The Std-Ex editorial board comes out in favor of a 25th or 26th Street streetcar corridor
Fine Standard-Examiner editorial this morning, touting streetcars as the only realistic Ogden City public transit solution.
And in this aspect, we believe editorial page editor Doug Gibson gets it particularly right:
Also to be decided is the route a streetcar or bus will take from the intermodal hub to WSU. It will head east toward Washington Boulevard. There are several directions it can take to Harrison Boulevard and WSU.[...] One idea we have is to make sure that the corridor extends through central Ogden, perhaps 25th or 26th Street. Making downtown Ogden a more desirable place to have an apartment or home is an added benefit streetcars can bring.
The Std-Ex also issues a friendly reminder:
UTA wants to hear public comment on the routes.[...] We urge local residents to state their opinions. It will be a chance to help determine a mass transit option that will be with us for generations.
We'll join with the Standard-Examiner in urging those readers who haven't yet expressed their preferences to do so now, before it's too late. In that connection we link to this 3/30/09 WCF article, which provides instructions about how you can accomplish that.
And for those readers who'd like to get it done right now, without any unnecessary muss and fuss, we helpfully provide the designated UTA email contact link:
We urge you to express your preference for streetcars as the only realistic mode of Ogden public transit, and for a 25th or 26th Street corridor as the best choice for the east-west leg.
Several items which don't quite fit neatly in with other topics downthread
By Curmidgeon
I'd like to direct my fellow WCF Readers' attention to two interesting news items, which don't quite fit in with the topics downthread:
First, The SL Weekly's latest issue features a long story implying that Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff [who received over $185K from various call-center companies last campaign] has been going easy, and arranging very low fines etc. for Utah call centers caught by Utah government engaging in fraudulent practices. [I thought the article suggestive, but not conclusive.] But these two paragraphs caught my eye. Here's the first:
The only public record of the $30,000 donation comes from MOA’s 2008 Year-End PAC contributor report. Shurtleff’s report does not mention the receipt of either donation. There’s no indication of the $30,000 at all. According to the State of Utah Lieutenant Governor’s Office which warehouses candidates’ campaign finance filings, without speaking to the specifics of this incident (since no complaint has been filed the office has not investigated) the missing expenditure on the report means either Shurtleff never reported receiving the money or he went back to the electronic report filing and deleted any note of ever receiving the money. Here's the first:
And here's the other:
According to Joe Demma, chief of staff for Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert, there is only one office that can really investigate and enforce compliance for negligent campaign finance filings—the Attorney General’s Office.
Secondly, The City Weekly is currently running a letter to the editor from Tom Owens of Farmington, who is I think is a sometime poster here at Weber County Forum. The letter deals with Hizzonah Mayor Godfrey, and with what Mr. Owens thinks is the City Weekly's unwarranted praise for Ogden's 25th Street as a party zone. It is interesting, the letter, for both its content and for Mr. Owens'.... vigorous? spirited? pungent? all of the above?... composition thereof. Worth a look.
After its very short regular meeting last night, the city council held a work session to discuss the ongoing water projects, and especially the plans to put two new tanks above the top of 36th Street. I don't have time to write up a full report but here are a few notable points:
• The planned system will be adequate to provide sufficient water pressure to the entire east bench, up to the Bonneville Shoreline, above WSU and the golf course.
• Pressure to the highest bench areas will be provided by a new 1.25 million gallon tank whose site is yet to be determined. The engineering consultant's report shows this tank just north of Strong's Canyon, a little above the Bonneville shoreline on a corner of Chris Peterson's property. But the administration staff said they're now thinking of putting it south of Strong's Canyon on WSU property, to be accessed from the end of Beus Drive. In any case, it's clear that they haven't actually decided on a location yet and they indicated no intent to consult the city council regarding the final site selection.
• The city council pointed out that north of Strong's Canyon, the undeveloped bench areas are either city park land, or zoned as open space, or outside the city limits. The administration responded that they're designing a system to last for generations and we can't predict who might want to develop some of this property in the future. The city council also pointed out that having the water infrastructure in place will increase the likelihood of someone wanting to develop the property.
• When asked specifically about the golf course committee's plans for condominiums on city park land near Strong's Canyon, the administration staff said they didn't know any more about that proposal than what was in the newspaper, and that the water system was being designed without any specific development proposal in mind.
• Nobody asked outright why current Ogden water customers should be paying for a totally new water tank that won't be needed for decades. Yes, WSU eventually plans to build as high as the Bonneville shoreline, but not any time soon. North of Strong's Canyon, development high on the bench is prohibited by the Mt. Ogden Community Plan. The estimated cost of this tank, incidentally, is $1.6 million.
Ed. Note: Special thanks to Dan S. for the detailed writeup.
WCF reader query: How will the Godfrey cabal fund its city council candidates in 2009?
Sharp-eyed readers will note that we've made an addition to our right sidebar this morning. At the suggestion of one of our gentle readers, we've put together a poll, focusing on the 2009 Emerald City municipal election, which is looming just six months hence. Perfect suggestion for an otherwise slow news day, we think. In light of the recent Envision Ogden money laundering scandal, and the percipient injection of possible federal stimulus funds into the Ogden City treasury, our submitting reader has composed this series of timely and and highly probative queries:
How will the Godfrey cabal fund its city council candidates in 2009? • Federal stimulus funds, laundered through Envision Ogden and FNURE • RAMP grant plus creative accounting • Stuart Reid shakes down BDO tenants yet again • Gary Williams opens a sidewalk stand at the Farmer's Market, selling cures for all ailments • All of the above • Other (insert your own suggestion)
We invite all readers to click the link below to cast their votes. Alternatively, navigate to the "ballot" in our right sidebar:
We haven't run a poll in quite a long while. Hopefully our readers will all participate and help generate data which will prove useful as the 2009 municipal election fast approaches.
The Emerald City Godfrey Lemmings turn up the noise level on the eve of Boss Godfrey's $70 million golf course makeover pitch
By What It Will Cost Us
There's another wacked-out Jeanette Ballantyne Standard-Examinerletter to the editor today saying the Mt. Ogden Golf Course costs the city money and Chris Peterson graciously allows us to use the trails that cross his property. She "wants the city to be first and benefit the many." She also questions the excellent Std-Ex guest commentary which was published over a week ago by Catherine Feeny.
Well, emphasis on the so-called debt that the administration has put on the golf course seems a bit odd considering the debt we pay on The Junction for the benefit for the few that actually use The Junction.
The irony is that selling the golf course, trying to build condos, and embarking on this boondoggle development would benefit a few friends, probably Jeanette Ballantyne's friends.
This letter may be another attempt to try and influence the golf course decisions that may be in front of the City Council this week. It seems the mayor's backers are always more vocal just before issues are presented, possibly to cloud the issues.
Maybe this letter is also intended to take the heat off of the Envision Ogden fiasco and possible illegal campaign contributions too.
Top notch Scott Schwebke writeup in this morning's Standard-Examiner, shedding more light on details of the Envision Ogden political contribution money laundering scandal. Ace Reporter Schwebke has been playing the gumshoe this week doing interviews, and adds this additional info to what's become a rapidly developing and eye-opening story:
1) Political Donors: Schwebke has interviewed several; and to the last one of them he quotes, none admits to having been told beforehand that their donations would be applied to the campaigns of Eccles, Johnson (or Godfrey.) Most are expressing their ire and righteous indignation; one isn't.
2) Envision Ogden: Mr. Schwebke clarifies who currently runs Envision Ogden. Jeff Lucas admits to being the current Treasurer. Abe Shreve, who's currently lying low, apparently still heads the organization.
3) Friends of Northern Utah Real Estate (FNURE): Although the facts surrounding this shadowy organization still remain murky, Mr. Schwebke does add several tantalizing facts to the story plot. While Blain Johnson goes on record to the extent of representing that FNURE was operated by employees of a title company (Lincoln Title, which operates from Mr. Johnson's office building,) Johnson mysteriously and inexplicably refuses to name names. Even more strangely, attorney Mel Smith, both a partner in Johnson's law firm and the owner of Lincoln Title, claims he knows nothing of FNURE at all. And to top it all, Jeff Lucas, the Envision Ogden treasurer who would have presumably written $20 thousand+ in checks to FNURE, claims he doesn't know beans about this shadowy campaign funds middle man either. The silence on this aspect of the story is deafening, and strains credibility, to say the very least.
Although Mr. Schwebke has done some fine work on this story, there still remains much to be done.
Among other things, it would be interesting to get more information on Envision Ogden'sSalomon Center Sneak Preview. Did Envision Ogden actually lease the rec center for the night, or did Boss Godfrey merely provide them keys to the place gratis?
A reprise of a couple of earlier Weber County Forum articles
Inasmuch as it's once again a painfully slow Emerald City news day, we'll reprise a couple of popular articles published earlier this week on Weber County Forum:
We're bringing these items up a second time for two reasons:
1) We don't want to see the Standard-Examiner go broke, so we'd like to drive as much traffic to the Std-Ex site as we can. Now that the Standard has adopted a new policy of posting most of its stories (including political stories) on its free site, and beyond its paid Digital Edition firewall, we're throwing our full support their way.
2) Both of the above-reprised WCF articles contain links to important Std-ExOgden City political stories, with reader comment sections below the articles. Now that these stories are up on the Std-Ex Live site, the Std-Ex provides WCF readers an ideal opportunity to inform Std-Ex readers about some of the issues we regularly discuss here on our home town community blog.
It's in that connection that we urge our readers to open up these WCF articles again, navigate to the Std-Ex stories which are embedded therein as links, and post your own edifying comments in the Std-Ex comments sections.
We've believed for quite a time that the relationship between the Standard-Examiner and Weber County Forum ought to be symbiotic rather than adversarial. The Std-Ex's new open website policy provides an ideal opportunity to prove that we're right about this.
Something akin to saying that hitting the snooze button is a good start on a Monday morning
Several interesting morning articles in the northern Utah news print media, on one of our favorite and constant topics, legislative ethics reform. The Standard-Examiner comes out with yet another strong editorial this morning, bemoaning the meager and weak ethics legislation which trickled out of the 2009 legislative session, and posing the simple query: "... we shake our heads and wonder, why can't you legislators keep ethics reform simple and to the point?"
The Salt Lake Tribune also gets into the act with this story, incorporating the recent remarks of Governor Huntsman, about the Utah legislature's lightweight 2009 ethics reform work product:
Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said Friday that the ethics measures passed by the Legislature are a good first step, but he hopes the process leads to campaign finance reform and a "serious cooling-off period" before lawmakers can become lobbyists. "The good thing is the dialogue has started," Huntsman said. "Now we build upon the foundation of this Legislature's success, and I hope it goes to things like a serious cooling-off period. I hope it goes to serious campaign finance reform."
In classic journalistic he said/she said style, Tribune reporter Gehrke provides one House Republican's mealy-mouthed retort:
Rep. John Dougall, R-Highland, took issue with Huntsman characterizing the Legislature's actions as a beginning of ethics reform. "I contend it's not a start, it's just a continuation of the ongoing process," said Dougall, who is chairman of the House Ethics Committee. "Do I think that process needs to continue? Absolutely."
A distinction without a difference? You bet. Talk about putting lipstick on a pig. We think one lumpencitizen commentator under the Trib article sums it up quite elegantly however:
Huntsman's own Lt. Governor declares the law toothless and filled with loopholes, so Huntsman declares it a good start? That's like saying that hitting the snooze button is a good start on a Monday morning!
As an added bonus, we'll link to another ethics-topical story which popped up on the Std-Ex website this morning, reporting on Friday's kickoff ceremony for WSU's brand spankin' new Richard Richards Institute for Politics, Decency and Ethical Conduct. This event was also briefly mentioned in the Trib story too. We'll comment at this juncture that we're delighted to observe Utah academics rolling up their sleeves and delving into the study of such topics; and at risk of jinxing The Institute at its inception, we'll nevertheless label it a good first step.
So what about it, gentle readers? Did the laughably toothless ethics reform legislation which emerged from the legislature this year constitute "a good start?" Is it a continuation of an "ongoing process," as Rep. Dougall suggests? Is it reasonable to assume that our GOP controlled legislature will act in "good faith" and ultimately deliver the robust brand of legislative ethics reform that high double-digit percentages of the Utah lumpencitizens demand? If so, will this happen within our lifetimes? Would it make better sense for Utah voters to simply throw out the bums who merely threw us a few hollow ethics reform bones (chicken bones to be exact,) and select a more citizen-friendly batch of new legislators in 2010? Or will we just keep mindlessly re-electing the same bums again?
In closing, we'll snarkily invoke that well-worn Albert Einstein ax: "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
Don't let the cat get your tongues, O Gentle Ones.
Another stong argument for liberal "concealed carry" laws
More stirring and creepy evidence to support legalized "concealed carry laws" across the nation. The news reporting networks and other media are in an absolute tizzy about this today:
Think about it, people. It took only one heavily-armed and mentally defective idiot to wreak mass murder (13 dead at last count) against a group of American citizens, or prospective American citizens, who were innocently unarmed and completely vulnerable to this kind of mindless attack in a public place.
On the other hand, look what happened on Valentine's day 2007 at Trolley Square, where one lightly armed, concealed carry-permitted Ogden Hero held another well armed assassin at bay, in what could have been the worst of the Killer Rampage of that year, and obviously reducing the potential rampage.
We believe this massacre in Birmington could have been very well mitigated or stopped, if even a small proportion of the people had been packing heat at that New York Civic Association immigration traing center building.
One thing is clear. Once an event like this has occurred, the police show up mainly to count the bodies. Unarmed people always become the victims when all the guns are own by criminals and the criminally psychotic... and NOT by the law abiding lumpencitizens. It's up to every citizen to protect himself and his family. In events like this, every individual becomes "the first responder." When the Utopians prevent citizens from arming and protecting themselves, we'll continue to read about heart-breaking stories like this.
In spite of the public passion of modern socialists to craft the perfect Utopian society, we all have to dwell in reality. We live in a world inhabited by 6+ billion Homo Sapiens, whose animal genetics differ little from chimpanzees. And we already know how unpredictable and dangerous Chimpanzees can be .
When the shit comes down, it's up to each citizen to protect himself and his loved ones from his fellow "higher apes," we believe, until the cavalry (the police responder) arrives.
It's a jungle here on earth, people, regardless of what the "Utopians" suggest.
It's been that way for human beings since the stone age, at least.
Time for the judiciary to step up to the plate and do their job
We were hog-tied all day yesterday with personal business, thus relegating our blog posting chore temporarily to the back burner. So we'll belatedly direct our readers' attention to a highly Weber County Forum-topical letter appearing on the Standard-Examiner website yesterday. It's brief, so we'll incorporate it in full. We've also taken the editorial liberty of adding a few of our own links:
Even more fun than even an evening of "Watch Mr. Wizard" reruns
We just received this comment heads-up from gentle reader Dan S. in a lower thread:
Speaking of physics, tonight is the 3rd annual WSU Physics Open House, 5:30 - 9:30 pm, in the Lind Lecture Hall at the northeast corner of campus. This is a free family event with lectures, demonstration shows, and hands-on activities.
Ex-legislators can still register as lobbyists, it seems, immediately after losing or vacating their seats
By Curmudgeon
Well, we [the voters] have been snookered yet again by Utah's Republican legislative majority. Remember the ethics reform package that passed this term? The one papers like the Standard-Examiner thought involved, at best, minimal reform but was at least a start in that direction? And remember one of the lynchpins of that so-called reform was that it banned former legislators from lobbying the legislature for at least a year after they left the house or senate? It closed "the revolving door" for at least a year?
Well, guess what? It didn't. The bill the boys in Salt Lake passed has a loophole which permits former legislators to register as lobbyists immediately after leaving the house or senate. No delay at all. The SL Trib has the story in one of its lead editorials this morning:
Rep. Brad Dee [R-Washington Terrace], one of the bill's lead sponsors, insists the loophole was not intended. That it was inadvertent. A mis-understanding. He needs to talk to Sen. Bramble [Troglodyte, Provo]. If the boys are going to sell this scam to the public, they need to get their stories straight. Here's Bramble on the loophole:
Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, tells The Tribune that he believes "most legislators were" aware of the loophole. "The bill was plain on its face."
So, the great ethics reform bill [politely so called] was a sham. And Rep. Dee either didn't understand what was in his own bill, or [as Sen. Bramble, one of Dee's party's own legislative leaders, implies] he did know what the bill said and would do, and so is now not being honest when he claims he didn't.
Yes, ex-legislators can still register as lobbyists, it seems, immediately after losing or vacating their seats. What a surprise....
Not the time for a knuckle-headed $70 million golf course makeover plan
Yet another fine editorial in this morning's Standard-Examiner, from which we lift these opening paragraphs:
A plan to build a hotel and condominium complex on top of Ogden's 36th Street as a way to pay for improvements on Ogden's struggling Mount Ogden Golf Course is one too many irons on the fairway for Junction City. The city should say no to the $70 million plan for now. There are too many other pressing responsibilities for Ogden officials. They include a new Wal-Mart, the planned Riverfront development, and The Junction and its properties. We are very skeptical that there is a market for time shares and condominiums in this severe recession. There's already no shortage of vacant buildings or stalled developments locally that were unveiled with optimistic forecasts. The fault of that is primarily the economic recession. Many projects stalled today were sound ideas so long as we were in traditional economic times. We do not feel the economic climate -- this recession, far from over -- is favorable to a 350-unit hotel/condo complex at this time. If the city takes on a $70 million golf course improvement plan, Ogden will be biting off far more than it can chew.
Note to Boss Godfrey: Write this down, so you don't forget it. Finish those languishing city projects which you've already started. You've already bitten off more than you can chew. Demonstrate some common sense at least one time in your life. Don't spend the next year of your ever-dwindling administration as Utah's laughing stock, as you did with your urban flatland gondola. Don't launch another civil war in Ogden City.
Just a few more helpful hints from your old pal Rudi... and your friends at the Standard-Examiner (formerly your own personal "house propaganda organ.")
Taking Google Sketchup out for a test drive to get a sense of what exactly a trillion dollars looks like
A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money.
Sen. Everett Dirksen (R-Illinois) The Big Apple (1896-1969)
We received an email attachment from of our gentle readers this morning, something we found to be quite interesting:
All this talk about "stimulus packages" and "bailouts"... A billion dollars... A hundred billion dollars... Eight hundred billion dollars... One TRILLION dollars... What does that look like?
One member of the Northern Utah print media finally picks up on the Envision Ogden money laundering story UPDATED: The Standard-Examiner also belatedly gets into the act, with its own story appearing on its live website late last evening
Good news for those of us following the series of Envision Ogden political corruption stories which Dan S. earlier provided in our robust Envision Ogden Article Collection (scroll down). At long last a member of the Northern Utah print media has finally picked up on the story. Check out the just now breaking Salt Lake Tribune/Chris Smart writeup below:
Interesting legal theory that Ogden City Attorney Gary Williams advocates. If one of Boss Godfrey's friends submits a false campaign financial disclosure statement, and then sits on it for seventeen months, the problem is miraculously cured by suddenly filing a truthful statement.
Notably, It's now been five weeks since the Standard-Examiner rejected Dan Schroeder's proposed op-ed on this subject:
Hard to believe it took so long to get this far. But persistence does pay off. Any bets on how long the Std-Ex will continue to ignore this story?
We'll urge our gentle readers to get involved in this story, and to post their own remarks in the comments section under this SLTrib article. If you're not already registered to post in the SLTrib comments section, please do so. It takes about thirty seconds, tops.
Now that this story is out in the open, it's important to make sure that it doesn't get buried again.
And when you get done posting on the Trib website, don't forget to leave a few comments here.
Update 3/31/09 7:30 a.m. MT: Too funny. After completely ignoring this story for over five weeks, the Standard-Examiner hurriedly published its own Scott Schwebke writeup on its live website last night, only hours after publication of the above Salt Lake Tribune story. Shamed into it, we guess. Here's the link:
In this connection, we urge our gentle readers to visit the Std-Ex site and to offer your ever-savvy comments there, for the benefit of the Std-Ex's online readers. Unlike the Tribune site, which requires a rudimentary online registration process, the Std-Ex site permits immediate posting under your chosen screen name, hampered only by a simple and user-friendly word verification system, designed to screen out bot-generated comments spam.
Have at it, O Gentle Ones.
What a pleasure it is, to see this story finally out in the open.
Is a new American lumpencitizen revolution in the works?
Inasmuch that it's another tediously slow Emerald City news day and all, we'll provide our readers with an opportunity to leapfrog from a Standard-Examiner lead editorial which appeared in yesterday's edition. The Std-Ex Editorial Board gets off to a danged good start in the lead paragraphs when they try to characterise the mood in America, even as the less economically advantaged are shuffled off to "the Governator's" 21st century version of Steinbeck's great depression-era labor camps, while the fat cat bankers in America rake in billions in bonuses:
"Who do we shoot?" -- "Muley," in the film version of John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath." Pitchfork politics. It sort of has a catchy ring to it, particularly if you're angry at the political and financial elite in our country. And a lot of us are angry right now. That anger seems to be very bipartisan in nature. After all, not all of those AIG execs who thought they could grab a bonus on the sly can be Republicans. In fact, the two senators who received the most campaign money from AIG are the currently notorious Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and, ahem, President Obama, when he was the Democratic senator from Illinois. The recession, or embryonic depression, or whatever you call it, has a lot of scapegoats. Wall Street, Congress, President Bush, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, Bear Stearns, Republicans, Democrats ... the list is endless. We should be outraged that the political and financial classes we trust to lead economic policy allowed blind faith in past financial history to supersede caution against an expanding, defenseless. mortgage-based credit bubble. To put it straight, we've got a lot of fixing to do. Optimism, faith and hope -- all admittedly wavering at the moment -- will be necessary to get that fixing accomplished.
And from that point, the Editorial Board goes completely off-track, we believe, with this stanza, which finishes the above paragraph:
We can't get sidetracked with emotional, pitchfork anger. We're seeing too much of that from precisely those who should have cool heads.
From there, the editorial board goes even more haywire through the rest of the editorial, complaining about incivility, and of course the threats to the personal safety of those bastards who were set to receive the outrageous multi-million dollar bonuses, despite their appallingly bad business judgment. Not that we condone that, BTW.
Nevertheless, we're going to point out what Thomas Jefferson wrote about this, in of all places, the U.S. Declaration of Independence:
When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness, [Emphasis added}.
Get a grip, Standard-Examiner Editorial Board. Here's a great video we googled up a couple of days ago which we believe better expresses the lumpencitizens' anger and angst, than any of the corporo-fascist crap you can post in your editorials. It's not about ivory tower lefty-righty ideology. It's about the more basic and fundamental ideology of survival. We believe this excellent video may very well capture the sentiment of our times in America.
"We can't make it here anymore":
We don't know that this is the current mood of the lumpen proletariat across the country, but we have a strong sense that it may well be.
And if the politically-jaded Std-Ex Editorial Board chooses invoke a quote from that dastardly neoCON Robert Shapiro to the effect that current American sentiment is "a spasmodic outpouring of ideologically incoherent rage," we'll just add that the Standard and their neoCON friends from Sanduskey obviously have no concept of the "dark side" of American Democracy, in a land where agile and aggressive Americans still believe that their government should be of, by and for"the people."
Remember people, that what the Std-Ex derisively calls "pitchfork anger" is the exact same motivation which propelled American colonialists to throw over King George.
Last chance to choose your preferred east-west Ogden streetcar corridor
In connection with the two UTA "scoping" open houses which were held in Ogden last week, on 3/24/09 and 3/26/09, we've just now received this helpful update from Dan S.:
We urge those readers who were unable to attend these sessions to familiarize yourselves with these materials, and submit your own input, via the email and snail-mail addresses provided therein.
This is the lumpencitens' last chance for input, folks. Let's not blow it. Be sure to include your own names, addresses and contact information.
Special thanks to Dan S. for this timely and important update.
Perhaps even Editor Andy and his Std-Ex editor cohorts would benefit by taking a look at this
Informative Andy Howell piece in yesterday's Standard-Examiner, highlighting some of the strategies that our home town newspaper is adopting to transform itself into an internet multimedia platform, with the object of remaining relevant and profitable in the 21st century information age. Among other things, editor Andy mentions having been "contacted by a couple of people in the media industry wanting to know why the Standard-Examiner seems to be doing so much better than other newspapers in this economic climate."
Coincidentally, we also received a timely tip from one of our gentle readers yesterday, pointing toward a fine three-part article published Wednesday on one of our online favorites, the Utah Stories blog. Although Editor Andy wasn't specific, we're going to take a wild guess that it was the article's author, Leo Dirr, about whom Andy was referring above. Leo's put together a fine tome, which presents a broad overview of the challenges and difficulties the traditional print media. As an added bonus, Leo features the fruits of a recent Editor Andy interview, providing a brief glimpse into the Std-Ex's new game plan, as it struggles to survive and thrive in an era where the paper and ink format may very well go the way of the buggy whip. At risk of oversimplification, we believe Mr. Howell's below statement sums it all up:
"I think you'll see the Standard progress into an information/marketing company that produces a newspaper, rather than a newspaper that does all these other things on the side," he says.
You can read Mr. Dirr's most excellent three-part article series here:
While we're on the subject of the fate of print newspapers in the online information age, don't miss this morning's Wasatch Rambler column by the way, in which Emerald City journalistic treasure Charlie Trentelman "fights for his livelihood in the online age," and makes a strong case for the preservation of a media business model which would support paid reporters in well staffed newsrooms. We're going to go along with Charlie on this. Frankly, we don't know what we'd do without the vigorous reporting of Ace Reporter Schwebke, and a few other thoroughbred reporters in the Std-Ex stable. Seriously.
And for those readers interested in the whole enchilada, we provide a live link to Mark Potts' extremely interesting Recovering Journalist blogsite, which was referenced by Mr. Dirr in his above article. This site is entirely dedicated to a discussion of traditional media survival in the looming digital information age. Lots of interesting and topical stuff there. Perhaps even Editor Andy and his Std-Ex editor cohorts would benefit by taking a look at the material contained therein.
The floor's open, gentle readers.
You know what to do; do it in our lower comments section.
The looting of the federal treasury appears to be continuing unabated, despite a change in presidential administrations
On Monday, we posted a brief article reporting on Treasury Secretary Geithner's "Public Private Investment Plan," whereby the U.S. government will "partner" with private investors to buy troubled (toxic) assets from troubled banks. We had our doubts, frankly, about the viability of Geithner's plan. In our final paragraph, we posed these questions:
Will the implementation of this plan result in an Obama-Geithner triumph of public-private partnership collaboration; or will the taxpayers wind up holding the bag once again (to the tune of another $ 1 trillion or so)? If an auction of these troubled assets is actually held, will ANY bidders actually show up? Will the holders of these assets be willing to send them at auction, or will they continue to "sit" on them, as they're doing now?
Thanks to yesterday's story from Yahoo News, our answers are already rolling in. According to yesterday's story, several giant U.S. banks are already loading up the truck with these "toxic" assets, in anticipation of giant future profits:
A "funny" thing is happening just as Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner seems to have finally found a scheme to deal with banks' toxic debt: Some big banks are aggressively bidding for toxic debt in the open market. Specifically "Citigroup and Bank of America have been aggressively scooping up those same securities in the secondary market," Mark DeCambre of The NY Post reported earlier this week. [...] The banks contend they are helping to bring liquidity to the "frozen" mortgage-backed-securities market, as per their "marching orders" under the TARP program, DeCambre notes. [...] A less generous interpretation is that Citi and BofA (among others, no doubt) are attempting to "front run" Geithner's program, which presumably will result in banks being able to unload these assets at prices above the current "depressed" market levels - leaving taxpayers on the hook for future losses.
Check out the full article here (includes an eye-opening video):
