Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, November 5, 1995                   TAG: 9511060017
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: ELIZABETH OBENSHAIN
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

MAYBE WE SHOULD PULL PLUG ON POLITICAL ATTACK ADS|

We've seen the newsprint and the airwaves heat up with charges over stolen letters and assertions of the public right to know; we've watched candidates spend big dollars for television and radio ads; we've read pointed criticism in newspaper advertisements and letters.

The pressure has intensified as races have tightened in this final week. Some incumbents face surprisingly tough challengers this fall, and some challengers sniff victory. With this comes the temptation on both sides to hit hard with negative ads, to ratchet up the criticism, and even to start whisper campaigns in the final crucial days.

These are the days when a big infusion of cash - and the professionally scripted television ads that cash can buy - can tilt a close campaign.

Yet a television ad in the last week of the campaign is probably the single worst way a voter can make a decision on the candidates. One truism any cub reporter can tell you is that he who hears - and believes - only one side of a story invariably gets the facts wrong.

Maybe we should pull the plug statewide on television for the last two weeks of any political campaign. Outrageous? Sure.

Yet imagine: No attack ads that distort an opponent's politics.

Local voters, desperate for entertainment with their TVs shut off, would turn out in droves for candidates' forums, where they could hear real people, not carefully scripted talking heads, debate the issues.

Instead, our society seems like a teen-ager careening out of control from too many hormones. With the sudden explosion of technology, we lack the self-control and sophistication to use technology except in the worst way. We exploit television and radio in 30-second spots rather than using them to open campaigns to a wider audience and question candidates in depth on issues.

Legislators for the first time outspent by their challengers' war chests and stunned by the last-minute television blitz have no one to blame but themselves for failing to come up with limits on campaign contributions and guidelines that could have opened the media more equally to all candidates.

In the next two days, you'd be wise to take what you hear from either side on radio or TV with a grain of salt. Refuse to be a lazy, gullible voter - the sort who validates negative ads.

At the paper, it's our job to give you more than sound bites. A newspaper must play a crucial role if voters are to make informed choices.

As reporters and editors, we've tried to tell you the important facts about the people who want to be your next sheriff or delegate and where they stand on the issues, whether it's patrolling Prices Fork Road or voting on the governor's prison budget.

Should it be Pat Cupp or Madison Marye?

Up to the final day, we will be dissecting advertisements and charges to help you sort out truth from fiction as the decibel level soars.

We hope we've helped you figure out if you like the looks of Everett Shockley or Byron Shankman for your next commonwealth's attorney.

Whether Helen St. Clair or Nancy Miller will do the best job as commissioner of revenue. Or whether you want to pay taxes to Rick Cook for another four years.

We've even tried to do this without boring the socks off readers for whom there is only one real campaign this fall - the one for a Hokie bowl bid.

Elizabeth Obenshain is The Roanoke Times' New River editor.