By Samuel Rubenfeld

An estimated 25 retired professors-along with a few current ones and a couple of students-attended a panel on the upcoming presidential election on Friday in the Plaza Rooms.

The Hofstra Association of Retired Professors (HARP) presented the panel which included Lawrence Levy, the executive director for the Center for Suburban Studies, James Klurfeld, a professor of journalism at SUNY Stony Brook and Herbert Rosenbaum, a professor emeritus of political science, as part of the University’s Educate ’08 campaign.

Levy, who worked under Klurfeld at Newsday for more than 20 years as an Op-Ed columnist, spoke from his expertise on the suburbs, about suburban voters, who he said are now the most important voters to capture in a presidential election.

“The suburbs make up about half of the voting bloc in the country,” Levy said. Specifically citing the upcoming Pennsylvania primary, which takes place on April 22, Levy mentioned the counties surrounding Philadelphia-Chester, Montgomery, Delaware and Bucks-as being vital to the eventual Democratic nominee.

“The candidate who wins those counties wins the state,” Levy said.

Klurfeld was critical of the press coverage of the election thus far. “Journalists put too much emphasis on the horse race,” he said.

There is a schism between how politicians and journalists view an election, Klurfeld said. “Journalists love telling a good story…they become obsessed with stories.”

Klurfeld was also critical of the work of 24-hour cable news networks, which he said was blurring the line between news and opinion during their coverage because they had a lot of time to fill and little news to fill it.

But he did say there was not nearly as much bias in the election coverage as the candidates said there was, or as much as voters think there is. “Bias is a pattern of unfair behavior,” he said, adding that the majority of outlets are making “professional journalistic decisions” in their coverage, and though specific examples of partiality exist, evidence of a pattern does not.

Rosenbaum emphasized the unique nature of this election cycle. “This election is unlike any other in our history,” he said. “There is an ingredient of voters who have never before participated in elections.”

The retired professors thought the panel was worth attending. “The interplay between the three was excellent,” said Stan Kertzner, a former professor of mathematics.