Move on.
The Urban Dictionary calls a "brain fart" something "ill considered and done impulsively."
A week after printing an odd, self-destructive editorial by the Mail Tribune owner/publisher, Steve Saslow returns with a sound, reflective explanation. I think we should use the first editorial to learn some lessons, then assume that what he really meant was the second one.
Take a moment to read editorial number two: Click: Saslow
There are several lessons to learn here.
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| Don't bother clicking. |
Saslow has moved on and we should, too.
The lesson to be extracted is that newspapers and longer-form journalism and commentary provide opportunities for careful reflective thought. Newspapers are better than social media. They are curated and most of the content passes through several hands. That insulates the author and reader from brain fart silliness.
Lesson 2. Sanders, the Socialist, is a trigger. Boomers in their 60s learned different lessons than younger people learned. The second editorial doesn't apologize, but it notes the Sanders problem. Boomers perceive "socialism" itself, and accusations of being a "socialist sympathizer," as toxic. The centerpiece of GOP policy from 1945 to 2016 was opposition to and containment of communism, which in practice meant socialism. It was a hammer used against Democrats, who were always at risk of being called "soft on communism." JFK worked against that accusation, campaigning in 1960 saying there was a missile gap he would close and that he would lead America to pay any price and bear any border to stop communism. Saslow cited JFK as the kind of Democrat he liked. The war against Vietnam pursued by JFK, then LBJ, and then Nixon was an effort to prove we weren't soft on Chinese communism.
Saslow's generation associates "socialism" with tyranny, and Sanders is attempting to normalize the term. It is a hard sell, made harder by the flaming words of some of Sanders' young supporters. Sanders isn't extreme? Well his supporters can be.
These two comments were posted in the past twelve hours in response to my post introducing Tom Steyer as a candidate. Prosperous boomers see this kind of talk as a threat.
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| Progressive rage elicits a rage response |
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| Sanders supporter fuels the pushback |
Lesson 3. The Mail Tribune has lost some of its institutional good will capital. The paper is changing. It needed to change because its advertising model changed out from under it and the habits of its readers have changed. There have been layoffs of reporters and the paper is thinner, with less local news. Readers have noticed. Subscription pricing is the opposite of Airline Loyalty model, and that, too, has eroded trust.
Social media was full of people eager to pile onto the Tribune. If there were any fans of the Tribune, people saying they loved seeing less local news and preferred the filler material and new editorial outlook, I have not seen it. There is a meme circulating that the Tribune is in a self imposed death spiral.
The second do-over editorial is an effort to repair that. It seems to understand the paper's opportunity. A newspaper has space actually to explain a local issue, while a television report might simply present a "balanced" story by showing 20 seconds of a proponent and 20 seconds of an opponent disagreeing, introduced by the reporter talking in front of something colorful and moving, with the two interviews contextualized for a few seconds, then back to the anchor desk. Newspapers do what TV cannot do, local news in enough depth that a citizen can actually be informed. That is good.
They can also provide a forum for dissenting views, which the Tribune accommodates, even with people critical of Saslow's first editorial. Also, good.
And apparently people still read the Tribune. I do. They have inertia, an installed base of habitual readers. Saslow says they get 1.2 million readers a month on their website, a number 20 times the 60,000 I get. That is a huge asset. Saslow's second editorial says that they want to keep that readership and that they recognize that being a trusted institution is essential to their continued success. Very good.
Perhaps most important is tone. Tribune readers are accustomed to conservative partisanship in the paper. It runs columns by Cal Thomas. What Tribune readers were not accustomed to was intemperate flaming in the editorial block, with the owner stepping in to show not just who is boss, but how no one can stop him from saying what is on his mind.
So he did, in editorial number two, as well. I am going to focus on editorial number two. That is a newspaper we can respect.
3 comments:
It's not really a newspaper we can respect, because no matter what his upbringing, the things Saslow said about Bernie Sanders, no matter of your opinion of him or his positions, simply aren't true. The repetition of Fox News talking points is not an editorial, it's propaganda, which is what both of Saslow's editorials read like. Yes, we must engage in respectful dialogue, but when demagoguery and lies (yes, actual lies) are the foundation of the opponents argument, there is nary a place for common ground. I think you're letting this guy off way too easy.
Steven Saslow is a pathological liar, as are his "reporters".
The Miriam Webster definition of socialism: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.
In his original editorial Saslow's sloppy analysis conflates the reforms that Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and other democrat candidates with "socialism/communism". At no point during the 2016 democrat primary, or at any other time in his long political career, has Sander's advocated for "the government ownership and administration of the means of production and the distribution of goods". In fact, Sanders has argued that the role of the government in a capitalist society should be to guarantee that the majority of the citizens should benefit the most from that society. Sanders argues that this can be accomplished through traditional government roles, such as taxation and regulation and entitlement programs. Sanders does not want the government to take over the health care industry in the US, he wants medicare for all, making the government the single payer to the private healthcare industry. This would drive down healthcare costs per capita and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of our healthcare system, like it has for every other industrialized nation on the planet. He wants to extend the free public education system that currently covers education from pre-K to high school, to include community colleges and eventually 4 years of undergraduate college. He wants a livable wage paid to all working Americans - again a regulatory move, and not, by definition, socialism. Saslow's attempts to paint Sander's and Warren's policy goals as "socialism/communism" just make him sound ignorant. America has been a social democracy since the 1930's, and if he has an example of a purely capitalistic society that has no socialist programs ingrained in it's government, he should point that out - but he won't because such a society does not exist. I would also ask Saslow what government reforms he would suggest to reverse the growing wealth inequality that exists in this country. And finally, I find it almost impossible to believe that Saslow's claim that he is a lifelong democrat; that may be the most mystifying thing I read in his editorial.
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