By Roldo Bartimole
Two subjects highlighted by and in the Plain Dealer reveal clearly how established desires become the conventional wisdom of supposed journalism and civic responsibility.
The first involves Alexander Cutler, the CEO of Eaton Corp. He wants austerity from the federal government. You know, cut the food stamps and extra goodies for poor babies. Belt-tightening stuff. Character building.
Easy for Cutler to say. He was paid $20.4 million in executive compensation in 2012. One year’s take, people. That’s up from $13.5 million the previous year. (Eaton executives took home $43.6 million in 2012, up 34 percent. No complaints there I guess.) Some people keep expanding their belts.
I guess he and they got some extra room. But what he advises is for the rest of us to pull the strap tighter. Breathe in. Now hold it.
What gets me is that he is provided the speakers platform at the Cleveland City Club, that establishment that likes to call itself the Citadel of Free Speech. Cheap speech that week.
The elites who sell the type of stuff Cutler’s peddling under the “Fix the Debt” banner get easy entree at the City Club. Never doubt they will.
Cutler, of course, got big headlines in the Plain Dealer. He was joined with former Senator George Voinovich, who plays the public frugality card when it involves giving away money to wealthy developers. That was his main job as Mayor of Cleveland.
Meanwhile, however, we have the problem of 7 percent plus unemployment. Much of it long term unemployment. And many people just giving up.
Could I suggest the City Club have Paul Krugman in for a session? A bit of reality.
The Plain Dealer did have a good, maybe perfect, headline on Cutler:
“Corporate ‘debt fixers’ are awash in hypocrisy.”
Wow! Did one of its columnists actually take a good poke at the corporate biggie?
Did they point out his hypocrisy? No. Actually readers did.
It took the letters to the editor contributors to recognize the duplicity. Not Phillip Morris, not Margaret Bernstein, not Brent Larkin, not Mark Naymik, not Regina Brett. You can’t expect them to tell some unvarnished truth about our corporate leaders. They apparently can’t see it.
Here’s one letter’s take:
“Eaton Corp. CEO Alexander Cutler has set a new standard for chutzpah. On May 24, Cutler appeared at the City Club of Cleveland to lecture the audience on the need to ‘fix the debt.’ Although spending cuts will be painful, Cutler said ‘this is fundamental to the health of our country,'” the letter read.
Then the writer points out that Eaton recently made itself an “Irish” company to escape annual taxes of $160 million. Goodbye America.
That’s not just chutzpah. That’s gross hypocrisy if not treason. It’s certainly proof that Cutler has no right to lecture any American.
“So I guess the Plain Dealer is now selling its space for lead stories instead of actually publishing real news stories,” wrote another of the coverage of Cutler’s City Club speech.
No. The Plain Dealer is providing corporate conservatives free propaganda use of its front page.
The second party line from the Plain Dealer: stories and editorials pushing the $350 million Opportunity Corridor. This is a road, through African-American communities to allow West Side whites I suspect, easy access to jobs in University Circle. It would go from I-490 to E. 55th to E. 105th. Delivery to the Cleveland Clinic.
We have $350 million to waste? Sure when the Greater Cleveland Partnership – comprised of some 50 Cleveland corporate headers – wants it.
But didn’t we just give them more than $200 million for the RTA Euclid Corridor, up Euclid Ave. from Public Square to University Circle? That gives access to University Circle from downtown. Yeah, but so what. They want more.
The PD mentions each time that PD publisher Terry Egger heads up the Opportunity committee but it hardly finds anyone to say anything opposite this conflicting position. The publisher should stick to his declining newspaper. He’s also a member of the Greater Cleveland Partnership board and was on the board of the Cleveland Clinic, though he isn’t listed presently. A real civic leader. No conflicts of interest, right?
There’s more balance on Fox News than in the PD on these issues.
The so-called newspaper had a front page article recently that the County Council – which more and more resembles the bumbling Cleveland City Council – will consider contributing $44 million to Opportunity Corridor’s first phase. County Executive Ed FitzGerald is, of course, also aboard. He’ll need some corporate money as he gears up his gubernatorial quest.
They toss off these multi-millions of dollars with such ease. As if there’s nothing else this community needs.
They say it will open land to new development. There’s so much open land in Cleveland that Eaton Corp. moved out to Chagrin Highlands, leaving Cleveland high and dry. But isn’t that part of the Cutler culture? Tell others what to do.
Look in the mirror guys.
Roldo Bartimole has been reporting since 1959. He came to Cleveland in 1965 to report for the Plain Dealer where he worked twice in the 1960s, left for the Wall Street Journal in 1967. He started publishing his newsletter Point of View in 1968 and ended it in 2000.In 1991 he was awarded the Second Annual Joe Callaway Award for Civic Courage in Washington, D.C. He received the Distinguished Service Award of the Society of Professional Journalists, Cleveland chapter, in 2002, and was named to the Cleveland Journalism Hall of Fame, 2004. [Photo by Todd Bartimole.]
2 Responses to “ROLDO: Plain Dealer as Propaganda Outlet”
Allen Freeman
Roldo, I agree with you 100% on the hypocrisy you reference. But let’s not mix our labels.
A true ‘conservative’ does not believe in corporate welfare. Just because some rich guy says he’s conservative doesn’t make it so, especially when he digs his corporate nose into the “free-money or tax-breaks for specific industries” trough.
The country does need to tighten its belt in many, many areas — with corporate welfare and corporate tax reforms being at the top of real conservative’s lists…
snarky
Biz as usual in Cuyahoga County and the city of Cleveland.
Corporate welfare first and foremost , citizens get to take a seat in the back of the bus.
Government by executive fiat , bad enough the medical mart – con – vention center by executive fiat [ Hagan and DiMora] now Fitzgerald and Jackson conspire to further paint the pig pink by means of using our tax dollars without our vote to build a pedestrian bridge and hotel for the tourist bureau that runs downtown.
Not like the city and county could not use the funds in our neighborhoods.