Newspapers As Non-Profits

Every time I write a post about the print media I lament the fact that it is slowly, or maybe not so slowly, disappearing. I talk of how I'll miss it with my morning coffee. Just today it was announced the Boston Globe has been added to the list.
True, I sit at my computer browsing on line editions every day. It just isn't the same. So when I read that Senator Ben Cardin, D-Md, introduced the Newspaper revitalization Act I took notice.

Why not? Most newspapers are non profit already! That's why they're going under like corpses encased in cement!

The suggestion is that this may be more suitable for small local papers rather than those held by large media conglomerates. The ones vital for communities, like ours, to get the information needed to be well informed. There are a few caveats however. They must have a staff of reporters large enough to cover what the community needs. The dull and boring stuff like city council meetings, regardless of what's on the agenda, and school board meetings, commissioners meetings, etc. All the non-glamorous stuff. And they must do it. Picture pages of social events and pages and pages of legal notices doesn't cut it.

According to Cardin's thinking, this could open the door for a non-profit paper to purchase one held by one of those conglomerates. Imagine the Coeur d'Alene Press being able to buy, say the Spokesman Review! Now that would be something! Yeah, I know, Hagadone owns a chain of papers but I don't think he's in the same league as, say Gannett or even Spokane's Cowles!

As a 501(c)3 they'd be operating for educational purposes similar to public television. That should be a slam dunk. Isn't that what newspapers are for in the first place? Education?

The best part of all is that while they would still be able to cover all things political, including campaigns, they'd be prohibited from giving political endorsements. Locally that would put a crimp in the style of the blogs operating under the newspaper's banner. It would certainly make for an interesting change of pace. Maybe they'd get back to something else a newspaper is supposed to be. Objective.

Intimidation Is Not Justice

When I was a youngster, there were two things I was forbidden to discuss with my friends. My mother's age and my dad's salary. They were no one's business. Nor were they mine for I knew neither.

When I learned New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo threatened to make the names of the AIG bonus recipients public it was one more step too far. His rationale was that the public had a right to know where their tax dollars went. They already do. They went to bonuses. It need go no further. The recipients had no part in determining the bonuses.

He finally thought better of it. Considering the recipients had been instructed to call 911 should they feel at all threatened, to watch out for anyone who might seem suspicious around their place of business or home and to wear nothing that would indicate that they were an employee. Of course there was also the e-mailed suggestion that these recipients "should be executed with piano wire around their necks."

It seems this whole fiasco is surrounded by people who are trying to further their careers, like Mr. Cuomo, or save their careers like Geitner and Bernanke, Dodd and Frank.

This administration and those entwined with it are beginning to bear an uncomfortable resemblance to the Bush administration's governing by fear. Bush relieved us of too many of our rights in the name of "security". The Obama administration is using the economic melt down to grab power.

Yes, we are suffering the consequences of bad management and greed but fear mongering to the point of turning us into frothing mobs of hatred is no way to solve the problem.

"We have nothing to fear but fear itself" no longer rings true. We well should fear those who instill it.

They Want What??

The current climate of the government going after everything and everybody represented by a three piece business suit and matching martini lunch reminds me of Japanese horror films where the monster emerges from murky depths and destroys everything in its path!

The monster in this case is a two headed one - one a Geitner head, the other a Bernanke. If this wasn't so serious it would be funny - just like the old Godzilla movies.

Here we have two men who were a part of the AIG bonus problem from the get go. Here we have two men who have been floundering for months, in way over their heads. Finally they tell us they have a solution. They had to tell us something before the demand for their heads really gets serious.

Buoyed by having come up with something, no one is yet sure exactly what, they've found themselves emboldened. Now they want the power to take over any financial institution they deem in need! They've got to be kidding! We don't even know if the "solution" they've come up with under duress is going to work. How the heck are they going to save others from themselves when they didn't even recognize the perils before them as they sat in on AIG strategy sessions!

The only positive I see in any of this is that they are asking for the power rather than seizing it like the Bushies did in the name of "security". Give them time, however, if Congress doesn't give them the authority they seek, they, too, may just seize it.

As I've said before and often, when the government gains too much power over the private sector, the private sector and we, the people, will lose. Yes, the private sector and we along with them are suffering mightily for mismanagement and greed. Who, however, in government has the slightest idea of how to manage such a business? Chris Dodd? Barney Frank?

Oh, stop. I can't stop laughing. Seriously though, who's next? Hmmm. How about the struggling airline industry? Do we want the government running them? Will they be able to take over, say a GE, because they have a financial branch? How many other large corporations do? Ford. Once they get their foot in the door watch out. They will spin it as a mandate from the people. Populism at its worst.

When those old monster movies were popular I loved watching them. I never dreamed I'd be living in the middle of one. The trouble with living it I'm finding, is those posing as the good guys either aren't or are the most inept hero's ever brought to light!

...But will You Respect Me In The Morning?

There's a line from a morality play that went out of vogue with my youth. However, there is a morality issue here. The question is, what's moral?

When I read that
Judge orders FDA to let 17-year-olds use pill I wondered if Bristol Palin and Levi Johnston would have been spared a lot of grief and heartbreak had it been available to them. When I was young one of the great deterrents to pre-marital sex was the chance of getting pregnant. Those who partook were playing with fire for their reputations would have been ruined. My, how times have changed. Sex between unmarrieds these days is as common as getting up in the morning. Maybe that isn't the best analogy but you get the idea. This no longer seems to be a matter of morality.

Does use of the pill? The pill being referred to is the "Plan B morning after pill". It is available across the counter without prescription for anyone 18 and older. Unless, in some instances, where the pharmacist finds it goes against his or her conscience. Is that morality or travesty?

The good thing about the pill is that the youngster who had sex, thinking or not, has up to three days to potentially prevent a pregnancy. It gives them a chance to consider the consequences of their actions.

My dilemma is knowing how many girls in their teens, even their early teens, are having sex. The opposition to making this pill available to every female, no matter her age, is that it prevents ovulation or fertilization which they feel is equivalent to abortion.

Which is worse; access to the pill or children having babies? Economically the pill makes sense considering how many of those babies become the responsibility of the tax payer. The parents don't have the financial ability to provide for them. Or the father wants no part of the situation and leaves a teen age girl to fend for herself - and the baby.

I look at young Bristol and Levi. They've decided to go their separate ways. There wasn't enough maturity nor love to offset the results of lust. It makes one wonder how long the father will stay involved with the child. Without an education, how long it will be before he can assume a proper degree of financial support?

For all young people who find themselves in this dilemma, it seems it's a shame they are denied a solution to a misstep on the grounds of someone's elses sense of morality. Morality. How the meaning has changed over the years. It used to be a guide as to how to conduct your life. Now it seems to be something to impose upon others.

Morality. Forget about pre-marital sex. How about not having children out of wedlock? Or how about anyone in the business of dispensing medications shall not impose their wills upon those using them? Or - how about making available to any individual who needs it, a life saving solution to a problem? Life saving? Absolutely. The quality of life for the mother, the father and most of all the child who through no fault of it's own is the consequence.

That's morality.

A Step Too Far!

According to the International Herald Tribune the Obama administration is going to seek an increase in oversight of executive pay.

Whoa! This is taking the current populist stance way too far. I can understand strict oversight of the companies who have accepted bailout money willingly, but for those whom those monies were forced on or those not involved at all, this is intrusion we will come to regret.

I think what's happening here is the general public is seeing the multi million dollar figures without knowledge of how large corporations conduct their business nor how executive level employees across the board are compensated. The administration is fast approaching European socialism where governments intrude in all things corporate.

I've read hundreds of blogs parroting the outrage of the dollar amounts of the bonuses while the populist are losing their jobs and homes. How many companies other than AIG are handing out similar bonuses? A lot. Is the public equally outraged at this? Are they even aware of it? Has it finally hit home that both Geitner and the Fed were aware of the AIG bonus plan before and complicit with it before the money was distributed? Has it come across that Senator Dodd, who denied putting the clause in the stimulus package allowing the bonus to be paid, did in fact put it in? That he lied? And that Geitner did too by not coming forward with this information?

Let's see where the outrage is for a few other things like the multi million dollar contracts athletes get, not to mention signing bonuses for untried players. How about the cost to tax payers when they're held hostage by team owners who want a new stadium or arena and won't put up the money themselves but threaten to pull the team? Where's the outrage from the people who will never make that kind of money nor get those bonuses nor even attend a game. A game! I won't even get into the money Hollywood puts out for trash! Where's the outrage? All the while this is happening people are still losing their jobs and their homes.

At the moment everything bailout is in a state of chaos. It reminds me a bit of the French Revolution when Marie Antoinette was saying, "Let them eat cake" as the people were starving. The people rebelled and aristocratic heads rolled. A parallel exists here by looking at how the web that has been spun is beginning to strangle those who wove it. That's why I suggested in yesterday's post it's time for Obama to scale back his own big picture agenda and get a handle on what in the grand scheme of things should be a relatively minor blip. Or does he really want this "revolution" to continue fomenting?

Obama should take note of Georges Danton, a revolutionist himself who fell out with Robespierre. He's noted for saying, as he went to meet Madam Guillotine, "La revolution devore ses enfantes." The revolution eats it's own children. What did he do that was so egregious to the more extreme of his own kind? He was not a fanatic and was capable of moderation and genuine reason.

This is how I view Obama. However, if he doesn't start leading, the more extreme segments of his own party as well as we, his people may begin a revolution he'll not be able to contain. Maybe now is the time for some heads to roll!