media should completely ignore him. He is a public official. Perhaps the story posted above was a bit nuanced, and I encourage you to read it again. Hopefully you will better understand the point that I was trying to make -- that his disruptiveness hinders coverage of issues of substance. And, that some people long ago predicted exactly this scenario should he ever wind up in the Legislature.

By: Richard Valenty

Richard Valenty — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 15:27:11 +0000

Pine beetles are better, but… Thank goodness, indeed! I spent 90 seconds on your archives and found 24 stories about Douglas Bruce without trying very hard.

By: Cara DeGette

Cara DeGette — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 14:57:23 +0000

Thanks Richard We've got a great story about controversial injections to kill off mountain pine bark beetles up at the top of the page now. Thank goodness.

By: Truthteller

Truthteller — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 14:23:50 +0000

With all due respect, I think that there…. ….was a pretty strong allusion that the media were all doing the same thing, and for the same bad reason, hence the question about “plot.” I don't think I'm off base of what he was suggesting.

By: Richard Valenty

Richard Valenty — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 14:23:11 +0000

Do as we say, not as we do Hi Cara, it's about 12:30 Wednesday and I'm just hoping that you and your readers will notice one thing. This post chided "the media" for focusing on Mr. Bruce at the expense of hard news, and what's at the top of the page on Colorado Confidential?
Yep, a picture of Douglas Bruce and a story mostly about him! Sure, there are a few other Legislative items bullet-pointed, but no substantial explanation on any of them.

The more I read Colorado Confidential, the more I wish you would drop media criticism from your agenda and use that energy towards simply being media, which you do fairly well at times. Leslie's recent story on Club 20 and the I-70 piece yesterday were both pretty strong in my opinion, for example.

So, here's a challenge. Go back through the Post and the Rocky's coverage on the Legislature since, say, the start of the 2008 session. Count the stories they've published on legislative affairs, and how many of them have primarily been about Douglas Bruce. Perhaps you could do the same thing with Colorado Confidential.

I don't have time to do this (you probably don't either), and I'm sure the Bruce count would be out of proportion to what really goes on under the dome, but I'd love to see you quantify what the media is really doing as opposed to what you just did here.

As for me, I'm working right now on a piece about a proposal to merge the state departments of Higher Education and (P-12) Education, and I probably won't be quoting Douglas Bruce. Cheers, Richard Valenty from the Colorado Daily newspaper

By: Wildflower

Wildflower — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 13:28:13 +0000

Diversion But I for one enjoy a good Dougie diversion in a vast sea of Brittany.

By: Wildflower

Wildflower — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 12:34:48 +0000

re trivial news diversions Very astute analysis. The "news" is all a diversion, it started with the advent of the ill-advised Iraq war I believe, that's why there is little information on the war, it's buried on the back pages if it's there at all. War info re the tally of dead and wounded soldiers, etc. used to be online but now even that is gone. It is assumed that we are so enrapt with Brittany etal that we will be too stupid to notice.

So different than the Vietnam War, where it made the front page when one of our own was killed. People were aware of the consequences and realized it was going nowhere and rebelled.

Yes, "news" today is a diversion.