<i>The Oregonian</i> and Smith's "furniture" attack ad

Chris Lowe

A recent BlueOregon "In the News" item gives props to The Oregonian's editorial writers for treating Gordon Smith's current misleading attack ad against Jeff Merkley, about spending by the legislature on upgrades to the State Capitol building, with the sarcasm it deserves. "In the News" says briefly that "Meanwhile, on the news side of the House, the Oregonian's Harry Esteve breaks down the anatomy of a campaign hit.. However, Esteve doesn't deserve such credit. While Esteve provides a story about the conception, gestation and birth of the ad, he does not address its anatomy, which would have required actual analysis of the ad and its claims. What he does provide comes close to being a description of The Oregonian acting as little more than Smith's press agent, an impression borne out by the paper's other reporting on the story.

The Oregonian's coverage began on Saturday, August 2 with a story by Janie Har, headlined "At $34 million, is the Oregon Capitol renovation extravagant or long overdue?". Like the headline, and like the beginning of Smith's ad, the first line of the story focuses on "the $34 million renovation" of the Capitol building. The next eight paragraphs focus on the new legislators' office furniture included in the project, leaving the strong impression, like Smith's ad, that the furniture is the main feature of the renovation and its costs. This first story nowhere in its main text reports on the actual cost of the furniture. (The online version has a link to a "factbox" that has no content. It may be that the print version did have such a box with the missing information). Overall, the headline mistates the focus of the story, which does not address or give information to answer the question it poses.

Since reporters don't write headlines, that's not Janie Har's fault. But editors approve headlines, and The Oregonian's editor approved one that made the reported controversy look much bigger than it is, to the benefit of one senatorial candidate, based on machinations by his staff, and enabling a misleading attack ad. The paper ought to be ashamed.

So how much was the furniture? According to Esteve's first story on the ad, published August 4, "New Smith ad hits Merkley for furniture upgrade", that cost is $2.1 million. The East Oregonian reports that "the project includes the purchase of $15,499 worth of new office furniture for each of the 30 senators, and $13,047 in new furniture for each of the 60 House members." That adds up to just under $1.25 million. Smith's ad also mentions $800,000 for carpeting. Esteve's $2.1 million presumably includes the carpeting, plus wiggle room for televisions and doorknobs mentioned in Har's story and the ad.

Well then, what's the remaining $32 million for? Esteve's "Anatomy" article mentions "Oregon lawmakers" speaking of "what they say is a desperately needed safety upgrade of the two state Capitol wings where House and Senate members have their offices" (my emphasis). And paragraph 10 of Har's 21 paragraph story says:

Legislators approved the $34 million upgrade last year, saying they couldn't wait any longer to fix outdated fire sprinklers and corroded pipes that made the water undrinkable in the 30-year-old wings. All 90 legislators -- save Merkley, whose office is not in a wing -- moved out of their offices last summer.

But that's really all we know from The Oregonian. Nineteen of Har's 21 paragraphs concern office furnishings. Har does report that the furniture expenditures were approved by a bipartisan committee and quotes prominent Republicans backing them, and cites Senate President Peter Courtney as saying the repairs have been needed for a decade, but that legislators had been afraid to take the heat for spending money on themselves. N.B. that this delay took place with Republicans controlling one or both houses, so any additional costs due to the delay have to be attributed to both parties.

Esteve's reporting is interesting, bad, and odd. His first story says nothing at all about the purpose of the $32 million beyond the $2.1 million for office furnishings. His "Anatomy of a Campaign Ad" likewise gives no actual facts, just reports X said, Y said, in a way that implies that the unnamed state legislators might be lying or exaggerating the safety upgrade needs.

How much money was for safety upgrades, of what sort? Esteve's story doesn't say. Were they necessary? Esteve's story doesn't offer information for an evaluation. Was spending on safety or structural upgrades or repairs extravagant? Esteve doesn't address the question. In the context of accusations of extravagance over the furniture, he leaves the implication that it might be.

Then Esteve quotes Jeff Merkley as saying he personally got no new furniture, but does not confirm that this is accurate, although Har's story says it is. Again, no facts, just "Merkley says."

Esteve further goes on to report how The Oregonian took the bait of machinations by the Smith campaign to get the story in the press, and decided it was a newsworthy story. But he never says what the paper actually reported on it. Possibly this reflected appropriate embarrassment.

Was Smith's ad accurate in its characterization of the story? Esteve doesn't say. Did the story address how much money went to safety upgrade, how much to furniture? Again, Esteve doesn't say. This last may be not be simple bad reporting, and more in the nature of poor reporting to obscure previous bad reporting by the O, which did not originally make clear that furnishings amount to less than 7% of the total cost of the Capitol renovations (unless it was in a separate box).

Esteve does quote the attack ad as saying "The Oregonian reports Jeff Merkley spending over $2 million on new furniture." Then Esteve lets that stand unquestioned.

Yet the body of The Oregonian's original story doesn't report that figure, though it may have been in a separate box. Janie Har's piece certainly doesn't say that "Jeff Merkley spen[t]" it. On the contrary, Har reports that his office was not affected, and that the vote to appropriate the money was bipartisan. Harry Esteve does not question the mischaracterization of the O's reporting, however.

The Smith attack ad leads and focuses prominently on the the figure $34 million, which is the total cost of the Capitol building upgrades, but otherwise is entirely about $2.1 million in furnishings, a figure it misrepresents. The ad uses a photo-shopped picture suggesting that The Oregonian did a major front page exposé of the Capitol improvement project, rather than a 21 paragraph story generated by the Smith campaign itself. It never mentions safety or structural upgrades and repairs at all.

The ad states the total cost of the furniture as if "more than $2 million" had been Jeff Merkley's personal expenditure. It leaves open the interpretation that the entire $34 million was for furniture, of which over $2 million benefited Merkley. It makes no mention of Republican legislators' support and defense of the spending.

Both Har's story and Esteve's reflect poor, incomplete reporting, unless Har and Esteve are the victims of hack editing.

Har does deserve credit for documenting the bipartisan nature of backing for the overall spending and the furniture spending specifically, as well as the fact that Jeff Merkley's own office isn't involved. She just utterly failed to present the whole context of the renovations. Unless her editor cut it out. Esteve deserves credit for revealing, if circuitously, how the Smith campaign manipulated The Oregonian.

At the end of the day, though, whether by commission or omission, the O's editors permitted Smith's p.r. team to define the story, failed to provide important context relevant to understanding the scale of the whole renovation and the office refurbishment within it, and published a headline implying a much larger scale of possible "extravagance" than the actual story supports or even suggests. They thereby enabled Smith's attack ad.

Regarding the misuse of its insufficient stories, The Oregonian is not responsible for the misrepresentations that Gordon Smith approved. But Harry Esteve deserves no credit for failing to point out the obvious abuse of his own newspaper's reporting. Unless he did, and his editor cut it out.

By Chris Lowe Aug. 09, 2008