Someone should tell the Toronto Star they are going the wrong direction. The Star cut 55 jobs this week and are going to contract out their page layout to a company based in Australia. Other papers have gone the same way, laying off news staff and contracting out page lay out and other work. The Brandon Sun has tried that route, so has the Winnipeg Free Press. Some weeklies have gone that route as well.
The trouble with newspapers began a long time ago when the only road to success seemed to be to sell out to a bigger newspaper or to a chain of newspapers.
If a person studies newspaper history, we see that the Southam group grew very large, so did the Thomson group, the Glacier Group, the Quebecor group, the Conrad Black group. There are many examples and most have not been that good as business models.
This latest trend to reduce newspapers to nothing more than a chain of store-front offices with lay-out, distribution and many other activities centralized in a larger town or a city far away, across the ocean. It has an appeal that seems can’t be resisted.
The problem can find its roots many year ago. It used to be that the publisher/editor/owner was either all the same person or a closely knit group of local people. Stories of how editors and publishers worked together, fought together, drank and ate together are the very fabric of the newspaper industry history.
Now, western Canadian weekly papers are mainly owned by a chain with an office in Vancouver or Montreal. When a newspaper association gathers for a convention, instead of 50 or 100 people in the room, there will be 20 and some individuals can carry 10 or 15 votes. It’s not unusual for two chains of newspapers to carry a majority of the votes in a room.
Newspapers are now owned, not so much by publishers and editors, but by non-newspaper shareholders. The bean counters have taken over the newspaper world. The only interest a shareholder has is to make a return on the investment. They don’t give a rat’s rear end about the community, the local issues or what is best for the community. This move to pay homage to chain ownership and their return on investment is a sign that money is marauding morality, that dollars are defeating decisions of decency and that common sense is captured by greed.
In order to survive, a company has to make a profit. This current trend however doesn’t seek growth for profit, it seeks a sort of self-cannabilism by cutting costs faster than they seek growth.
Many years ago, these two newspapers, the Neepawa Banner and The Rivers Banner had the opportunity to sell out, to cash in so to speak. This publisher (and his partner/wife) said “No”. A well thought out “No” and we are glad we did. It was a tough decision but now, we stand as the oldest publishers in Manitoba among all publishers both private and corporately owned . We have a strong local presence and God willing, plan to stay that way for a long time to come. No one can truly predict the future but we can certainly lay out our hopes and plans.
That’s where the chain newspapers and the large corporate groups have gone wrong. Add to that the fact that many papers, not the least of which is the Toronto Star, have gone off the rails politically for years. Sometimes these large papers and paper groups simply lose touch with their readers.
A newspaper has to pick a road and stay on it. It’s a bit tougher for a larger city newspaper to do so but the Toronto Star long ago lost touch with the needs of their local community. In a day and age when world-wide news stories are flashed instantly to every desk top in the world, the daily newspaper can’t keep up with world news. Daily, three times a week or weekly, a local newspaper has to cover local stuff. In real estate sales, they say everything is location, location, location. In a newspaper, no matter how large or small, it’s local, local, local.
It’s a pretty simple formula and many papers and newspaper chains have lost sight of that.

To Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s credit, he stood up to the terrorist FLQ group. When faced with very serious and imminent danger, Trudeau implemented the War Measures Act and arrested many people. Some will argue it was an over reaction, but when murder and kidnapping was set against a backdrop of historic mail box bombings, it’s hard to argue with Trudeau’s reaction.
But Trudeau failed in many ways. He totally abandoned his Roman Catholic roots in various pieces of legislation. His economic policies led to rampant inflation and horrendous interest rates. He passed legislation that damaged farms and farm families. He implemented the National Energy Policy that robbed Alberta of billions in resource revenue.
To my generation, Trudeau was a disaster. Those of us who were eager enough to think we could farm lost everything to inflation and 23 per cent interest rates. The loss of farms and farmers in the Trudeau years was only surpassed by the Great Depression. Small businesses, also facing runaway inflation and high interest rates, failed by the thousands.
So the next generation has come along. Justin Trudeau is a handsome, charming young man. He is seen as the saviour of the now weakened Liberal Party of Canada. We have no idea what he really stands for. He hasn’t said and he probably doesn’t really know.
Justin Trudeau is currently being challenged to speak out about what he stands for by rival candidate Marc Garneau who has laid out some specific policies. Trudeau speaks in more general terms, much as his father did. The Trudeau genes deal much better with dreams and and nebulous concepts than real issues. However it cannot be argued that either father or son are dumb, they are certainly anything but dumb.
I think the real problem is that neither Pierre nor Justin really understand what the “common” person goes through. They can briefly engage, and engage in a very charming way, but to actually have to work every day, day-in-day-out to keep a job or to meet payroll — not so much. Their lifestyles have denied them the opportunity to understand what most people go through every day.
Justin Trudeau may well win the Liberal Party of Canada leadership race. If he does, he could then some day become prime minister of Canada.
I was asked recently what advice I would give Justin Trudeau if he asked for it.
It would be simply, “Remember the mistakes of your father and don’t repeat them.”

By Ken Waddell
Recently, the Department of Defense suggested they would start charging municipalities for emergency assistance such as flood fighting and helping with other natural disasters. The government apparently has since backtracked on that one. While it’s understandable that the military might want to generate some funds, nobody asked the question as to what funds they had in mind. It would make sense maybe to compensate for gas and wear and tear on equipment used in fighting a flood for example, but as far as I know, the staff were getting paid anyway.
•Idle no more. It didn’t take long for rogue signs to be stuck here and there across Canada. The hand-painted signs said “Idle no more-get a job”. That there are problems in communities and that there are more then the usual problems in some First Nation communities is without question. However, if an able bodied person doesn’t have job, then they need to move to another community. It’s a time-honoured method of surviving and getting ahead. If my grandfather hadn’t moved, if my dad hadn’t moved, if I hadn’t moved, if hundreds of Filipino people hadn’t moved, then we might all be sitting at home waiting for the next job.
•Here’s a great quote from Sun Media:
“Some chiefs have suggested that Atleo’s future as national chief of the Assembly of First Nations could now be in jeopardy for failing to adhere to the demands of many chiefs that he boycott the meeting with Harper.
“The AFN was set up to represent the decisions of the chiefs,” Pam Palmater said Thursday evening. Palmater, a Ryerson University professor, ran unsuccessfully against Atleo last summer and has sharply criticized him for being too close to the Harper government.
“If the AFN decided to go to that meeting against the will and decision of the chiefs, then the AFN would no longer be a valid and representative organization of the chiefs.”
How about representing the needs and wishes of the people not the chiefs? That would be a good start. Protesting and hunger striking, Chief Spence is getting well paid to sit in a teepee in a phony hunger strike by day when the cameras are running, all the while spending some, if not all, nights in a nice hotel. How about she and all these other chiefs go home and run their communities?”
The hard line First Nations chiefs and the multitude of spokespersons seem to think that they are nations equal with Canada and England. They think that negotiations need to take place nation-to-nation. They are wrong. There’s a difference between a clan and a nation. There’s a difference between a tribe and nation, there’s a difference between the Scottish society and a nation. There are nations and then there are groups, sometimes some very small groups, who have lived in a relatively small area, even if it’s for centuries — but they still don’t make a nation.
Some aboriginal people, including Theresa Spence, have said they have gotten nothing from Canada. I beg to differ. That’s way over the top. Spence apparently can’t count the millions and the audit of her reserve would seem to prove the point. Every Canadian gets a lot from Canada, some more than others. We get health care, education, social security, military and police protection and the list goes on. Some communities seem to benefit more than others but it has nothing to do with money. If money and large numbers meant a successful community, then why is Winnipeg the murder capital of Canada?
It doesn’t matter if it’s an aboriginal community, a small reserve, a small town or village or large city, there needs to be a lot more truth and logic applied to our funding, our decisions and to our administration. 
Protesting, hunger strikes, placard waving, name calling, racial prejudice (and that’s a two-way street), more money; none of these things solve problems. Good use of money, good administration and good decisions solve problems, whether it be individually, as a family, as a community, as a province or as a country. That’s the logical way to solve problems.

The title is attributed to Joe Friday, the lead character in the radio and TV series Dragnet from the early 1950s. It’s a catchphrase, but it’s also good advice.
In this day and age of every story being remastered by spin doctors, it’s important to hearken back to this one liner bit of advice, “Just the facts ma’am”. 
It doesn’t matter if one is dealing with stories or issues at the international level down to the smallest of household disputes, it’s important to know the facts. Without the facts, sheer reaction is always easier, backlash soon follows, then everything becomes emotional. Pretty soon it’s all about emotions and feelings. By then, the facts are pretty much trampled into the mud.
Take the spate of aboriginal protests across the country. A time and date is set, so is the location. The people show up, the media shows up, the RCMP show up. People walk around blockading traffic or holding a circle dance or making some speeches. Sometimes all three. Press releases go out, ah yes, the inevitable press release. The media grabs onto it, regurgitates it and then throws in a five second TV clip showing protesters clumped around the camera. Then the media’s job is done, right?
Wrong! There’s rarely a discussion of the real issues.
When I get press releases, I have started to fire them right back with questions attached to it. Guess what? I have yet to get answers from the “Idle no more” group. No answers, no explanation of the issues, nothing.
Some media have actually dug into the facts and with a budget that allows them to travel far to do so. For example, CBC went to Attawapiskat and did a documentary on spending and living conditions. It wasn’t pretty. Twenty modular homes were delivered to the community but they couldn’t get them hooked up to sewer and water. Funny how a lot of houses never had a sewer and water 50 years ago and people survived. One would think that a modular home, hooked up to electricity, would be a lot better than a tent. Neither one has water or a sewer. There may well be more to that story, but I’m just saying if you can live in a tent without a sewer, water or electricity, perhaps you should be able to live in a modular home with only electricity.
Sun Media has done a lot of work analyzing the Attawapiskat audit and it doesn’t appear to be pretty. Less than 2,000 people and the budget seems astronomical. Looks like, and I emphasize looks like, a lot of corruption and misspending.
But instead of getting really bent or vocal about this case or any other case, it would be very helpful if we all looked at just the facts. Knowing and understanding the facts almost always leads to a better solution than emotion and reaction.
If an appropriate sized leadership group looks at all the facts, the income, the expenses, the needs, the shortfalls, the advantages of a particular community, then good decisions can be made. Without that level of good governance, usually emotions and bad decisions follow. 
We have a lot of local issues, right here in our small rural communities, issues that could benefit from a “Just the facts” approach. That approach will lead to better decisions. Municipalities are all struggling with infrastructure issues, with escalating costs of providing services, with an increased demand for services from rate payers and due to downloading from senior governments. 
Municipal governments need to take a measured approach to every problem. A full analysis of a town or a municipality will reveal the level of services that can and should be provided and at what cost. One simple example is that towns and municipalities tend to hide the real cost of providing water and sewer. Faced with periodic increases in water rates, councils tend to add on a little bit but without a real cost analysis, the rates may be totally unrealistic. The shortfall gets buried in the tax bill.  That’s wrong because taxes are supposed to go for funding services that can’t be billed out such as fire and policing and for debt repayment. Water and sewer services are readily identified and just as easily billable to the user. 
A little too much trivia in that last example, but it’s illustrative that a measured and factual approach gets better results than the reactive and emotional approach.