How well the media has been covering this election depends a lot on who you talk to. The Republicans' drumbeat has been: don't believe the liberal media; they're against us.

Democrats have been saying: they're not asking the tough questions; they're not going for the real story.

We may be - in addition to an energy crisis, a health-care crisis, and a financial crisis - in the middle of an information crisis.

Few of us really believe there is much truth in advertising. But much of what passes for news about the last few elections has been promotion and advocacy.

In his recent New York Times column, Frank Rich rightly points out that the toughest questions Senator John McCain has fielded so far came from the gals on the morning gab fest, the View.

Co-host Joy Behar cut right to the chase and called Governor Palin's claim that she said no thanks to the "bridge to nowhere a lie." It was a refreshing moment of clarity amid all the junk and jive talk.

And the man who might possibly be the next president of the United States couldn't tell a simple truth either.

Most of the mainstream media use paid surrogates, a fancy word for public relations people, who pitch the public on their candidate and boss from the script of the day. They could be hawking anti-wrinkle cream that will make you look younger in the morning or a miracle drink that melts away pounds without diet and exercise.

These so-called experts are there to sort out the facts for the rest of us.

But this is no ordinary election. If the senseless war in Iraq isn't a game-changer, and it doesn't appear to be, the meltdown on Wall Street surely is.

Getting at the truth and trusting those who deliver it to us, whether it is the media or our elected officials, is more important than it has been in a long time.

Our grandparents have been chiding us for years that we don't know what it was like during the Great Depression.

We may be about to find out.