In his handling of the Clariday stock scandal story, cub reporter Gore shows an instinctive grasp of the basics of reporting. Any properly constructed news story has to tell the reader who did what, where, when and why.
"Who" is clear. "Where" was presumably clear to his Tennessee readership. "What" Councilman Jack did, obviously, was to get hold of stock in a campground. And young Al deftly used that trick of the trade, so beloved of Sunday newspaper journalists and others who need to justify reporting as hot news something that happened some while ago. "Last night the question was an open controversy on the council floor" is a classic way of solving the "when" question in a way that makes a story smell fresh.
But a cub reporter taking a story to the news desk has also to pass a harsher test - the "so what" test. In order to pass it, the first paragraph of the story (and, if possible, its first sentence) needs to contain the answer to the hard-bitten news editor's automatic reaction: "Yeah, so what?"
On this score young Gore should have been told to do some more work on his story. Councilman C. owned stock. OK? So what? For those, like Lady Damask Monogram in The Way We Live Now, who could see no clear line between commerce and fraud, the facts as presented may be enough proof of skulduggery.
But for most readers, unversed in the detail of company ownership and municipal ethics, it is not really a story unless you say in the first sentence exactly what it is that Jack is being accused of doing, or not doing. To back up that introduction, we should then have been told when he bought the stock, who sold it to him, when the zoning permission was applied for and granted, what registration of members interests he had failed to make and the like.
The next rule of good story construction is that it should have a coherent shape, flagged to the busy reader by the first paragraph. This story flouts that basic rule. You are led to believe that you are about to read a story concerning J Clariday and Pennington Bend campground.
But then, just as you are getting your mind round that idea, you are led off "at the same time" (a sure indicator that what follows has little to do with what has gone before) into complications involving two more local politicians and then a third, who seems to have liked pears and peaches, and a DA who has no usable proof about allegations that, in any event, have nothing to do with brother Jack in the first place.
So his news editor should have said to young Al: "Is this a story about widespread municipal corruption? In that case, say so in the intro. But, if you are gunning for Jack, let's have a story on Jack."
And whoever was subediting Al's copy might usefully have called him over and told him about putting commas in sentences to break up subordinate clauses (eg after campground at the beginning) and not using jargon words like "councilmanic".
He also needed to decide what to do with verbatim quotes that are not grammatical. It is accepted practice to tidy up politicians' grammar, provided you leave their sense inviolate.
Overall young Gore showed competence, rather than flair. You rather feel that a young journalist with more of an instinct for the jugular could have got a sexier story out of this material. He might be advised to look for jobs in the local press, rather than go for the nationals. Overall mark? 58%
