Dead hand of the state
YOU DESERVE credit for publishing as lead letters three critical contributions about your coverage in the last edition. You deserve credit for offering in the new polished Journalist a platform for Vice-President Peter Murray’s view that [the dead hand of] socialism is the panacea for all mankind’s ills.
No system devised by man is perfect, nor ever will be. But state control, which is growing more rapidly in the UK than anywhere else in the world, is not the answer.
All journalists should note with care the phrases in Mr Murray’s inspiring agitprop: “A political compass to guide you”: in other words, use bias in your approach.
“Nationalisation is back on the agenda”: ie, the dead hand of bureaucrats is best at spending our money; and “People before profits”: no organisation has a right to exist unless it can pay for itself from its own efforts. To thrive it needs to make a profit. That applies especially to newspapers.
Mr Murray advocates state and union control of virtually everything, including over your right to work (yes, the NUJ once had that with the closed shop).
Advocates of big government are hiding what they really think: that you people out there are too stupid to make your own decisions and have no right to spend your own money. They can do it better then you can.
On the issue of local papers, the Journalist is naive to argue that scrapping plans for BBC local video news has cost 400 worthwhile jobs. It would have killed many local newspapers, substituting more state control (BBC version) of the media.
Don Briggs
Knutsford, Cheshire