news-record.com

I don't normally comment on Rhino coverage of the newspaper because we all know what they think of us and the efforts they'll go to make that point. But I couldn't help but laugh at today's article (not posted) in which Skip Alston is allowed to go on about how unfairly we have portrayed him through the years.

As if that's news.

Heck, 9 years ago he called a news conference to thank voters for approving a bond issue for the International Civil Rights Museum and, mostly, to criticize our coverage of the museum's funding and leadership. (By the way, the paper editorialized in favor of the bond's passage.) Of course, that was after we questioned whether he should serve as an elected county official and be a paid lobbyist for the billboard industry, which just happened to be lobbying the city council on billboards.

Most recently, our complaint has been that the county is being run as if it were a private business, with decisions made behind closed doors and records released about whenever county officials feel like it. The county isn't a private business, and elected officials should want citizens to know what they are doing and how they are doing it. At least, they should if it is something to be proud of.

None of that kind of stuff is mentioned in the Rhino, which, you might think, would care about it.

Truth be told, in the scheme of things, Skip is good for us. He speaks his mind. Blaming us for this or that doesn't affect our coverage of him one way or the other, but I guess it does get him ink elsewhere.