Archive for February, 2017

The Hypocrisy of Pretending to Care

Posted: February 23, 2017 in Uncategorized
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One more time: Another report comes that our growing small city has need of more police officers on the streets, on the payroll, serving the community. Columbia, Missouri is woefully inadequate in providing reasonable law enforcement. The shortage creates work loads and lack of coverage that squeezes and stresses the force. And pressure from the top of the food chain simply instructs them to do more with less. We lose officers all the time to other departments or agencies because of low morale.

As the reports continue to come and the noise level rises the public pretends to be concerned. Well, ain’t that a crying shame. But the simple and inconvenient truth is that we continue to vote down tax increases that could remedy this situation. We do that even as our local tax rates already hover in the bargain basement rage for cities our size. But we won’t ante up. Instead, we pretend to care and say inane things to officers like “Thank you for your service.” You want to really thank them for their service?

Hire more officers. Increase their salaries, benefits and retirement programs. Provide reasonable equipment and gear at no cost to officers. Make sure they have the most current vehicles and technology. Keep military style firearms and ammo off the streets and out of the hands of the bad guys and mentally ill. Re-institute the motorcycle and  mounted patrol horses. Offer routine continuing education and opportunities for our force to achieve best peer city practices.

We can settle for mediocre, overworked, understaffed and unsafe, or we can do the right thing. We can pay for this. What that means is voting yes to the next proposed tax increase. Just do it.

And while we are on the subject Missourians, go ahead and increase Missouri state taxes. We are at the bottom of the barrel. It’s ridiculous. The ultimate answer to every fiscal dilemma of our state is not slashing essential programs and lowering taxes even more. No, to the contrary, as a moral issue increase our taxes.

Wake up Columbia. Wake up Missouri. Okay, wake up USA. Stop pretending to care when you really, really don’t.

The Journalist’s Creed

Posted: February 17, 2017 in Uncategorized
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The first Dean of the School of Journalism of the University of Missouri was Walter Williams, a man who would later become the University’s President. There is one composition by which Williams became known far beyond his own locale and that is The Journalist’s Creed. It echoes  high mindedness of a 19th century moral tome. That, I think, is why it has endured. Though the Creed employs the language of its own time it names truths that may speak to all times:

I believe in the profession of journalism.
I believe that the public journal is a public trust; that all connected with it are, to the full measure of their responsibility, trustees for the public; that acceptance of a lesser service than the public service is betrayal of this trust.
I believe that clear thinking and clear statement, accuracy and fairness are fundamental to good journalism.
I believe that a journalist should write only what he holds in his heart to be true.
I believe that suppression of the news, for any consideration other than the welfare of society, is indefensible.
I believe that no one should write as a journalist what he would not say as a gentleman; that bribery by one’s own pocketbook is as much to be avoided as bribery by the pocketbook of another; that individual responsibility may not be escaped by pleading another’s instructions or another’s dividends.
I believe that advertising, news and editorial columns should alike serve the best interests of readers; that a single standard of helpful truth and cleanness should prevail for all; that the supreme test of good journalism is the measure of its public service.
I believe that the journalism which succeeds best — and best deserves success — fears God and honors Man; is stoutly independent, unmoved by pride of opinion or greed of power, constructive, tolerant but never careless, self-controlled, patient, always respectful of its readers but always unafraid, is quickly indignant at injustice; is unswayed by the appeal of privilege or the clamor of the mob; seeks to give every man a chance and, as far as law and honest wage and recognition of human brotherhood can make it so, an equal chance; is profoundly patriotic while sincerely promoting international good will and cementing world-comradeship; is a journalism of humanity, of and for today’s world.