There’s nothing uncommon about newspapers giving their endorsements to political campaigns. The practice is almost as old as the republic itself. Many papers, including some still in existence today, acted as mouthpieces for one political party over another.

    What’s almost as old is the argument over whether a media outlet, which has the responsibility to report fairly and justly, can make a recommendation when it comes to whom to vote for. Some journalists feel an endorsement jeopardizes that objectivity, while others feel it is the public duty of a newspaper to bring out the strengths and weaknesses of candidates and give voters a reasoned explanation for why one is better than the other.

    From the day it was founded, the editors of the Dover Post have taken the view we will not suggest how you should vote.

    Honestly, making that decision is your job.

    It is a voter’s responsibility to look at all the issues and make a reasoned judgment. It is his or her responsibility to clear away the dirt, to work through the obfuscations and half-truths and, possibly, toss aside some old prejudices to decide who will be best at the job they’re seeking.

    Like everyone else, the publisher, editors, writers and staff of the Dover Post have their opinions on who should win elections, and like everyone else, will make that choice in the voting booth. Don’t expect to see those choices reflected in these pages.

    In politics, like religion, what an individual believes and how he or she acts on that belief is a personal choice, and not one that should be made or influenced by others.

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    This is the last week you will see Letters to the Editor extolling the merits of those running for office statewide or nationally. Being a weekly paper, we could not in good conscience publish letters possibly attacking a candidate’s position on Wednesday, Oct. 29, since the candidate could not have the opportunity to respond before the Tuesday, Nov. 4 election.

    This week, we are running 16 political Letters to the Editor, which must be a record. Interestingly, despite the huge amount of attention paid to the national candidates, the great majority have dealt with county and state issues. It just goes to show that all politics indeed are local.

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    Friends of those interested in the history of the Capital City lost a champion Oct. 10 with the passing of Ed Clevenger.

    Mr. Clevenger — that’s how I always referred to him, not only because of his seniority, but just because he deserved that sign of respect — was an inveterate collector of Doverania. He had postcards, books, photographs, you name it, of old Dover. Mr. Clevenger collected the ghosts of things that are no longer there, things that were it not for his love of Dover and, let’s face it, utter tenacity, might be lost forever.

    If the Post’s editorial staff ever needed a picture of something that once stood in Dover, Mr. Clevenger probably had a copy of it.

    But he also had another side, one that was told in a Post article I wrote in December 2004. Mr. Clevenger was one of the thousands of U.S. military men who witnessed two atomic bomb blasts in the South Pacific in 1946. He was later on a cleanup crew who went aboard some of the test ships, vessels that were reeking of radiation.

    Mr. Clevenger didn’t have much of a choice in the matter — he was in the military, after all — but said years later he’d have preferred not to have been at the atomic tests.

    However, he added it was one of the most dramatic experiences of his life.

    “You just don’t believe it could happen,” he told me. “It was just like one of the wonders of the world. It was fantastic to see it.”

Email Jeff Brown at jeff.brown@doverpost.com.