The Duality of A Journalist: Tales of Following a Campaign

This spring I found myself in a compromising position. In the midst of one of the most compelling SGA races in the history of the University of Alabama, I lost my impartiality. I clearly was a proponent of a particular candidate so much so that I campaigned for that candidate via emails.

The bottom of my emails read:

Vote Kendra Key for SGA President! Your Voice is Key!

Clearly this was an issue for a journalist covering politics for an online media source. It occurred to me the issues journalist face when endorsing candidates. It is a slippery slope that journalists dare not tread in risking their credibility; a lesson I learned on the job.

This spring, the stage was perfectly set to put me in this position. In the red corner, you had Kendra Key. A junior majoring in political science, from Tuscaloosa, and a profound speaker. She had all the credentials to be the ideal SGA president- in my opinion. She started the recycling initiative on campus that helped provide jobs for students and help Bryant-Denny Stadium become more eco-friendly. Also, she created the Office of International Involvement that gave international students an opportunity to plug into campus easier than ever before, with tools and resources prepared for them to involve them in campus life.

Her opponent was Steven Oliver, the "Machine-backed" candidate from Tennessee, a biology major who was executive adviser to the SGA president Cason Kirby. The Machine, as noted on Wikeipidia, is an organization designed to mobilize the Greek population in controlling campus politics. This group has been notorious for intimidation tactics in the past, and selects who their candidate for each position will be. This attributes to why there is only one Greek candidate to run each year, when the number of independent candidates vary each year. This group bases their political affiliation on class, because if you are not able to afford to be in a fraternity or sorority, you are excluded from SGA positions. If you do not have the backing of the Machine to support your candidacy it is near impossible to beat a guaranteed voter block of Greeks. This is shown by the fact that there has only been seven non-Greek presidents at the University of Alabama in SGA history, two of which have been non-white. Greeks are given incentives to vote and campaign, and are sometimes forced to participate against their will. This is nothing new to Alabama. "The Machine" has been around for ages, and the last candidate to win, had the advantage that sororities were not included in the "Machine" and therefore he (Cleo Thomas) was able to convince the sororities to vote on his behalf.
Because Alabama campus politics has a direct influence on state politics, Greeks see campus politics as a launching pad to having the same positions in the state in the future.

Yes, Steven Oliver's experience with SGA primed him to take over the position as president, but with that said, nothing in his resume convinced me that he would do anything differently if given the opportunity to be SGA president. He had been adviser to the president and had very little to show for it. In the debates, Oliver had very little to attribute to what bills he had actually drafted, but was moreso attributing to the things he had worked on, and was hoping to implement in the future. His platform provided for a loop hole for students to weasel out of their class obligations creating a "mini-mester" so that you can cram what you slacked off during the semester into a six-week period at the end of the semester. Oliver also pushed for a restaurant incentive program where students could get extra items at locations for presenting their student ID's, and also wanted to extend a 24-hour library to Thursday rather than just Friday. All good initiatives, but is that really what we need as students? I thought it was rather weak.

Kendra Key wanted to make the entire campus wireless accessible, so that you could use the internet in each and every building and location across campus. She also wanted to get Meal Plans back in the Ferg so that students were not forced to use all their dining dollars up in a month or two. She also sought to freeze if not lower tuition rates so that students would not be forced into financial hardship after college. Key pushed a first ticket forgiveness program where students were able to get out of their first ticket fine.

I looked at both candidates individually and saw that Key's platform was significantly better. However, given my position as a journalist it is my job to be objective. And it was hard to be when involved in politics.