I bought a print edition of The Miami Herald at the airport on the way out of Miami this morning. On its editorial page, the Herald gives a new generation the chance to push for another aspect of transit reform: GreenLink. That would be the space under Metrorail. Miami's High Line. OK.
Twenty or thirty years ago, when Miami needed a muscular newspaper to call out the rats who infested South Florida with traffic, the Herald leadership was AWOL. Publishers David Lawrence, Alberto Ibarguen, Alvah Chapman? Nada. The Knight Foundation? Nada. Maybe there is a new generation of Herald leadership too …
If by example of this morning's editorial page, the Herald is extending an olive branch to civic activists and willing to try its hand at supporting activism, then it is reasonable to ask for the Herald to support those activists and activism by calling out local elected leaders -- like our city and county commissioners -- at the time when the Herald's voice means the most: up to and including elections.
In other words, don't talk to readers in April about a greener city and in July (county commission races) and October, omit these and other "environmental" thresholds from the paper's political coverage.
Make as big a deal about the weakness of incumbent leaders as you do about GreenLink today. Call for citizens to run for public office, if only to make the lobbyists pay at the campaign finance pump (as G.O.D. wrote on this blog, yesterday). Withhold any endorsement at all, when challengers are incompetent and/or incumbents have outlived their time in office. Grow a set of balls.
Don't just extend a sliver of sunlight to a new generation of activists. Help create the conditions for change in our politics. Perhaps that is asking too much of Miami's only daily newspaper.
Twenty or thirty years ago, when Miami needed a muscular newspaper to call out the rats who infested South Florida with traffic, the Herald leadership was AWOL. Publishers David Lawrence, Alberto Ibarguen, Alvah Chapman? Nada. The Knight Foundation? Nada. Maybe there is a new generation of Herald leadership too …
If by example of this morning's editorial page, the Herald is extending an olive branch to civic activists and willing to try its hand at supporting activism, then it is reasonable to ask for the Herald to support those activists and activism by calling out local elected leaders -- like our city and county commissioners -- at the time when the Herald's voice means the most: up to and including elections.
In other words, don't talk to readers in April about a greener city and in July (county commission races) and October, omit these and other "environmental" thresholds from the paper's political coverage.
Make as big a deal about the weakness of incumbent leaders as you do about GreenLink today. Call for citizens to run for public office, if only to make the lobbyists pay at the campaign finance pump (as G.O.D. wrote on this blog, yesterday). Withhold any endorsement at all, when challengers are incompetent and/or incumbents have outlived their time in office. Grow a set of balls.
Don't just extend a sliver of sunlight to a new generation of activists. Help create the conditions for change in our politics. Perhaps that is asking too much of Miami's only daily newspaper.
9 comments:
i couldnt gree with you more. the reason i cancelled my Herald subscription is becuse they have become either cowards or bought by politicians. go after those who do for themselves rather than the citizens. go a set like aforementionedt
The idiots at the Herald wrote today that salesman David Beckham met with civic groups. Beckham met with the the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce to promote his business group taking over part of PortMiami. The Herald called the GMCC a civic group. Righto. The Chamber of Commerce is more like a lobbyist convention. More accurate would be calling the GMCC a "cabal of lobbyists" run by chief Beckham lobbyist Neisan Kasden.
Yeah. Read that and had the same reaction. Full surrender at the Herald.
The Herald has a new generation of reporters who might not know what a true civic group is. The headline should have said business group.
Does it feel more and more like Miami has been occupied by oligarths and the Koch brothers?
Are the real residents just servants?
Geez, they can't even fund libraries and public parks anymore with our own tax money. But everything to promote this giant resort for the world's elite and superwealthy called Miami - the resort.
If this is not the future we want for our city, we need to organize and speak out. And I don't mean just posting gripes on Facebook.
Good Points last poster...
It is far too easy for out-of-town salesman and slicksters to fly into Miami and hire local mouthpieces like Neisan Kasden and various other Chamber of Commerce lobbyists to pitch their distorted schemes. Too bad reporters do not ask basic questions.
So many examples:
Marlins $3 Bil
Illegal LED billboards
Dolphin Stadium cash grab
1,000' SkyRise? Really? On public property?
Walmart in Midtown? Really?
50 stories at 5th and Alton Road?
So many examples...
I buy the Herald for the coupons. Keep putting them in there folks or I will cancel one one-day-a-week subscription. I don't need the papers for the bird cage.
Knight Foundation is corrupt. Recently they funded 50k to some Ohio "art project" that imho was disguised as a project but used to harass people.
The "new" Miami Herald" is so quick to publish press releases as "news". Sad.
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