If nothing else, being a community volunteer and voicing my opinion has taught me to not only be thick skinned but to continue to point out the injustices, manipulation and the bull-crap that goes on in the Santa Clarita Valley regularly. I’ve gotten used to the smears, threats, the baseless lies and more or less ignore it. 

But every once in a while it’s appropriate for me to point out the pile of crap that the local paper tries to pawn off as justification for their journalistic ineptitude.

Yes, those two paragraphs are a parody; a satirical re-jiggering of the first two paragraphs from a Signal editorial  that tries to explain or justify its Feb. 7 front page story profiling an illegal immigrant.  

The Signal editorial goes on to say: “We’ve been accused of trying to generate sympathy for law-breakers. One letter-writer called the story a “pile of propaganda.” Some have leveled a charge we’ve faced before: The Signal has an agenda. To that last one we respond: “Yes. We do.”

Of course The Signal has an agenda; it is apparently to spoon-feed what it wants or is told to to its’ dwindled readership. The editorial claims; “Our agenda as the newspaper of local record is to do the best job we can in objectively covering all sides of a controversial issue” which is a load of crap to anyone that has lived in the Santa Clarita Valley for any period of time.

The Signal has published slanted stories; has misquoted individuals often; has regularly not been complete or thorough with presenting both sides of a story; and has printed inaccurate and/or completely false facts. There are a plethora of individuals that can be assembled in a moments notice to attest to that fact! 

The outcry of criticism towards The Signal for its coverage of the illegal immigrant and of Bob Kellar’s speech at the local rally weeks ago is a perfect example of this. Yet the paper tries to justify it as “news coverage” when in reality it was nothing more then spinning a poor-choice of words taken out of context into a “sensational” story.

The responsibility of a community paper is to report newsworthy stories and to investigate stories and issues that are newsworthy to the community. Not to pick up on baseless and frivolous misinterpretations from out of town carpetbaggers looking for their 15 minutes of fame by puking-up some socialist/communist rhetoric. And certainly not from “interviewing” an illegal immigrant to get their side of the story; they’re blatantly breaking the law which makes them criminals; there is no other side to the story!

The Signal editorial goes on to say; “But at the end of the day, the responsibility is ours to report as many sides of a news story as we can find. It’s our job to put the issues on the table. As for the legitimacy of the various sides of those issues, we leave it to our readers to decide.” But if that were true they would actually be truly reporting the facts and merits of those issues which they have not done a good enough job on for quite some time.

And then there is the final insult to our intelligence by saying; “Furthermore, we invite readers to send letters to the editor and tell us their perspectives on the issue. That’s what we’re here for.”

Don’t bother wasting your time folks because from my own personal experience they will edit what you have to say; even if you follow their guidelines and they tell you they won’t, they will. That so-called community paper has little to no integrity as I have found out often. They will lie to your face; manipulate, distort or ignore the facts and downright get it wrong figuring that those that read the paper are just a bunch of gullible dolts.

That charade will continue when they endorse the three incumbents in the Santa Clarita City Council race and give bad or little press coverage to the others. Hell, they’ve already edited David Gauny’s op-ed piece!

What the Santa Clarita Valley needs is a real newspaper that has integrity and shows it has independence. An authentic newspaper that can actually dig deep on a story, that asks the tough questions and that turns up the heat to get at the facts and the truth. Not the self-aggrandized “newspaper of local record”; the abomination that is spewed onto newsprint daily filled with puff pieces crafted by the City gentry for the consumption of the unsuspecting and naïve.   

But hey, what do I know I’m just a guy with a computer!

Dave Bossert- Commentary

Dave Bossert is a community volunteer who serves on a number of boards and councils. His commentaries represent his own opinions and not necessarily the views of any organization he may be affiliated with or those of the West Ranch Beacon