We the People: Meet the Citizen Journalists of Purple States TV

If the highly publicized, dual-tinged partisan color palette of the modern political landscape strikes you as more than a bit limited, behold the middle ground of The Purple States, where red and blue bleed together to create a Pollack-esque fusion of topical splatter. The first season of this series, focused on the primaries, was featured in the Opinion section at NYTimes.com, but Season Two will now be taking up an 8-episode residence at washingtonpost.com as the citizen journalists are once more dispatched to cover the race to the White House.

Meet Alex, Bert, Elizabeth, Tamara and Tanya – your Everymen and Everywomen on the scene. All have been hitting the campaign trail without the benefit of an entourage of analysts, network lackeys or stylists. While the fancy-pants pundits of CNN attempt to extrapolate microscopic nuance from a candidate’s vocal inflection or body language, these plain-talking people intend to get to the heart of the issues the old-fashioned way…by pushing the rhetoric aside and getting real.

For example: Thanks to an ill-fated analogy, lipstick has become something of a galvanizing cosmetic on the campaign trail in recent weeks. Barnyard animals and candidates alike are apparently prone to its usage. So you can’t really blame Citizen Bert for wondering why the cosmetics packaging plant he used to work at has since been shut down with nary a peep (or oink). His fellow citizen journalists have their own concerns. We witness Elizabeth getting some face time (and how) with Joe Biden to discuss carbon emissions. Tamara wants to know how education and health care will be salvaged, not an inventory of how many homes McCain actually owns. Meanwhile, homeland security and threats of terrorism eclipse all else, according to Tanya, which does not stop Alex from questioning America’s posturing atop the bully pulpit. And yet, all seem to agree that traditional media coverage has been burying the core issues beneath a thick layer of ballyhoo, blather and outright BS.

A feature new to Season Two is the addition of a daily vlog called “The Daily Citizen” at purplestates.tv, which provides more one-on-one time with each citizen beyond the official allotment of episodes at Washington Post.com. And in early 2009, a third season will cover the first few months of the new president and new Congress in action — which, according to the Purple States home site, will introduce us to a “new citizen team” as well. (Is the infusion of even fresher faces necessary to preserve the mission of this project, to serve as a counterpoint for the jaded perspective of more seasoned journalists?)

Regardless, the real story here stems neither from the candidates nor the professional pundits who cover them for a living. Instead we’re reminded that there is a story behind each “average” citizen journalist, and that the outcome of the election will impact them (and the rest of us) in a myriad of ways. For that reason, Purple States brings it all home in a way that Matt Lauer never could.