Where are we?

I often wonder if people in Fort Worth or Superior or Moorhead or Oakland or St. Petersburg or Tacoma feel the same way we do sometimes. After all, we all have the same problem. We live in cities [clearly cities with our own urban identities, not suburbs, and in many cases good cities] which are located next to or near a larger city. And I wonder how often the media, even alleged news media for whom an obligation to factual accuracy would seem to be important, fail to properly identify them and what takes place in them.

We have already seen and heard more incorrect references to the site of this year’s Republican National Convention than most of us care to note.

These things are not new. I imagine that they have been going on since the nineteenth century. One of the earliest memories of seeing television screw this up was when Democratic Presidential nominee George McGovern stopped by during a campaign stop in the 1972 election. [Actually, I had never owned a television until that summer when I got a used black and white which only received VHF to watch the political conventions.] NBC showed the South Dakota senator speaking from behind a podium which clearly said “Saint Paul Hilton” and put a caption on the screen saying, “Minneapolis.” I don’t follow ice hockey, but have heard references to a hockey team going to Minneapolis to play the Wilds.

Well, Katie Couric recently made this same, common mistake and even our Governor got confused. [There was an incident involving Michele Bachmann, but I haven’t figured enough out about that one yet to figure out the whole context and, frankly, I doubt if she is worth the effort of finding out.]

Couric was confused, Pawlenty likely was just spiteful. Couric apologized. Pawlenty had his spokesperson waffle. We have no reason to suspect that Couric wishes us ill. Maybe she had just seen too many stories of Mayor Coleman the Second running around with Rybak acting as if their cities were sharing the hosting of this awful event. We know that Pawlenty wishes us ill. [In addition to living in Eagan which ought to be a clear enough indication of his spite toward us, he has compiled a legislative and gubernatorial record which make it manifest, his veto of Central Corridor notwithstanding.] He is the enemy of Minneapolis also, but it is easy to confuse ones enemies. After all Pawlenty’s friends Bush and McCain know that whomever is not ones friend is ones enemy, a blanket assumption which can lead to a lot of confusion.

I doubt that there is any easy solution. We can continue to call the errors to people’s attention, but that is likely no more productive than our efforts to catch traffic scofflaws on Edgerton or elsewhere.

I know that people still screw this all up for other places too. Local media, including the DPP have referred to the Twins or somebody else going to Tampa to play the Rays.

Well, let’s keep our eyes and ears open. As far as the pols are concerned we can do our best to influence or possibly remove them. And for the media we need to remember to factor all of this in when we evaluate the other things they tell us.