Fact-checking Carla Babb, Part II

But one of the (many) problems with the student's report is that it never attempts to answer the legitimate question you ask: why the campaign rented space in Southern Village instead of someplace that might be more convenient for visitors (like downtown Raleigh) or more emblematic (like downtown Mayberry).

If the reporter had asked that question, viewers could at least consider Edwards' reasons for placing his headquarters in Southern Village and could evaluate his reasons against the critic's arguments. Instead, the story is framed around the criticism, and the only comments from the campaign come from a young volunteer - who doesn't address the question you raised.

That's one of the reasons the story seems unbalanced, even though the reporter (and her professors) can nominally claim to have interviewed two people with contrasting views.

You know, journalists are not obliged to stick to one original focus of a news story or interview if some other aspect of the story begins to take on greater interest for some reason. And the fact is that the selection of Southern Village for a North Carolina state headquarters for the Edwards presidential campaign is an interesting and curious choice and a natural subject of inquiry by good journalists.

It's quite a wonderful community, but let's face it: for national or state press folks visitng or stationed in Raleigh, Durham or Chapel Hill, Southern Village is not simple or easy to reach in terms of time required. So somebody needed to raise that question about the campaign, and Carla Babb did so for the benefit of Edwards supporters and opponents alike who might wish to know why the campaign did not take out space in one of the main business districts of downtown Chapel Hill, Durham or Raleigh. Or at least in the next block past Goober's Garage or Floyd's Barber Shop in Mayberry.

But the clue to all of this could be in the location of the Giuliani campaign in New York: maybe, when it comes to selected a well-situated headquarters for a major presidential campaign, north or south, it--er, "it takes a village..."

Q. How many journalists does it take to realize that Carla Babb's "Carolina Week" piece is awful?
A. None. They just wait for readers to do it for them...?

Come on. The piece is full of unsubstantiated generalizations from her and her sources, declares "it's up to the voters to decide" as though the election will be a referendum on Southern Village campaign headquarters, and relies on two "experts" who don't know what they're talking about and aren't representative of anyone before concluding "Opinions are split". As journalists, this just has to make you cringe...