Perhaps We Can Wrap Fish In It?

Soooooo.... The Post Dispatch is plummeting into irrelevancy. It has no depth, no substance and often, no nothing. There is no there, there. It is pathetic at best. If I allot ten minutes each morning I can cover everything of substance in the paper. The Sports Section is still OK. Other then that...nothing. I have a personal problem in that my home delivery is getting somewhat unreliable. Unreliable is bad. It is one thing to have to read a very average paper every day. It is another thing altogether when that paper might, or might not be here at 6:30 in the morning when daddy pulls out. I just do not understand why the paper has declined so rapidly.

I do not know what every other minor/major city's paper looks like. I have fond memories of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and although Nazi conservative it was a damn fine paper. The Chicago Tribune though has been useless for some time. I can say that the Belleville News Democrat does every bit as good of a job as the Post in covering both local and national news. Perhaps that is a better model. Even Kansas City's Star is a better newspaper and we all know that Kansas City is not even a "city" in anything but their own mind. It is more of a northern suburb of Tulsa.

I blame the mergers of so many news sources into these large paper holding companies. They are burdened with debt and have to make the bottom line. That means more adds, more wire services, less reporters, no investigations, no budgets. There is simply no hope for the post. It raises questions about whether there is hope for any local daily outside of New York, L.A. and maybe Chicago. I like to read Bill Mc Lellan. I even like (and sometimes really like) Sylvester Brown. I hate Deb Petersen. She is no Jerry Berger and that is the nicest thing I can say about her items.

That they give their content away on line makes sense in some way... I guess. I know lots of people now who read what they want to read on line but there is something tactile about holding that paper in my hand, especially while eating at a local diner that has become ritual. And I love my rituals. It seems to me that there is a market for the advertisers in people who read papers. We are still out there. In a geberation we will not be. I would pay a lot more for a good local paper and I have to think local advertisers would pay to reach me but what do I know. I also believe in capitalism and the free market system and trickle down economics. I am clearly not that bright.

I have taken to reading the Wall Street Journal each day at lunch. The conservative editorials are good for my soul and make me think. The national news coverage is the best and the business coverage is top notch. I might have to start subscribing again. But what do you do? I will keep my subscription but at this point it feels like a death watch. I think it is a failing effort but lets write to the Post, or at least email them and tell them they need to step up their game or do the honorable thing and die and go away. There will be no bail out for newspapers. They are not banks after all.