Thursday, December 4, 2008

Why You Should Subscribe to The Journal Times

http://news.racinepost.com/2008/12/dtente-jt-needs-your-help.html

Dustin Block, former employee of the Journal Times and founder of the Racine Post, argues in the above article that the Racine community should support the Journal Times financially because of Lee Enterprises' dire economic straits and the possibility that it and/or its newspapers could go belly up. I have to agree that the thought of Racine without a daily newspaper is not a pleasant one. The Journal Sentinel's coverage of Racine has been spotty at best, even when they had a local bureau. In other words, the Journal Times is just too big to fail in Racine.

Mr. Block's primary suggestion is that more people subscribe to the newspaper in order to provide a cash infusion. I applaud that idea. If you can afford it, subscribe to the Journal Times. Perhaps you should consider giving subscriptions to the Journal Times as holiday gifts this year. I know that at the JT Irregulars, whenever we put up the Festivus Pole and start the Airing of Grievances, the Journal Times plays a big part. I would subscribe myself but for the fact that I already receive a daily paper via my mother's subscription. I don't need that much fish wrapping material.

There are other ways to raise money for the Journal Times, too. First, I recommend that Lee Enterprises' CEO beg Congress for money. There certainly is no shame in doing that during these tough times - look at the Big 3 - and I always like to see people who are paid annually more than five times what the average person makes in a lifetime explain why we should give them our money. Perish the thought that maybe an executive making millions and millions of dollars should have his or her salary anchored in economic reality. In any case, it's worth a shot. The current administration is on its way out and apparently is giving away the store. Time to line up for the handouts.

There are other options. I've done some soul searching and I've decided to ask my fellow Irregulars if they might consider digging deep into their pockets so that we might advertise our site in the Journal Times. I'm not sure what print or online ads cost, but if we pool our resources, perhaps we could give a boost to the Journal Times' bottom line while also promoting our own peculiar form of insanity. After all, when you think about it, we are the bastard children of the Journal Times, and maybe we owe our parent something. A full page ad for the JTI is definitely preferable to more scams about Amish heaters and the like.

Or how about an adopt-a-JT-employee plan? Put all of the Journal Times' employees names into a hat and then draw them out for select sponsors to help. You could provide a Journal Times employee with lunch or dinner once a week, or maybe chip in for a warm winter jacket or snow boots or whatever else he or she might need. The possibilities are endless. Set up bell ringers outside of major retail stores to solicit donations for the Journal Times. A bake sale, maybe. Or we could stage a benefit, like the Thoughts for Food event. Put some bands on a stage, get everyone drunk, and watch the money pour in. Perhaps a telethon on Channel 25. At the very least, the Journal Times should put a donation box in their lobby. We can't help them if they're too proud to ask.

Whatever happens, I don't want to lose our local daily newspaper. It's as much a part of Racine as Danish Kringle, North Beach, and corrupt courts. We need the Journal Times to provide our community with a sense of identity. Me and almost all of my trolls agree on that.

18 comments:

Lizardmom said...

I checked my pockets, only lint, is that worth anything?? I have plenty of old USA Today's for lining lizard tanks, and we have rarely gotten the paper, I can find out better info in a few key strokes than even their online version. I will happily donate all my lint if it will help the cause...

OrbsCorbs said...

I was thinking of hitching my trailer to the truck and driving around town asking people to give whatever they can: money, food, old clothes, furniture, etc.; then take it to the Journal Times' parking lot and let them pick over the goodies.

kkdither said...

I think I have an old "Sit and Spin" toy in the garage. I think that would be a fitting donation to our abusive "parents." What time will the truck be around to collect, orbs?

OrbsCorbs said...

Abusive parent? I like to think of the Journal Times as the drunk who comes home and opens up a big ol' can of whoop-ass on you, but is always sorry in the morning.

And then does it again, and again, and again . . .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zzak8Gq3KO0

kkdither said...

I seriously don't think they are sorry one bit when morning comes around...
Reoffender

kkdither said...

Rats... can't get things to work from here.

The song to listen to is by Travis and it is called Reoffender. I tried.

Anonymous said...

I'll subscribe the moment they admit to their bias and start putting out an objective paper.

They lean so far to the left they have a chiropractor on staff to help fix their posture.

Anonymous said...

I'll think about it. Buts it kinda fun to go around to different doctors offices, businesses and waiting rooms and read it for free.

First off, can the editorial board. Editorials are nothing but opinions, and you know how the saying goes about opinions (oops, that's what we do here!)

Second, report the news, and report it objectively. Quit using line item editorializing to change the meaning of a quote or to slant a story.

Third, BRING BACK "BC" IN THE COMICS!

Lizardmom said...

Logjam, if you use yahoo's start page, you can get BC every morning, I do :) I can email them to you in the morning if you like, they're usually really good :)

Anonymous said...

Sorry about the typo...I put the "s' on my "but" instead of my "it".

Anonymous said...

Liz,

Here's another good site for all kinds of comics: comics.com

But that's not the reason I said it.
Apparently Johnny Hart a few years back did a strip that upset the PC crowd so they like a number of other papers pulled an OrbsCorbs on the strip. The hell with being offended, that's a very funny strip!

Lizardmom said...

I know, it is one of the best, and I was really ticked when they pulled it, we always got my moms comics for that reason, now they're not worth it, I was determined to find and keep it myself, I'm such a rebel...

drewzepmeister said...

I'd love to help Racine keep a newspaper. The JT? I don't what I can do to help them. Subscribe? The hardcopy is yesterday's news. I don't have any birds to line cages with. Everything else is on the Internet somewhere. A flyswatter maybe...

Orbs-My son loves that song.

KK-Travis really rocks!

Logjam-I remember JT pulling the plug on BC. They also did the same thing for For Better Or For Worse for a little bit.

MinnesotaChick said...

What did For Better Or Worse do to offend them?

I know I stopped reading it for awhile after the dog died... but that's just me.

drewzepmeister said...

FB or FW's writer,Lynn Johnston ran a storyline on Micheal's friend Lawrence coming "out of the closet". Of course,JT didn't want the controversy,didn't run it.

OrbsCorbs said...

DA, I stopped reading the strip for awhile after the dog's death, too. It tore me up. I couldn't believe that I was so emotionally attached to a comic strip dog.

SER said...

What a touching article, as soon as I finished reading it, I reached right into my pockets, but with my short arms and deep pockets, I just couldn’t snag anything up for them.

AvengingAngel said...

The RJT killed my dog. Not really, but that's what I told them when they called me for a subscription. They hung up and never called back.