ghost stories from the globe-news

Here's another problem with the unsigned editorials that run on the left side of the Amarillo Globe-News Opinion page:

We're told that only one staff member who works on the page is a gen-yoo-wine right-wing wacko. And we believe this to be true. But the unsigned editorials are required by the publisher to follow something darkly referred to as the "historical stance of the paper." We're supposed to imagine that there's some Ghost of Opinions Past running around the newsroom typing up these editorials on an ancient Underwood Model 5.

If you call or e-mail the editorial staff about these editorials the defensive staff reaction will remind you of little Jeffy from the "Family Circus" comic: Who wrote the unsigned editorial? "Not Me!" It was that damned newsroom ghost! He's the right-wing wacko-- not me!

But, sadly, there is no newsroom ghost. These reprehensible opinions have to be typed up by a real, live human being. Real people who probably have gay friends have to script garbage like yesterday's support for State Rep. Warren Chisum's proposed legislation calling for a gay marriage ban. The corporate bosses who enforce the right-wing agenda get champagne and huge houses; the poor souls who type the agenda get—what? Free Ambien to help them sleep at night?

Another defense of the ghost editorials is equally childlike: Everybody does it! While we understand this reality, we are the self-proclaimed ombudsmen for the Amarillo media-- not for everybody. We do, however, oppose the practice of publishing unsigned editorials in all major media. Making the writing of editorials with which one may personally disagree a condition of one's employment is an undemocratic abuse of one's employees. We stand in solidarity with our oppressed brethren and sistren at the Amarillo Globe-News in calling for the corporate pigs to step away from the trough and write the damned things themselves.

SPACEDARK