Rep. Gattis victimized by partisan politics and deceptive journalism

Lynn Gattis is getting a raw deal.

The Republican from Wasilla was recently the subject of controversy for allegedly anti-senior citizen statements she made to Anchorage TV station KTVA. Here’s what Gattis said:

“Alaska is a tough state for older folks to live in: slipping, falling, icy, so on and so forth. So if you’re not working, on a fixed income, sometimes there are other places that are less expensive to live.”

Doesn’t sound too controversial, does it? In fact, if you went down to the senior center in Palmer or Wasilla today, you’d likely hear similar statements regarding Alaska’s high cost of living and its harsh winters.

Now, here’s what KTVA said Gattis said in paraphrasing her remarks:

“Rep. Lynn Gattis says seniors who can’t afford to live in Alaska, should consider moving out of state.”

Poor punctuation aside, that’s simply not true. Gattis never said seniors should think about moving out of state, she only stated obvious facts about the reality of living in Alaska. She went on to say legislators and citizens should have a conversation about whether to continue extending benefits to senior citizens, benefits that help them live here despite the cold and expense. While that might strike some as cold-hearted, it’s at least a discussion worthy of debate. With the state in a precarious fiscal position, all options for potential savings should be explored.

However, once the KTVA story ran, Gattis found herself at the center of a firestorm led by the senior lobby, partisan politicians and left-wing bloggers, all of whom couldn’t resist the chance to take shots at her allegedly inflammatory statements.

The Alaska Democratic Party came out swinging with this attempt to draw a parallel between Gattis’s comments and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump: “Representative Lynn Gattis says those seniors living on a fixed income should just move. What’s next? Ask seniors to pay for a wall to keep them from returning to Alaska?”

Frank Ameduri, a former journalist and ex-Frontiersman editor who went on to a career as a Democratic party operative and blogger, ran a satirical piece on his blog that portrayed Gattis telling children to join their “grandparent refugee” relatives and leave the state, too. The blog’s take on the situation wouldn’t normally merit mention, if not for the fact that Alaska Dispatch News picked up on it and — without naming Ameduri — cited his blog’s anonymous satire in its article about the controversy.

We in the media are frequently criticized for having a left-leaning or “liberal” bias, something many of us find offensive. That’s because most of us work hard to report accurately and without bias in order to give our readers and viewers a clear, unfiltered account of what’s happening in the world around us.

When people’s words are twisted by the media and used to skew the narrative in a political way, it besmirches the reputation of those of us in the majority who believe the facts are more important than an agenda. That’s upsetting, because it goes against the principles of fairness we try to uphold and weakens an already teetering Fourth Estate.

While we don’t agree with Rep. Gattis on many things (her support for a pending bill that would ban groups like Planned Parenthood from providing educational materials in schools is one example where we believe the legislator is off base), we feel it’s our duty to defend her in this case.

Rep. Gattis never said seniors should leave Alaska, nor did she say anything factually incorrect. Her only points — that Alaska is tough on seniors, and that the Legislature and Alaskans should decide if they want to continue subsidizing older residents — are valid, and the criticism she’s received is unfair.

Alaska’s current fiscal situation is a serious affair that demands frank discussion and adult conversation, not juvenile partisan barbs and misleading, dishonest journalism.