The St. Louis Post-Dispatch belongs to the Democratic Party

The sole remaining print newspaper in my hometown of Saint Louis, is the Saint Louis Post-Dispatch. It was founded by Joseph Pulitzer himself in 1878. Here is the paper's official platform, as written by Mr. Pulitzer:

"I know that my retirement will make no difference in its cardinal principles, that it will always fight for progress and reform, never tolerate injustice or corruption, always fight demagogues of all parties, never belong to any party, always oppose privileged classes and public plunderers, never lack sympathy with the poor, always remain devoted to the public welfare, never be satisfied with merely printing news, always be drastically independent, never be afraid to attack wrong, whether by predatory plutocracy or predatory poverty."

(Emphasis mine).

For a long time however, the reality has been otherwise, at least as far as politics is concerned. If you look at this year's endorsements for the election tomorrow, every single candidate but one, is a Democrat (They leave off the D's and R's, but trust me, you can look them all up yourself). The lone Republican on the page is John T. Lamping, and he is only a candidate for the Missouri house legislature, not for the US House of Representatives. Still the paper praises his opponent, Barbara Fraser. The paper must have hated to endorse Lamping at all, but they realized they had to have at least one token Republican on the list to appear impartial.

So Ms. Fraser became the sacrificial lamb this year. But don't worry for her - there's a form of payback on the way. In 1988, Democrat Jay Nixon was that sacrificial lamb when the Post-Dispatch endorsed Republican John Danforth over him for US Senate in 1988; but they never failed to endorse Jay Nixon for any election since! I believe that was also the last time they endorsed any Republican in a federal election.

There is, of course, the question that these endorsements are even relevant anymore. Like most papers, their circulation is way down from their heyday. But relevant or not, the whole thing has been a sham for a very long time. Papers really should not endorse candidates - period. Why not just report the facts and let the readers make up their own minds?