It’s an oft-repeated truism that the future writes the history of the present.
That’s true in Whitewater as much as anywhere. It is a truth (like the most important truths) apart from both independent present-day commentary and contrasting, mendacious marketing and press-flacking.
All the marketing in the world cannot shield against this simple question from the future:
If that should be the question from our future – and it will be – then what shall we say about so many projects now touted?
That they’re doomed to irrelevancy or scorn; they’ll not be able to answer these simple questions adequately.
Marketing to sugar-coat the present serves only the present; it has no hope of winning the future.
There’s a distinction to be made, though, between news and commentary. In an blog post at the Gazette, VP of News Operations Scott Angus writes that Editor’s views: Despite objections, media must reflect societal changes (subscription req’d).
That’s very true: for news, there’s an inescapable need to be honest about the present. I don’t write this as a newsman (needless to say), but simply as someone who grew up in a newspaper-reading family.
That’s no easy spot for Mr. Angus and the Gazette: much is changing, and some readers are surely angry that the paper’s writing about those changes, not simply reporting happy news, or feature stories, etc.
But if news demands an attention to the actual present, then commentary demands both that present-focus and an eye to the future.
That’s the Gazette‘s great problem: its editorial position is weak, and its exposition of those positions poor. An editorial position that involves deal-making among tiny factions will be in disrepute, and error-prone editorial descriptions and analyses will not be able to answer satisfactorily the future’s question, Who, did what, for whom, at what cost?
So there’s the Gazette‘s dilemma: keep the editorial focus it has, bow to present-day demands for bowdlerized news, and lose the future. Alternatively, they can risk a truly hard slog now, but at the prospect of a more secure future.
For the risk-adverse, I’d guess, that’s no easy decision.
There’s a contrast with Whitewater, though. Reading his work, I’ve no doubt that Mr. Angus sees this choice, sees more than one path. (I have no idea if the Gazette‘s editorialist, Greg Peck, sees any of this.)
Locally, in Whitewater, a waning faction of town squires shows no (outward) understanding of a choice.
They must know that their marketing efforts over these last several years have amounted to little, all their endless headlines and crowing brought few genuine gains, and that despite representing institutions fueled with millions in taxpayer dollars, they can’t get a crowd – let alone a majority – for their political agenda.
They’ve no sense, though, of a viable alternative, so they’ll just double their efforts for more of the same, to an audience smaller and less believing with each passing season.
I don’t know if the Gazette will make a change to answer the future’s questions adequately; Whitewater’s aging town squires simply can’t.