Author: erikeisele

In the Middle

Well, I was right, Herman Cain moved to the middle seat next to Mitt Romney in the G.O.P. debate at Dartmouth last night. This morning among the slew of candidate emails I got (They must have thought I was watching. I wasn’t. I had to do laundry…) were attacks on Cain’s 9-9-9 economic plan from both Bachmann and Huntsman.

The panic to clamber on top of rivals is interesting, but it misses the more important point — who would make a good president. We’ve met several of the candidates at the Sun, and neither of the two we were most impressed by were even allowed on stage last night. It’s a shame. But at least we know who many in the media consider the fringe and who they consider a serious candidate — all you had to do was look at who sat where at the table.

Media Reading

Just a quick thought: when you watch Tuesday night’s debate, see who is in the middle.

Romney has always been in the middle; he’s the frontrunner. When Perry got top billing, he was next to him. Then it was Bachmann, and at the corners were the fringes. Now Cain is moving up. Look to see if the debate organizers play up this horse-race aspect of the race on Tuesday, and put him in the center with Romney. See if they emphasize the current frontrunners, or if they try to give equal billing to everyone. The other debates have consistently pitted number one versus number two, but maybe this will be the exception. We’ll see.

Michele

So I found out today I had been spelling Michele Bachmann wrong. I had Bachmann right, but there is one L in Michele. I’d been using two.

I also found out some New Hampshire voters are not pleased she waited so long before visiting.

Bachmann is now a margin-of-error candidate in the Granite State. In June and July she was polling as high as 18 percent, second only to Mitt Romney. Now she’s hovering around 2 percent. Not a good sign, but in some ways it’s still early.

Not that she should be concentrating on New Hampshire anyway. She’s a strong candidate in Iowa and South Carolina, where social conservatives have a louder voice. Up here Independent voters and even Democrats can opt into the primary, making it tough for a candidate with her views to win. Plus the frontrunner owns a house here and governed one state a way. And libertarian Ron Paul has a strong network here. To expect Bachmann to make serious inroads is too much.

Still, not visiting for four months might be too long for someone serious about a White House bid. I met fans of her’s today who were cautious about her for exactly that reason.

If she pulls off another strong debate performance, however, she could easily shoot upwards. Still three months to go. Can’t wait to find out where things land.

Hopefully you caught my NHPR piece this morning. If you didn’t, I’ll post a link soon. I’ll have coverage in the Conway Daily Sun too, so don’t miss it.

A Promising Future

This gives me hope. Investigative reporting isn’t dead, as the success of 60 Minutes proves. Fager doesn’t shy away from the costs or the burdens of doing it, because he knows the value news consumers place on real reporting. Media may be changing, but reporting isn’t dying. That’s always nice to see.

Vacation, Candidates, and a lot more Radio

So I was gone last week out to Colorado for a family visit and some mountain fun. Now I’m back and things are no slower than when I left. Michelle Bachmann is going to be here this weekend, and I’m covering her visit for both the Sun and for NHPR. The day I got back a man’s body was pulled from the Swift River (always a depressing story), and the municipal budget cycle is starting to heat up.

I left for my week off amid another flurry of stories — Hurricane Irene, an NPR tape sync, coverage of an emergency town meeting — not really needing a vacation. The variety and the pace of coverage lately, from presidential candidates to a natural disaster to what at times appears to be impending economic doom, has kept me entertained. I go to work every day looking forward to what story I’m about to find. Sure, it was great to get away with my wife and visit my brother and his fiance, but it was a nice break, not a needed one.

I did, however, pack an extra radio story and some NPR work into that last week. Now I’m doing the same. I can’t help it though, when there is a chance to cover a cool story, I’m going. Now it’s just time to see what’s next.

More Radio

It’s my last few days before I leave for a week of vacation in Colorado, and I’ve been cramming in as much work as possible. Today I pulled together three Conway Daily Sun stories (all bypass related, which is always interesting), finished an NHPR Hurricane Irene update and pulled my first gig for NPR. Not a story, but a technological trick called a tape sync. NPR reporter Howard Berkes interviewed a guy in Madison by phone while I sat there with my microphone in his face. Then I shipped the quality audio recording to Berkes, who can pull sound from it that won’t sound like a telephone call.

And on Tuesday I got to chat with a reporter at NHPR about a story idea about I-93 that I’m in no position to do. I can’t complain when I’m having so many ideas that I can’t even get to all of them. That’s a bit how it feels at work know, which I love. Every day is guaranteed to be fast-paced.

Throw in a little radio and I’m in heaven. Now I have to get to sleep so I can do it again tomorrow.