The Brazilian media has devoted all of its manpower to cover a series of scandals recently emerged.

One of them involves the claim that members of the ruling Workers Party (PT, as its known in its Portuguese acronym) leaked records of several people close to the main opposition candidate José Serra, among them, his daughter Veronica.

Last week, there was a brand new accusation making the headlines. First published by the country's main weekly magazine, Veja, and then picked up by the main outlets, the story dealt with allegations that the son of Erenice Guerra, chief-of-staff of president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, took part in a scheme to benefit private businesses in winning government contracts.

Erenice Guerra was the former aide to the leading presidential contender, Dilma Rousseff, and took over her post when Rousseff announced her candidacy.

Over the last decade, poverty alleviation programs in the country have helped lift over 12 million families out of poverty and lead President Lula's popularity to sky rocket to close to 80%.

Little wonder that his hand-picked successor, Ms. Rousseff, is leading the polls on a rate of 51% against Mr Serra's 27%. If the numbers don't change, she might be able to accomplish a feat not even matched by Mr Lula himself - victory on the first round of the October 3rd elections.

Many analysts claim that these scandals, serious as they are, are unlikely to affect the outcome of the vote, given that the accusations involve too many technicalities and those intricacies arouse little interest of the Brazilian everyman.

None of that, of course, should prevent the press for investigating these topics thoroughly.

The problem, however, is that the mainstream media is centring its focus only on scandals and accusations that could change the game.

This is tricky territory. By betting mainly on one or two stories, many, especially in the blogosphere, are now certain that the country's press has sided with the opposition against the left-leaning administration and its planned successor.

If that impression alone doesn't do the country's press any favours, to make matters worst, the media is, if not ignoring, at least not giving the proper attention to a wide range of important topics and to the whole rest of campaign.

On October 3rd, Brazilian voters will chose not only the new president, but also representatives for the lower house of Congress and two-thirds of the Senate.

In spite of the poverty alleviation programs and of the recent economic growth, expected to be of reaching over 7% this year, Brazil is one of the most unequal countries in the world and little if anything is know on Ms Rousseff and Mr Serra's programs to tackle the nation's serious problems in areas such as education, infra-structure, sanitation and health.

Polls also show that many in the country don't know whom to vote for Congress or Senate or don't even know who the candidates are or what are their proposals.

There is no denial that the accusations making front pages are extremely serious and should be investigated in depth by Brazil's long-standing democratic press. But, first, we must remember that digging in the dirt has to be done both on the government as well as on the opposition's backyard.

And, second, covering the campaign also involves covering the issues that still affect the millions of lives of Brazilians.