The business of radio broadcasting has become a largely
unsustainable model; newspapers and news magazines struggle to find ways, in
the digital age, to stay alive. TV news
operations – local, national, over-the-airwaves, and cable – have been steadily
downsized for the past five years. Local
TV news operations in Wisconsin and a handful of other states which had highly
contested political races in the past election cycle (Tammy vs. Tommy, etc.)
got a huge infusion of cash that may have forestalled further downsizing by a
year or two.
At a time when we need more investigative journalism than
ever before to keep track of the vast sums of anonymous cash that fuel
increasingly negative and insulting political ad campaigns, it’s disappearing.
In large part, investigative journalism has been supplanted by bloggers - some
more well-intentioned than others, others blatantly partisan - and
well-financed sources of deliberate disinformation.
That’s why it’s so disappointing that the Midwest's largest funder of
independent, non-partisan examination of politics and political spending, the Chicago-based
Joyce Foundation, has abruptly pulled the plug on its funding for the Wisconsin
Democracy Campaign after 16 years of continued support.
This is a huge blow to the budget of the Wisconsin Democracy
Campaign, one that’s going to be very challenging to the continued operations
of our state’s premier organization, in its mission of delivering unbiased
political analysis and political fundraising accountability. That’s why this blind-side from the Joyce
Foundation sucks so much. Essentially
every news organization in the state has relied on the Wisconsin Democracy
Campaign to provide untainted information.
Now, when we need this kind of information the most, with dwindling
resources in every newsroom in the state, its existence is threatened.
As the Executive Director of the Wisconsin Democracy
Campaign, Mike McCabe, has said, “Somebody needs to follow the money in
Wisconsin politics. Somebody needs to
show how all that money contaminates public policymaking. Somebody needs to
expose corruption, blow the whistle on wrongdoing, and fight to keep government
as clean, open, and honest as possible.”
Increasingly, that job has been done by the Wisconsin
Democracy Campaign, filling in the huge staffing gaps that exist in newsrooms
in our state. Hence, the title of this
post, “No Good Deed” – and, its modern suffix, “goes unpunished”.
I encourage you to join my wife and me in donating whatever
you can to the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign.
It’s as easy as logging onto their website.
I’ve never understood why so many people on the right think
organizations like the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign and the American Civil
Liberties Union, to name only two, are “left-leaning” organizations. They’re not.
They exist to help protect the constitutional rights of every American,
and to fulfill the Jeffersonian demand for a well-informed citizenry. Every citizen, regardless of political bent,
should support organizations like these.
I have never, since I started this blog in 2009, asked my
readers to contribute to anything.
I’m asking now.
It’s that important.
