I would not be so bold as to say that our news media are in the tank for Gov. Phil Scott. But their sadly reduced capacity has redounded to the governor’s benefit, over and over again. No one has the bandwidth and/or interest in covering state politics anymore. As a result, recent events that might be harmful to Scott’s popularity have gone completely unreported or, at best, substantially underreported.

Example #1: The legislative hearing that revealed the disastrous state of the administration’s biggest IT project, which includes the budget, human resources, and finance and accounting — a project that touches on everybody in state government and every dollar it spends. This project is so badly off the rails that no one can say how long it will take to fix, how much more it will cost, or even if it will ever come to fruition. That’s not coming from critics, but from top administration officials themselves. I cannot explain why this isn’t a big fat deal.

Example #2: Scott’s attempt to bigfoot the Democratic primary for Chittenden County State’s Attorney. He openly urged Republicans to take Democratic ballots and vote for challenger Bram Kranichfeld over incumbent Sarah Fair George. At best it’s an ethically questionable thing for a self-proclaimed non-politician to do.

Example #3: What the Scott administration has done to Act 143, the Legislature’s attempt to reform the emergency housing program. I’m preparing to write a full post about this. For now, I’ll just say that Scott signed it and immediately began subverting it. His administration has devised its own plan that certainly violates the spirit of Act 143 and probably the letter of the law as well. Carly Berlin, a reporter shared by VTDigger and Vermont Public, did post a story about this on September 1, but it didn’t explore the full extent of the administration’s skulduggery. Otherwise this sorry affair has gone pretty much uncovered. It ought to be a scandal.

Example #4: In late July, the University of New Hampshire Survey Center published a poll showing that one-half of Vermonters “have a positive overall view of socialism, while only about four in ten have a positive view of capitalism,” and “a plurality have a positive view of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).” (It also showed Donald Trump’s popularity at an all-time low of 22% in Vermont, bwahahaha.)

My apologies for not noticing this sooner. But hell, I’m a one-man shop. As far as I can tell, no fully-staffed newsroom gave this poll the slightest notice even though it’s clearly relevant to the mood of the electorate in a campaign season. In retrospect, it essentially predicted Janoo’s primary win over centrist Aly Richards. It also outlined the potential for Janoo to actually beat the “unbeatable” Scott.

Conventional wisdom is that Janoo is too far left to win a general election. But this poll has a different tale to tell.

That’s 51% of all voters holding a favorable view of socialism, and 47% of all voters with positive feelings toward the DSA. Among Democrats, it’s 71% positive to 4% negative. The DSA even wins a positive (if narrow) edge among independents. The survey suggests, quite strongly, that there is enough support in Vermont to elect a progressive governor.

So why didn’t this poll get any coverage? You got me.

It’s part and parcel of the almost complete lack of post-primary reportage. The general election season is very short in Vermont, and we’re already 40% of the way from August 11 to November 3. What have our media done so far to report on the campaign, especially the gubernatorial contest?

From our three best in-depth news sources*, the answer is damn little. (Note: I’m going by each outlet’s search function. If it missed any stories, not my fault.)

*VTDigger, Vermont Public, Seven Days

Take VTDigger (cue Henny Youngman), please take it. Since the primary, Digger’s search function finds exactly one article that mentions Democratic nominee Amanda Janoo: a September 10 piece by Shaun Robinson outlining “5 Things We’re Watching in Vermont’s General Election.” Points for accuracy, I guess: He did say “watching,” not “reporting.” Because whatever the hell Digger is up to these days, reporting on the campaign is off the list. Even more of a molar-grinder: On that same day, Digger published a fundraising appeal asking readers to “Help Sustain VTDigger’s Election Coverage.” It is to laugh, bitterly. (I remain a monthly Digger supporter, if only in hopes of future improvement.)

Vermont Public did publish a good piece on the September 1 campaign finance deadline, reporting that Janoo outraised Scott in August but lags far behind in cash on hand. Otherwise, not much at all. Seven Days is short on standalone campaign reporting, but has repeatedly made room for comments from Janoo on stories related to state government. That qualifies for top marks on this particular bell curve.

I expect that sometime in the middle of October, our media will collectively get their asses in gear and start churning out stories about the campaign. Maybe one of them will even dare to label the election “sleepy,” as Vermont Public did to the primary. If it was a “sleepy” contest, the media did everything it could to make it sleepy. Until the last minute, it basically mashed a pillow on the primary and cut off its oxygen.

Who does this benefit? The incumbent with an edge in name recognition. Who does it hurt? His challenger.