Term-limited State Sen. Bruce Patterson, R-Canton Township, is the kind of leader you wish wasn’t being forced to leave office.

Officially, a Republican, he is independent minded and not afraid to express his views. He’s also the kind of Lansing leader that you know wouldn’t be afraid to cross party lines if he felt there was an issue worth supporting.
As he states in talking about legislators, “I don’t think its enough to self-describe ourselves as a Democrat or Republican. It take more courage to vote for a tax increase than it does to borrow money and increase the debt. Elected people need to take their constitutional oath of office seriously.”

The outspoken Patterson has been quite verbal on his campaign to wake up journalists to their role.

He has said he is worried that with so many newspapers in financial trouble, our state and nation may lose what are the pillars of our democracy.
In fact, he felt newspaper were so important he introduced Senate Bill 1285, which supposedly would have put a deposit on every newspaper sold, similar to the bottle deposit.

He later admitted he didn’t have any intention of seeing the bill through the legislature and passed into law, he just wanted to get our attention. He did.

Once we woke up, we noticed a second bill, Senate Bill 1323, that Patterson also said was geared to making his point about the importance of newspapers and particularly reporters. This second bill would have established a voluntary state registry of reporters, listing their credentials.

It’s not a bad idea although don’t look for it anytime soon.
The second bill is a bit more critical of the press.

“The idea again,” Patterson explains, “is to try and provoke thought to get people to understand that our democratic system is heavily reliant on the media being able to get information to ‘we. The people.’ What I have witnessed is fewer and fewer reporters actually coming in to (legislative sessions) and reporting what we do.”
He’s right again. Unfortunately, limited staff and resources makes it more difficult, if not impossible to cover some events and government sessions in person. The Oakland Press used to have a Lansing reporter but we lost that person to budget cuts. Now, we rely on wire service news and the free-lance work of Tim Skubick.
Patterson continued “Senate Bill 1323 was designed to get people to realize there are different levels of people who report the news. I had assumed every reporter had a journalism degree, but that’s not true.”

Experience has always played a key role in a reporter or journalist’s career. A degree can get a person into the newsroom for an interview but experience usually is what gets that individual the job. Skill and talent are important but experience is what hones those characteristics and turns a graduate of Journalism into a good reporter.
The role of newspapers and its reporters is critical to our society. The fact newspapers are addressed in the first amendment to the Constitution is a testament to how our founding fathers felt about the press.

Patterson sums it up quite nicely when he says “The job of a reporter is very very important if this constitutional republic is to survive.”

Although the primary election is still a couple months away, with the recent filing of petitions by candidates who are running for office, we have to concede that the “election season” is here.

And it’s not going to end until after the November general election, if then. It seems over the past few years whatever “honeymoon” newly elected candidates received from the political parties is gone. New politicians used to be given a few months to see what they were actually going to do in office.

Now, the minute one person is declared a winner in an election, there are two or three others already campaigning to unseat him.

So, as the primary looms and the general election isn’t too much further away, it’s time to discuss The Oakland Press policy on election-related letters to the editor.
We normally get letters in waves and so we have a backlog.

We try to print all letters that we receive, provided they meet some basic criteria. They must be around 250 words and not use foul language. You can express your opinion but if you’re going to state something as a fact, it must hold up as such.

The most time intensive aspect of processing letters is checking out what writers are calling facts. We can’t argue with your opinion but we will not knowingly print something that’s stated to be fact when it isn’t. To give you a simple example, if someone says the capital of Michigan is Flint, we’re not going to let that go in a letter. If possible, we’re correct the error. If not, we’re take out the statement.

Also,let’s make something perfectly clear — to coin old, trite phrase — we reserve the right to edit your letters. We promise to try and not change the meaning of your letter or your opinion. Sometimes, the letter is too long and needs to be cut to fill the space available. Sometimes it carries incorrect information.
We cannot publish a letter stating something as fact when it isn’t. If nothing else, it affects our creditability as a newspaper. But even more important, it could leave the newspaper and the writer open for a lawsuit.

That’s another restriction to letters to the editor, we cannot allow libelous statements to be printed. You can say the mayor isn’t doing a good job but you can’t say he’s stealing public money unless there’s an ongoing public investigation or if the individual was convicted of the crime.

You also can’t say the mayor is running around with his neighbor’s wife. Even if it’s true, that’s an invasion of his privacy, which provides more grounds for a lawsuit.
So, with these reasonable restrictions in mind, let’s take a look at our policy involving election-related letters.

All letters dealing with the Aug. 3 primary election must be received by The Oakland Press no later than 5 p.m., Friday, July 23. This will give us time to process them and get them in by Tuesday, July 27. No election-related letter will run after that date. This is done to be fair to all readers. We don’t publish letters within a week of the election because everyone would want their letter to be run on the day of the election or the day just before. Obviously, we don’t have the space to accommodate all of those letters.

And speaking of space, because of our limitations, the maximum length for these letters that endorse a particular candidate are limited is 150 words.

So, please feel free to e-mail at allan.adler@oakpress.com or just mail letters to me at The Oakland Press, P.O. Box 436009, Pontiac, MI 48343. But please, be sure if they are election-related to observe the deadline and length restrictions.

Is the Tea Party Movement going to turn into a third political party?
Supposedly there is a petition drive underway trying to get the party on the election ballot.
The action is drawing strong responses from people who say it is not a political party. They are adamantly denying the suggestion and claim that any efforts to turn the movement into a political party are probably being made by Democrats in an effort to discredit the movement.
We are starting to receive letters espousing both positions in this debate.
Until a formal party is established, The Oakland Press cannot say yes or no to the question.
So, to be fair to our readers, we will run letters that have taken both sides of the issue.
As heated as the demonstrations have been by tea party rally participates, we expect the debate over this issue to be equally as passionate.
Let us know what you think.

The Oakland Press prides itself on catering to its local readers.

When we write a story, it is about something or someone who is from Oakland County or an event that has occurred in the county. If we feature an out of the county story, it’s probably because there is some local angle involved.

The Opinion Page operates basically the same way. We run letters to the editor and guest opinions from people who are from Oakland County. We write editorials concerning local issues.

Of course, sometimes we take a swipe a legislator or focus on our state capital because something that is going on there could affect Oakland County.So, to answer the question, why did we this week write an editorial about State Sen. Bruce Patterson, R-Canton Township, the answer should be fairly clear. While a legislator from outside the county, he has a message that could affect everyone in Oakland.

In fact, his concerns should be the concerns of citizens not only throughout Michigan but throughout the nation.He’s worried about the “legitimate” media going out of the business because of financial problems and eventually, maybe in a generation or two, leaving the state in the hands of people and news organizations that manipulate the system for their own gain.

Patterson notes that even now, important information isn’t getting to the general public. He fears that when his granddaughter grows up, there will not be reliable news sources for her. The media has a responsibility to get real information out to the people so they can get informed and vote based on accurate, real facts, he says, other wise people will get all sorts of misinformation.

To get our attention, Patterson introduced legislation that called for a deposit on all newspapers — similar to the one placed on bottles. Such a fee would put newspapers out of business but Patterson admits he doesn’t plan to pursue the regulations, it was ruse to get some attention for his concerns.

He did get our attention. Newspaper editors have been awakened by his proposal and now are more than willing to listen to him and his message, which most of us share. The message is not just for the media but to all citizens who value the free flow of accurate information.

So, there are several reasons why we wrote about Patterson, even though he is out of the area. His personality is engaging, one that our readers would find interesting. His tactics are unorthodox, to say the least, but they also are some out of the box thinking, which Michigan badly needs to get back on the road to economic recovery. And most important, his message is something that must be shared and spread.

Do you want to have your voice heard?

It’s easy to express your opinion. All you have to do is write a letter to the editor.
The rules are fairly simple.

Letters can be no more than 250 words. You must keep the language clean and you can’t make any wild accusations about people. You can express your feelings about elected officials but it must be done without any foul language.

Also, information you state in the letter must be factually accurate. Even though you’re expressing you opinion, to can’t stretch the truth or state false information.

The Oakland Press asks that when you submit a letter, include your full name, full address and phone number so we can contact you for verification purposes. We will, however, only publish your name and home town.

We also reserve the right to edit your letter, if needed.

Aside from these few regulations, you can write about anything you wish.
Submit letters to “allan.adler@oakpress.com”

A reader of The Oakland Press recently called the newspaper a hypocrite because we have endorsed a texting ban while driving but stayed basically neutral in the debate over a smoking ban.

The health benefits of the ban are indisputable but the position the Editorial Board took in a March 31, 2009 editorial was not quite adamant. We wrote:
“The concern over too much government involvement won’t be resolved anytime soon. But the controversy over smoking in restaurants could be if it were just left up to the eateries. Remembering that people have a choice to frequent a restaurant, maybe, in this case, a voluntary smoking ban is the best alternative.”

The reader concluded that because we didn’t oppose or support both the smoking ban and texting ban, it shows the newspaper’s hypocrisy.

The Editorial Board takes the position that some things need regulation while others may not.

What do you think?

The Oakland Press and its Editorial Board concede that ailing people are finding some relief through marijuana.

We’re glad that the drug is helping them but that doesn’t mean we’re convinced that use of marijuana for medical purposes should be legal.

The debate is somewhat moot now because it is law in Michigan but we’re still concerned about the drug, its use, misuse and its control.

We opposed approval of the law when it was voted on last year and we have continued to promote strict control now that it is law.

The board has not reached these conclusions arbitrarily.

Members have reviewed studies and discussed the problem with law enforcement and other officials.

When it was merely a proposal that voters were going to decide in a November election, we met with local, state and national law enforcement officers who expressed extreme concern over the proposal. Among other things, they were afraid it would hurt their efforts to crackdown on illegal drug use.

Once approved, the state struggled for months with attempting to come up with guidelines for controlling the substance, making sure those who legally could use it had access to it while trying to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands.

Problems still exist on the local level with who to allow to distribute the drug.

Recent studies indicate that legal marijuana may be contributing to increased illegal use by teens. A decade-long decline in teens’ use of pot has stalled and some teen attitudes on how harmful marijuana can be may be softening, according to a federal survey on teen drugs. The findings were based on a survey of roughly 47,000 eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders conducted by the University of Michigan for the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The national debate over medical use of marijuana could be making the drugs seem safer to teenagers, researchers say.

Of particular concern in examining the survey results is how teens perceive the drug. Students were asked how much people risk harming themselves if they smoke marijuana occasionally or smoke marijuana regularly. Fewer eighth-grade students said that people who smoked pot put themselves at great risk than a year ago.

Consequently, the young people perceive the danger from marijuana use as less risky. That’s youthful and wrong thinking. The dangers of marijuana use are just not fully known. However, some studies are indicating that long-term marijuana use decreases fertility and increases the risk of certain cancers, such as prostate cancer.

Medical marijuana was approved probably more by emotion, than logic. People who voted yes felt sympathy for those who were ailing. It’s understandable.

The board still believes legal marijuana poses many risks so strict controls should be instituted. And since it is here for now, we’ve also editorialized about taxing it. Considering Michigan’s economy, the state could sure use the revenue.

A reader threatened to cancel the newspaper today because he didn’t like the views on the opinion page. He seemed to think that the views represented how our reporters covered and wrote stories.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t convince the gentlemen that he was wrong about the newspaper. What is even more frightening is there other individuals out there who seem to be confused as to the purpose of the opinion page and how stories are written for the other pages of the newspaper.

The opinion page is exactly that — a composite of opinions from our readers. They don’t have to agree on a topic. Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion. That’s called free speech in America. We will refrain from publishing racists, vulgar or other inappropriate letters but we don’t restrict the opinions to just one side or another. For example, we run letters from readers who are against abortion and also letters from those who are for it.

However, for the news pages, our reporters make every effort to write stories impartially and have comments from both sides of an issue.

The irate reader questioned why we ran a story about Sarah Palin visiting Clarkston. Well, it should be obvious that she is a national figure who visited a local community. The reader may not like Palin or the fact she visited Clarkston but her visit was news.

Unfortunately, I didn’t seem to get him to understand that nor the differences between the opinion page and the news pages.

With all due respect to this reader and others, you need to be first, more open-minded and second, take a closer look at The Oakland Press.

If they do, then they should realize that the opinion page and what appears there is vastly different from the way news stories are written.