Friday, April 16, 2010

Listen Up, Morris Family -- Newspapers Owe A Duty of Care, Loyalty and Trust to Their Readers -- What do you reckon?

Editor and Publisher magazine reports that newspapers in bankruptcy “stiffed" creditors for $2 billion.
See below.
Creditors aren’t the only ones people who have been "stiffed."
Newspaper readers are not getting news they’re paying for – newspapers such as the St. Augustine WRecKord have stopped covering local news, failing to investigate government and corporate wrongdoing.
Newspaper employees, including journalists, are being terminated by the carload.
Newspapers are abusing free interns, using them to cover news without complying with minimum wage laws.
Newspapers have lost classified advertising business to the Internet, including Craig’s List.
Newspapers have lost readers to the Internet because it’s free.
Newspapers have adopted a defeatist attitude, violating the rights of their employees and disrespecting their readers.
Newspapers are kissing up to the rich and powerful, whether advertisers or governments, to get money. This means that the City of St. Augustine, St. Johns County, and other organizations that spend lots of money on legal advertisements get even more somnambulistic coverage than they did before.
Two local St. Augustine residents have asked a U.S. District Court in Georgia to examine the MORRIS PUBLISHING bankruptcy with a gimlet eye – particularly the Bankruptcy Court decision’s refusal to grant an unopposed motion to intervene in the bankruptcy of the St. Augustine Record’s parent company.
The WRecKord’s corporate lawyers refuse to commit to keep the St. Augustine Record open. They have threatened to seek attorney fees and costs and claim it will cost them “tens of thousands of dollars” to defend against our l’il ‘ole intervention petition.
If the WRecKord and other newspapers would be true to the Founding Father’s vision – instead of corporate greed – they would not have been in bankruptcy court int the first place. Their product is becoming obsolete and noisome because they just won’t cover fraudfeasors, wetland-destroyers, tree-killers, polluters, unionbusters, price-fixers, monopolists, waste, fraud, abuse, misfeasance, malfeasance and nonfeasance.
They’d rather stiff their creditors for $2 billion and give newspaper readers handouts.
Is that all you’ve got, Morris Publishing?
Since Morris has not dared to file anything substantive in federal court about the low and declining quality of journalism in St. Augustine, Florida, we know that they have no defense.
So rather than spend tens of thousands of dollars defending the indefensible, why won’t they just promise to keep the St. Augustine Record open?
Why would they think that insulting their customers – and threatening to pursue a Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation against us – would help it win friends and influence people?
Why won’t they hold another Open House – as they did upon the completion of the Record’s new building – and invite readers to comment about the quality of the Record’s coverage and how it can be improved?
Why won’t they appoint an Ombudsperson – as the New York Times and other quality newspapers have – to monitor journalistic ethics and quality?
Why won’t the WRecKOrd report the news that they know, instead of being lickspittles, doormats and tools for the ruling classes, whether it is City Manager WILLIAM B. HARRISS (a/k/a “WILL HARASS”) in City Hall, the Courthouse Gang in St. Johns County, or Congressman JOHN LUIGI MICA, as lugubrious a bunch of goobers who ever made a chair squeak?
Could it be that mediocrity and mendacity are encouraged by the MORRISS FAMILY in Augusta, Georgia?
Could it be that they want to use their economic power – and the forgiveness of hundreds of millions of dollars in debt in bankruptcy – to back the Repug thugs who share in their ideological perversions – empowering polluters, union-busters, price-fixers, monopolists and the rape of taxpayers?
What do you reckon?
Will the MORRIS FAMILY show the perspicacity to meet with concerned newspaper readers, instead of kicking us in the teeth with baby-talkin’, jive newspapers that fail to protect the public interest?
Or will they let some hobbledehoy in their employ continue to threaten the First Amendment with idiotic statements about reserving the right to seek attorney fees and costs, simply for seeking the right to be heard in Federal Court?
What do you reckon?

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