-Gabe

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And if the Davis administration's communications minions didn't hit a grand slam -- as former Gov. Wilson's staff did the year that class-size reduction was developed for schools -- they did hit an inside-the-park home run.

The issue this time was nursing homes. As part of his $85 billion-plus budget to be announced this week, the governor has proposed a $270 million plan to improve nursing home care, including more inspectors on the job, financial incentives for those who work in the facilities, tougher enforcement and tax credits for those who care for elderly relatives in their homes.

By anybody's yardstick, and absent any unpleasant details, these are reforms that are long overdue. And, equally important to a politician like Davis, they are popular.

But instead of unveiling the reforms at his formal budget briefing on Monday, the governor's staff selectively briefed reporters on the issue over the weekend. That allowed the reporters to write extensive stories on the governor's plan for their Sunday editions, which are the papers that have the highest circulation. The spoon-fed stories reflected little, if any, independent investigation. Rather, they reflected the administration's position on a high-profile issue, and they got that position out front without any fundamental criticism.

For a politician and his communications staff, this is just about as good as it gets: Versions appeared on A1, or at least in the front sections, of newspapers across the state, including the Los Angeles Times, the San Diego Union, the Orange County Register and the Los Angeles Daily News. And other papers, such as the Sacramento Bee, the Oakland Tribune and the San Francisco Examiner, had their tales as well.

A reader might well ask, why do reporters -- and their editors -- allow themselves to be manipulated this way?

The answers go to the heart of competitive journalism.

Reporters want to get a story first. If they can't, they want to make sure they don't miss a big story that their rivals have. The governor and his communications staff know this. So, they invited reporters to the briefings, inundated them with material and sat back to watch the stories appear. Which they did.

Moreover, reporters like to get stories in advance of their official release. So, the reporters are happy because they get a good story. The politicians are happy because the stories, almost exclusively, reflect their perspective. Presumably, the readers are happy because they learn what their governor is thinking.

In at least one case this weekend, the governor made himself available for a personal interview, and in another provided material not given to the other reporters. This, too, is beneficial, at least from the administration's perspective, because it sewed seeds of dissension in the Capitol Press Corps.

Readers don't see the fabric of information-gathering behind the stories.

But in the end, does that really matter?

I believe that, as with most issues that involve politics and (potential) litigation, the truth is almost midway between the extremists' positions. Not being as sensational as the extremes, the truth is usually ignored by the media.

I don't believe that, absent precautions taken in reaction to the scaremongers, civilization would have self-destructed or been destroyed by nuclear Armageddon. But I do believe that without the doomsday publicity the problem would have been ignored, and the "millennium" would not have been the relative nonevent that it was. In other words, this was the flip side of the self-fulfilling prophecy: the self-defeating prophecy.

- Louis Jones
San Diego, Calif.

To the Editor,

Congratulations on completely polarizing an issue; specific symptoms of the software malady did evidence themselves, albeit not in an endemic fashion. I applaud your honesty and candor in describing how far out on one pole you and your staff place yourselves. I detest how you do not allow for a reasonable position, on either side of the exact center. Who put you in the judgement seat?

- Landon Miller
Lake Forest, Calif.

The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America put this newsletter in the judgment seat. And what's so unreasonable about taking a position on an issue? Had we taken the "exact center" -- or even the good ol' "center" -- you'd have nothing with which to disagree. --Ed.

To the Editor,

First, there are no mountains in DC (I know because I lived there for seven years). Second, the people in DC have no idea how to deal with snow, and adopt a bunker mentality the every once or twice a year that it does. Many people in DC have never seen snow before, because they come from a place where there is no snow and they're just there to log a couple years of DC experience, and they buy up all the toilet paper and canned goods as soon as the weather person points at a snowflake.

So while Enoch's point was amusing, it's utterly false. You might want to know that before repeating it in print. - Tim McRae
Planning and Conservation League and Foundation

Whoops. I guess I should've mentioned last week that Enoch's a stand-up comedian. Next time I print a comic remark, I'll be sure to annotate it as such. --Ed.

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