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Texas: Moderate Republican Wins as Speaker of the House with Democratic Votes

By dianeravitch
January 15, 2025 //
11

The top elected leaders of Texas are far-right extremists–Governor Greg Abbott, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, and Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Abbott is passionate about school vouchers, despite the fact they would harm rural public schools. He called multiple special sessions of the legislature last year specifically to pass vouchers, but failing each time.

Gov. Abbott got more than $10 million from Pennsylvania billionaire Jeff Yass to oust the moderate Republicans who blocked vouchers. He won most of those races, defeating conservatives who prioritized their constituents over the wishes of the Governor, Jeff Yass, Betsy DeVos and the Texas oil and gas billionaires Wilks and Dunn, devout evangelical supports of vouchers.

A new session of the legislature opened. The hard right backed Rep. David Cook to be Speaker of the House. Rep. Dustin Burrows ran against him. Abbott, Patrick, and Paxton supported Cook. Burrows won. Burrows received more Democratic votes than Republican votes.

The Texas Tribune has the story.

Burrows won the speaker’s race after two rounds of voting, edging out Cook by a vote of 85-55. During the first round, Rep. Ana-María Rodríguez-Ramos, a Richardson Democrat, received 23 votes from fellow Democratic members — enough to keep Burrows and Cook from reaching the majority threshold of 76.

In the ensuing runoff round, twelve Democrats who had voted for Rodríguez-Ramos switched to Burrows. He also netted two more GOP votes from members who defected from Cook. Nine members marked themselves present without voting for either option, and one member, Yvonne Davis of Dallas, was marked as absent.

Burrows’ winning coalition was made up of 49 Democrats and 36 Republicans, drawing instant backlash from hardline members and activists who vowed revenge in next year’s primaries.

The Abbott wing of the party–more MAGA than Trump–is furious.

The question is: Does this mean that Abbott’s voucher plan will lose again?

A time for watchful waiting.

Categories Billionaires, Democrats, Education Industry, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Failure, Republicans, Texas, Vouchers

“Democracy”: Billionaire Bezos Abjectly Kisses Trump’s Ring

By dianeravitch
January 15, 2025 //
14

Our reader who calls him/herself “Democracy” writes here about Jeff Bezos’ shameless betrayal of the founding principles of The Washington Post, as well as its recent motto “Democracy dies in darkness.” He not only canceled the editorial board’s endorsement of Kamala Harris (to avoid taking sides), but he (or David Shipley, editor of the editorial page), canceled a cartoon critical of billionaires (including Bezos) who rushed to pay court to the new, felonious president.

Why would a titan with assets of more than $200 billion bend his knee and kiss the ring of a convicted felon? Why would Mark Zuckerberg, also with assets of more than $200 billion, immediately made his peace with Trump by eliminating content moderation from Facebook, welcoming the return to FB of Nazis, conspiracy theorists, racists, and other malefactors. Are they fearful of losing a few billions? Are they worried about being left out of dinners at Mar-a-Lago?

Bear in mind that The Washington Post led the way in discrediting Joseph McCarthy (those who were alive then will never forget Herblock’s cartoons, portraying him as a thug) and exposing the Watergate Scandal, which led to the resignation of Richard Nixon.

Bezos’s cowardice is causing the loss of excellent journalists, readership, revenue–and most important–reputation.

“Democracy” wrote, as a comment on this blog:

When Eugene Meyer bought The Washington Post in 1933 he established seven “guiding principles” for the newspaper. At the very top was this:

“The first mission of a newspaper is to tell the truth as nearly as the truth can be ascertained.”

Some of the other principles were these:

*  “The newspaper’s duty is to its readers and to the public at large, and not to the private interests of its owners.”

*  “The Newspaper shall tell ALL the truth so far as it can learn it.”

*  “In the pursuit of truth, the newspaper shall be prepared to make sacrifices of its material fortunes, if such course be necessary for the public good.”

*  “The newspaper shall not be the ally of any special interest, but shall be fair and free and wholesome in its outlook on public affairs.”

Given what has happened to The Post in the last couple of years under Jeff Bezos, one of the richest people in the world, Eugene Meyer must be spinning in his grave.

Prior to the election, The Fiscal Times reported this:

“23 Nobel Prize-winning economists expressed support for the policies proposed by Kamala Harris, warning that the policies of her opponent would be ‘counterproductive.’…The 23 Nobel laureates — more than half of all living recipients of the economics award — said that the Harris agenda focused on the middle class and entrepreneurship would ‘improve our nation’s health, investment, sustainability, resilience, employment opportunities, and fairness.’…By comparison, Trump’s agenda of high tariffs and regressive tax cuts would ‘lead to higher prices, larger deficits, and greater inequality.’ In addition, in their view Trump represents a threat to the rule of law and political stability, necessary components of a thriving economy.”

The New York Times reported this:

“More than 80 American Nobel Prize winners in physics, chemistry, medicine and economics have signed an open letter endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president…The letter praises Ms. Harris for understanding that ‘the enormous increases in living standards and life expectancies over the past two centuries are largely the result of advances in science and technology.’ Former President Donald Trump, by contrast, would ‘jeopardize any advancements in our standards of living, slow the progress of science and technology and impede our responses to climate change,’ the letter said.”

And yet, Jeff Bezos SPIKED a Post endorsement of Harris, and then lied about it in a column that was shameful, dishonest, and disreputable to The Post and the quality journalists who work there, or who used to, because a number of them have already quit or are planning on exiting.

Bezos had a relatively simple choice.

Honor The Post’s masthead logo — “Democracy Dies in Darkness — AND the principles established by Eugene Meyer, OR not.

Bezos chose racism and misogyny and sedition, and fascism.

The Atlantic published a piece three days ago by historian Timothy Ryback on Adolf Hitler.Here’s an overview:

“Monday, he swore an oath to uphold the constitution, went across the street for lunch, then returned to the Reich Chancellery and outlined his plans for expunging key government officials and filling their positions with loyalists and  turned to his main agenda: an empowering law that would give him the authority to make good on his promises to revive the economy…withdraw from international treaty obligations, purge the country of foreigners, and exact revenge on political opponents. ‘Heads will roll,’ Hitler vowed…

“When Hitler wondered whether the army could be used to crush any public unrest, Defense Minister Werner von Blomberg dismissed the idea out of hand, observing ‘that a soldier was trained to see an external enemy as his only potential opponent.’…Blomberg could not imagine German soldiers being ordered to shoot German citizens on German streets in defense of Hitler’s government…Hitler had campaigned on the promise of draining the “parliamentarian swamp”—den parlamentarischen Sumpf—only to find himself now foundering in a quagmire of partisan politics and banging up against constitutional guardrails. He responded as he invariably did when confronted with dissenting opinions or inconvenient truths: He ignored them and doubled down.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/01/hitler-germany-constitution-authoritarianism/681233/

Sound familiar? 

You’d think that Jeff Bezos might be aware of all of this. He likely is. But he’s chosen to collude with Trump, presumably because it helps his bank account – as if he needs that. Bezos gave $1 million to the Trump inaugural fund, which presumably Trump will pocket, and he coughed up $40 million to produce a “documentary”on Melania Trump, set to air later this year. A. Documentary. On. Melania. Trump.

Honestly, given her “accomplishments,” couldn’t a suitable “documentary” be produced for about $40?

As someone who used to deliver The Post, and who has been a reader for more than 50 years, I think it only appropriate to tell Jeff Bezos from the bottom of my heart that he can Kiss My Ass.

The American democratic republic deserves better.

Categories Billionaires, Democracy, Elections, Ethics, Evil, Failure, Fascism, Freedom of the Press, Hypocrisy, Media, Trump

Guess Who Will Attend Trump’s Inauguration and Sit on the Platform?

By dianeravitch
January 15, 2025 //
7

Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg will not only attend Trump’s Inauguration, they will be seated together on the platform.

Trump will show them off like house pets. Which they are. Trump brought out Musk’s inner Nazi. He intimidated Zuckerberg by threatening to put him in jail. He humbled Bezos, leading him to censor his journalists, who are fleeing the Washington Post.

Will they heel, sit and stay on command?

Sad.

Categories Billionaires, Censorship, Elections, Ethics, Fraud, Freedom of the Press, Trump

Jennifer Rubin: Why I Resigned from The Washington Post

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2025 //
11

Jennifer Rubin explains why she gave up her column at The Washington Post, previously one of the most prestigious positions in American journalism. Billionaire Jeff Bezos, one of the richest men in the world, with assets exceeding $200 billion, has bent his knee to kiss the ring of Trump. To stay in Trump’s good graces, he has censored the editorial board, even an editorial cartoonist. The Post is hemorrhaging great journalists. Bezos bought one of the nation’s greatest newspapers and is destroying it.

She writes today:

Corporate and billionaire owners of major media outlets have betrayed their audiences’ loyalty and sabotaged journalism’s sacred mission — defending, protecting and advancing democracy.

The Washington Post’s billionaire owner and enlisted management are among the offenders. They have undercut the values central to The Post’s mission and that of all journalism: integrity, courage, and independence. I cannot justify remaining at The Post. Jeff Bezos and his fellow billionaires accommodate and enable the most acute threat to American democracy—Donald Trump—at a time when a vibrant free press is more essential than ever to our democracy’s survival and capacity to thrive.

I therefore have resigned from The Post, effective today. In doing so, I join a throng of veteran journalists so distressed over The Post’s management they felt compelled to resign.

The decay and compromised principles of corporate and billionaire-owned media underscore the urgent need for alternatives. Americans are eager for innovative and independent journalism that offers lively, unflinching coverage free from cant, conflicts of interest and moral equivocation.

Which is why I am so thrilled to simultaneously announce this new outlet, The Contrarian: Not Owned by Anybody. The Contrarian will offer daily columns, weekly features, podcasts and social media from me and fellow pro-democracy contrarians, many of whom have decamped from corporate media, others who were never a part of it. I am launching this endeavor with my cofounder, Norm Eisen. Founding contributors will include Joyce Vance, Andy Borowitz, Laurence Tribe, Katie Phang, George Conway, Olivia Julianna, Harry Litman (who recently resigned from the LA Times for reasons similar to mine for leaving the Post), and Asha Rangappa, among many other brilliant voices. We will provide fearless and distinctive reported opinion and cultural commentary without phony balance, euphemisms or gamified political punditry.

The need for upstart outlets has never been more acute. The contradiction between, on the one hand, the journalistic obligation to hold the powerful accountable and, on the other, the financial interests of billionaire moguls and corporate conglomerates could not be starker.

The Post’s own headline last month warned: “Trump signals plans to use all levers of power against the media; Press freedom advocates say they fear that the second Trump administration will ramp up pressure on journalists, in keeping with the president-elect’s combative rhetoric.” And yet The Post’s owner quashed a presidential endorsement for Trump’s opponent, forked over $1M for Trump’s inauguration through Amazon, and publicly lauded Trump’s agenda.

None of us could imagine Katharine Graham sending LBJ or Nixon a $1M check. It would have been, as it is now, a fundamental betrayal of a great American newspaper. Defense of the First Amendment is incompatible with funding or cheerleading for the very person who seeks to “drastically undermine the institutions tasked with reporting on his coming administration.”

The Post’s downfall is hardly unique. ABC, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta and corporate-owned cable TV networks (which have scrambled to enlist Trump-friendly voices) are catering to powerful interests, and have profound corporate conflicts. Instead of guarding their independence, they join financial leaders, politicians and other public figures currying favor with Trump and his orbit.

Through classic anticipatory obedience—a dangerous but all too familiar pattern—they normalize the authoritarian menace. If Trump has taken “attacks on the press to an entirely new level, softening the ground for an erosion of robust press freedom,” as The Post reported, it is because he finds insufficient resistance. Instead, owners whose outlets he targets quite literally rewarded him.

In closing, I want to reiterate that I have been honored to work for over fourteen years alongside the finest writers and editors in journalism. Above all, I was blessed to work for The Post under the Graham Family ownership and Fred Hiatt’s leadership of the editorial section. My admiration for their collective integrity, dedication to craft, courage, patriotism, and decency is boundless. But when new leaders sully the reputation of institutions entrusted to them and the fate of democracy is in the balance, we all must reevaluate our careers and our obligations to the world’s most essential nation.

History calls us all.

I treasure the readers who have stuck with me over the years. I invite them and all those interested in defeating authoritarianism as well as writers and content creators to join this exciting new venture in defense of democracy. Forward!

Categories Billionaires, Censorship, Character, Courage, Democracy, Disruption, Elections, Evil, Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press, Media

Jennifer Rubin Is Leaving the Washington Post

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2025 //
13

More evidence that Jeff Bezos’ sycophantic actions are destroying The Washington Post.

Jennifer Rubin is one of my favorite columnists. She was hired by the Washington Post to offer a view from the right, after establishing a career as a conservative. Trump’s lies and policies turned Rubin into a liberal. She is both a journalist and a lawyer. She writes clearly and forcefully.

Media specialist Brian Stelter reports that Rubin is leaving the Post to start a new venture.

Today, veteran opinion columnist Jennifer Rubin is becoming the latest in a long list of Washington Post figures to leave the troubled institution.

Rubin tells me she is partnering with former White House ethics czar Norm Eisen and launching a startup publication called The Contrarian. Its tagline, “Not owned by anybody,” is a pointed reference to billionaire Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos and other moguls who, in Rubin’s view, have “bent the knee” to President-elect Donald Trump.

“Our goal is to combat, with every fiber of our being, the authoritarian threat that we face,” Rubin says.

Rather than anti-Trump, the founders describe their venture as pro-democracy. They said they have already enlisted about two dozen contributors, including Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Andy Borowitz, George Conway, John Dean, Bob Kagan, Barb McQuade, Katie Phang, Asha Rangappa, Stephen Richer, and Andrew Weissmann.

Eisen, who is departing his CNN legal analyst role, will be the publisher. Rubin will be the editor-in-chief. Rubin says she resigned from the Post because it, “along with most mainstream news outlets, has failed spectacularly at a moment that we most need a robust, aggressive free press.” She adds: “I fear that things are going from bad to worse at The Post.”

Categories Billionaires, Democracy, Ethics, Media

Karen Francisco: The Roots of the Charter School Grift in Indiana

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2025 //
8

Karen Francisco retired as editorial page editor of the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette. She grew up in Muncie and graduated from Ball State University. She is a fearless advocate for public schools. I invited her to write about what happened in Indiana to turn Republicans against public schools.

She wrote this article for the blog.

The corporate-controlled American Legislative Exchange Council in 2011 rolled out a set of model bills designed to weaken one of its primary targets: public schools. “The Indiana Education Reform Package” was patterned after the destructive legislation pushed through by Indiana’s Republican legislative supermajority and then-Gov. Mitch Daniels.

Indiana has been setting the bar for public-school carnage ever since, quietly advancing a near-universal voucher program and advancing education privatization efforts. But the newly introduced House Bill 1136 is designed to serve as a death blow for public education in Indiana. It would immediately dissolve five school districts, including Indianapolis Public Schools, and effectively set every other district in the state on a path to elimination.

The bill requires the dissolution of districts that have lost more than 50% of students within the district’s boundaries to other schools. The districts’ schools would be converted to charter schools by July 1, 2028. The first schools converted would be those with the lowest test scores.

The legislation cleverly builds on those “education reform” measures designed to cripple public school districts. Ever-changing assessment standards kept the schools chasing arbitrary benchmarks. Sky-high income limits allowed wealthy families to abandon neighborhood schools for parochial and private schools. Inadequate funding and legislation favoring charter schools left districts without the resources needed to serve the at-risk students who are not welcome at voucher or charter schools.

Indianapolis Public Schools, in particular, has been hammered by Republican lawmakers and the city’s Democratic mayors. From an enrollment of nearly 40,000 in 2005, IPS now serves only 21,055 students, having lost thousands of students  to voucher schools, charters and poor-performing “innovation schools.”

Why is Indiana, known for its conservatism, such fertile ground for radical education policy? Blame it on a perfect storm of anti-democratic forces. Out-of-state billionaires like Netflix founder Reed Hastings and the heirs to the Walmart fortune have poured millions of dollars into the state to destroy teacher unions. Powerful Republican lawmakers have built careers off education privatization. Indiana’s strong evangelical community, including its newly elected lieutenant governor, has recognized the potential of expanding Christian Nationalist  influence with taxpayer-supported schools. 

The bigger mystery is why Indiana voters have allowed the continuing destruction of their public schools, electing and re-electing representatives actively working against the voters’ best interests.

I would like to believe House Bill 1136 is the proverbial bridge too far. But 40 years of newspaper experience in Indiana tells me most Hoosiers will show little interest in the imminent threat to two urban school districts and three small rural school corporations. Sadly, race and class play heavenly into opinions about Indiana public schools, and too many Hoosiers will dismiss the danger as “not my problem.”

Elected school boards are the last piece of control Indiana voters exercise over education. Republican lawmakers eliminated the constitutional position of state superintendent of public instruction, and Indiana has always had an unelected state board of education.

House Bill 1136 starts the process of disbanding locally elected school boards, replacing them with boards filled by the governor, local officials and the director of the partisan Indiana Charter School Board.  It’s only a matter of time before every elected school board in the state is eliminated.

Look for the American Legislative Exchange Council to update its 2011 “Indiana Education Reform Package” with this crowning piece of anti-democratic legislation and for ALEC’s disciples to carry it across the nation.

Categories Accountability, ALEC, Billionaires, Charter Schools, Corruption, Democracy, Disruption, Education Industry, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Fraud, Funding, Indiana, Indianapolis, Privatization

Today is Jeff Bezos’ Birthday

By dianeravitch
January 12, 2025 //
10

The New York Review of Books is offering a free review of a book about Jeff Bezos’ life, written a decade ago. Bezos didn’t like the book, so he forbade readers from preordering it on Amazon. It’s time for Brad Stone to update his book. The past decade has shown new sides to Bezos’ character.

Free from the Archives

Today is Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s sixty-first birthday. For our July 10, 2014, issue, Steve Coll reviewed The Everything Store, Brad Stone’s account of both Bezos’s life and Amazon’s transformation from an upstart digital bookstore into the kind of corporate behemoth that saw fit to prevent customers from preordering Stone’s book in paperback, or from preordering other titles from Stone’s publisher.

Steve Coll
Citizen Bezos

“The real problem of ‘the Age of Amazon’…does not concern antitrust economics or consumer prices. It concerns the future of reading and writing. There is no evidence that high retail book prices today discourage reading. The problem is the opposite: because of the digital revolution, the price of information has collapsed in a very short time. Free news, stories, YouTube videos, games, and other content generated by users but enabled by online aggregators and pirates have undermined the leverage of authors and publishers who depend on copyright protection to make a living.”

Jeff Bezos; drawing by Pancho
Categories Billionaires, Disruption, Ethics

Editor at Washington Post Defends Killing Cartoon Critical of Bezos

By dianeravitch
January 12, 2025 //
11

David Shipley, editor of the Washington Post editorial page, took responsibility for spiking the cartoon by Ann Telnaes, an act that touched off a firestorm of controversy.

The cartoon showed several billionaires, including Jeff Bezos, paying homage to Trump.

Shipley stopped publication because, he said, the cartoon was repetitious of articles on the same subject.

Telnaes announced her resignation in a sharply worded piece on Substack.

Shipley sent the following letter to staff at the Post. By now, they must be deeply demoralized, given Bezos’ intervention to block the editorial board’s endorsement of Kamala Harris., his gift of $1 million to Trump for his inauguration, and the Amazon payment of $40 million to Trump for the license to the life story of Melania, produced by Melania. Bezos owns Amazon.

Shipley wrote:

Dear DOO,

It’s been nearly a week since Ann Telnaes resigned. I’ve been gathering my thoughts in that time and there are a few things I’d like to share. Given the depth of the response, and some of the assumptions that have been made, I hope you’ll read to the end.

Let me start with the basics.

Our owner, in his own words, is a “complexifier.” Jeff supports a news organization while having significant interests (and work) elsewhere. His support allows The Post to exist and produce excellent, independent journalism; it also means that editorial decisions can be viewed by the outside world through the prism of his ownership.

My decision not to run a cartoon by Ann in which Jeff was depicted is being viewed through this prism. I believe I made a sound editorial decision. Ann felt otherwise. She offered her interpretation. I’d like to offer mine.

First, I decided not to run the cartoon because it was repetitive. When I learned of Ann’s piece, we had just published a column on billionaire visits to Trump (with a clear mention of our owner) and we had a satire piece on the same topic underway (also with a clear reference to our owner). Yet another piece in the span of a few days struck me as overkill.

This is a subjective judgment, but it is a subjective judgment in sync with a longstanding approach. In my time here, we have focused on reducing the number of articles we publish on a given topic and from the same point of view within a given time frame – all as a way to improve the overall quality and variety of our report.

To that same end, I did not feel the cartoon was strong. Could it have been made better? Possibly. In fact, we’d recently worked with Ann on a cartoon that had gone through edits and was published after she and editors had finished working together.

In this regard, I regret that we did not have the opportunity to revisit this possibility. In what (unfortunately) turned out to be my final conversation with Ann last Friday afternoon, it was my understanding that she and I had agreed to take the weekend to consider options and that we would speak on Monday. I respect Ann’s work and was actively considering her suggestions bar one – the idea that we add language to her contract restricting editing – when she put out her Substack on Friday night, closing the door on any possibility of further discussion.

The decisions on redundancy and quality were both judgments on my part. I stand by them. At no point did I discuss any of this with Will Lewis or Jeff Bezos. This was my call.

Now let me share a couple broader thoughts. Do I pay extra attention if Jeff is in a column or a cartoon or the subject of a story? Of course I do. Does this prevent us from commenting on him? No. Look at the record. The two other pieces we ran – pieces I saw and was aware of – should dispel that bit of mythology. Do we allow dissent? Yes. Erik Wemple published a chat taking issue with my actions. Letters to the editor will do the same. If you have additional doubts, look at our published response to the decision not to run a presidential endorsement. If the work is good, if it is relevant, if it advances the story, we’ll publish it. This is my prism.

My job is a balancing act. Was I extra careful here? Sure. It’s obviously true that we have published other pieces that are redundant and duplicative. We have also published things that others judged strong and effective, and I did not. So, yes, scrutiny is on high when it comes to our owner.

But this extra scrutiny has a purpose. I am trying to ensure the overall independence of our report. Though we have a “complexifying” owner, I will not use that as a reason to exempt him from the evenhandedness we ought to extend to any public figure (an evenhandedness other news organizations extend to their owners). Nor will coverage of him be an exception to our strategic turn toward heightened curation and diminished repetition. By exercising care, we preserve the ability to do what we are in business to do: To speak forthrightly and without fear about things that matter.

I know many of you are concerned that we might be wavering in this regard. I get that concern, but I don’t think it’s true. I believe that The Post’s business success depends on its integrity and its independence. These things cannot be separated. If you don’t have them, you don’t have a business – nor are you adhering to the mission that this newspaper has always held dear. As the person responsible for this department, I am guided by this belief. And if I believe we can’t act on it any longer, I will share that feeling with you and act accordingly. But that’s not what’s happening now.

America and the world are entering a complicated moment. It’s one in which honesty, clarity of thought, fair-mindedness and courage will be required. These are the values that will guide our coverage – and my judgments. This is who we are, and it’s my belief that our work shows it.

D.

P.S. Many of you have already shared your (varied) views on the situation; please know that my door is always open to discuss decisions. I want to hear your thoughts about how we do what we do.

Categories Billionaires, Censorship, Corruption, Elections, Ethics, Evil, Freedom of the Press, Trump

Dan Rather: Is Jeff Bezos Killing the Washington Post?

By dianeravitch
January 11, 2025 //
10

Dan Rather, the fearless reporter for “60 Mibutes,” now retired, writes about Jeff Bezos’ ham-handed interference with the editorial independence of The Washington Post. The moral of the story is that newspapers should not be owned by billionaires with other financial interests, especially those who need a good relationship with the President, like Bezos. Why should Bezos cut staff because the Post is losing money? His net worth is more than $200 billion. Why destroy one of the nation’s greatest newspapers to recoup $77 million in losses? That’s chump change for Bezos.

When a journalistic institution is the one making headlines, it’s rarely good news. Such is the case for a revered American newspaper, The Washington Post. A mothership of American journalism, whose reporters helped topple an American president and inspired generations of young reporters, is listing and taking on water.

As Donald Trump and his army of “alternate” truth-tellers get ready to take the reins of government again, the country desperately needs the best and brightest journalists watching and reporting on their every move. And yet we wake to news that the Post is expected to lay off dozens more staffers the very month Trump returns to power.

The 147-year-old newspaper is apparently bleeding money, a problem of its own making. When billionaire Post owner Jeff Bezos pulled the newspaper’s endorsement of Kamala Harris just days before the election, a reported 250,000 readers cancelled their subscriptions in protest. That accounts for 10% of the paper’s online audience.

“I just cancelled my Washington Post subscription. The web site asked why, and the closest option was ‘concern with the content.’ There was no option about surrendering to fascism, but that’s the real reason,” a former subscriber posted on X.

For Bezos, founder of Amazon, the Post’s financial losses are peanuts considering his $200 billion plus net worth. But his love of the paper and his passion for quality journalism seem to be shrinking.

Back in 2013, when Bezos bought the Post from the family of venerated publisher Katharine Graham, he said he wanted to transform it from a regional newspaper to a global one. He provided money — big money — to expand the newsroom and encouraged reporters to extend their reach by embracing the “gifts of the internet.”

Over the ensuing decade, his interest in the paper ebbed and flowed, but he mostly stayed out of the editorial decision-making. Then he pulled the Harris endorsement causing an exodus of top editors, opinion writers, and reporters.

But Bezos wasn’t done burnishing his rep with the former president. After the election, he pledged $1 million to help pay for Trump’s inauguration and agreed to stream it live on Amazon Prime (an additional $1 million in-kind contribution). Just before Christmas, he was seen at Mar-a-Lago, kissing the ring with fellow super-rich guy Elon Musk. And he has green-lit a documentary about Melania Trump to air on Prime. I’m guessing it will be what’s known in the trade as a “sweetheart profile.”

While it isn’t great that the owner of one of the most important papers in the country is cozying up to an incoming president who says he will be a dictator on “day one,” Bezos’s actions aren’t surprising. He didn’t become a billionaire by being selfless.

But on Friday, things took another turn at the Post. Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Ann Telnaes quit in protest after a cartoon of hers was killed.

In a piece she published on Substack, Telnaes explained that “there have been instances where sketches have been rejected or revisions requested, but never because of the point of view inherent in the cartoon’s commentary. That’s a game changer…and dangerous for a free press…”

Since 2005, a third of newspapers in the United States have folded, and two-thirds of newspaper reporters are gone. On an Axios podcast, Victor Pickard, a professor of media policy and political economy at the University of Pennsylvania, explained that “We no longer have a commercial market that can support the levels of journalism that democracy requires.”

Another model needs to be found, and fast. We’ve learned the hard way that benevolent billionaires aren’t going to rescue American journalism. Smarter people than I are working on ways to do just that … an important topic for another Steady down the road.

In the meantime, fingers crossed. As I have said over the years and repeat now for emphasis: A free and independent — fiercely independent when necessary — press is the red beating heart of democracy.

Categories Accountability, Billionaires, Censorship, Freedom of the Press, Media

The 500 Richest People in the World Now Have $10 Trillion in Wealth

By dianeravitch
January 7, 2025 //
31

Bloomberg.com reported that the 500 richest people in the world have $10 trillion in wealth.

The biggest winners were leaders of the tech industry. Elon Musk is the richest man in the world, with a fortune exceeding $400 billion.

The world’s 500 richest people got vastly richer in 2024, with Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Jensen Huang leading the group of billionaires to a new milestone: A combined $10 trillion net worth.

An indomitable rally in US technology stocks played a key role in turbocharging the trio’s wealth, as well as the fortunes of Larry Ellison, Jeff Bezos, Michael Dell and Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. The eight tech titans alone gained more than $600 billion this year, 43% of the $1.5 trillion increase among the 500 richest people tracked by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

But consider this: The United States is considered the richest country in the world, and yet 37.9 million (11.5%) of its residents live in poverty.

The tech bros could pool their excess billions and end poverty in America. Imagine if each of the top 500 contributed $1 billion to a fund to end poverty. What’s $1 billion to someone with $10 billion or $50 billion or $400 billion. Pocket change.

Another thought: as the richest grew richer, homelessness soared. The Boston Globe reported on the homelessness statistics for every state.

Homelessness is on the rise across the country, including in Massachusetts, which had the third largest increase among all states in 2024.

The number of people experiencing homelessness across the nation rose 18.1 percent between 2023 and 2024, according to new data from the federal housing agency’s annual report to Congress. In New England, the data showed diverging trends, with two states, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, reporting steep increases, while two others, Maine and New Hampshire, had smaller homeless populations.

In Massachusetts, the homeless population increased by 53 percent, to about 29,300 in 2024, from just over 19,100 the year before. That’s nearly three times the national rate, and behind only Illinois and Hawaii. Massachusetts is unusual among states in that it has a right-to-shelter law, so the majority of homeless families had a place to sleep indoors in a state-sponsored facility.

In New York State, where I live, 158,000 people are homeless, a 53% increase from 2023 to 2024.

In California, 187,000 are homeless, an increase of 3%.

During the pandemic, the Biden administration expanded the child tax credit, and child poverty plummeted. But Republicans refused to renew the higher payments proposed by Biden, and child poverty rate more than doubled from 5.2% in 2021 to 12.4% in 2022, according to the US Census Bureau.

I recommend to you a book called The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger. It was written by British sociologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. The more equality, the happier people are. Extreme inequality contributes to envy, rage, and despair.

Again, the fabulously wealthy tech bros could end poverty in America. But I’m not holding my breath. They are too engaged in competing to see who can amass the biggest fortune.

Categories Billionaires, Democracy, Economy, Inequity, Injustice, Poverty
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