we watched the kalb sheriff candidate debate/forum tonight and we gotta say we had been warming up to maj. mike slocum, because...well...he came off as a bigger prick than we are and in our book thats a definite plus.
then we sat down to watch the 10pm newscast and kalb ran the video (see link) interview with kalb station manager les golman to explain why news director michele godard was absent from the forum.
according to mr. golman last wednesday someone from the slocum campaign who he identified as david roach came by the station.
les golman says that mr. roach "presented himself as the advertising consultant for mike slocum. that meeting basically went similar to this - he did not want you (michele godard) as an individual to be involved in the upcoming debate. as a matter of fact [mr. roach] said his candidate [mike slocum] would not show up unless you declared the fact that that you were a supporter of his opponent. they were threats made by mr. roach in fact he would turn us over to the fcc commission. the decision to pull you off of the debate, tonight, was based on the fact that i felt like that our responsibility is to let the people know whats going on. they can make their decision. anytime anybody is put under the stress that would keep them from voting, you know, i think that point is bigger than the sheriff, the sheriff's department, mr. roach and certainly kalb television, so, therein is why, you were pulled off, not because of threats by mr. roach."
the problem with this is that neither ms. godard or mr. golman ever say whether or not ms. godard is a supporter of maj. slocum's opponent. that would seem like a very important and obvious question to answer;
one that should be answered. especially, since kalb are the ones making it an issue by airing this in what they style as "KALB Responds To Biased Reporting Accusations." so the fact that mr. golman or ms. godard and especially ms. godard didnt explicity deny it leads us to believe that the slocum campaign accusation is true.
what makes us uneasy about maj. slocum in all this (besides his enabling kalb to make him look childish and petty) is that he's been a police officer for twenty something years and yet is afraid of or cant outwit ms. godard at her own game. how in the world can we expect maj. slocum to outwit or show his deputy's how to finesse professional and in a lot of cases lifelong criminals who's stock in trade is deception?
ho hum back to the drawing board.
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