SBJ seeks political pundits, informed debate

Clarissa French is editor of Springfield Business Journal.

At the beginning of 2004, I decided that this presidential election year would be a good time for SBJ to jump into election coverage.

My goal was simple: to provide our readers with the information they need on the issues that will affect business on the local, state and national levels, and to provide a forum for political discussion and debate through our Opinion pages.

On the local level, I don't anticipate any problems. The local candidates are accessible and accountable. We will interview them about the issues that affect business, and we will bring their responses to you.

The problem is statewide and national politics.

You'll notice we haven't run much on state or national politics so far. There are two reasons for that.

First, I've been receiving press releases from the Missouri Republican and Democrat parties for months. You haven't seen anything from them in this paper because I'm still waiting for them to say anything of substance.

I have a huge stack of worthless, mealy-mouthed, opponent-baiting crap from both sides. This "information" will appear in SBJ pages on the same day Satan builds a snowman in Hades.

Second, I also have press releases from individual candidates that I have likewise not run because they A) contain information that is purely self-serving; B) contain information I know to be wrong or incomplete; or C) contain no information of any value whatsoever.

In other words, those darn politicians are acting like politicians, and if we wait for them to change their ways, the elections will come and go and we'll still have published nothing.

We have now reached the time when we must weigh in and begin presenting you with the candidates and issues on a regular basis to prepare for the elections in June, August and November.

That means I need your help now.

You make this community and economy tick. I need you to tell me what is important to you and your business; what issues will influence your decisions in the upcoming races. Off the top of my head, I peg health care affordability, taxation and education as key topics, but I know there's more to it.

I need to hear from you.

Also, I know members of the business community have strong feelings about candidates and issues, and I invite them to express those opinions in the SBJ forum. I will happily make Opinion page space available for intelligent discussion and debate of issues and candidates.

Note the word "intelligent."

Considered opinions are welcome, but irresponsible rants are not. There's already a forum for those; it's called talk radio.

We don't mind people writing about what the other guy is doing wrong, as long as they also write, specifically, about how their candidate or party is going to fix it.

Note the word "specifically."

And while we welcome informed debate, we don't welcome the already tired clichs of this campaign year, such as accusing the opposition of "playing politics."

What else would politicians be playing, baseball?

SBJ isn't going to tell anybody how to vote. That, you may be surprised to hear, is not the media's job. We are going to present the facts, and we are going to provide a forum to discuss the issues from both sides without taking sides.

It's an experiment. The outcome of this experiment, like the upcoming elections, is up to you.