Great Interview

TO: barbara.west@wftv.com

I just watched your interview with Vice Presidential candidate Joe Biden.

You were obviously asking questions straight out of John McCain's talking points.
It is esp. important for Local TV News in this changing world of journalism to be non-partisan and hold the publics trust. People now have
a great choice of where to go for news. It is impossible for your station to compete if people decide you are not fair and trustworthy.
Studies show this is true even for most of the people that agree with you!
How does it serve your customers and advertisers to fling outrageous "when did you stop hitting your wife" type questions at Joe Biden or any other public servant? All the info on ACORN even an intern can lookup at factcheck.org (it is complete non-issue and meant to distract people from real issues) and the tax policy OBAMA supports is essentially the same one MCCAIN supported in 2001 and 2003.
Since when is progressive tax Marxist? Have not the people of your community seen real wages go down? Have not you noticed that the
top dogs in corporate America's boardrooms have been voting each other larger and larger salaries and other compensation?

When OBAMA campaign accepted your invitation to interview I am sure they expected professional behavior on the behalf of your station.
You probably know of the great difference in number and range of interviews between BIDEN and PALIN. You should feel thankful for the
chance to have an interview and used this opportunity for yourself and your community to ask original questions with local spin. Certainly in
this age of great challenges in the economy, global warming (that affects FL directly), international stress in almost every continent (Russia, Iran, N. Korea, China emerging, Africa and S. America). plus 2 wars.
Your chance to make news yourself!! You blew it on ACORN?

You could have asked a general question about voter registration and suppression in light of the 2000 FL election problems.
ACORN has been around since 1970 and is not an evil organization out to fraud America with Micky Mouse voters. They
are trying to "get out the vote" for class of Americans that are under represented at the polls. This organization and mission has been
praised by non other than John McCain. They pay people by the hour and do not pay people to commit voter registration fraud.
IN FACT THEY HELP IDENTIFY AND CONVICT PEOPLE THAT DO.
A small number of the people for whatever reason summit these phony registrants. This has nothing to do with voter fraud but is
easily confused with voter fraud (See Sean Hannitty).
Obama's links to ACORN are old (nothing this year) and honorable.

This whole story is targeted at uneducated people trying to confuse them about OBAMA - you have a "Master Degree" (in what?) so
how did you get fooled into going down this path?

Meanwhile, a real issue this year and esp. in FLORIDA will be voter suppression. Many thousands of people , Republicans and Democrats,
will be denied chance to vote for various reasons - some innocent and some not. These are actual VOTERS. Not funny names
filled in on registration forms just to make it look like Joe the Acorn was "working" when they were actually goofing off.

You could do your customers and fellow citizens a favor and make sure the real news focus on this real problem.



I hope this helps give some perspective.

Gene McPhail
Goto http://www.acorn.org/truth to PLEASE HELP ACORN STOP THE ATTACKS