I've noticed that a remarkable number of newspaper articles on state politics quote political scientist Todd Donovan of Western Washington University. Yesterday's article on the legislature by the AP's David Ammons quotes Donovan yet again: "GOP looks to new leaders for help in '06 session"
"If your goal is more seats, and not necessarily what's best for the state, you may want to be a united, critical voice of opposition, offering your program in the clearest possible fashion -- the Gingrich model," [Donovan] says.There's more than a hint of bias in the suggestion that being a critical voice of opposition to the Democrats is not good for the state. While Donovan is presented as a presumably disinterested scholar of state politics, there's a not-so-subtle liberal Democratic bias to many of his quotes. This should not be a surprise to anybody who looks up Donovan's campaign contributions, which are exclusively to Democrats, environmental PACs and left-of-center candidates in "non-partisan" races.
News reporters who quote Donovan would do well to qualify his commentary by mentionioning his liberal Democrat leanings, and also to quote a more diverse array of scholarly experts on state politics, such as conservative Profs. Anthony Gill of the UW and Matthew Mannweller of CWU.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at December 27, 2005 10:10 AM | Email This