Cover story, Dec. 26, "The Year in Photo Review"
"A year in photos" feature is sure to get your readers' attention. You've already got the content, now repurpose those images in a summary of 2019! Well done, City Weekly.
@ourhometowninc
Via Twitter
Our ERA Now action on Temple Square in downtown Salt Lake made the front cover of City Weekly's photo edition. We projected ERA Yes two stories tall onto the Mormon church's Conference Center, and it was glorious!
@Kate_Kelly_Esq
Via Twitter
#NotFake
Last year, when I told my childhood teacher that I was majoring in journalism, I could see disappointment color her face. Her voice lowered and became sickeningly sweet, asking, "Do you want to get a job? It's all fake news."
While my childhood teacher's main objection was "fake news," the problem that I see is less malicious but rather misleading and sensualizing news. Specifically, I've seen this misleading by using statistics without the context of where those statistics came from and what they mean.
I understand why statistics are so appealing. They provide catchy headlines that entice people to click on the article; they are persuasive and provocative; they are packed with information and tangible. But ethical journalism shouldn't be about the headlines, it should be about going further, making information accessible for the average citizen who isn't statistically literate or able to understand the hidden complexities—like constructed population sizes—that lie behind those numbers. People often trust data backed by research more than opinions, and so I think that journalists should continue to use statistics when possible but be careful not to mislead people, whether intentionally or not, by stating statistics without context.
Martha Harris,
Provo
The Giuliani Train
America is inviting a big problem with Rudy Giuliani and his shady group running foreign affairs for Trump. In 1776, American colonists objected loudly to King George III's use of unelected private advisers and government ministers with little Parliamentary support to force economic and political policies on them.
Those policies constituted the "long train of usurpations and abuses" mentioned in the Declaration of Independence. Even more so than the Ukrainian people, the American electorate today are in the same position as our ancestors.
Giuliani and Trump are pushing the legislative power aside just as George III did in the 1760s and 1770s. What will Americans do this time? Submit to kingly power or make noise like we did once before?
Robert Kimball Shinkoskey,
Woods Cross
Mad Lib
I want people to know why I have become a "liberal/progressive" Republican:
1. Too many national Democrats who are women come across to me as being "anti-men" and as disliking men. Men's lives "matter" too.
2. Because research indicates that by around the year 2030, over 50% of the U.S. will be "non-white." Too many national Democrats have been going overboard and are pandering "in a big way" to get the votes of all minority groups including the future votes of legal and illegal immigrants. Their love affair with illegal immigrants is really all about wanting to get their votes one day. They really don't care about these people as human beings. I care more about them than they do.
3. Too many national Democrats come across as being anti-business.
4. Too many national Democrats are no longer prioritizing the economic and financial needs and struggles of our lower and middle classes as well as our poor, our near-poor, and our senior citizens. They are no longer fighting for our federal government to do more to help these at-risk groups of Americans. They no longer "have their backs." I miss the national liberal Democrats of the 1960s who did champion and fight harder for these at-risk Americans.
Stewart B. Epstein,
Rochester, N.Y.
A Newborn Schmuck to See
Dear Soap Box: The Donald has stated that he is "a stable genius." How 'bout we lock him in a stable and see if the jackass is smarter than the horses?
Oops! I forgot Little Lord Fauntleroy, "the chosen one," was born in a manger. A manger is a wooden trough used to slop hogs and feed other barnyard animals. At least Mary and Joseph were responsible enough to travel to Bethlehem to pay their taxes.
Alan Wright,
Salt Lake City
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