CanWest Needs To Clean Shop

Short and sweet.

CanWest, the owner of the Windsor Star, needs to send down to Windsor the head of their newspaper group. His/her function is to coach the Editors about their jobs.

The first person who should be coached is the person who decided that the speech of Dennis DesRosiers, and in particular the section dealing with his views on Windsor, should be buried on page C2, the 24th page of the Thursday Star.

Whether you agree with Dennis or not, it does not matter. He has an important point of view that we need to hear. He is a well recognized expert, known across Canada for his opinions about the automobile industry. He is also from Windsor and maintains a presence in Windsor with his role at the University. If the Star can give so much space to a Frank McKenna who can talk about Windsor and write a Guest Column, it is a shocking indictment of their editorial judgment that they gave so little to DesRosiers.

Let's see now... CKLW interviewed DesRosiers on their prime 5:20 p.m. spot on Wednesday, CBC TV news with Susan Pedler did a major interview of him on the 6 p.m. news and John Lewis of A-Channel virtually summarized his speech on their 6 p.m. newscast.

And what did the Windsor Star do... damage control to help out a failing Mayor who

• "dismissed the speech as the analyst’s annual attack on the city. “It’s a typical, predictable Dennis speech. And that’s all I’ll say.”

Why that comment was very similar to that the day before dealing with the 2007 Local Government Performance Index (LGPI) by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy in Winnipeg.

• "It’s conclusions were dismissed by local officials, who said it drew unfair comparisons between cities.
  
  “I write it all off,” said Mayor Eddie Francis."

"Dismissed" must be the newest, favourite word. It's the typical action of the beleaguered Mayor who cannot deal with any criticism. Why, as Gord Henderson would say, Eddie is "Shooting the Messenger."

Really now, how can one complain when the Star gave DesRosiers so much advance publicity... a Henderson column a week ago and a big Star editorial on Saturday. What the heck, who needed to read his speech anyway when the Star told us in advance what he was going to say. Look at how much time they saved us by ignoring most of what he said.

We must maintain unity after all and accentuate the positive. Criticism will not be allowed. You see the Star has a mission. It is not to report the news as one might have thought that a newspaper is supposed to do. No, no, no, it is much more important than that:

• "The Star and other media outlets have a responsibility to focus on positive stories — they are out there — instead of focusing only on the negative ones that land with a thud on the community’s doorstep."

It is time that Canwest bring some people here are who understand what the role of a newspaper is, especially when it is the major media outlet in town.

Thank goodness that you, dear reader, and readers of the BLOG of Chris Schnurr had the opportunity to read for yourself what Dennis had to say to form your own opinion. You don't get that chance in a CanWest newspaper it seems.

If you did not read the speech, you can find it in the archives yesterday http://windsorcityon.blogspot.com/2007/11/desrosiers-strikes-again.html