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Editorials/Columns
Virginia’s State Board of Elections wants to move back the filing deadline for electronic campaign-finance reports from 5 p.m. to midnight. The change reportedly was prompted by complaints from a lawmaker whose submission came in 14 minutes too late. Those of us in the newspaper business know a little something about deadlines. One of the things we know is that they are inconvenient no matter when they’re set. Something often comes up at the last minute, whenever that last minute falls. As one skeptic of the change notes, moving the deadline reverses a long-term trend toward greater immediacy. Another points out that the change was made with no public input — which doesn’t jibe well with the board’s public purpose.
Times-Dispatch
In days of yore, journalists lived and died by The Deadline. Old-fashioned deadlines still exist for newspapers' print editions, but in a digital world, every second is a deadline, as reporters rush to post the latest breaking news online before the competition. Politicians have deadlines, too, for filing reports detailing the money they've collected for election campaigns. Rather than trying to beat the competition, candidates would prefer to wait until the last minute in hopes of finding how much their opponent has stuffed in his back pocket before disclosing their own war chest. Under existing rules, their deadline is 5 p.m. on each of the reporting dates scattered throughout an election year. But the State Board of Elections has voted to change the timing, giving candidates until 11:59 p.m. The seven-hour delay is not a threat to democracy, but even a minor change has meaning in the 21st century, when technology has allowed public information to be made accessible almost instantaneously.
Roanoke Times
Gov. Terry McAuliffe, on his first day in office, signed an executive order setting a strict $100 limit on gifts to most executive branch employees and called on Assembly members to enact similarly strict rules for themselves. They failed utterly, but you’d never know it from listening to them. House Bill 1211, sponsored by Del. Todd Gilbert, R-Woodstock, is labeled as ethics reform legislation. In reality, it’s little more than a large fig leaf for legislators. Yes, gifts to senators and delegates are capped at $250 per year — the first time there’s ever been a cap for state legislators, but when it comes to enforcement and loopholes, the bill is toothless. We urge Gov. McAuliffe to use his amendment powers and substantially toughen the bill. Cut the annual cap to $100, do away with the distinction between “tangible” and “intangible” gifts and give ethics council true enforcement and punishment powers.
News & Advance
Fact-checking has become big business. Not only do we have websites covering national politicians and issues, such as FactCheck.org, but we also have sites covering state and local. The largest of these is PolitiFact, a project of the Tampa Bay Times. It has expanded to 10 states, including Virginia. Some newspapers, such as The Washington Post, have set up in-house fact-checking operations. Why has fact-checking become so widespread? Perhaps it is because playing loose with facts has become the norm, an adherence to the Albert Einstein model: "If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts." I think we've come to expect that politicians and advocacy groups will, given the opportunity, change or simply ignore facts that don't support their position.
Vivian Paige, Virginian-Pilot |