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Monday, November 14, 2011

The Daily Times - In For A Penny

Salisbury’s newspaper, the Daily Times, has decided that they would rather lie than admit an error. Given an opportunity to correct that mistake, they would rather compound that error with additional lies. Why not? Daily Times publisher Greg Bassett seems to believe that they are beyond criticism or action.

Sadly, any community the size of Salisbury should have a daily newspaper, readers are acting. They are choosing to cease being customers of a paper they can’t trust and seeking their local news from other sources, including SBYNews. Some recent actions by the staff and management of the Daily Times shed a bright light on why readers continue to abandon their local newspaper.

On Thursday, the DT published a story – “Black Friday Security in Jeopardy”. In its original form, the third paragraph read:

A memorandum of understanding -- modeled after an agreement forged with The Centre at Salisbury mall for similar services -- was signed by Muir Boda, asset protection coordinator for the Salisbury Walmart, and forwarded to the council for consideration.”

It was pointed to the management of the paper that this was not true. In fact, reporter Sarah Lake was at the meeting and KNEW that it wasn’t true. Rather than correct their mistake by publishing a correction in Friday’s paper, they simply went behind the readers’ backs and changed Lake’s lie (in the online edition) to read:

“A memorandum of understanding -- modeled after an agreement forged with The Centre at Salisbury mall for similar services -- would be signed by Muir Boda, asset protection coordinator for the Salisbury Walmart, and forwarded to the council for consideration, according to a memo from Police Chief Barbara Duncan.”

This corrected version is accurate. It also proves the bias of Lake and the DT by keeping a quote from Mayor Jim Ireton which is not true. This is a stock-in-trade device of the DT; wrap a lie in quotes and claim that they have fulfilled their journalistic responsibility. They also can’t claim, as they have in the past, of being unable to point out known factual errors because they did point out an error made by councilwoman Terry Cohen:

Cohen also said there was no mention of the name of who signed the agreement and the mayor's accusations regarding the council's actions being politically motivated are baseless and offensive.

However, a recording available on the city's website reveals that Cohen mentioned Boda several times throughout the initial conversation regarding the MOU, at this week's work session. Visit www.ci.salisbury.md.us.

Cohen was wrong. Boda’s name was mentioned and he was also mentioned in SPD chief Barbara Duncan’s memo. Lake pointed it out, as she should. Ireton makes a statement to Lake, it’s not true. Lake knows that it isn’t true. Yet, there is not correction of Ireton’s misstatement (OK, it’s really a lie).

This brings us to Sunday’s newspaper. Bassett runs a piece by councilwoman Debbie Campbell acknowledging Lake’s (and the DT’s) collusion with Ireton and councilwoman Laura Mitchell in attacking Campbell, Cohen, and councilman Tim Spies. They preface Campbell’s piece with the following “note”:

Editor’s Note: The following is an opinion submission from Salisbury City Councilwoman Deborah Campbell. As part of routine city beat coverage, the reporter Campbell criticizes attended a Nov. 8 public meeting regarding the ongoing city charter petition effort; no “collusion” occurred. Mayor Jim Ireton’s comments were part of a news release sent to all local media outlets. The Daily Times stands by its Nov. 10 story and all subsequent reporting on the matter.

As shown above, they DON’T stand by their story. Like a thief in the night, they changed the story on their online edition without printing a correction. Sarah Lake wrote a provable lie. This wasn’t a quote from Ireton; that comes later in the article. Ireton’s quote was a lie too; one that Lake was unwilling to acknowledge because of her collusion with Ireton.

The management of the Daily Times claims that Lake took part in a “public meeting regarding the ongoing city charter petition effort; no ‘collusion’ occurred. Again, the DT compounds one lie with another. This was not a public meeting. It was an invitation-only strategy session at the Salisbury Area Chamber of Commerce. The attendees were a group of people who are working together in opposition to Campbell, Cohen, and Spies (the charter change is only their latest guise). One of those attendees was DT reporter, and assistant editor, Sarah Lake. Her role was to provide the political group with a “nice, flattering, front page article”. She fulfilled her obligation well.

It was also interesting that the DT stripped Campbell’s article, billed as op-ed but really far more accurate than any “news” Lake has written recently, from their online edition. As readers flee the biased, less than accurate coverage of the Daily Times, I can only guess that they didn’t want those people to read how badly the DT allowed this one to be bungled.

Even if one does not accept the notion that lying is morally wrong, it remains a poor course of action. One lie, or more in the case of Lake and the Daily Times, begets more lies as you try to cover up the initial ones. However, the DT continues to struggle against a tsunami of biased and outright false coverage of city news. I can only conclude that they are going to continue to compound error upon error, lie upon lie, in the hopes that this issue will go away. It won’t. Sadly, until the DT’s management realizes this they will continue to lose readers as a growing number of citizens refuse to lay down their hard earned money for a paper which they can neither trust, nor respect.

New Posts to fall below.

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ladies and gentlemen, while your humble editor, continues to, with amazing skills, make mountains out of molehills!

jason c. said...

Hate to pop your bubble, but the DT's circulation has increased over the last year. Just thought you'd like to know the facts.

Anonymous said...

The daily Times is much like obama, he has lied about everything and the media is following. They figure if the president of the United States can get away with it , then so can we.
The MSM is guilty of this also. I'm sure most people who still have values realize what is going on.
The daily times is a left wing racist group led by Greg.

Anonymous said...

They pulled the letter because Debbie Campbell tells people to listen to the audio which blows their theory out of the water.

Anonymous said...

people must be buying more birds lol

Anonymous said...

I also find it interesting that certain members of the Times staff write scathing editorials about the council, but never, ever actually attend council meetings or speak with any of the council members.

Anonymous said...

I, like many people, get the paper just to read the obituary... now I'm not sure if the people that they say have died are really dead!

Joseph Albero said...

Funny how the Daily Times is in damage control mode, posting comments on Salisbury News. I personally believe Bassett's job is on the line over this one and I hear lawsuits may be in the works.

Anonymous said...

I think that the Gannett president should get a copy of the paper and the audio recording and Joe's comments. Let him make up his mind.

While you're at it, give him a copy the Chamber of Commerce meeting transcript and the story written about it.

This paper has been an unapologetic tool of the Tilghmanites for too long.

Joseph Albero said...

To be fair, I am receiving quite a few comments, (rejected) challenging me on my earlier comment about a possible lawsuit. Obviouosly the DT's is squirming because THEY KNOW there is language out there where they in fact can be challenged, even if its a public official. I can assure you, the research is being done to possibly file suit against them.

I should add, just how many times has the DT's published articles sating someone was going to sue me. Granny, JR come to mind for starters. Nevertheless, they once again have failed to follow protocol and could be challenged for such.

To Mike Lewis and Matt Maciarello, you CLAIM the MSM is held to higher standards, PROVE IT. Case Closed!

Anonymous said...

While the house is burning down the community is arguing who's going to pick the fire hose up and squirt it at the fire. The City of Salisbury has out lived its usefullness and the taxpayers can no longer afford to keep on paying for two police departments which is the biggest expense on the books. Consolidate with the county and abide by what the voters voted for in a referendum. How much longer do the Citizens of this community want for this to continue?

Anonymous said...

9:31, I have heard that the real purpose of the meetings at the Chamber was to further an agenda of disolving the city. As a city resident and taxpayer, I am not in favor of that. If Barrie TIlghman, Mike Dunn and the others can't control the city, they will disolve it. That sounds about right for that bunch.

Anonymous said...

bwall@gannett.com is the email to report Gannett Publishing ethics violations.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for all the info on your site, Joe. I did want to give credit where credit was due. I thought the article the Daily Times did on Eric Ludwig's barber shop was great. I know he is one of your advertisers, I wondered what you thought of the article?! I am not an employee of the Daily Times by the way. I only subscribe to the Sunday edition, mainly for the coupons. Have a great day and keep up the good work!

Anonymous said...

The Habitat for Humanity story was great also 10:14, but that does not overide the papers unethical actions. If I were a Gannett shareholder I would be making a stink out of this on Yahoo Finance message boards. Shareholders expect ethical behaviour out of a company they have invested in.

Anonymous said...

10:53, I was simply wondering what Joe thought of the article about the article on Eric Ludwig, nothing else. I am still wondering. LOL

Anonymous said...

wow the DT lies and covers up their lies? insights into the bleeding obvious! sad part is how many years it's taken for you dimwits to realize this! keep drinking the kool-aid!

JoeAlbero said...

anonymous 10:14, Please forgive me, it's been a very busy morning.

I have yet to see the article but I was just across the street while the reporter spent several days hanging out at Eric's Barber Shop, so we talked quite often during the interview process.

ANY press is great press and its encouraging to see someone would take the time to promote an up and coming, (I should say arrived) business in Downtown Salisbury.

I don't see how Eric's advertising with Salisbury News makes any difference. He's a good man who deserves the attention. His customers love him and he's a craftsman. Good for the Daily Times. Maybe they'll send the same reporter over for a few days to interview Salisbury News as well, LOL. They might learn a whole lot about how many visitors we get per day, how many comments come in per day and how many we reject in one day.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the reply! I've seen you in there before with your grandson so I know you like his work too! And maybe they WILL interview you next! :-)

JoeAlbero said...

anonymous 12:25, your very welcome. As I said, it's been an absolutely crazy morning so I'm sorry for the delay. I happen to be helping out with moderating this morning so I caught your comment. Far too often I never see them. Nevertheless, its good to hear they are spending some time on local stuff.

Anonymous said...

To 9:31. You are opposed to having an open public discussion about delivering local governmental services more efficiently but you support a 7 day change to the charter with out a public discussion or public awareness. And people wonder why we are in such a sad state in our town. Brilliant!!!

Anonymous said...

1:26, what "open public discussion"? Show me where it was announced so that I could have come to the Skull and Bones meeting.

The charter change was done in public, on TV.