In the Shadows

 

Fairness.  You expected it in the courts.  With judges.  I expected it with the daily newspapers.

Today it as reported on the Workday Minnesota website that last September when the Twin Cities labor community rallied outside a Wayzata’s office for Wayzata Investment Partners, the Minneapolis Star Tribune did not cover that story.  The rally concerned the attempt of Wayzata Investment Partners, the private equity investment firm, to impose dramatic concessions in workers’ wages and benefits on Cascade Pacific Pulp, a longtime union paper mill in Halsey, Oregon. The rally was in the wake of the Republican National Convention and was an attempt to get visiting protesters in town to support steelworkers from Oregon.  It was not a local story but the “anarchist” website, self-described, had directed their supporters to stick around for an extra day or two to attend the rally.

 

David Brauer of MinnPost has since reported in the last month that Wayzata Investment Partners was the largest creditor of Avista Capital Partners as revealed in documents filed in the bankruptcy procedure of the Minneapolis Star Tribune.  Avista Capital Partners had purchased the Star Tribune in December 2006. 

 

It might be fair to conclude that the Minneapolis Star Tribune will not be fairly covering the story of their own bankruptcy. 

For anyone cheering for the paper to survive, this news does call the question how Avista can declare one business bankrupt yet continue to operate businesses that operate oil rigs and manufacture wound care products.  In the world of investments, it no longer was the doctrine of survival of the fittest and the hunger that goes with the quest, but simply one of money for money’s sake, when the end justifies the means.  

 

Most of the news today was about the ground hog seeing its shadow, without mention what was lurking in the shadows. 

 

Fairness.  I expected it with the daily newspapers.  

Insurable Interest

Accountability and public policy:  The police professional liability insurance paid for by the Republican Party’s host committee reportedly hs a coverage limit of $10 million for resulting damages, and providing for costs of legal expense for allegations against law enforcement officials accused of misconduct including the violation of civil rights. The Associated Press reported today that Mayor Chris Coleman was the one who insisted the host committee purchase the policy with its private donations rather than the city of St. Paul.  The article states there are in St. Paul some critics who suggest insurance only encourages police to use aggressive tactics, when the city does not have to pay damages.  Along that line, those critics must think insurance on personal automobiles increase negligent driving.   

A better question is “What does it say when someone else pays damages for the action of people under your control?”  A spokeswoman in New York City’s law department told the reporter that New York City still faces more than 400 lawsuits from some of the 1,800 people arrested at the 2004 GOP convention.  The premium paid by the RNC Host Committee was reportedly $1.1 million.  How could underwriters from Lexington Insurance ever expect to turn a profit by insuring such events?  Did they really do their homework?

Were there legal opinions gathered before the preemptive raid of offices being rented by I-Witness Video for its work during the Convention, with computers, equipment allegedly conviscated and not returned?  If legal opinions  were not obtained, this looked like an intentional act by the police that should not be covered by insurance. 

A License to Steal

An editorial voice:  How much can you trust NBC or Yahoo?  These looked to be the inheritors of the journalistic tradition in the new media. 

On the collapse of newspapers, there was an unruly public.  Blog entries often find readers saying that this is what the newspapers deserve.  There was a “new paradigm,” and the newspapers had failed to change in this new world order, according to media critics.  “The new paradigm” was mentioned in a hostile question to Mark Halperin the other night at a forum sponsored by the St. Paul Public Library. 

If the news media creed was based upon an institutional voice in the presentation of explanations of the world and world events, the standards of care were now facing a dramatic shift.  The shift was every bit as frightening as living through Hurricane Katrina. 

 

Today in the New York Times, Andrew Jacobs has a piece about what NBC and NBC News has yet to address.  Writing from Beijing, Jacobs points out that the announced protest zones set up by the Chinese government during the Olympics that their citizens might have a “channel to voice grievances otherwise ignored by party officials and the state media,” after applying for a protest license, had yet to see one protest.  Yet the government had a list of applicants to investigate of Chinese people who desired to “hold their demonstrations in designated places.”

 

Without a story from the network on this, NBC had displayed that NBC News was not the channel to watch in the pursuit of Truth.  NBC was following the recent example of Yahoo in China as collaborators to make money on sport, abandoning the concept of news.  “With four days left before the closing ceremony, the authorities acknowledge that they have yet to allow a single protest,” Jacobs reported.  Prior to the opening ceremony, the president of the International Olympic Committee had offered assurances that the Olympics would result in a more open China, advancing issues of human freedom.  The International Olympic Committee with NBC surely was in bed with the Chinese government, in order to make as much money as possible this August.  

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/sports/olympics/21protest.html

The issue of protest and security would be tested in the coming weeks in my hometown, as it got ready to host the Republican National Convention.  As someone who lived within walking distance of the Xcel Arena, it had seemed reasonable to request that protesters apply for licenses to demonstrate.  But the question to ponder, on issues of license to protest, was about how different this current government was from the government in China. 

                 

And the awarding of broadcasting rights to NBC by the International Olympic Committee seems little more than a license to steal, sacrifing journalistic integrity.  

POST SCRIPT:

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5i3OMvEA_ehIHkQwvUsKHCWZ5QzIAD92P1F4G0

 

“No rallies were held throughout the entire Olympics in three parks designated as protest zones after Chinese officials declined to issue permits to 77 applicants, and detained some of them. But mostly foreign activists staged a series of small illegal demonstrations near Olympic venues and at Beijing landmarks.”

“The foreigners, for the most part, unveiled “Free Tibet” banners before being seized by security officials, hustled into cars and taken away to be put on flights out of China.”

“A handful journalists trying to cover the protests were roughed up by authorities then released. There were also tensions with the media over China restricting access to the Internet.”

“Beijing had promised the media freedom to report the games and announced the protest parks as part of efforts to address criticism that China should not have been awarded the games because of its human rights record and tight controls on internal dissent.”

“The White House said in a statement that eight individuals — James Powderly, Brian Conley, Jeffrey Rae, Jeff Goldin, Michael Liss, Tom Grant, Jeremy Wells and John Watterberg — were deported by Chinese authorities at 9 p.m. Sunday Beijing time on a China Air flight to Los Angeles.”  Associated Press Story on the last day of the summer olympcis by By ROHAN SULLIVAN