Behind the Headlines

Just about every other blog, think tank or political organization encourages its supporters to write local newspapers about some important issue or another.

Fine.

But they go too far when they write the letter and then urge you to put your name on it and send it.

Or, they provide a selection of paragraphs that you can combine to create a letter, as if you were working a jigsaw puzzle.

That tactic creates a letter-writing campaign that gives a distorted impression of grass-roots support for an issue. Astroturf is what it’s called in the news business. And it comes from groups of all political persuasions.

While it may appear to be a helpful service for the time-strapped, the strategy allows people to pass off someone else’s words as their own. That’s cheating.

Vanessa Gallman
Editorial Page Editor