"First, They Came for the Reporters ... "

“ … we don’t know what happened after that.”

That’s the wording of a two-panel cartoon quoted in a recent column by the great Texan, Jim Hightower. (If you don’t read his newsletter, The Hightower Lowdown, you should start today.)

It sort of says it all.

That column was censored by the Creators Syndicate, which distributes his column to newspapers nationwide. The story behind that chillng decision is detailed in the Texas Observer, and you can read it here: http://bit.ly/2PSuDp0.

Basically, the column calls out the thieving newspaper chains that are destroying real journalism. These “hedge-fund scavengers know nothing about journalism and care less.”

High on his list of such villains is GateHouse Media, owner of, among dozens of other papers, the Middletown Times Herald-Record, which has been shedding reporters and copy editors at an alarming rate. They’re down to just eight beleaguered reporters now.

G-d help us all.

Jim Hightower, Poet, Philosopher, Cowboy and Hero.