Parody of journalism

As a recent transplant to Arkansas, I will say that I love the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. I find it both entertaining and useful. I will say, however, that in the early days I honestly thought that Bradley Gitz’s columns were a comedic parody—something like one would find in The Onion.

There are too many examples to mention, but some would be: where he found a loony professor in Australia who claimed reading to children would give them an unfair advantage and was not “egalitarian.” Let’s be clear: he couldn’t find a nutty professor out of 350 million Americans (or Europeans for that matter) so he had to go to the other side of the planet. Then he went on a bloviating rant about how liberals don’t want you to read to your children.

Then, he spent two weeks with rants on how discussing Islam was “off-limits.” It was a wonderful example of irony. In the last two weeks he has claimed that raising the minimum wage is “stupidity.” While CEO pay has skyrocketed, Republicans have willfully passed legislation to limit the increases in the minimum wage. And those “savings” could justify increased CEO pay. Mr. Gitz apparently thinks that’s just fine. I will agree with Mr. Gitz that there was “stupidity” in his column, but it didn’t come from those trying to raise the minimum wage.

I have some genuine suggestions: Have a high school or college freshmen educate Mr. Gitz on basic journalism, mainly that you should do at least some research before writing. Have the same person show him how to use Google, and remind him that watching Fox and Friends does not constitute “research.” And finally, for your HR department, is Mr. Gitz really the best that Arkansas has for one day a week on your opinion pages? BRENT HATFIELD

Maumelle