TX-10: LJD, KUT, and NAIS

by: MeanRachel

Fri Feb 15, 2008 at 01:38 AM CST

Mark Duncan's attack today on Larry Joe Doherty is a great example. Instead of a responsible examination of the facts, the use of evidence, and a fair presentation of two opposing sides, a bunch of unfounded and unsupported claims are put forward as truth. While it may be fun to try take a whack at someone you don't like, it does readers no good to not practice a little due diligence before attacking someone.  

As an avid Larry Joe Doherty supporter & volunteer, I feel compelled to try to set the record straight.  Let's take a look at facts, and then go from there:

This whole squabble traces back to a simple little online bio of LJD over at KUT. In the middle of it was a claim that LJD supports an NAIS system, and that Dan Grant opposes it. At the time, there was no source to back this up. However, McBlogger picked up on this and ran with it.

Larry Joe's campaign contacted KUT, and asked them to back up on that, since he's against NAIS and there aren't any credible sources proving otherwise. So KUT corrected the bio and issued a retraction:

A spokesman for Mr. Doherty said the candidate is not in favor of the National Animal Identification System. An earlier version of his biography posted on this site reported that he supported the program. KUT regrets the error.

Brenham resident and ex-TV personality Larry Joe Doherty this week told KUT-FM radio that he agrees with Republican incumbent Mike McCaul that the federal government should be allowed to impose a controversial new animal identification system on Central Texas farmers and ranchers.

Talk about running with the ball. Where did he get that from? No wonder Larry Joe's campaign quickly issued a scathing statement:

"This is a fight against Michael McCaul and the failed policies of George Bush," stated Doherty. "That my primary opponent would attempt to claim that I've expressed any type of agreement with Michael McCaul about a program I oppose shows a total lack of seriousness when it comes to representing people."

Well that seemed simple: KUT got something wrong, they corrected it. Dan Grant took the original KUT piece and turned it into something it wasn't, attributed statements to Larry Joe that he never made, doing so with no good evidence to back himself up. Libelous if you ask me, but I'm no lawyer.  

Once KUT corrected their error, Dan Grant had to edit his press release to link to a blog post as his source instead of KUT. That's the equivalent of citing the White House but linking to a Wikipedia article about the West Wing TV show.  This is a Congressional race, right?

But here's where things get weird. In an transparent effort to further slander the LJD campaign, Capitol Annex started trying to fit the square peg into a round hole:

KUT got the statement off Doherty's website, although it is no longer there, either. Sources from KUT have confirmed to Capitol Annex that the station found the material about his support of NAIS on Doherty's website, but that his campaign called and requested they pull it. The station complied.

Does that make any sense? Why would KUT pull something they themselves call an error, all the while complaining to Vince that it was true all along? I give the KUT editors a little more credit, even if Vince doesn't. Wouldn't Dan Grant or McBlogger or somebody have been pointing this out long ago if it had supposedly been on Larry Joe's website, instead of waiting for KUT to put it up? Common sense says it's that something went wrong on KUT's end, it was corrected, and life goes on. If you Google this, you'll find bloggers obsessing about Larry Joe and NAIS, but no substance behind any of it. If there was anything to it, they would have been attacking Larry Joe long before yesterday. Instead, KUT is was the only source for this, and they ended up retracting it because it's not true. Dan Grant assumed it was based on an interview between Larry Joe and KUT. A candidate fit for office would have gotten his facts straight before launching an untrue attack on another Democrat (maybe he needs a bracelet that says "WWBOD?" - What would Barack Obama do?).

Is it any wonder Vince's big piece of "evidence" is an online comment left at the Statesman last year. You can cite an online comment made by one random person, who offers no source backing up his comment, as a source? There are so many unsources here, my head is spinning.  Maybe there's no better evidence because . . . there never was any.

KUT messed up. They fixed it. Dan Grant smelled an opportunity, but didn't get his ducks in a row before going negative on Larry Joe. It blew up in his face, and now his campaign is looking like amateur hour.

I'm disappointed in the Dan Grant campaign for continuing to promote libelous statements on his website about Larry Joe.  It's also shameful that a couple of bloggers then use nasty attacks to try and perpetuate a smear and a lie, and the best "evidence" they can give is an unattributable online comment. That's bad for bloggers' credibility, and it doesn't do our audience any good. It's immature and it's amateurish and frankly, it's just wrong.

Bloggers, don't abuse your sway.  I suspect that the general readership here has already made up their minds one way or another as to whom they will support in the TX-10 race on March 4th.  However, bloggers still have the opportunity to reach undecided and swing voters and those voters deserve respect.  Readers want something productive and concrete, not something unfounded and incorrect.  Bloggers:  respect the readers and the candidates enough to perpetuate truth -- not lies.