Focus 580; Challenges of Investigative Journalism

Good morning. Welcome to focus 580 This is our telephone talk program my name is David Ensor. Glad to have you with us as we begin another week in the first hour of the show today. We have as our guest Steve Luxenberg He is assistant managing editor of outlook at the Washington Post Outlook is a section of the paper that runs on Sundays and it's a collection of various kinds of pieces of opinion and commentary from various points of view before joining outlook he was the director of The Post's investigative special project staff. First as deputy assistant managing editor and later as assistant managing editor he supervised a staff of six reporters that worked on different kinds of stories local national international financial subjects. He has been a reporter for awhile before going to work at the post. He worked at The Baltimore Sun for 11 years he was a police and suburban reporter then an investigative reporter and later city editor and metropolitan editor. And during the time that he was investigative special project staff head of that staff he and his department

won a number of major awards there including Leon Desh who is on the faculty of the US by now along with photographer Lucian PERKINS They want a Pulitzer Prize for explanatory journalism and 95 for a series they did on one family's life in poverty. Yes Steve Luxenberg is here visiting the campus some time talking with journalism students and was good enough to come over and spend some time with us. Well talk a little bit about investigative reporting but I have a feeling that people who are listening also might like to talk about coverage of this year's election. He said he'd be happy to hear what you have to say about that and share what thoughts he has. All you have to do that is you folks are listening is give us a call the number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We also have toll free line good anywhere that you can hear us that's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 at any point here you can call us all we ask of callers as people just try to be brief so we can accommodate as many different folks as possible and keep things moving along. But anyone is welcome to call. Again three three three W I L L and toll free 800 to 2

W while. Thanks very much. Good morning to you being here. I thought we could talk at least for a little while beginning here about investigative reporting. And I thought I'd ask to ask you to just give a definition to start out because I suppose some people might say well in some sense all reporting is Investigative to one degree or another but here we're talking about something that's a that's a little bit different. When when when you use that term investigative reporting what do you mean. I'm glad you said that because I just talked to a group of journalism students this morning and I made that point. Oh reporters if they're doing their job well are using the techniques of investigative reporting. Being skeptical oppressing people etc.. I like to think that truly investigative reporters are ones who have made time their friend rather than their enemy. Time is the enemy of all daily reporters they have to file that story by the end of the day. If they're on a morning newspaper and now with the Web they have to file it by Sometimes one o'clock at the post. Beat reporters

are filing five six inches. The investigative reporters are the ones who have been granted by because their skills and because of their inclinations a little more time a month several months sometimes a year to look at something in depth. These because these are very time and labor intensive investigative reporting could be an expensive proposition and not all organizations can do it because they can't afford to have one or two people or maybe more working on a story for a long time. Those are the stories that they can have great impact. Those are the kind of things that can win you awards. But I suppose they also can be controversy all as well depending on what it is and the techniques that you use. What what is now the state of investigative journalism. I would be remiss if I didn't didn't make clear that I hadn't been the investigative editor of The Post for four years. But I do obviously keep up with it and I'm very interested in the state of it. I used to be the metro editor of The Baltimore Sun and there we did not

have an investigative team like we have at the post in part because of the kind of cost issues that you're referring to. I had a staff then of forty one reporters and a couple of columnists. And the way in which we handle investigative reporting which is I think the best way to handle it in any event because the best ideas come from the reporters is when someone would come up with something they run across that they believe requires investigation whether it's something traditional like a corruption allegation or something more complex like a sociological investigation. I would grant them the time to do that and then fill in behind them. And when reporters would come in and complain because Sally was off doing something for her. Two or three months and they had to cover for her beat. I would say our problem isn't too much investigative reporting it's too little by virtue of how many people we have. We really are spending about 5 to 8 percent of our resources on investigative reporting I think we can afford that. Well how it is there is much investigative reporting now as there has been in the

past. I think there's more but I think it's of a kind that isn't as good. Everyone wants to have investigative reporting. There's a lot of what I would call tabloid ization or celebrity ization of journalism going on. I don't want to knock for Matt Drudge who certainly gets enough attention. But to suggest that reporting on what other newspapers are doing which is what Drudge often does on his Drudge Report before they've actually reported it you can dislike or like that think that newsrooms ought to be as open as everyone else. But it's not investigative reporting. The investigative reporting is the kind that really honors something original and new or holds people's feet to the fire. That kind of thing. I thought it was interesting the New York Times recently issued a form of apology for their reporting on the Wen Ho Lee case. Ran in the in the Times that was a sort of extraordinary statement or was considered so in journalism

what I thought was extraordinary about it is that their reporting on that story. At the same time they wanted to call it investigative they also wanted to say that it was really really reporting what the government already knew. You can't have it both ways in a sense. There's nothing wrong with reporting on the government's already known. But that's not true investigative reporting that's the unearthing of a prosecutor's prosecution that's already ongoing. Is it when you talk about what investigative reporters do. Is it the case that mostly they spend time in the library or going through public records or perhaps now you can do that on line. And it's mostly something that you either could do from your desk or basically in a seated position not the kind of thing you're going to wear out your shoes down. There really are various forms and there are still various practitioners of the art. When I began doing investigative reporting back in 1975. I would take several days to do something that I can now do at my desk. The Lexus Nexus Service has put for example court records from all over the country on line as part of its

service and if you can afford that service which some newspapers of course can't and some broadcast shouldn't be broadcast out here. I can find out facts that I could not. It would take me several phone calls or maybe even a trip 20 years ago. But there are we divide investigative reporting into various forms there's the source reporting human sources. Somebody from the CIA might might call it. Then there is document investigative reporting. Then there is the investigative reporting that requires a great deal of complex reading and explanation. The best reporters of course combine all of these are it's been on every story requires you to have a good quote human sources. Not every story requires looking at documents. One of the arts that I think is sadly lacking in journalism is many students or new reporters come to the post at least that's the place I know and they really have never been to a courthouse and looked at a simple record and they have no idea how to look it up. There used to Lexis Nexis form. It's not a perfect service and it doesn't give you everything.

There has been some controversy I think surrounding the business investigative reporting in regards to the question of reporters and who they say they are and what they say they're doing. And whether or not one can if if you're doing something and a cover for it. So for example let's just say you want to investigate some industry and you think that their behavior might be endangering the public health and the way really to find out what they're doing is to go there and get a job. And you go when you apply for the job you start working there but you don't tell them that you're a reporter doing investigative work. You just go in here and you apply for the job and then the last laugh towards the employer comes back now with the big stories on employee comes back and says well this person lied. They they misrepresented themselves. This is not it's not legal it's not ethical. Is it clear what you you can and can't do if you're doing that kind of work.

It isn't clear really I have my own rules and the Post has standards and policies which I will briefly state. We don't ever misrepresent ourselves we would not go undercover into a business and pretend to be an employee and then write about it certainly not write about it without talking to the employer. But there's a long tradition in journalism where that kind of approach that muckraking if you will is something that is extolled. I think there is a category of consumer journalism where possibly the recreation of an experience that all consumers have could or could not be misrepresenting yourself. If I go into a store I'm treated the same way as everyone else. I come out I have an opinion about that and then I go back as a reporter and I talk to the person about my experience. I'm not sure that that's misrepresenting yourself. The famous example the Chicago Tribune creating a bar is one that caused a great deal of controversy in journalism. The undercover work of ABC News with the Food Lion

story. I like to think of these things as last resorts. Normally we can find out what we need to know by interviewing people who actually work in that organisation who have that experience already and who are the real people who are experiencing that problem if there is one. We don't need to go in and pretend to be them unless and I would always be flexible and maybe there is some situation where I say to myself you can't get that story any other way. But I found very few times when I think that's the case. You know given the fact that news organizations do would like to. Get attention and if you're doing this in a commercial broadcast television you're concerned about ratings that might lead you to do one story as opposed to another. There always will be stories that don't get covered either because we don't have enough time or maybe because we think that something is more important. But when you look at the things stories out there that you think would would bear saw some investigative work.

Is there anything that you think it just begs to be a story that just begs to be caught. Well I think that is a story that we did several years ago now 10 years ago that I think was groundbreaking work that came back this last summer and I thought it was it was very important to have done the reporting so I don't know if it's relevant but in the Firestone tire Ford Explorer story for example. I read since some things that suggested to me that back two three four years ago when the rollovers and tire explosions first began to come out that there were lawsuits that had occurred that were settled out of court with protective orders. These are legal but legal instruments that are both legal and are used to help provide documents to the other side in a lawsuit. The legal community has decided that it doesn't want to

change the private litigant way of doing the settlement of lawsuits and so the judge becomes a referee rather than an advocate for the public. And there have been health and safety issues that have been known to small groups of people that have been hidden from the rest of us because the protective order is sealed. And I think that's a problem area for investigation because we could prevent people from being injured or perhaps killed. You have some of these things would come out earlier. I should introduce again at this point our guest We're talking with Steve Luxenberg He is assistant managing editor of outlook at the Washington Post. And before that worked in the Post investigative special project staff he directed staff in fact and he's here on the campus to talk with students and journalism students and that was good enough to come over here spend some time with us were talking a bit about investigative reporting but other subjects certainly are welcome and at some point here I'm sure we'll be talking about the way that this election has been covered if you have questions you can give

us a call 3 3 3 wy L.L. or 9 4 5 5 we do also have a toll free line good anywhere that you can hear us and that is 800 1:58 And while there's a call or Bloomington Indiana line for yellow. I have a scenario that I would like to see an investigative reporter evaluate. We have a small town and this small town has one hospital. And it's it's a very good hospital delivers good medicine. But it is defrauding its patients systematically and one of its patients keeps records goes into the hospital keeps records and discovers that he's being defrauded. That is to say overcharged massively overcharged. And he can prove it and he keeps the records. He takes the hospital to court. The court is horrified sees the evidence this is good evidence. If this plaintiff is able to win his case against the

hospital it's going to expose the hospital to class action is good for everybody that the hospital has cheated which would go back for a long way would now have a cause of action against that hospital so that the court is afraid the hospital's going to be destroyed if the case ever comes to court and the court dismisses the case. Now that played it. Been unjustly dismissed calls you to be the investigative reporter and he's got all this evidence you laid out before you. Are you interested. Sure how. How are you going to to. Do you have any responsibility for not destroying the hospital. Well I'm not sure that the cause would result in the effect that you're talking about. Well the courts thought so. Well duh that's part of the. As a reporter who would be dispassionate It would certainly be something that I would listen to but I don't think that I would reach that conclusion without a great deal of reporting work. Yeah. Well I would like to confirm

of course is that there is a pattern of of the kind that you describe. If this is one case and for some reason it's the only case and I know you're suggesting that it's not so far what you described I couldn't prove it based upon that one patients experience. And I would need to get other patients to show me their records as well. Well it's just that during the A Gathering of evidence the kind of scattering of evidence she has talked with department heads of the hospital and they have admitted to him that it's. Part of his bill went to as they say financed charity patients. That's what they said. But then when he looked at the hospital's financial reports he found out that only two point three percent of the hospital's income was expended on charity patients. Evidently there was much more income excessive income than 2.3 percent in other words it looks as if there's been some embezzlement

since. Now since we have statements by the department heads that looks as if the abuse is systematic and it's been ongoing. Well it seems to me that the there are many parties here that would have an interest in preventing an Belle's moment of fraud at any institution. I'm not sure because I'm not a resident of the state of Illinois. What how hospitals are regulated I know a little bit about the state of Maryland where where I live they have a hospital cost review commission but I could imagine that you would the reporter could get a great deal of help in figuring out the system. Whether the embezzlement is going on what are the rules and regulations regarding the diversion of monies to that portion of the population that cannot the indigent population cannot afford things. And I think that it's in the hospital's interest to prevent embezzlement Unless of course it's being done at the top levels. I don't think it would destroy it. It would probably say that we're not.

That's but that's basically the question that I'd like to ask. How would you approach a situation like this so as to correct the corruption correct the abuse without destroying the hospital. Well as I say you can raise questions about what's happening in an institution without reaching the conclusion that the embezzlement pretty hard for someone without subpoena powers to prove invalid embezzlement. But you can raise questions that would draw other authorities attention to that problem. If if a prosecutor or a regulator were to find out that there was a mentor fraud going on a particular institution. They would not stop and say well we're going to destroy this hospital that may have been the judge's opinion. I haven't seen the records in that case but it would not be the opinion of a law enforcement person. So I would as I say I would do a systematic approach in which I would talk to a lot of patients. I would try to interview people at the hospital they might be opposed to talking to a reporter but you never know I've been in lots of situations where you would have thought that it wasn't the case and I would then talk

to regulators. I would talk to law enforcement people but I would be very I wouldn't worry so much about destroying the hospital. I would just be worried that I was being I wouldn't reach a conclusion I wouldn't adopt the conclusion that the patient has reached as a reporter I would be dispassionate and I would not convey to the authorities that I would my own conclusions about what the hospital was doing without any evidence. Well it's so interesting to talk to you. All right thanks for the call we're getting close to our midpoint here. Again our guest is Steve Luxenberg he works at The Washington Post where he is now system managing editor of outlook. That's Sunday section of analysis and commentary before going to work it out look he directed The Post investigative and special project staff and we have been talking a bit here about investigative reporting we'll probably get on some other subjects you can give us a call if you have a question or comment 333 W. Weil toll free 800 1:58 WY. One of the things we know is that many Americans don't hold

reporters in the news media particularly high esteem. Has that made it more difficult for journalists who are trying to hold on to. What I think a lot of reporters have seen as the traditional role of the media and that is looking out for the welfare of the public. That's I think at at the bottom that's where the bottom line that's what investigative journalism is really about. Is it more difficult now. I think that it is more difficult. It's certainly more challenging because with the advent of investigative reporting 25 years ago and the flood of that kind of reporting it goes in cycles sometimes we have a lot of it sometimes we don't have very much. But there are more and more outlets to try to practice investigative reporting. I feel the public has become somewhat inured to investigative reporting you almost can't get their attention. Oh another scandal. And they expect the newspaper in some areas I would never say that investigative reporting or scandal mongering is

true in every community in this country and it certainly is not. But when the public sees it especially in the national media on television you now have news magazines on television several versions of Dateline two versions of 60 Minutes 20 20 etc. and while they do various kinds of stories there's always a kind of investigative report that's part of their hour. I fear that the public is yawning. That we've made them. As I say inured to this. When you go out in the public I'm always amazed at how despite the polls which I think are accurate that say that the press is not highly regarded. Americans are pretty helpful. Part of it's human nature. They're flattered to be asked and if they know something or they feel that something is unfair they like talking to the reporters about them which is great for reporting. But I think that

we've become more sophisticated at least I think some news outlets have become more sophisticated about finding the story beyond just the obvious. So and so it took a trip he shouldn't have taken or she you know paid herself too much money or hired somebody that she she shouldn't have hired. I'm trying to understand the motivations of people who would might commit a wrong to do something wrong as opposed to just gotcha. Part of it and I think that's important if you want to know why would a person do that. As I said about it ever hear about our midpoint and as I measure a moment ago our guest even Luxembourg works for The Washington Post here visiting the campus and we're very happy to have questions comments 3 3 3 WRAL toll free 800 to 2 2 W while those the numbers are that we'd maybe shift gears a little bit here and talk about the coverage of the campaign this year. I think that you know we still get the same criticism that we've gotten in the past that

is that reporters news organizations are spending too much time on the horse race aspects. And what the polls say of course but they say this year is pretty confusing they don't really tell us much of anything and not is not enough time looking very closely at what candidates have to say they programs that they advocate trying to answer the question is is that right. Do they have the details right. Is it likely that things will work out the way that they say that they will work out. How do you think that the news media is doing. At innocent at both of those things because that's you've got to cover both parts of this story you don't want to just do it be one or the other but do we spend enough time is there enough enough air time enough ink devoted to digging into what candidates say what they have done in the past and what they say that they will do. I think George Bush might feel we do a little too much time digging into the past as of what happened on

Thursday with the revelation of a 24 year old incident of driving under the influence and that would be an interesting question as to whether that was a fair story to have at this point in the campaign. It's hard to talk about the press as a monolith in this particular case it always is. I would say that there are much variations on this theme as there are any standards. The Washington Post The New York Times the national media. I think if you did a content analysis of how much they think they are spending on the issues you would be surprised at how high the percentage is. They also are engaged in daily polling. Something it didn't happen 25 years ago. It's expensive. We obviously think that the public wants to read about it hear about it. The post is on its website doing a daily tracking poll. It's a very tricky. Instrument to do well because you're doing polling constantly. Are

people home who's home what parties are they from. How do you get the right sample. You don't have much time. How accurate are they and that's your reference to the fact that the polls have been confusing is exactly right. Their kind of victory because I think the quality of the interest in go back and see the quality of the polling that's been done. Do we spend enough time on the issues. I think that because of the advent of the debates. Where you get 90 minutes in a sense of issues there's a lot of personality and character that's coming out in those 90 minutes but in essence they talk about substance. I think I see a retreat in letting the debates become the mechanism by which we learn substance. It is widely broadcast. If you don't want to watch it on ABC or NBC or CBS you can watch it on cable and watch it on C-SPAN. There's no limit to the access you can have to the process at this point. I think it's quite a confusing time for journalism.

The web and cable has dramatically changed the nature of journalism. There's more of a cough NEA voices out there noise level that I don't know that people are turned off to it but I could imagine that they would argue they can't get away from it and that what happened to the good old days when you could just listen to one show Walter Cronkite you know by my childhood Walter saying good night this is CBS News is long gone. So I think that if you want to read about the issues and you care you can go on the web and find out their positions at their own websites. There's no there's no limit of information out there. Let's talk about the this George Bush story that you mention this fact that some 20 some years ago he was arrested for DUI. I think this is this is precisely the kind of thing that people will point to when they

say you know this is what we don't like about reporting. It's gone. It's now scandal mongering something that's this old. What does this tell us at this point. And and also they will question the timing of the announcement and just who is you know who benefits by the fact that the story comes out it at the point that it does. Should this story have been reported at all. Or how do we even. How do we even think about whether it's appropriate to go with a story like that. Let me be clear that my information on here is no better than yours and yours. You're listening public site. I read things. I'm not involved in this coverage. I was fascinated to read that a reporter for a Maine newspaper who had learned of this several months ago in the course of his court reporting because there were court records and Comey Bunk Port had decided on his own that it wasn't even worth telling his editors about according to the story that I read. And he defended his decision and thought that it was just not relevant it was too old and in every

campaign. Let's tell he's good to go to the videotape as sportscasters like to say There comes a story about whether it's too old. Bob Dole there was a story about the relationship and whether that was too old. And so we wrestle with this and we are now using the imperial way to apply imply the news media in this case. I think it was probably somewhat easier for the television reporter who heard about this in the courthouse who pursued it and on earth did and thought it was news. On Thursday last week to report it or to have to convince her editors and her producers to report it because it fit the story line that we already knew. George Bush has admitted that he had a drinking problem when he was a younger man. This fit into that. Is there any big surprise here. When I first heard about it I said this isn't going to change anything because there's nothing surprising here. On the other hand

he did have to recover from it for two days and I can talk about as a journalist and about as a strategist you are you suggested David that perhaps it would help him in a way the media would be the target and not the politician and therefore it might bring out Republican faithful to vote for him saying I don't know what this unfairness stand. These things are not easy to decide and I'm glad I didn't have to make a decision. I think that some of the Republican Party strategist that I talked to last week were frustrated with George Bush's campaign for not somehow finding a way to bring this out two years ago. We have a couple callers we have several callers. Let's talk with some who moved from journalism to politics and I got the call they get the callers interurban will start here. Inline line number one in Urbana. Hello. Yeah just a short question I was just wondering how if you happen to know anything about what happened this weekend as far as the

the story that's going on between the Boston Globe and I understand the London Times where someone claims to have personal first hand knowledge of people coming in and trying to clean up Bush's military record. You know expunging anything that points to an AWOL period. I did you. I did. The people at The Washington Post approached that that they call up the Boston Globe in the London Times that they that they tried to follow up on it. How they doing. Day how did they decide not to cover it if they didn't. That's right. You've caught me unawares. I really don't know what the post is done with and so I can't give you any information or illuminate anything I suspect that knowing our pattern we will have tried to report it if we are to learn about it and then decide whether there's anything worth publishing but I actually don't know any details.

I apologize but that would that would that include the first step be calling the reporters involved in the other newspapers. Generally not but we would certainly read whatever the other newspapers would have reported and talked to. We would do two lines of inquiry. I'm talking about hypothetically we would begin to talk to the people in the campaign to find out whether there's any underlying truth to the substance of what you were just talking about. And then we might also call would be unheard of the color reporter but usually we try to regard reporters as dispassionate observers and not the sources of information. But it depends I know that in a previous campaign I'll just say this very briefly involving a United States senator that we concluded that we should not publish anything after Saturday before the Tuesday voting day because we felt that there was not enough time for the candidate to recover. We eventually did publish a story after he was re-elected and we got criticized for not publishing what we

knew and I felt we didn't know enough before the election ended. So it is a controversial thing to do these last few days it was kind of a time out of policy years ago that you just Sunday was kind of it. You just didn't write anything on Sunday and Monday that the candidate couldn't recover from. I'm not sure that teens in the age of the Web can say that seems like an arbitrary approach to this given that there's such a thing with their friends and so on. Thanks. All right let's go to another band a person here this line number two. Hello. Yes yes harking back to the caller before last about the truck driving and what seems to be you're probably right that 20 year old like you driving is probably not the support they have. Point the river through it which you know I had this two years ago and I wonder if that isn't of some importance given that it is

one of the basic premises that is has been that he is truthful would never lie in the discipline that in fact is going to the point of misquoting Vice President Gore on the web but invention has been a primary campaign teeth for him. And I think it's been demonstrated that it is a misquotation that he has been showing it's a. Primary characteristic of war. Given this I wonder if there's a cover up doesn't become me. I think I wouldn't want to share your view that it's a cover up because I'm not sure of the facts myself I can throw around a bit and yes assuming it is. This is why people argue that this kind of reporting ought to be done ought to be published until allow the candidate to react that it was the

revelation that George Bush in 1996 I believe had denied to a Dallas Morning News reporter that he had been arrested after nine hundred sixty eight sixty eight being an incident at Yale where some sort of prank or he was arrested as a young man and that therefore. It was in fact telling. Given his assertions about Gore's character and the relationship to the Clinton ministration and the scandals there this is why we have campaigns and why people can assess this for themselves and I don't have much of a problem in this case with with that it is in less of course were leaked at the last minute and held back to me that it would be troubling if it was held back in part to try to do in October in this case November surprise. The facts of what happened in an interview with The Dallas Morning News are not terribly well known. There are some people who believe

that the governor's aides hustled the reporter out of the room at the last minute and that he really never answered the question all that specifically but he certainly didn't on earth it and as a voter his voters out there have a right to decide that. Maybe George Bush was withholding it. I suspect just looking at as a strategist that the issue of whether George Bush is honest is really not the primary issue that people have with him. He's pretty direct and straightforward about his opinions and his views. His ideology and I don't think that's really that. I wonder whether one incident of Understandably I'm not trying to be sympathetic to George Bush or to Al Gore here or try to be dispassionate but the holding back of that incident is sort of human nature. I just don't know how it plays out there we'll see. Well I would agree with you that it's human nature and actually I just stuck to the side. President Clinton get in the back. It's just it's

being accepted is human nature. The site is crucified for it right. We're not very forgiving in the media about these kinds of things are we I mean we we want to crucify our buddy sometimes. One side is quite forgiven but I hear you. Maybe that's my opinion. But anyway thank you for the critique. All right thanks for the call. Well let me ask you this I think that the criticism has been made of the media it media has been criticized for being more critical of or looking more closely at things that Mr. Gore has said and pointed out misstatements than things that Mr. Bush has said. I think though in fairness probably each side has made that charge. I'm sure that the Democrats have said the media aren't being hard enough on Bush and the Republicans have said our media aren't being hard enough on Gore. As as you look at it do you think that there that either side has a claim

to make that somehow there there's been more scrutiny of their candidate than the other guy. I actually don't think either side has much to say about that because I think there are feelings on both sides when it comes to the way the media has gone after the story. I would argue that that certain story lines develop when the facts fall outside of those story lines aren't pursued very ardently So for example. Al Gore is an exaggerator. Would be the assertion. I won't use the word liar but others might. George Bush is dumb. I'm not saying he is dumb I'm saying that's the assertion. The impression. So when George Bush is unable to articulately explain his Social Security plan it's attributed to his lack of intelligence by some people. Other people have analyzed the plan and say he's not telling us the truth about this plan. So why don't we look at his truth of

the The Wall Street Journal on an opinion piece by their Washington bureau chief had a headline. The real whopper colon. George Bush's Social Security plan. That headline was to convey. Why would we be talking about the real untruths here. Meanwhile on the Gore side every time Al Gore slightly boosts himself as candidates do it becomes fodder for the idea that he's an exaggerator to the point where as a viewer watching those debates I thought in the second third debate that Al Gore didn't quite know who to be because he was afraid of making a statement that was going to be picked apart as. Legitimately his statements were picked apart first. So it's a very tough situation to be and I suspect that you could pick apart my statements right now. Well given that we talked about it and the fact that the polls have been confusing and that when you consider the margin of error it's been a toss up about a toss up for some time. One thing though that also has seems to been fairly

consistent is that we know there are significant number of voters that say they don't know who they're going to vote for. And then for those who say they're likely to vote for one of the other candidate also significant number of them say they might change their mind. When it comes all when it comes down to it and people go into the booth to cast their vote what do you think what will this election turn out and what are people going to grab onto to try to make the choice. Well the modelers would say that what they will grab onto is prosperity and that will stay with Gore this is something that several of the economic political models that have been done by academics. But I think that the economic prosperity has been around for so long that it may be that we've taken it for granted it extends back into the Reagan years. Who do we attributed to to be attributed. Are you better off now than four years ago or 15 years ago. I think that it's clear at least there was an article in our section that was we ran a series of

four articles from swing states. Illinois was not one we chose. But from Michigan Ohio Florida Washington State and the man who wrote the article from Michigan had an amazing fact I thought on the issues Gore voters were asked about the how they felt about the positions on issues in education and health care in both cases. Gore outpolled Bush by 50 plus to 30 something. But it was a dead heat. What is that tell you. It tells you that Gore is not very likable that Bush is more likable. But people don't want to go into the voting booth and vote on likeability I don't think or as or as what Whitman said in the 1890s likeability he would meet a lot of words about politicians. I think that they want to hold on to something more substantial than that. I think they know the issues. I think they know about so security I think they know about the tax cut plans. I think they know about foreign policy

and I think that the reason the election is close is because neither candidate has emerged as one that really grabs people's imagination. We have about five six minutes left. Our guest is Steve Luxenberg He's assistant managing editor of outlook at the Washington Post Outlook a Sunday section of analysis and commentary. And before that as we mentioned near the beginning of the program he was the director of The Post investigative project staff. Questions welcome 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. And let's see where we go next. Bloomington I presume this Bloomington Illinois line number four yes it is very much in Illinois. DAVID Yes well go ahead. The you know the you are your first caller was from Bloomington Indiana. Yes and I would never confuse the two of you. You know I'm sure you would. You were speaking about George Bush's convictions for DUI 24 years ago and you seem to be feeling that he should be absolved from that because of for so

long. Oh I want to point out something. He has been proclaiming himself as the one who will bring dignity to the White House. And I also want to point out that to you as a heavy drinker apparently from much to news reports for at least 10 years after that drunk driving. Now are you trying to tell me that during all that period of time that he was still drinking that he did not drive under the influence. He wasn't caught apparently. But are you trying to tell me that he would have been not driving during that 10 year period. Not at all sir. I think it's important his past behavior and drinking and that's when I was trying to point out was that his drinking and his addiction to alcohol was known before this incident was revealed last Thursday. And I assumed that he had

perhaps been drinking and driving and I thought everyone else had but if you think that it's an important point to bring out I don't know absolve him of anything I'm not and if I didn't say you sure are talking to Dave Anyway I think that is an important point to bring out and it's clear that it's something that troubles you as a voter I would if I'm picking up what you what you're saying. Oh and I guess I would say if you heard me absolving George Bush I would now state categorically that I'm not an absolution business so I was not mean to make a statement either for or against Mr Bush but still have. I want to reemphasize what I said at first. He has been claiming that who it is or why. To really bring dignity back to the White House do you call that bringing dignity back to the White House. If you do I don't know I think what we are saying is is that because it happened on Thursday it was a different issue. Journalistic issue that came up but clearly. I would I would suspect that you felt because of his drinking problem that he

would not bring dignity back to the White House before Leicester's the Is that true. Well the caller's gone in fact were almost the point we're going to have to quit anyway I am going to get real quick here champagne County and then we're going to have to go to a line number two. Hello. There's no time to deal with this really but I want to ask about our knowledge sources are one of them one of the key words for that I mean I saw this thing on Lori Berenson and that's the gate of Dateline or Primetime I forget which one it was but the very end of the saying right we have some of that on a benefit source that she indeed was acting under cover for a guy that was killed in the Peruvian embassy and it was just introduced. You know without any explanation about why he would not identify himself and you know I didn't even say national security reasons I just outlined that. But I know also know that the Times has somebody on other things about British and they have an on acknowledged source that he was dealing coke as well as using coke and this is a possible

thing in that he was running fairly normal business is running had a big habit. And it's a possible thing it's also possible that it's from oh yeah only who would who has gone off the record to say that this is spin the case. Well you know not what I don't know that I you can find out a counterpunch star with a lot of other investigative journalism but quickly I think that invasion and acknowledge sources are informed sources. There are various forms of this word this phrase the trickiest thing in journalism because we know that you as a reader or viewer don't trust sources that you can identify sometimes as you pointed out Nessa security. You can't always identify your sources but I am a big critic of journalism for this. I think that we abuse this and I think that often we can get people on the record is what we call it and we don't try hard enough. There are many kinds of stories that if

you just work harder at it and you didn't give the person the opportunity to go off the record they wouldn't go off the record. We're going to have to stop here because we at the end of the time for people who are in and around Champaign-Urbana just mention that our guest Steve Luxenberg going to be talking about investigative journalism at a brown bag at noon today in 123 Greg Hall. And I'm sure that anybody who is interested in dropping by and hearing what he had to say would should feel themselves welcome. And we want to say also Well thanks very much. Thanks to being here Steve Luxenberg assistant managing editor of outlook at the Washington Post.