Youtube Miscellany

Too much disturbing stuff being thrown out there with everybody having a video camera and youtube access. Here are a few from the last day that I may feel like looking back on in ten years.

Shooting the Brees

Weird day so far as I got a covid test and an x-ray prior to my kidney stone crushing on Monday and, during my half hour in waiting rooms, was exposed to mainstream news stories that I try to avoid.

Some information and thoughts for those who may care:

Murphy’s Pass

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has been all over the airwaves spewing gibberish to the detriment of our health and safety yet his media accomplices, rather than calling out his CYA tactics, give him a pass. For example, his favorite justification for incompetence:

Coronavirus Coverage: Concealing Loaded Guns

Until someone presses the question of why we do not have universal testing I try to avoid all current coronavirus coverage which the media has again turned into a farce of journalism as they concentrate on the .1% of bad actors coughing deliberately or the .1% of good actors sewing face masks at home while ignoring real issues that impact 99.8% of us who are left feeling like:
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Looking beyond the self-congratulatory press conferences where politicians tell us what to do while ignoring their own responsibilities you have to go back to a 2007 TED talk by an expert to get a dose of what they are hiding.

NJTV On Pension Deal

The deal seems to be that New Jersey State Senate President Steve Sweeney will abandon his Path to cutting pension benefits for public employees in exchange for an extra billion dollars going into the pension system ignoring the fact that it needs $200 billion and that was before the likely loss of $10 billion last week. Here’s how public television media see it:
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Here’s how the Murphy people (in this case Treasurer Elizabeth Maher Muoio) see it:

McClatchy Seeks Bankruptcy

newjerseyglobe reports:

“McClatchy’s Plan provides a resolution to legacy debt and pension obligations while maximizing outcomes for customers and other stakeholders,” said McClatchy CEO Craig Forman.

USA Today reports:

Although bankruptcies can result in pensioners receiving less than they were due, McClatchy said Thursday that it believes its plan “would not have an adverse impact on qualified pension benefits for substantially all plan participants.” In a court filing, McClatchy listed the PBGC as its largest unsecured creditor with a claim of $530 million. The PBGC and a federal judge would have to sign off on the company’s pension plan and sale.

Here are the real reasons for the bankruptcy filing.

New NJEA Director on Pensions

Steve Swetsky, the new executive director of the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA), found his seat at the politician/lobbyist/media manipulator table:
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When asked about public pensions:

Words Matter – So Use Them

Today’s headline in New Jersey is of another ‘-gate’ scandal:
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The real scandal:
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Though nobody is focusing on incurious-gate, it would be far better for the majority of us if somebody did. For example.

Heyday of NJEA

The heyday of Arthur Sackler was a period of crossover in the methods used for the marketing of prescription drugs and the marketing of the drug delivery system known as the cigarette. Sackler’s counterpart in the tobacco industry, and fellow master of manipulation, was John Hill of the public relations giant Hill & Knowlton. Sackler and Hill shared authorship of such techniques as third-party advocacy, subliminal message reinforcement, junk science, phony front groups, advocacy advertising, and using advertising dollars to buy favorable “news” to report. (pages 154-5)

More from “Code Blue” later but around the time I was reading this I came across an interview a media millionaire did with a public-union millionaire. Below are some video excerpts.

Saving Local Journalism?

Included in the $1.4 trillion spending bill for FY 2020 (pages 1585 – 1597) was the Save the Community Newspaper Act which, according to the Seattle Times:

will allow privately held community newspapers to stretch out payments owed to pension plans that have been frozen through years of industry trouble. Without the urgently needed relief, these newspaper companies would face immense obligations coming due in 2021 under federal pension contribution laws. This long-sought relief reduces the annual bill to a manageable level while preserving pensioners’ rights to every penny they are due.

So what will this do for the Seattle Times?