I would think that many people who work for your newspaper as well as a large percentage of the citizens of Portland are ashamed today by your choice to give prominence to the opinion piece on wind energy by Jonathan Carter (“The great green wind scam,” May 21). This is not responsible journalism.

It is not responsible because you — the editor, publisher, owner or whoever makes the decisions regarding the content of your publication — by placing this article over 80 percent of the front page of the Insight section, indicated an obvious bias on this issue.

The piece is one-sided enough without your assistance with its placement, the color illustration and large headline.

This is not responsible or respectable journalism because there is absolutely no authority behind assertions made by the author. I approached this article from a point of view that wind turbines are generally good, that their positives far outweigh their negatives. I thought that I would discover some facts that I wasn’t aware of, new information that might alter my position.

I read a lot of shocking statistics that if true or if not, couched in a particular context, would give me pause. But there were no references to sources for the claims made by the author, who for all I know maybe 100 percent correct.

The most blatant example of this is his statement that “three separate studies have now documented that industrial wind does not reduce greenhouse gas emissions.” Maybe there is some truth there, but it’s irresponsible to write and publish things like this without at least an attempt at substantiation.

The public has become polarized on this issue and on many others, on a local level and on a national level, partially because publishers allow pieces like this to be printed and consumed without documentation.

 


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