Thursday, December 7, 2006

Pictures vs. People

NY Post reporter and overall grand poobah of City Hall reporting David Seifman and I took the same objection to moderator Peter Vallone, Sr.'s assertion that the media destroys candidates, sometimes, just by printing an unflattering picture.

PVSR held up the picture of Howard Dean's scream on the cover of the Post, and a series of NY Times photos of Al Gore, Muskie, GW Bush and others.

The thing about those photos (image later if PVSR shares them with me) is that the pictures captured aspects about the candidates that we as reporters either knew about, reported on, or were just so widely known by the public.

Pictures are worth a thousands words, and arguably, a few candidates.

-- Azi Paybarah

Dominic Carter's Dual Role

"I had to do his job because he didn't stand up as a candidate."

That's what NY1 News host Dominic Carter said about hosting the comptroller's debate with the embattled Alan Hevesi and under-whelming Chris Callaghan.

It kind of speaks to dual role of the media, as news reporter and candidate when one party (which one this year?) doesn't really field an alternative.

-- Azi Paybarah

Update: I just got chewed out by a lady for not noting Dominic's other point, which was that he found it hard to interview Hevesi because they were friends. Friends!? (Wish I had some.) But she's right and I'm sort of glad she doesn't have a blog. But the point that Dominic was hesitant to press the questions was pretty honest.

By the way, this audience gets this blogging stuff pretty quickly. Great.