The Outspoken Sportsman

The King is not dead ... just not renewed.

In an unflattering statement, Channel 4 announced that King's contract was canceled "following negotiations with Mr. King and his representative." The station, which most surely has complained about folks who won't talk for a news story, told the media it would have no further comment. Ugh.

No matter what the reason for Mr. King's removal, it's a blow to our democracy. King unceremoniously joins a long list of political correspondents who once covered Lansing politics but don't anymore.

Anybody remember the walrus-mustached Tom Greene? Or Jim Herrington, Joe Weaver, Matt McLogan, Tim Jones, Dennis Larson, Andy Such or Walt Sorg?

Back in the early 1970s, they were part of a vibrant broadcast media contingency bird-dogging Michigan government.

Then slowly, one by one, they disappeared for a variety of reasons. But the most destructive element quietly unfolded off the screen and off the air.

Broadcast consultants insidiously advised management that the audience was not interested in political news. That, however, is not the yardstick for deciding what to cover. Sometimes you need news you don't want to hear or see.

If the stations really wanted to create larger audiences and make more money, they were told to drop the political stuff and replace it with other non-newsy stuff such as health news, glitzier weather maps and more worm eating.

King, like the others before him, felt a strong personal and professional commitment to covering politics and must have been disheartened by all the fluff in the newscasts. The station did call him its "chief political correspondent" but rarely allowed him to journey to Lansing and, during nonelection times, who knows what he was relegated to cover.

All this does impact you. The vast majority of citizens get their news from the tube and the radio. Do the math. If broadcast news operations are not covering politics, what quality of information are you getting from them?

Responsible citizens need that information to judge for themselves the quality of government their dollars are buying. And, especially at election time, minus honest to goodness political reporting, voters are left to make a decision on this candidate or that based on their commercials. Double ugh.

The quality of our democracy is directly related to the quality of information voters have. But you don't see that sign hanging anywhere in most newsrooms in Michigan ... save one in Lansing, Grand Rapids, and in one radio station in Detroit. That's because broadcast news is no longer about doing good political journalism for the citizens. It's all about beefing up the station's bottom line for the stockholders.

So, the real loser in all this wasn't Emery King. It really was you.

Now, you can go get the fish.

Tim Skubick has covered Michigan politics and the state Legislature since 1969. He anchors the weekly public TV series "Off the Record" and is capitol correspondent for WWJ-AM (950). His column appears Fridays in The Daily Oakland Press.