Par for the course

Last week, I wrote a column about Bob Davidson, a local artist whose son, Robert Jr., is serving with Army Special Forces somewhere in Iraq. During a call on Bob's birthday, Robert told him military personnel at several bases throughout Iraq and Afghanistan were carving out driving ranges so they could hit golf balls as a way of relieving stress. He asked his dad to collect as many balls, clubs, tees, etc., as he could and ship them to the troops. Bob called several country clubs and got the effort started, and then called me.

I was pleased to see that Channels 10, 13 and 31 picked up on the column because it compelled golfers from the Sacramento area to donate equipment. Bob Davidson received a call from El Dorado County telling him six country clubs are gathering equipment. Al Ford, owner of Cal-West Roofing in Modesto, volunteered his business yard as a staging area to crate the stuff up and ship it out. Davidson has to date over 3,000 clubs and more than 17,000 golf balls to ship to Iraq.

Typically, TV news editors read The Bee and often my column to find story ideas, and the dispatch reporters to copy them. Again, that's flattering. But in those rare cases where TV beats us on a story -- and especially if it's a breaking news story -- we credit the station "Ch. 13 reported Thursday....." Too bad the local stations lack the ethics to do the same. Same with radio stations who read our stories verbatim, yet will claim they came from their own "newsrooms." in most cases, their "newsroom" is The Bee.

The most egregious case of story idea theft came a couple of years ago, when I wrote a column about a gentleman in a Turlock rest home who is the proud owner of the Guinness World Record for living the longest with a bullet in his head. A day or so later, I got a call at home from one of our night editors telling me to switch on the TV to see a Ch. whatever "exclusive" about a man who set the record for living the longest with a bullet in his head. After reading my column, they went to Turlock and interviewed him. And in this "exclusive," they showed him on camera reading The Bee. What was he reading? My column from a few days earlier -- a column, I might add, that had truly been exclusive two days earlier.

Again, I'm thrilled that TV picked up on the golf gear column because it will benefit so many more people serving overseas and who truly deserve any comfort from home that helps deal with the stress or break the monotony. The TV folks, however, should simply be honest with their viewers instead of pretending they're actually out there digging up their own stories.

Because for all they gloating TV seems to be doing about the financial state of the newspaper industry these days, they'd better not gloat so much. If The Bee ever quit printing, they'd have to actually go out and find their own stories. Imagine that.