Local politicians are not putting their money where their mouth is

What to do about our local politicians?

If you haven’t noticed, there’s another election coming up. The March primaries will be here sooner than you think. Do you know whom you will vote for? Do you even know who is on the ballot? Did you even know there was an election?

It’s hard to miss the political signs going up everywhere. That, however, is part of the problem. No sooner do the signs from one election come down and the new ones for the next election go up. It’s like the only thing that changes are the names and faces. I really don’t think people bother to look at them anymore.

It used to be that you could pick up a newspaper and not only would you see candidate profiles, stories about issues related to key races, and editorial endorsements, you would also see huge ads from the different campaigns explaining why you should vote for their candidate or against their opponent.  I used to work for daily newspapers that would sponsor candidates’ forums and hold editorial board meetings and deeply deliberate political endorsements.

So what changed?

Plenty. For starters, politicians, like many businesses, don’t like to pay for advertising in newspapers if they can spread their word for little or no cost via social media, email and other forms of electronic communication. The end result is that without advertising support, newspapers get smaller and newspaper staffs get whittled to the bone. We now have less space to publish stories and fewer people to write them.

Before you start going on about newspapers being worthless dinosaurs that nobody reads, I want you to consider a few things. First of all, you’re reading one. Obviously you must place some value in it. Secondly, local politicians and businesses place value in it. They may not want to pay to be in the paper, but believe me; my email box fills up everyday with “press releases” that they have a volunteer or a paid a marketing firm to send out.

I can’t begin to count the number of phone and email conversations I’ve had with people who are upset that I won’t publish their “news” (i.e. free ad) because it’s important information that our readers need to know, yet in the same breath they say they won’t pay for an ad because nobody reads the paper anymore. I have some real news for these people – studies show that circulation revenue for newspapers is steadily increasing. When you combine print and digital products, newspaper readership is rising, not declining, as many would have you believe.

Newspapers are as relevant today as they’ve ever been. Because so much content is shared online, more people are reading papers without being aware of it. After all, where do you think the news in your social media news feeds comes from? Plus, the number of people paying for digital subscriptions to major newspapers is steadily rising.

When I first came to the Fort Bend Star almost two years ago, I could count on a weekly round of emails and phone calls from people asking us to stop throwing the paper in their yard. Since then, those calls and emails have nearly completely stopped. Now I’m getting numerous requests from people who want to know where they can find our paper. (Walgreens, libraries, and some supermarkets and convenience stores carry it.)

Believe me, readership is great. People are reading the paper and people still want their information in the paper, especially politicians. I know this because I get plenty of press releases from candidates who announce their bid for office. I also get plenty of requests to investigate issues and opponents of various politicians. They want us to do the heavy lifting for them and to give them ample coverage in our pages, but they’re not willing to put their money where their mouth is. They rarely – if ever – buy ads anymore.

That is why I have made it a policy to stop running election news other than filings, pertinent voter information, and election results. I do that because it’s information our readers need to know.

As you may have noticed on the front page of this paper, I am deviating from my policy. I am running very brief candidate bios between now and the election. I’m doing this as an experiment, not for the benefit of the candidates, but for our readers.

In order for me to keep doing this, I need two things to happen. First, I need to hear from you that this is something of value that you appreciate. Secondly, and more importantly, we need the candidates to step up to the plate and advertise again. They need to stop paying out of town marketing firms, sign makers and billboard companies and start investing locally, especially with mom-and-pop organizations like ours who service the very communities they’re trying to represent.

Trust me, we would love to hire more staff, publish bigger papers and cover more local news, but that takes money. The candidates are good at taking your money, but where is the re-investment? We spend a lot of time and money to put them into the paper but it seems the only thing we get back from them are requests for more free publicity.

To put the shoe on the other foot, I like having nice roads to drive on, hot and cold running water, electricity, police and fire protection, etc., but I don’t want to pay taxes for it. Why should I if the cities and counties already provide it? That’s ridiculous, I know, but that’s kind of the way things work.

If we’re relevant enough to publish your news, we’re important enough for you to invest your advertising dollars. This applies not only to politicians, but to businesses as well. If you think people are going to buy your product because they see it online, just remember this – your customer is just a click away from Amazon.

We’re here for the sake and benefit of the people in Sugar Land, Missouri City, Stafford, Meadows Place and the rest of Fort Bend County. If reaching these fine folks is important to you, then we should be as well.

The Force is not with ‘The Last Jedi’

Spoiler alert! If you have not seen “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” but plan to, you might not want to read this column.

I figure that I’ve waited long enough that anyone who really cares about the movie will have already seen it at least once. I’ve seen it twice. If you haven’t seen it but plan to, why are you still here? Turn the page already! Then go get your tickets.

Actually, if you’re not a big Star Wars fan, this is one you can probably hold out to see in home video. I’d like to see it once more in the theater, not because I liked the movie but because I’m that big a Star Wars fan. Actually, because I’m such a fan, I found this movie painful to watch. Director Rian Johnson was given free rein to do with as he pleases with the greatest film franchise in cinematic history and he left George Lucas’s empire in shambles.

I was just shy of my 12^th birthday the first time I saw “Star Wars” in the theater. Ever since then I’ve dreamed of being Luke Skywalker, wielding my lightsaber and zipping across the galaxy in my X-wing fighter. In my mind I was the headstrong, adventure-seeking farm boy who rescues the princess and saves the populace from the clutches of tyranny.

Thank you, Rian Johnson, for turning the greatest hero in the galaxy into a decrepit, reclusive hermit and then needlessly killing him. Skywalker was so far out of character in “The Last Jedi” that I had to wonder if this was the same hero I grew up with.

On top of that, the movie was filled with so many plot holes and letdowns that you have to wonder what the Disney and Lucasfilm executives were smoking when they green-lighted this train wreck. Not only did they OK it, they gave Johnson the nod to make three more Star Wars movies! (I’ve got a bad feeling about this.)

Let’s take a closer look, shall we? First you have General-Princess Leia getting blasted into space and not only surviving, but also flying back to the ship to be rescued. Then there is the issue of gravity in space needed not only for dropping bombs but also the falling back of a spaceship out of gas.

The original trilogy of films gave us Force ghosts of fallen Jedis. Now they don’t even have to die. They can use their Jedi power to project themselves as some kind of Force avatar. If the Jedi had that power, why did they use holograms when they were at the height of their power in the prequel trilogy?

Don’t even get me started on how ridiculous the whole slow-speed chase was with the mighty First Order fleet managing to stay just out of range of the feeble remnants of the Rebel fleet when they clearly had the ability to not only catch them, but surround them and annihilate them in a heartbeat.

Speaking of annihilations, Johnson managed to give a lot of key characters some rather meaningless purposes and deaths. In one blast he eliminated Admiral Ackbar and other minor characters from the original trilogy.

Following “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” there was a huge build-up and a lot of speculation about who Supreme Leader Snoke is and who Rey’s parents are. They all turned out to be nobodies.

In a parallel to “The Return of the Jedi” when Darth Vader brings Luke Skywalker before the emperor, “The Last Jedi” gives us Kylo Ren bringing Rey before Snoke. Not only was the latter lacking the same drama and suspense, but both ended the same way with Vader and Kylo each vanquishing their masters. Snoke’s death came so quickly and easily that it reminded me of Boba Fett – a character with a big build-up but a small scene and little to no overall significance. The same thing happened with Captain Phasma. There was a lot of hype but all she had a cameo appearance and then died.

One of the things that really disappointed me was how Chewbacca, C-3PO, and R2-D2 were little more than window dressing in this movie, providing nothing more than scant comic relief. Speaking of comic relief, I must admit that I do like porgs. That’s something Johnson did right.

Unfortunately, when you look at all the characters Johnson killed off (compounded by the passing of Princess Leia actress Carrie Fisher) plus the deflated suspense coming off of “The Force Awakens,” it’s a wonder that director J.J. Abrams has anything left to work with when he takes over for the ninth part of the saga. Abrams directed “The Force Awakens” and got a lot of criticism for killing off Han Solo. Still, he delivered a fresh and enjoyable chapter to the Star Wars legend.

One can only hope he can do better with Star Wars than he did for Star Trek. As the director of the rebooted “Star Trek,” he delivered a masterpiece but then followed-up with a clunker of a sequel.

In the meantime, we have “Solo: A Star Wars Story” coming out this spring. Lucasfilm gave its directors the boot midway through production and replaced them with Ron Howard, who is one of my favorite directors. I have high hopes for that one.

May the Force be with “Solo,” because it certainly wasn’t with “The Last Jedi.”

What Southerners do when the weather turns bad

It’s sad when your own children begin to doubt you.
The other day I was complaining about being cold and Colton, my youngest son, said he was beginning to wonder if I was really from Colorado. Yes, I was born and raised in Colorado – a state known for it’s cold, snowy winters. Additionally, I went to Adams State College (now University) in Alamosa, where it is not uncommon to see (and feel) temperatures drop to double-digits below zero. From there I went to Minnesota, where the temperatures do the same thing, but with humidity.
There is a reason I now live in Southeast Texas. I hate being cold (which is ironic because I married a native Houstonian who loves the cold). Trust me, humid cold is much, much worse than the dry cold we had in Colorado. So yeah, when the temperature last week dropped below freezing, I was miserable. I’d much rather be sweating it out in the 90s than chilling out in the 20s.
Still, it was my integrity as a manly, native Coloradan that my own son, himself a Colorado native, was questioning. The strange things is, I didn’t care. Sure, we got a good chuckle out of it, but the truth is, I’m proud to be from Colorado and very happy to live in Texas. I’ve always been a cold weather wimp, so I take no insult in that.
Here in our office in Stafford, the air conditioner blasts away all summer long. I have closed off the vent to my office and keep a space heater handy because my office is more like a walk-in cooler than a sauna. Even now as I write this I’m wearing my Texans hoodie and am blasting the space heater with hopes of thawing the 10 ice cubes at the end of my feet.
The only benefits to the cold that I can think of is that it makes for good sleeping weather and it keeps the bugs at bay. Other than that, I have no use for the cold. Still, as one who grew up in cold climates, I find it entertaining to see Southerners panic whenever the temperatures dip, especially whenever the S-word creeps into the forecast.
Honestly, I think TV weather people enjoy saying snow as often as they can. It’s a ratings bonanza for them. I think they may be in cahoots with the grocery stores over this. Whenever they say snow, shelves go empty at local supermarkets. That’s just good business for both entities.
They do the same thing with hurricane forecasts. There may be no chance of a hurricane hitting us, but the meteorologists will tell us repeatedly that they are tracking the storm and that we should stay glued to our TVs just in case there is a change in direction. They then segue into hurricane prevention tips and advise you to run to the grocery store and strip the shelves bare of food and supplies because you might not be able to get out of the house for a day or two. This is vitally important because they want more advertising from the grocery chains. The more anxious they can make people about the weather, the more groceries get sold and the happier they are.
Whether it’s a hurricane or a chance of snow, the same scenario plays out. The panic-stricken public leaves work early, rushes to the store and circles the parking lot for 30 minutes waiting for a parking space. They then go into the store and create a black Friday scene in the bottled water aisle. Once their cart is full of canned food, jars of peanut butter, loaves of bread, a box of Twinkies, and more cases of bottled water than a person could drink in a year, they go stand in line and the checkout registers where they wait until the storm has blown over just to make their purchase. Well, at least it seems that long.
Meanwhile, back in Colorado and other cold weather states, folks are staring out the back window through a blinding snowstorm at the grill with five inches of snow on it wondering if they should dust it off and grill steaks or stay inside and scramble some hamburger to make tacos. Yeah, the struggle is real!
A few years ago I used to work for a local sporting goods store. Whenever the temperatures dipped, we would have a run on space heaters and generators. We also did a brisk business on hoodies, thermal underwear and hunting jackets.
I will say this much for Southerners, they do know how to prepare for the weather. It’s almost second nature to stock up and hunker down whenever foul weather is forecast. They don’t need to write down a checklist; they have it memorized. The lists of foodstuffs are handed down from mothers to daughters for generations. The supply list is likewise passed father to son as it has been since the days of cavemen, or at least since the invention of TV news.
I can see this scene being played out in living rooms across the South last week:
Wife: Look hon, the weatherman said it might snow.
Husband: I’m on it.
Wife: I’ll leave work at noon tomorrow and hit the Kroger and the HEB.
Husband: I’ve got Academy covered.
Wife: What about the kids?
Husband: What about them?
Wife: Should we wait for the bus to bring them home or go park in line to pick them up at school with everybody else?
Husband: That depends. Are they feeding them steak or tacos for lunch?
And so it goes.
I guess the bottom line to all this talk about the weather is that my son, and the rest of the family, has noticed that I’ve completely acclimated to Texas. It only took 12 years, but here I am, all bundled up and ready to start circling parking lots at the first sign of a snowflake.

Response to stories on Trump protestors came fast and furious

Whoa there partner!
Two weeks ago we ran a pair of stories on the front page about two people protesting President Donald Trump – Karen Fonseca and Gale McCray. The feedback came fast and furious and was filled with spite and hate. To read the emails, letters, and comments on social media, you would think that we were in cahoots with the protestors and that the Fort Bend Star is in league with some left-wing media conspiracy to remove Trump from office.
Let me tell you, nothing could be further from the truth. We are not part of any conspiracy and I am about as conservative Christian as they come. Although I can’t speak for the ownership, I dare say they would identify the same way. As responsible journalists, however, we can’t let personal biases get in the way of reporting the news.
Since nearly every single person contacting us about the stories lacked the personal integrity to allow us to use their names with their comments, I’m going to share a few of these nastygrams anonymously to give you an example of the vitriol that has been spewed at us for the last couple weeks. I’m sharing these abbreviated but otherwise unedited, as written, mistakes and all.
“Why the f**k would you print 2 anti Trump stories on the first page? You do realize he was elected president of the USA by the people of the USA! Where the f**k is your head give the man the support that goes with the office, Who gives a f**k about Karen F**koff or the old man and his sign? I put you in the category with CNN and its fake news. F**k your newspaper ! They would like you in the Middle East.. Put my address on your don.t not throw list, you commie bastards”
Given the fact that we have received a high volume of response to these stories and they did happen here, I’d say that makes it local news.
“Please check your facts before reporting … There is so much more to the story.....eventually it will all come out. Freedom of speech...we all have that right but her arrest was based on her not being a good citizen.”
There is always a lot more to every story. The purpose wasn’t to dig into her past, but to giver her a chance to tell her side of the story after Sheriff Troy Nehls told his the previous week – a fact that many people seem to have overlooked or forgotten.
“What a shock to my system. The front page of your December 20, 2017 issue of The Star was. I have read your newspaper for years and have enjoyed it. I considered it a newspaper covering local news with an objective view point. However, I detected a rather strong point of view on page 1 as belittling President Donald Trump in your choosing to highlite two articles

1. Trump that boy don’t act right
2. F-Trump woman tells her side story …

I’ve had it ‘up to here’ with the media, TV comedians and actors and actresses and musicians insulting me personally, my intelligence and my judgment because I voted for Trump. And, if I’m not mistaken, you as editor of this newspaper think so too. I’d be crazy to continue giving you my precious time when I know what you think of me. … I watch CNN and FOX too. I like to hear both view points. I recommend that you do too. I read the main, most important page of your newspaper and have decided not to read it again.”
Is this guilt by association? Just because we report on something does not necessarily mean we agree with it.
“I saw the ‘white garbage truck’ in the HEB parking lot. It’s more offensive in person than seeing it on tv. It should read, ‘truck occupied by trash’. I’d hate to have young kids who see a ‘supposed adult’ displaying such garbage. I feel sorry for their kids.”
“…that’s why any journalistic viewpoint, merely giving coverage or actual support to Fonseca, is called ‘yellow journalism.’ Sensationalism sells.”
Our paper is delivered free. We’re not trying to sell copies. We are reporting local news.
“I read your editorial about the Trump hater and her husband. I understand the need for free speech but not the need for vulgar free speech, especially where children can see it. Isn’t there an obscenity law? I also don’t see the need to show the crybabies that don’t like the fact that Trump won the election fair and square. … These two people ( I use that term loosely) have no class at all. Mrs. Fonseca said she had 12 children & this is the way she is raising them? Where is CPS?
I also don’t understand why you give this loser of a husband and wife team free publicity. There must be other quality stories your paper could cover during this time of the year about acts of unrequired kindness people do for one another in the aftermath of Harvey, the floods, the shootings and other things that have happened during the past year. Your paper put the two of them on the front page?
If stories like this are published because the news media likes to sensationalize the news, then you have succeeded. Even if you succeeded, you have lowered yourself to the level of these two and in doing that, you ultimately have failed to maintain your own decency and integrity.”
The week before we had front-page stories about a woman who is continuing to help victims of Hurricane Harvey, as well as the arrival of a nonprofit organization that helps abused women. Those stories didn’t elicit nearly the same response. Also, I think I maintain my integrity for printing stories with viewpoints so diametrically opposed to my own. It shows we are trying to be fair and balanced in our coverage.
Not all the response was negative. I wrote a column in the same edition of the paper denouncing Fonseca (the F-Trump woman) and many people agreed with my conclusions.
“As a former journalist myself, I thought your editorial was well done in that you certainly showed both sides of the issue yet came to the right conclusion. I especially liked your close: “find a positive message that will help solve problems, not create them.” We’re in an awful divide right now. I’m a Trump supporter and the new tax bill will be awesome for all; and, hopefully, change the opinions of the many Trump haters. Although doubt it. It’s hard to get rid of hate. And, I say that about many of my intelligent friends and family.”
“Your column in the December 20th issue of the STAR regarding the woman (I won’t refer to her as a lady) with the vulgar signs on her pick-up was very well written. I totally agree with your opinion, and I commend you for writing it.”