Retooling Presidential Election Coverage

Beginning of article

Ever since news organizations laid their collective egg in the 1988 presidential election, the second-guessers have had a field day lecturing the press on how it should retool their political coverage.

The latest batch of ideas comes from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, more specifically the Joan Shorenstein Barone Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy.

Its report, "Campaign Lessons for '92", has grand academic-media-foundation trappings, crafted by working and former journalists and funded by the Markle Foundation and the National Education Association.

The document is a little preachy but deserves attention because coverage of the 1992 election campaign has begun, and because almost all the suggestions are solid and doable, if not exactly brand new ideas.

The Harvard folks give credit to Sissela Bok, …