Cong. OH-12: Swords (D) Furious About Dispatch Error

Imagine you are a fresh face in an important political race, running for a seat held by an entrenched and well-funded incumbent. You work hard at building name recognition, but without funds for TV ads you must do it by meeting people individually or in small groups, at meetings and candidate forums. Then, a major newspaper, through a bit of journalistic bungling, misrepresents to hundreds of thousands of readers that you belong to the incumbent's political party. How frustrating is that?

This is what happened to John Swords (D-Columbus), running for the 12th District Congressional seat of Pat Tiberi (R-Westerville), in this story in the Columbus Dispatch. Swords, a proud Democrat, is none too pleased to be misidentified as a Republican, as he stated in no uncertain terms in an email message to supporters: "Now, all those citizens I met in Licking County will ask if I am a Republican. All of the good people I have met at local Democrat functions will wonder what I was doing there if I am a Republican. All of the citizens I met going door-to-door will wonder if they misunderstood my party affiliation. The campaign today has already received several calls about the article and people are concerned about my party affiliation."

At the very least, the Dispatch owes Swords a correction. A profile of the candidate would be an appropriate way to set the record straight. How about it?