Former Dakota Reporter on the Argus

See this from a reader, a former Dakota reporter living on the coast:

Years ago, I was a newspaper reporter in the Dakotas. I find it incomprehensible that the Argus Leader would not regard the cross-state touring of the Senate Majority Leader as a front page story. It is a failing in news judgement that must be explained.

OK, let's say, Frist's visit in and of itself was not newsworthy. But didn't his comments about Ellsworth's new role justify front page news coverage? Of course it did. In any other context, it would have.

As former journalist, I have been critical of your attacks against the Argus-Leader, trying often to explain how journalism works. But I have now come to the conclusion you share -- The Argus Leader is partisan. It does not report, or minimizes, stories that harm Tom Daschle.

David Kranz spent, oh, two hours, readying himself for the CNN interview on Saturday. Wouldn't his time have been spent better by reporting?

No. Because reporting is not really his concern.

Ouch. Word is getting around about the Argus problem. But hey, good for Dave Kranz being on CNN. I'm all for it. And I didn't really disagree with anything he said, with one major exception I'll explain later. But the problem this weekend was the editorial decision about where to place a major story like Frist's visit. But even worse, in my mind, is the Argus Leader's unwillingness to cover this MAJOR STORY, which I think, actually, is much more important than the Frist visit. There is absolutely no reason I can see why this is not a major story for the Argus. But that's an editorial decision and, as SDP has noted, there are some serious questions to be answered about how such decisions are made at the Argus. Finally, let me say that there are certainly some very fine reporters at the Argus. This very sad story about Lakota Rose Garden in today's Argus was well done and touching. And some Argus reporters who are on the receiving end of criticism say they are powerless to make decisions about what gets covered and where it is placed. That could very well be the case, as the SDP link above indicates. It's too bad the fine people at the Argus are tarred with the results of the editorial inadequacies of the Argus. And it's too bad the Argus itself has become an issue in this critically-important election. The editors and a few reporters are hurting the democratic process.