More than a half-dozen readers called or sent e-mail messages in recent days, asking if a shift in Erie Times-News' coverage of the war in Iraq was due to politics.

At first, I wasn't certain what the questions meant. In the days leading up to Election Day, readers from all political persuasions called or e-mailed to say that we were distorting news coverage to give "the left" or "the right" an advantage. It proved two things: one, that the 2006 election resonated deeply with many readers, and, two, that many readers still can't quite put their finger on where the Times-News editorial is coming from politically.

In the two weeks leading up to Election Day, I talked to 14 readers who said the newspaper was "way too far to the right" to suit their tastes. Coversely, 11 charged we were "too far to the left."
An eldely reader in Meadville angrily quit the newspaper following the Times-News' endorsement of U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum. After a long phone conversation, he said he might give us a "second look" if Bob Casey defeated Santorum. True to his word, he called back on Thursday -- two days after the election -- to restart his subscription.

Getting back to the orignal question about a change in the tenor of the coverage of the war in Iraq, what's different is having an Erie Times-News reporter in Baghdad. Scott Waldman has been embedded with the 329th medical corps for most of the last two weeks, and has been sending back stories, photos and audio interviews of the troops there. The 329th includes nearly 70 soldiers from this region.

Waldman's stories and photos received extensive play on page 1 of the newspaper, which might have prompted some readers to think we were covering the war from a different view. We have been: from Waldman's point of view. But recent editions also have included stories about battles, attack, injuries and deaths.

Readers who felt we might be distorting our coverage of the war for political purposes haven't read the Erie Times-News for very long. Any publication that would do that wouldn't be worth the paper the news is printed on.

You might not always agree with the editorials or personal columns that appear in the Erie Times-News, but by-lined news stories play it straight down the middle.

A second question that's been asked by some alert readers is: Why did we change our longtime policy of refraining from printing letters to the editor of a political after a certain date. This year, we ran the letters all the way up to Election Day. In the past, however, we cut off such letters about 3-4 weeks before the election.

Here's why we changed. Our editorial staff worked hard to eliminate what we call "astro turf" letters. I've written here before about such letters, which are prompted by the campaigns of both Democratic and Republican candidates. The letters are fairly easy to spot -- especially when you receive a lot of them, which we did this year. As your read them, you notice similarities in wording -- entire sentences that are the same as three other letters.

We encountered, more than a dozen such letters, but the rest seemed genuine. In confirming the authorship, we would get a sense if the writer had actually written the letters submitted under his/her name.

There was a strong sentiment in the letters leading up to Election Day that voters were in the mood for a change, which is pretty much what the voting eventually showed.

I suppose that some would argue there is more "art" than "science" to this method, but I think our letters page accurately reflected the voices of the majority of the newspaper's readers.

-- Kevin Cuneo