POLITICS MAKES MUSTN'T-SEE TV IN MOST PLACES

Despite Republican Bob Taft's canned answers and Democrat Timothy F.
Hagan's off-the-cuff meandering, there were more than a few good television
moments in Tuesday's gubernatorial debate.

The best came when the candidates responded to a videotaped question from a
Cleveland woman who said she had an incurable nerve disorder and used
marijuana to help ease the pain. She wanted to know the views of Hagan and
Taft on the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

Hagan movingly detailed his father's death from cancer, saying he would
have used any drug, including marijuana, to help relieve his father's
suffering. But then Hagan tripped on his tongue by saying he would send out
his nephew to buy the illegal drug.

Taft, meanwhile, answered the question from somewhere in never-never land,
saying marijuana was addictive and could lead to a life of crime. Only Taft
could envision the Cleveland woman or Hagan's father knocking off carryouts
for money to score some weed.

It made for good television.

Too bad television, for the most part, didn't care enough about the debate
to bring it to you.

Only one of Ohio's 26 commercial television stations broadcast the debate.
Those same 26 stations, meanwhile, are reaping an estimated $20 million in
advertising revenue from political campaigns this year.

More and more, local TV stations in Ohio and across the country are
shirking their responsibility to cover political campaigns, while growing
fat on the ubiquitous 30-second ads that have turned candidates into
full-time fund-raisers.

A study released last week of early and late newscasts in the nation's 50
largest media markets, including Columbus, showed that from Sept. 18
through Oct. 4, most newscasts on local TV stations contained no election
coverage at all.

Researchers from the University of Southern California and the University
of Wisconsin found that of the 2,454 local newscasts analyzed, 1,311 -- or
more than half -- contained no coverage of political campaigns. Through
Nov. 5, local TV stations across the country are projected to rake in
between $850 million and $1 billion in political ad revenue, according to
the Washington-based Alliance for Better Campaigns.

"There's a long-term trend of retreat by local TV from substantive coverage
of political campaigns," said Paul Taylor, president of the alliance.
"Their ratings tell them people don't watch debates. I would argue one
reason they don't watch is because all they get from television is the
rat-a-tat-tat of 30-second ads."

The three major stations in Columbus -- Channels 4, 6 and 10 -- cover
campaigns more than do other Ohio stations, probably because of a
politically attuned audience in the state capital. And while all three
stations are offering free air time to candidates in their late-afternoon
shows, TV reporters are rarely seen bird-dogging the campaign for governor.

In the race for ratings, TV stations give viewers what they want. Most
viewers don't want politics; the political junkies are left to get their
fix by turning to cable news programs.

But that should not relieve Ohio's television stations of their obligation
to inform Ohioans about the two men who would lead them as governor, even
if it means sacrificing ratings and revenues.

On Tuesday, only WBNS-TV (Channel 10) in Columbus accepted that
responsibility by broadcasting the debate live. (You can choose to believe,
or not, that any horn-blowing here is coincidental; Channel 10 is an
affiliate of The Dispatch.

By pre-empting Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune and going ad-free for an hour,
the station lost money by airing the debate, according to Michael Fiorile,
president and chief executive officer of the Dispatch Broadcast Group.

Still, Channel 10 plans to broadcast live the second debate between Taft
and Hagan on Wednesday and is seeking rights to air the third debate on Nov. 1.

"I think it's an obligation of stations regardless of ratings, regardless
of revenues," Fiorile said. There's no question, he said, that "politics
doesn't score too high in viewership, and more often than not, coverage of
a debate does not interest viewers."

But something unexpected came from the good television made by Hagan and
Taft. Their debate Tuesday was the No. 1-rated show in the 7 p.m. slot in
Columbus.

There may be hope for this democracy after all.