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Tag Archives: Post-Dispatch

Civility starts at home, Trumpies

25 Friday Nov 2016

Posted by willykay in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Civility, Donald Trump, free speech, harassment, missouri, Post-Dispatch, St. Louis

As an antidote to post-election despair, coupled with disgust at the endless exhortations to be civil and strive for unity with an opposition that elected an ignorant, narcissistic grifter to lead the country, I wrote a letter to the editor (LTE) of the St. Louis Dispatch that was published on November 16. It was subsequently republished on the blog, Occasional Planet. The letter itself is not the subject of this post, however, but rather the chilling nature of the response it generated.

A few days ago, I received a phone message from a representative of the Post-Dispatch inquiring about whether or not I had received any “blowback” from the LTE since a gentleman in the same suburb in which I live had been receiving lots of unwarranted and unpleasant attention based on the mistaken perception that he had authored the letter. The mistake is easily explained. My first name “Willy” is a shortened version of a feminine name, and the gentleman in question is named “William,” shares my last name, and lives in the same suburb. Evidently some rabid Trumpie with more anger than brains had tried to look me up by name and city, the only identifiers printed in the paper, and jumped to the conclusion that the first likely name he found was the anti-Trump offender whom he/she needed to silence.

In a subsequent conversation with the Post-Dispatch representative, I learned that the harassment was repeated over time and had reached the level of stalking. The Trumpie thug had informed his “lefty” victim that he knew the type of car he drives and would be watching him. This type of implied threat, according to my informant, had left the poor man understandably nearly distraught.

I have never spoken to this man and cannot think of anything to do to help alleviate the distress he is experiencing because of my opinions – which I will, however, continue to express. In the future, though, I will use my full first name if I submit any more letters to the paper in order to avoid implicating the many innocent Williams in the area. Of course I know that small potatoes are the ones that grow in the future when the problem is here and now.

It’s also true that I don’t want to invite the attentions of this or any other unhinged rightwing crackpot; we’ve already experienced random if minor vandalism on our property in past years and, thanks to the NRA, people have far too much leeway in Missouri to shoot whenever emotion moves them. I also hope that the victim of these implicit efforts to violently repress free speech reports them to the police. If nothing more, we need to establish an official record of threats that are delivered in Trump’s name.

Ironically, the letter that started it all addressed my belief that civility is not likely to be effective in dealing with a Trump-led government, and that unity with folks espousing odious goals is not desirable. And then, what do you know? A Trump supporter showed me just how much value Trumpies place on civil discourse. In case you’re interested, here is the text of the letter (see if you can find the outstanding grammatical error)

I have read several letters in this space urging those who voted for Hillary Cointon – winner of the popular vote – to be gracious in defeat and unify behind President-elect Donald Trump. As well-meant as such exhortations are, they ignore the fact that, based on Trump’s rhetoric and the team of advisors he has assembled, many Americans are frightened for our future and the future of our country. There is too much at stake to sit back and pretend it’s business as usual.

Trump actively encouraged a nativist coalition that includes overt racists. He acquiesced in essentially treasonous Russian meddling in an American election. He has promised to curtail press freedom, and impose the socio-religious preferences of a rightwing Christian minority on the entire country. His inner circle includes advocates of police state tactics and torture.

Trump has given the thumbs up to Paul Ryan’s plans to gut Medicare under the guise of replacing Obamacare – the loss of which will itself will cost millions of us our healthcare. Efforts to decimate Social Security are on the horizon. Environmental protection is now a dead letter.

Trump has pledged to nominate Supreme Court Justices who will enable all these depredations while supporting “business friendly” laws that sustain the creation of a corporate oligarchy.

If you think that Trump’s cadres care about civility, you are fooling yourself. This is not the time for exchanging polite nothings; it’s time to get ready for the fight of our lives.

Interestingly, another contributor to the Post-Dispatch’s letters section experienced a similarly uncivil response – while the semi-illegible letter she received is not as frightening as threats of implied bodily harm and evidence of stalking, it is scary enough that it was placed in her home’s mailbox, indicating that a writer who feels that Trump’s election entitles her/him to express his/her inner ugliness knows where she lives.

It’s fitting that the moral of this story seems to confirm the message of my LTE, that “if you think Trump’s cadres care about civility you are fooling yourself.” It is clear that the only thing they care about is submission on the part of their opponents, which leads to the second lesson to be learned: watch out and take care – there are plenty of potential recruits for an American brownshirt-stlyle militia just raring to get going.

*2nd sentence of 4th paragraph slightly edited (11/25/16, 9:33 pm)

Tony Messenger is a meanie

02 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

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Tags

ACA, health care, missouri, Obamacare, Post-Dispatch, Tiny Messenger, Twitter

Tony Messenger, of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, via Twitter today:

Tony Messenger ‏@tonymess

About 6 million more Americans have insurance today than they did in 2013. #Obamacare will never, ever be repealed. [….] 11:23 AM – 2 Jan 14

He linked to an article in The Atlantic:

….Only 10,000 people whose individual-market plans have been cancelled or slotted for cancellation under the Affordable Care Act will be unable to get affordable insurance going forward, according to a new report from Democrats on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. That’s “0.2 percent of the oft-cited 5 million cancellations statistic,” The Plum Line noted. The vast majority should be eligible to stay on their existing plans, thanks to the administration’s last-minute fix to permit this, or get subsidies through the exchanges, according to the report. The rest should be able to obtain affordable catastrophic-care plans, according to the congressional staffers. Still, there are bound to be enough people who previously had something better among the nearly one million people the report says could at least get catastrophic care plans that concerns and objections will continue into the new year. But the specter of a massive increase in uninsurance due to the Affordable Care Act seems unwarranted, the report makes clear, because that projection fails to take into account the variety of insurance options now available.

That upset someone:

Gregg Keller ‏@RGreggKeller

@tonymess Alternate reading: 4M more dependent on govt. 2M enrolled in OCare. 5M forced off their existing coverage. 11:31 AM – 2 Jan 14

Tony Messenger responded:

Tony Messenger ‏@tonymess

@RGreggKeller Alternate reading: Republican consultant machine freaking out because good hair and “repeal Obamacare” is all they’ve got. 11:35 AM – 2 Jan 14

Game. Set. Match. Nothin’ but net.

We couldn’t help ourselves:

Michael Bersin ‏@MBersin

@tonymess Okay, now you’re just toying with them. #battleofwitswithunarmed 11:48 AM – 2 Jan 14

President Obama will be visiting Warrensburg, Missouri next week

20 Saturday Jul 2013

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

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Tags

media criticism, missouri, Obama, Post-Dispatch, St. Louis, Warrensburg

This is the funniest take on that:

President Obama to visit Warrensburg, Mo.

July 18, 2013 5:49 pm  •  By Nicholas J.C. Pistor

The White House announced that President Barack Obama will visit Warrensburg, Mo., for a speech on the economy.

[….]

Warrensburg is on the western side of Missouri, about 60 miles southeast of Kansas City.  Obama hasn’t visited St. Louis since 2011.

[emphasis added]

Seriously? Uh, the last time President Obama visited Warrensburg was, well, never.

RFT piping up about the rally; Post offering lame excuses

16 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

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Tags

missouri, Post-Dispatch, Rally against corporate greed

Plenty of local leftwing activists have been fuming about the Post-Dispatch not covering the union rally last Friday, and plenty of them wrote the P-D to complain. Those of us who did got this reply from editor Christopher Ave:

We had a reporter at the rally, but he was called away to help cover local reactions to the tsunami.

The Riverfront Times has picked up the story, linking to our site and to St. Louis Activist Hub. I especially appreciated RFT’s response to Ave’s form letter:

Pardon me, but who gives a rat’s ass what Joe Hoosier in south city thinks about the tragedy in Japan?

Apparently the Post still doesn’t get it. We feel as if it will cover Tea Partiers if they drop an extra lump of sugar in their drinks. But cover people fighting to preserve a middle class? How boring.

Activist Hub deconstructs Ave’s lame excuse and illustrates the disparity in the Post’s coverage of us and the TP:

Furthermore, compare this non-coverage to the fact that the Post-Dispatch bends over backwards to write a 600 word article about a tea party rally with 1/8 as many people last April. Would they even dream of ignoring a 1,000 person rally from the tea party, let alone a 4,000 person rally, in St. Louis? Of course not.

The Post-Dispatch fails St. Louisans again

13 Sunday Mar 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

missouri, Post-Dispatch, Rally against corporate greed

St. Louis Activist Hub has a posting praising the good coverage from some media outlets of Friday night’s 4300 strong rally at Kiener Plaza and decrying the inexcusable lack of coverage from others, especially KMOV and the Post-Dispatch.

And the Post-Dispatch ignoring this story? Ahhh, where do I start? Perhaps Post-Dispatch political director Christopher Ave needs to meet with some union members just like he invited Dana Loesch to coach him on how to cover the tea party. Of course, we don’t need to ask how the Post-Dispatch owners feel about workers: they quite clearly do not care at all about them, to the point where they’re willing to break written agreements and drop health care coverage for people with cancer in order to save a few pennies.

When the story of the strikes in Wisconsin broke, the Post was silent about it for the first couple of days. I wrote at the time about activist Marilyn Morton calling the paper to complain about that. She was told that the Post focuses on local news. It’s pitiful enough that the paper founded by Joseph Pulitzer would have ignored such a crucial story, but at least if the P-D wants to focus on local news, then by god let them DO it. Ignoring a rally 4500 strong called about an issue that is sweeping the nation–corporate greed and the war on working people–is hardly “covering” local news. After all, Jo Mannies, who used to write for them and now works at the online newspaper, The Beacon, was at the rally and did a fine piece about it.

If it weren’t for Kevin Horrigan and the other fine op-ed writers at the Post-Dispatch, I’d drop my subscription yesterday.

The Post-Dispatch picks on Maria

20 Sunday Feb 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

"The Mean Girls & Boys Club", drug testing, Maria Chappell-Nadal, missouri, Post-Dispatch

The Sunday Post-Dispatch ran an editorial about “The Mean Girls & Boys Club”, which described the most gratuitously nasty bills introduced in the current Missouri legislature:

[A] truly mean bill creates hardship for classes of people without sound public purpose. A truly mean bill is based on prejudice, not fact.

The column spewed mean ideas: cutting COLAs for minimum wage earners; weakening child labor laws; designating the day after Thanksgiving until Dec. 26th as the Christmas Season; requiring welfare recipients to undergo drug testing; requiring Voter ID, which would disenfranchise many elderly, poor and disabled voters; and making it harder for fired workers to prove discrimination.

In yet one more example of the press’s willingness to draw a false equivalence in order to appear unbiased, the list of a dozen legislators who’ve introduced such bills included one Democrat, Maria Chappelle-Nadal. It would be imprudent of the Post to print such a column without a Democrat on the list. Chappelle-Nadal’s supposedly mean bill would require drug testing for those elected to the legislature. But if memory serves, and I can’t find proof of it on the internet, she introduced the bill only as a sarcastic comeback at the people who want to require drug testing of welfare recipients–sort of a “sauce for the goose” move. Since the P-D editorial opened her section with that very phrase, I get the feeling they suspect the same thing about the bill.

Since Chappelle-Nadal is very concerned about finding the funds for testing all welfare recipients, she probably relished introducing a bill that would require those mean Republicans to submit to the test AND pay for it themselves. Like I said, though, the editorial staff had to have at least one Democrat so as not to appear biased, even if including her in the list was … kind of mean.

Hey, editors, it is what it is. The Republicans are the mean ones. And your false equivalence doesn’t get you off the hook with them; all it does is embarrass you.  

Wisconsin strikes? Who knew?

18 Friday Feb 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

missouri, Post-Dispatch, Wisconsin public sector strikes

Last evening, local activist Marilyn Morton was telling me that she opened the Thursday Post-Dispatch and found no mention of the strikes in Wisconsin. She called the P-D to see if she could possibly have overlooked it. Surely the Post wouldn’t pass up such an important story. The woman who answered informed Marilyn that the Post is a local newspaper now. But Marilyn persisted: “What do you mean, local? You carry stories on Pakistan.” And then she explained that some 30,000 public sector workers were striking in Wisconsin–the biggest strike that state has ever seen.

“Oh! Really?” said the voice on the other end of the line. “Hmm.”

The Post covered the story this morning.

I’m sure there were people on staff there better informed about Wisconsin than the lady who answers the phones. They were probably going to cover it this morning anyway. Right? But Marilyn’s complaint couldn’t have hurt.

Lee Enterprises has turned a once great newspaper parochial. It’s sad, but what the hey? Their profit margin is doing nicely.

The Post-Dispatch doesn't deserve to brag about being founded by Joseph Pulitzer

16 Wednesday Feb 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

McClatchy, missouri, Post-Dispatch, social security

It’s bad enough that mainstream media repeat answers from the right and the left in he said/she said fashion as if all responses were equally credible. But when the Post-Dispatch publishes a front page McClatchy article that repeats a Republican lie as if it were incontrovertible fact, I grind my teeth. So I wrote them:

I don’t know which is more culpable: a newspaper founded by Joseph Pulitzer for printing an article which falsely claims that Social Security is “driving the national debt skyward” or McClatchy newspapers, which circulates throughout the entire nation, for saying so. That claim, made in “Blueprint targets deficit, spending” (Feb. 14) is ridiculous on its face. First, Social Security takes no government funds. None. So how could it drive the debt up? It’s totally funded by its participants, which makes it an insurance program. How dare McClatchy and the Post  besmirch the reputation of the most beloved and important social program this nation has ever seen! Republicans have been spreading this calumny, and the Post should be ashamed for printing it.

Furthermore, Social Security is so fundamentally strong that it is fully funded at least through 2039, and any problems that might arise at that point could be easily fixed simply by raising the cap on Social Security taxes. Meantime, it is so healthy that its extra funds must be invested; therefore, Social Security has been buying T-Bonds. The truth, then, is that our government has been relying on Social Security to buys its bonds. It has not been propping up a program that contributes to the deficit. So Social Security has been supporting the government, all the while maintaining its own fiscal integrity.

If you got yourself into hock and borrowed a thousand bucks from a friend, would you blame your friend for your debt?

The editorial staff at the P-D is sharp. I get valuable information and well substantiated opinion from them regularly. But you know what I want to see the op-ed staff do? Write an editorial taking the paper’s own front page coverage to task when it offers lies to the reading public.

Post-Dispatch owners are willfully harming many of their retirees

28 Friday Jan 2011

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Fred Jackson, health care, Lee Enterprises, missouri, Post-Dispatch

When Lee Enterprises bought the Post-Dispatch, it lured many older employees into retiring early with the promise of free health care for life. Now the corporation is dumping those retirees off their health care. It could afford to honor its contract, but the execs have decided they’re … not in the mood.

Fred Jackson, who has cancer, is about to be bankrupt because of their heartlessness and greed.

As Jackson points out, there are no federal laws sanctioning corporations for breaking this kind of contract, as there are for refusing to pay pensions. There should be, because Jackson, even with the help of the Newspaper Guild, which is suing Lee, cannot protect himself against the company for flouting its contracts. He and the other retirees need a government that can predict and protect people against these bunco games.

As it is, Jackson finds himself in a Catch-22 that even the new health care law would not have prevented had it been fully in effect. Am I correct in that assumption? And if I am, could legislation prevent corporations from indulging in this bait and switch? Or are ordinary people, no matter what laws are passed, at the mercy of businesses with in-house legal staff that can fend them off for years or decades?

Opinions, anyone?

Health insurance profits aren't anemic

06 Friday Nov 2009

Posted by Michael Bersin in Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

AHIP, health insurance profits, missouri, Post-Dispatch

Figures lie and liars, well, you know. Liars in the health insurance industry are going to plenty of trouble to disseminate their latest lying figures. The Post-Dispatch printed them a week ago Monday, in an AP news article.

Quick quiz: What do these enterprises have in common? Farm and construction machinery, Tupperware, the railroads, Hershey sweets, Yum food brands and Yahoo?

Answer: They’re all more profitable than the health insurance industry.

Health insurance profit margins typically run about 6 percent, give or take a point or two. That’s anemic compared with other forms of insurance and a broad array of industries, even some beleaguered ones.

Profits barely exceeded 2 percent of revenue in the latest annual measure. This partly explains why the credit ratings of some of the largest insurers were downgraded to negative from stable heading into this year, as investors were warned of a stagnant if not shrinking market for private plans.

Then on Thursday, the P-D gave an insurance industry spokeshole space on the op-ed page to reiterate that line:

Health insurers’ profits are 3 percent to 5 percent. The average profit margin for Standard & Poor’s 500 is 12 percent.

Chances are good that the AP story quoted above also appeared in the KC Star, not to mention the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Chicago Sun Times, the Dallas Herald, the Los Angeles Times and …..

Before you shed any tears for the way that WellPoint and UnitedHealth have been vilified for excessive profits, consider a study released by HCAN (Health Care for America Now) late last May, which begs to differ with the insurance company line:

Profits at 10 of the country’s largest publicly traded health insurance companies rose 428 percent from 2000 to 2007, while consumers paid more for less coverage. One of the major reasons, according to a new study, is the growing lack of competition in the private health insurance industry that has led to near monopoly conditions in many markets.

(…)

In the past 13 years, more than 400 corporate mergers have involved health insurers, and a small number of companies now dominate local markets but haven’t delivered on promises of increased efficiency. According to the American Medical Association, 94 percent of insurance markets in the United States are now highly concentrated, and insurers are thriving in the anti-competitive marketplace, raking in enormous profits and paying out huge CEO salaries.

Of course, we shouldn’t let our wish for affordable health care make villains where they don’t exist. How can we be sure that the HCAN report is more reliable than the info the Post-Dispatch is helping health insurers disseminate? For starters, AHIP (America’s Health Insurance Plans) has been zig zagging between various untruths and misrepresentations so regularly that AHIP President and CEO, Karen Ignagi, thinks a zig zag is the shortest distance between two points.

A story by Joanne Silberner at NPR explains this specific misrepresentation:

Insurers are measuring their profits against total health care spending. That’s all the money you and I and employers and insurers and the government spend for doctors’ visits, hospitalizations, drugs and other things.

By using the total health care costs, their profits look lower.

All this is not to say that insurance company profits are the only driving force in rising health care costs. But when you know that AHIP is lying to you, you get understandably cynical about any of their pretended promises to cooperate.  

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