Buffalo News has it in for Workers

I have been reading the Buffalo News with increasing anger the last few weeks.  And anyone that reads the news and is a member of a union would know why.  

The News -  owned by Warren Buffet, the Crown Prince of the 1% in the US, has been taking full broadsides at any victory by unions or the working class.  No matter what the victory,  the News slams it.

NYS is increasing the minimum wage:  Bad because it will cost jobs and hurt small businessmen.  They cited no proof.  Then again,  there are plenty of states and areas with higher minimum wages than NYS and they are doing just fine.

And at that increase,  it's only for the NYC area.  Probably Yonkers too.  It's pretty expensive to live down there because of the over priced real estate.  (Seriously – People in NYC are getting ripped off big time.  They are paying to live in a city with a famous name.)  The rest of NY is getting increased only to $12.50.  Incrementally.  And with a review in 2021 to see if it needs to go higher.

If wages kept up with productivity workers would be making over $20 an hour.  The profits are all going to the 1% and not to the people that make them possible.  

And the paid leave of absence.  Up to 12 weeks I believe.  100% funded by payroll deductions from worker paychecks.  I have read nothing about matching payments from business owners.  And this is bad.  (I will have to read more about this I admit.  I am still catching up on my reading.)

And the restoration of education funding.  Again,  bad.  Unions fought for it so it's bad.  (The News might want to remember something:  People who can't read don't buy newspapers.)  The cuts in funding have hurt districts and students immeasurably.  I have students that are so turned off by education (even though they need it for the careers that they want to pursue) that it's sad.

And the opposition to testing.  Union run, so bad.  I heard about opposition to testing and the whole opt-out movement from conservative Republican parents who dislike President Obama more than I hear it from union representatives.  (Never mind that the whole idea of testing has its roots in a Bush Era, Republican backed law called “No Child Left Behind.)  Yes,  the high stakes testing has a negative impact on teachers and their careers.  It is also stressing out students.  That is never talked about though.  Only the fact that NYSUT – the teachers' union – is opposed to the unrealistic level of accountability that no other career is held to - and wants ended.

Seriously,  if the news media were held to the same criteria that they demand that teachers be held to there wouldn't be a paper around. Afghanistan in 2001?  Iraq in 2003? Epic fails.  Libya in 2011?  Still a basket case.  No success there.  The Iran nuclear deal?  (Iran even wanting nuclear weapons for that matter):  Total screw up.  American newspapers might as well have had Israeli hardliners writing their stories.  Now,  to give the News credit,  they did post the story (buried inside the paper and not on the front page where it belonged) that Mossad (Israeli Intelligence Service) stated that Iran had no nuclear weapons,  was not pursuing the ability to develop nuclear weapons,  and did not want nuclear weapons.  

Quite honestly,  pretty every newspaper editor in the country deserves a pink slip over those stories alone.

I can go into the Venezuela coup and opposition – which is being run by the CIA.  Go into world news services and they talk about it.  The News?  Maybe a sentence or two.  Possibly a small paragraph buried somewhere.  No resounding critique of a US foreign policy run amok destabilizing countries that are none of its concern.

An US mindless support for Saudi Arabia  and Pakistan – the two leading countries that support al-Qaeda, al-Nusra, ISIS/DAESH, and other terrorist organizations?  Almost missing.  Except on the Sunday Viewpoints page.  It doesn't belong there.  It belongs on the front page where people will read about it and demand that the federal government stop subsidizing these terrorist supporting regimes with our taxpayer dollars.

I have former students that go into history and political science. They won't even read US papers because of how bad and wrong they report things.

And I am not alone in this disgust of the News' anti-union,  anti-labor, & anti-worker attitude.

If everyone that fell into any of those three categories stopped buying the paper,  it would be belly up in a week.

So,  what to do?

We the people need to remind the News that they exist to serve us.  

Perhaps we need a day of action outside their offices to remind them that we are the biggest part of the population and we want our voices heard.  (I really don't care what Carl PaladiNO thinks about education or anything else.)

Perhaps we need to flood their newsroom with letters from workers that subscribe to their paper.

Flooding their in-boxes with emails is too easy to deal with– mass delete.  I do it every day with those stupid porn e-mails that come in.  (Why do I get them?)

Perhaps we need to start our own labor newspaper.  Articles written by workers in the various industries,  unionized or not.  NYSUT, CWA, Teamsters, AFL-CIO,  SEIU, and others.  And the non-unionized workers as well.  OUR Wal-Mart comes to mind.

A workers paper.  Even if weekly.  It would give us a voice that we don't have and that the people need to hear.

Remember:  Buffalo is a one newspaper town.  There is no competition, aside from the local weeklies.  So there is an opening.  And I thought capitalism thrived on competition. But then again,  maybe that's why the News is falling into mediocrity.  (And other papers around the region and our country.)

And it would not have to be socialist necessarily.  Though socialists have fought for workers rights and in workers issues from time immemorial.  

So,  will the News listen to us or do we need to make our own megaphone?

Either way,  we need to be loud and clear:  WE'RE NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!