We Are the Victims
POTTSTOWN, PA – The online Wild West circus continues over at The Mercury, where civility is as absent as Tom Hylton’s ethics.
Since last Thursday’s Pottstown School Board meeting, not one or two, but three online articles have been published describing the events that took place during the meeting.
Here are the three different articles:
Code Blue asks Pottstown School Board to remove Hylton (multimedia)
Code Blue asks board to remove Hylton (Updated)
Code Blue, candidates call for Hylton’s ouster (Video and time-line on elementaries added)
It’s a cesspool of confusion isn’t it?
And for each and every article, the mysterious not to be seen in public online supporters of Tom Hylton continue to hate and spit their viral venom to anyone who dares question The Great One.
Give us a break you cyber clowns and go back to downloading your porn.
Contrary to what the few online posers at The Mercury want you to believe, Tom Hylton is not a victim. Say it with us one more time: Tom Hylton is not a victim. We taxpaying residents of Pottstown are the real victims. For far too long Tom Hylton has been bullying and trying to peddle his wacky facts and figures in defense of his personal money-making schemes (money making for Tom…but not us taxpayers).
If Tom Hylton’s numbers are so correct, why didn’t former school district business manager and current President’s Task Force Chairman Jim Bush distribute those figures to task force members at their first meeting last year? After all, we would think that Jim Bush has a pretty good head for numbers after serving as the district’s business manager for some 30 years.
Why did Tom Hylton wait for a year to present his so-called independent report? Was he too busy improving the educational opportunities for our children? Was he too busy being a philanthropist and helping those in need using his tax-payer funded quarter-million dollar non-profit bank accounts?
Facts don’t lie…Tom Hylton’s numbers are incorrect and skewed. They are as outdated as the smiling photos of him printed in The Mercury and cherry picked like a garage sale at 3:00 in the afternoon.
The sooner Pottstown citizens wake up and start asking questions, the better off we’ll all be.
Why is Tom Hylton spending so much money to convince us that we can afford five 40+ year old elementary schools? Why? Why? Why?
We were waiting to read someone posting a comment at The Mercury regarding what Tom does for a living and how he earns his income (other than the cushy retirement package he receives from his retired school district teacher spouse). Nowhere did we read about Tom’s lucrative speaking engagements and how he promotes the economic sustainability of having so-called neighborhood schools. Tom thinks neighborhood schools are the cat’s meow… but we here in Pottstown who are forced to finance them see them as the true fiscal albatross that they are.
Pottstown taxpayers are the real victims…not Tom Hylton.
Don’t pity the fool!
Thank you, SP, for pointing out what I wish I could find..that mysterious never ending money supply that Mr. Hylton uses to paint the town with his personal palette. Question from the commentors on the Mercury: Why doesn’t Code Blue put their own information out there? Answer: Because we DO respect the process and procedures the Task Force was charged with, and we don’t have thousands in Pottstown tax dollars at our disposal to print and distribute color supplements. I wish we did, believe me.
Thank you SP for your great articles. They get me thinking.
I’m a little curious though. Why was there only a few comments on the charter school article in yesterday’s Mercury, but there are 30 some comments on the articles about having Tom Hylton removed from office? Don’t you think that’s strange?
Remember when Geo Bush and the GOP were paying journalists to write GOP friendly articles in national publications to get their message out?
I think Tom Hylton is paying people to write online comments in order to do some damage control. How else can you explain it? I never read about people going to school board meetings or borough meetings in defense of Tom Hylton. I only read about people coming to his defense online – at The Mercury. I find it very suspicious, especially since The Mercury generates so much ad revenue from Tom Hylton.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist, but something is amiss here.
PS – Did anyone else read that dumb opinion article in today’s Mercury? Of course The Mercury is going to go to bat for Tom Hylton. He’s their boy wonder! Can the school board remove Nancy March from The Mercury when they remove Tom Hylton from the board? It would be a good way to sweep the dirt off the streets of Pottstown.
As they say, talk is cheap.
How do these commentors at the Merc site know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that any of the people that dispute the supplement don’t agreee some of the ideas don’t make good sense or that other ideas have/are being verbalized but fail to make it into print?
How a person chooses to spend their time or money is up to them, clearly. The fact is that many of the residents of Pottstown don’t have the financial means to do this, opting for talk – thereby not as far reaching as the print media.
The problem with this is, sometimes, if it’s in black and white (or color, as the case may be) it must be true. It would be a level playing field if a greater majority of people had the means to put their thoughts in print. Since this is not the case, I believe this is the reason people question the motive behind the means (and where the means might have come from).
Funny how this has become a Constitutional issue for some people. It began as a simple lack of respect for a process that some took offense to. Now the issue is Freedom of Speech? What about the students, schools and taxpayers?
Let’s get back on track and answer, if possible, the main concern of this mess: How do we move forward toward a common goal to educate our youth in the elementary schools (no matter the configuration or location while keeping safety, success, mandates and costs as balanced as we can)?
ljohnson, thanks for your observation. This concept was just beginning to gel for me this morning as I too noticed very little commenting on the Charter School article. As SP has pointed out previously, Hylton has made efforts to get into the front pocket protector of Corbett, and I beginning to think that Tom was the point of contact with the Charter School organization, CSMI. Oh the drippy, messy political muck oozing out of this alliance is rotten to the core.
In Tom’s beguiling world of mysterious behaviors I believe he was “priming the pump”, so to speak, with the onslaught of advetorials on education alternatives, knowing that this letter to Mr. Lindley was forthcoming. His attempt to get public consensus on his side seems as obvious as the wart on the Mercury’s nose. Of course the granddaddy of all this b.s. is the well timed insert.
I actually wondered if the Mercury employees are behind all of the dubious monikers that spike when Hylton prompts controversy?
Ms. Johnson, you bring up a very valid point.
As noted on our site last month, in 2010 Tom Hylton spent over $5,300 on 20 paid ads that appeared in The Mercury:
http://savepottstown.com/2011/03/money-can't-buy-him-love/
In the past four months, Tom Hylton has spent close to $4,000 on 15 ads – and that dollar figure DOES NOT include last Wednesday’s 32-page advertising supplement, which we’re sure cost at least $5,000.
So, it’s a total joke that The Mercury feels the need to defend one of their biggest advertisers. Where’s the news in that? That’s BS pure and simple.
Does Tom Hylton stand to personally profit from this information being made public? Is there a conflict of personal or professional interests involved? Is he undermining the political process with corrupt actions, or exhibiting malfeasance in office?
Yes, yes and YES!
Nancy March has the same ethical standards as Tom Hylton…NONE!
And they should both be ashamed of themselves for defrauding Pottstown taxpayers for the pursuit of corporate profits.
Nancy March and Tom Hylton are sellouts. Selling Pottstown to the highest bidder.
@UpsideDown
Just an FYI on your observation about the Charter School Story.
The story was first posted Saturday night, a version on which nine comments were posted:
http://www.pottsmerc.com/articles/2011/04/02/news/doc4d97e01de0fcf321886353.txt
The second was posted Sunday on which four more comments were posted:
http://www.pottsmerc.com/articles/2011/04/03/news/srv0000011309921.txt
Hope that helps.
After reading all the crappy Pro-Heil-Hylton comments over at The Merc, I have to honestly say that there are a lot of nuts in Pottstown (present company excluded of course). And they all seem to read The Merc like the good religious zealots that they pretend to be.
How can anyone really believe the junk that Tom Hylton is trying to shove down the throats of us taxpayers? It’s obvious to me that The Merc is making a ton of money from Tom Hylton and when there’s money exchanging hands, you can forget about integrity and ethics.
It really is disgusting and only shows how truly desperate Tom Hylton has become to push his cause. I can only imagine the advertorials that will appear in The Merc closer to the final task force meetings and next month’s primary. He’ll be pretty busy biking his way around town delivering his paid rantings to task force members (and maybe he’ll throw in a basket of fruit to say thank you). Just like that old guy on Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood delivering the mail. Except it’ll be Mr. Hylton’s Neighborhood (watch out for those flying bullets!).
Here’s another way that We Are The Victims:
The Mercury is not allowing any comments that are not pro-Hylton to be posted to its editorial rushing to the aid and defense of their favorite son.
After reading several of the comments from the poor, unsuspecting neophytes who believe Tom Hylton’s writings to be filled with well-researched facts instead of the well-honed opinions we know much of them to be, I submitted a comment urging them to take a closer look. I used as an example Hylton’s assertion in the article about Rupert that multiple administrations over multiple decades (conspiracy implied if not outright stated) have intentionally allowed the school to decay as a means of making a case for getting rid of it. I also said something to the effect of this: If Hylton had ever once shown any inclination or ability to sit down and discuss, to listen to the ideas of others instead of only promoting his own, to negotiate or to compromise, then he might not find himself in this current pickle.
The Mercury won’t post my comment. When I called them on it, the on-line editor said it violated The Mercury’s rules about hate.
Please. It’s not hateful for Tom Hylton to accuse administrators and elected officials of intentional neglect that, if true, would be damaging to students? But it is hateful for me to present Hylton’s own words in the full light of what they imply?
It’s not hateful for The Mercury to talk about Tom’s lack of “people skills.” But it is hateful for me to say those skills in which he is lacking are specifically: ability to listen, to learn from others, to compromise.
I responded to The Mercury’s on-line editor that this was further proof that the publication has such an intense bias in Mr. Hylton’s favor that it allows that bias to slip into news reporting in addition to its editorial pages.
No surprise…. The Mercury won’t publish that comment either.
On the heels of the biased opinion piece, hyperbolic accusations and overwrought defenses of the poor judgement shown by Tom Hylton, (their Pulitzer Golden Boy), – hidden right there in plain sight – as it were, is the reality that the Mercury is descending into relative insignificance.
Whether from a commitment to the public or to self-preservation, The Mercury would be wise to find a way to deal with the perception of their bias. One obvious way to do that would be to hire more people who consider themselves cultivated, unbiased and responsive. Another that wouldn’t require an ideological litmus test would be to hire editors who oblige the most exacting kind of standards of objectivity from all of their reporters, and themselves.
Sideshows, like the Mercury, do plenty to get people agitated and incensed. But the real focus should be not on purveyors of opinion, but on the news reporters and other journalists who claim objectivity while delivering content that is perceived as having a strong and unmistakable whiff of bias.
Ignore them and they will go away.
UpSide… The bigger problem at the moment is that Tom Hylton’s gigantic full-color catalog ad is ALSO pretending to be objective analysis (journalism) when it contains no objectivity whatsoever. It explores nothing but methods of propping up his tired, 20-year-old claims that “neighborhood” schools are the panacea for all societal ills.
Mark my words…. this perversion of objectivity will hit the homes of every registered voter in Pottstown before the election – with a copy of the Hyltonites’ campaign literature stapled to it… just like those brightly colored J.C. Penney’s catalogs used to hit our hands just before Christmas when we were kids.
His claims of being able to solve all of Pottstown’s educational needs at zero cost is catnip to the seniors who vote.
I think The Mercury SUCKS. Yes I am a hater and proud of it – I HATE THE MERCURY. Thank God I canceled my subscription years ago. BEST THING I EVER DID!
They are so biased and their editor has no editing skills. Why are they writing opinions about a guy who buys lots of advertising from them? Do they really think we’re that stupid that we can’t see through their obvious motives?? And what’s up with all those pro Tom Hilton fake commenters? Hilton probably threw in a couple extra bucks with his last ad payment to have Mercury staffers post those comments under fake aliases.
Can’t wait for that rag to go down.
They say they haven’t approved any “hateful” comments? From what I read there are a ton – and none that are directed at that loser Tom Hilton. That guy is another one that needs to go. Him and that poor excuse of a newspaper. I wouldn’t even let my pup poop on that paper. I would let my pup poop on Tom Hilton though.
@WAYFTP:
I saw your earlier comment about your post not being allowed on The Mercury site and was concerned.
When it was reviewed, it didn’t seem to violate the rules so it was brought to the editor’s attention.
She agreed and allowed your post to be put back up. It is now beneath the editorial where you posted it.
The complaint you made about not being posted and the on-line editor’s response have both been removed as they are both now moot.
We apologize for the inconvenience.
As you’ve noted, we’re human too and we make errors.
Thank you for your continued interest in http://www.pottsmerc.com.
Thank you, Evan. I appreciate that. I know I can be “snarky,” but I try not to be hateful to anyone. (Although it is particularly challenging when it comes to Tom Hylton… I must admit.)
An honest confession: I was contemplating writing to the editors of Save Pottstown!! to tell them that I was finished attacking Hylton’s tactics and many of his ideas. This town wastes more time and energy with factions fighting against one another instead of working together, even when all the players want the same thing. I was most disturbed by this behavior as exhibited by Tom Hylton during discussion of the central campus. At one time, he seemed to want very much to improve property values and quality of life in the center of town. And yet he worked tirelessly and spent tons of money to protect the derelict conditions and low property values that are strangling the rest of the Borough.
It is time for the people of Pottstown to start finding common ground. We don’t have forever. The town slips deeper and deeper into economic quicksand every year. If we keep struggling against one another, we will all go down that much faster.
The only thing (just being honest here) that stopped me from writing this a day or two ago was my deep belief that Tom Hylton will never be a part of that kind of compromise. I honestly believe he is incapable of it. Did he sit down with any of the other people who are devoted to improving our schools and our community when he wrote that 32-page insert? I somehow doubt it. If he had included some of his fellow elected officials, paid administrators, and community activists and volunteers in that analysis he prepared, it might not have been greeted with so much scorn.
But that’s not the way Tom Hylton works. I’m just sayin’….
LOL…just plucked this little quote from a comment on the Mercury:
“The wise understand for themselves, fools follow the reports of others.”
Tibetan Proverb
Doesn’t someone buy ad space in a newspaper to sell something?
What is Tom Hylton selling? And why is he spending so much money to do so?
I wanted to post this on The Mercury’s website, but it seems that lately it has been hijacked by Tom Hylton supporters (didn’t know there were any out there).
Does anyone know what’s up with Tom Hylton’s school board candidates? I haven’t seen any mailings or heard one peep out of any of them. I’m surprised Mr. Hylton didn’t mention them in his 32-page ad last week. I wonder if he’s trying to distance himself from his hand-picked candidates.