Iowa Dems Play Reporter - Updated

(UPDATED at the end of the post)

Earlier this week, I wrote about Iowa Republicans allowing only friendly bloggers to cover the party's legislative breakfast.

But Iowa Senate Democrats eliminate the middle man/woman entirely. They just do the reporting themselves.

Senate Democrats sent out a news release and audio files to reporters Thursday, including this fully packaged, ready-to-air "news story:"

TRANSCRIPT:

VOICEOVER: HERE'S ANOTHER SIGN THAT NEW LAWS DISCOURAGING SMOKING IN IOWA ARE IMPROVING HEALTH AND SAVING MONEY. DR. CHRISTOPHER SQUIER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA TODAY RELEASED FINDINGS THAT IOWA HOSPITAL ADMISSIONS FOR CORONARY HEART DISEASE HAVE DROPPED BY ALMOST A QUARTER. DR. SQUIER SAID THE SHARP DROP HE FOUND IN IOWA WAS RIGHT IN LINE WITH SIMILAR RESULTS IN OTHER STATES THAT HAVE SUCCESSFULLY REDUCED SMOKING.

DR SQUIER: “The numbers I'm referring to are a 24 percent reduction in hospital admissions, that's 2,324 fewer Iowans who had coronary heart disease during the year that the Smoke Free Act was in operation. The legislation that increased the cost of tobacco in 2007 and which introduced smoke free working places in 2008 were probably the two single greatest public health benefits that have ever been passed in the state of Iowa, in terms of saving lives and reducing disease. And so legislators are to be congratulated on having the courage to enact this legislation.”

VOICEOVER: HE SPOKE THURSDAY AT THE AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY'S ANNUAL LEGISLATIVE RECEPTION AT THE STATEHOUSE. THIS IS IOWA STATEHOUSE NEWS.

Here's the audio.

This is "Statehouse News?" Seriously?

The "reporter" in this case is Rusty Martin, communications director for the Senate Democrats. He doesn't identify himself in the clip.

It wasn't all that long ago that Democrats were howling at the Bush administration and its efforts to put journalists on its payroll and to release "news" stories touting Medicare drug coverage and other White House policies.

Now, we have Democrats in Iowa doing essentially the same thing.

If the piece were aired as-is, listeners would have no way of knowing its partisan origin.

I'm sure this is considered a great political communications strategy. But its also deceptive. It's one thing to send out raw audio clips and news releases, but offering a fully packaged "news story" goes too far.

UPDATE -- Senate Democratic staff director Ron Parker sent me an email:

"Any such future reports from our office will include as disclaimer, such as "This Iowa Statehouse Update was produced by the Iowa Senate Democratic Research Staff."

Good news.