Sen. Barack Obama’s speech on race, “A More Perfect Union,” was designed to open a national dialogue to chart a way past the racial bitterness of the past. It was also, from a practical standpoint, designed to put out the flames of controversy that had engulfed Obama’s campaign after inflammatory video of hateful comments by his former minister were widely circulated. On both counts I believe the speech has been a resounding success. Obama leads by 10 over Hillary Clinton in today’s Gallup tracking poll, his biggest lead ever in that poll. In addition, the speech has prompted an amazing column today from Hibbing Daily Tribune editor Mike Jennings. (Disclosure: I write a column for the Tribune and technically report to Mike, but I am not contractually bound to say nice things about him on this blog).
A few weeks ago Barack Obama gave a speech in Philadelphia that some have called the most probing and deeply truthful speech in a generation about race in America. Others have called Obama’s speech an adroit but unconvincing effort to explain away his adherence over many years – and beyond that, his professed love and loyalty – to his former pastor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, who has uttered vicious, racially divisive views from the pulpit.
I don’t know which of those perspectives on Obama’s performance contains the greater truth. I do know that both contain a measure of truth because, like every white Southerner of my generation, I have spent my life swimming through the intricate cross-currents of race. Reading Obama’s speech, I often felt he was giving clear voice to a muddled narrative that has been going on in my own head since I was a child. My family straddled two versions of Southern racism, the genteel version and the open, vicious version.
I followed the link and the entire article came up. Thought you’d like to know that.
But can I use this as a soapbox to bitch about something with the Iron Range papers? What the hell are they thinking with this “free account” crap? I refuse to register. I find their sites difficult to use, and damned annoying in that they don’t include all the articles. In fact, I’mve pretty much quit going to the sites at all because they try to make it hard for me to use their sites, in the apparent hope that by doing so, I’ll buy a paper.
Well. I don’t. I am not a newspaper reader. I don’t buy newspapers, and I’m not about to start buying them.
I DO go to websites to read news. Presumably they derive ad revenue from the advertisers on their website who count on me to buy their goods and services just like those who advertise in the paper assume their is a connection between readers and sales.
I feel the Range papers are marginilizing their online readers. They are marginilizing the potential of their online business. And they are marginilizing their future existence.
I’m waiting for the day when the owner of these papers finally wakes up to this reality: There is ONE market called the Iron Range, and there is a need for ONE paper that serves the Iron Range, with a page devoted to each community to cover the paltry news that is reported from each. And there is a need for ONE online version of that ONE Iron Range paper that is complete, freely accessible, and professional.
I keep waiting.
*climbs down off soapbox*
Great comment. I’ve had a busy day but you have had me thinking about this during my free half-moments. I think I’ll write a longer piece tonight or tommorrow about the general state of small town newspapers.
On the idea of a unified Iron Range daily — Well, that’s easier said than done. Any effort to do a region-wide daily would cut into the most loyal readers who buy the things for their specific town’s coverage (things that often don’t appear on the website or register on the radar of dedicated “news” seekers). Since all the large Range papers are owned by the same company, the owners know that they have more readers and more revenue with separate papers than they would with a unified paper (even though running a unified paper would cost less).
Belieeeeeve me. If they could make a buck with a unified paper they would have done so a long time ago. The only way this happens now is if someone cuts into their market and starts such a thing (unlikely) or if the existing owner or a future owner is forced into the merger by enormous costs (distinctly possible, but probably no time soon)
I must say that one of the reasons I read so much of the news online is specifically because I want to read something from Virgina, something from Hibbing, something from Rapids. Too much trouble to keep up with the paper versions. But when they screw with how much of the content they put online, that’s not useful either. There is a problem here, whether the owners recognize it or not.