We finally had a relaxing Sunday morning this past weekend after a couple of months of nonstop activity, golf, weekend trips and the like. It was delicious.
I noticed over coffee that Meet the Press was on. I’m don’t usually watch national news shows but the panel intrigued me, especially given what’s been going on with the market, the debt ceiling, the dissatisfaction with Congress and the worst day ever in the Afghanistan conflict.
As I watched how well the differing points of view were presented, I was struck by how knowledgeable the panel was, on both sides of the fence, and how objective and informed the host, David Gregory, was. Since I had just read the Sunday Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, I couldn’t help compare the two: the intelligent dialogue and the very clear preparedness of the panelists on Meet the Press, versus what in my opinion is unobjective, poorly written editorial in our local paper.
Let me give you a couple of examples: First, there was Sunday’s lead story about the Milwaukee Police Department: “Response times lag as patrol strategy shifts.” They did this big analysis about how slow the Milwaukee Police are in 2011 in responding to 911 calls. They tried to associate this premise with the death of an 82 year-old car accident victim when in fact the police had nothing to do with it. Here’s what they said about it:
“Jim Lustig, an 82 year-old cancer survivor, died two days after the car he was riding in was broad-sided on June 16.” This is the first copy you read over Jim’s photo, and right under the above headline, a clear intent to associate the lack of police response time here with Jim’s unfortunate death. Let’s look at the facts: Milwaukee firefighters and paramedics arrived about five minutes after the receiving the 911 call. So it was in their hands. The fact that it took Milwaukee police two hours to arrive at the scene had nothing to do with the fatality. Yes, it influenced their ability to identify the hit and run driver, and that’s really quite wrong, but why create the implication that it was anything more than that?
Next, there was an article, again the lead story on the front page on July 27, questioning the reputation of an alternative care doctor, Sik Kin Wu of Shorewood. Alternative care is not conventional medicine and as such is quite unproven. It’s basically intuitive and energy healing and is becoming more and more popular as a treatment option.
The Journal Sentinel’s premise is based on a woman who was in Dr. Wu’s care for 11 treatments, after which she found out she was suffering from a spinal disease that had been present for a year prior to her treatments with Dr. Wu. Yet the implication of the article is that Dr. Wu’s treatment caused her current condition, requiring her to get around with a walker. “Before she knew she had spinal disease, Barbara May of West Allis spent almost a year in the care of… Sik Kin Wu, whom she paid to adjust her neck 11 times during a year. May has filed a state complaint against Wu”. They even try to drag Wu’s reputation down further by saying he has “a history of federal tax fraud” as if this has something to do with Ms. May’s case. I talked with people who know Dr. Wu and found that he has a significant following and a very good reputation in the community. So it seems that the Journal Sentinel was on a witch-hunt here to bring him down. Not a very objective approach for this ‘Pulitzer Prize winning’ newspaper in my opinion.
As you’ve undoubtedly heard, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is on a steady decline, and they continue to lay people off, relying more and more on their website JSOnline, and contributions from syndicated sources like the Associated Press. There are a few solid and objective columnists, like golf writer Gary D’Amato, but I’m sorry, most of the rest don’t cut it. With the paper itself going down the tubes, maybe it’s time for an entrepreneur to step up and start a new local news website for Milwaukee. One that’s objective and factual. They’d get my business in a heartbeat.
