The Weekly World News publishes its last issue this week. But, for almost three decades, there may have been a wink of more truth in it than in some of the media.

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             For a few years, usually when I had too much time and not enough sense, I thought about writing a weekly newspaper column. It would be a great catharsis of what I proudly knew to be a warped mind, fertilized now and then by my wife. With only 23,000 other columnists trying to pitch their own catharses, I figured there was room for another 700–800 words a week, especially since newspapers appeared to be desperate for features. How else could anyone explain why they publish celebrity gossip columns, horoscopes, and capsule summaries of soap operas? Thus was born, in August 1992, 15 years ago this month, “Wanderings,” a column that probes a small particle of society. Sometimes it’s humor or a biting satire; sometimes it’s a wistful essay or a hard-hitting investigative report.
 
            My first column, which mixed politics and the media, a harbinger of more than 500 future columns, was a look at the tabloids in America, most of which were developing more credibility than the mainstream media. The focus was on presidential politics and the Weekly World News. The newspaper’s reporters and editors never took themselves seriously, never succumbing to the necessity, often overlooked by mainstream media, of fact-checking stories or the sin of salivating after self-congratulatory media awards, bestowed by the media themselves. The reporters, almost all of whom had extensive daily media experience, mixed in stories that were completely accurate, stories the major newspaper didn’t or wouldn’t cover, with a lot of believable fiction, which a gullible America wanted to believe. Editor Harold (Eddie) Clontz’s popular column, “Ed Anger,” allegedly written by someone who was filled with venom and hatred but which always had several grains of truth, predated radio and TV talk show blabbermouths.
 
            The first issue of the News was in 1979; its last issue is this week, its circulation having dropped from a peak of more than 1.2 million in the mid-1980s to about 80,000 at its death. Part of that decline was because people could learn about Elvis, space aliens, and conspiracies on radio talk shows and from the Internet. A large part of that decline, however, was because a new management in 1999 had begun hiring comedy writers to write what they thought was news, and fired journalists who could write plausible stories with a comedic flair. The quality and campiness of the News rapidly declined into sophomoric humor.
 
            During almost three decades, the Weekly World News, produced on a black-ink press during an era that saw the rise of splashy over-designed color and graphics, was a part of American culture. Its death should be mourned by Americans who rightfully believe they are not getting either the facts or the truth from the mainstream media. Below, in honor of the Weekly World News, is my first column.
 
           
 
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            When I don’t believe I’m getting all the news from the nation’s 1,450 daily newspapers, 6,700 community weeklies, 16,000 radio and TV stations, 20,000 magazines, or 170,000 books published every year, I turn to the supermarket tabloids for the truth.
 
            Since most of the tabloid reporters worked on daily newspapers, and are earning $60,000–$100,000 in their new assignments, I place great credibility in what is being reported in the six major tabloids, all of them published in Boca Raton or Lantana, Florida, and which have a combined circulation of about 10 million.
 
            From the tabloids, I can monitor where Elvis is this week, learn first about who is seen with whom, and which TV series is planning to replace which megastar, and more than anyone
ever needs to know about soap stars, none of this reported by the local press. I also know everything there is to know about Elizabeth Taylor, the Kennedys, the British royal family, Big Foot, and why taking coffee bean baths can perk you up. I have also learned about monkey-faced boys, dog-faced girls, human-faced pigs, an 8-year-old who gave birth to twins, a woman who gave birth to a litter of 12 children, a 28-year-old grandmother, a man who was pregnant, and a tribe in South America that found a cure for cancer.
 
            From the 350,000-circulation Sun, in one week alone, I learned that a survivor of the Titanic spent 20 years on an iceberg, that there really is a flying elephant with jumbo ears who lives in Zaire, that a woman is turning into Marilyn Monroe, that scientists in Jerusalem found Goliath’s mummified head, and that miracles occur near a Florida tree that has the face of Christ.
The establishment media also don’t report much about house hauntings, psychic revelations, reincarnations, and extraterrestrials. However, all are conscientiously reported by the tabloids, and all for a buck or so a week.
 
            In just one issue of the 722,000-circulation Weekly World News, this week alone, I learned that condoms cause breast cancer, that a 7,000-year-old gargantuan shark patrols Lake Superior, that Hitler was really a woman who survived World War II and died in 1992 in Buenos Aires at the age of 103, and that a spaceship (with 14 perfectly preserved extraterrestrial corpses) was found in the Gobi Desert. More importantly, I learned that a friendly space alien, not too unlike E. T., declared his (her? its?) support for Bill Clinton for the presidency. A photo on page 1 showed the smooth-skinned, large-headed, long-fingered, unclothed alien shaking hands with the Democratic Presidential nominee after a 40-minute super-secret visit in Madison Square Garden during the Democratic National Convention.
 
            It wasn’t the first scoop for the News. In May, the newspaper had reported that the alien visited George Bush at Camp David; in July, it reported the alien stopped by Dallas for a chat with Ross Perot who, apparently taking the alien’s advice, soon dropped out of the race. Pictures also accompanied these articles, thus proving the alien’s existence. We learned that the alien—who came from the most successful planet in the universe—gave Gov. Clinton advice on health and environmental issues as well as how to turn the economy around. The alien’s mission—other than to evaluate and recommend a candidate for the confused American masses, most of whom would vote for the alien over any of the presidential candidates—was to seek “trade concessions that would benefit his home planet,” according to reliable sources who talked with the Weekly World News.
 
            The major news media, obviously jealous they were scooped on the biggest news story of the decade, called the story a hoax. To get to the truth, I made a few phone calls.
 
            A member of the White House staff said she believed that President Bush may have made several light-hearted comments about the visit of the alien, but referred me to another office for confirmation. An official spokesman for the President at first indicated he didn’t know what I was talking about when I asked about the space alien. After informing him of this late-breaking news, he said he didn’t think the President made any comments about “that alleged meeting.” He then informed me that “as far as we’re concerned,” there was no meeting, thus confirming my belief that if the White House says it didn’t occur, it probably did occur.
 
            On to Bill Clinton’s team. Being the hard-hitting investigative journalist that I am, I had to get confirmation, if not from the Governor, certainly from an official spokesperson. Did you ever try to find an official spokesperson when you need one? After three days of phone calls, all I had was a lot of conversations with a pack of confused but obviously arrogant campaign officials who couldn’t or wouldn’t confirm or deny anything. All, it seemed, were so full of themselves, unlike their boss, that none had room for any sense of humor. Obviously, the Clinton team was more impressed with themselves, and the possibility they may one day be able to walk into the White House without a tourist pass, than in revealing the truth.
 
            To clear up the confusion, I contacted Eddie Clontz, editor of the Weekly World News. Eddie’s a pleasant fellow and an excellent journalist who worked for several years as a reporter and wire editor at the St. Petersburg Evening Independent.
 
            He did his best to keep a straight face, but he and I both knew it was going to take a bigger actor than him to pull that one off. 
 
            “We had been working the story for a year,” said Eddie who revealed that the newspaper received the tip from “some of our people in the military.” He said that credible sources “often don’t call regular newspapers because the dailies take it as a joke or will treat it as such,” thus confirming my suspicions that daily newspaper reporters are more concerned with trivial pursuits than they are with news of interplanetary consequence.
 
            The photos, Eddie said, were submitted by one of the newspaper’s sources. A true journalist, he wouldn’t reveal a confidence. He did confirm that the newspaper plans to follow the alien’s travels through the country, but probably won’t be tracking either George Bush or Bill Clinton. Their lives just weren’t as important, or as interesting, as that of an intelligent life form from another planet. “We don’t get into political coverage unless it has to do with a space alien,” the newspaper’s editor slyly said.
 
            Now, for the big question. Does Eddie Clontz, editor of a newspaper with larger circulation than all but the top five American dailies, believe in the alien? “I really don’t think so,” he said, noting that although “the photographs look real to me, as a skeptic I’d say it’s not true.” Actually, he also called the existence of the alien “preposterous.”
 
            In every political campaign, there is always something to break the tension, something to lighten up a campaign that tires out candidates, staff, reporters, and voters. This year, it’s the alien’s visit with the candidates. Next campaign, maybe it will be coverage of the alien’s race for the Presidency.
 
               [Eddie Clontz, editor from 1981 to 2001, died three years later at the age of 56. Walter Brasch’s latest books are America’s Unpatriotic Acts: The Federal Government’s Violation of Constitutional and Civil Rights and ‘Unacceptable’: The Federal Response to Hurricane Katrina. Forthcoming is Sinking the Ship of State: The Presidency of George W. Bush. You may contact Dr. Brasch through his website, www.walterbrasch.com or at brasch@bloomu.edu] 
  
  
  
 

Authors Website: http://www.walterbrasch.com

Authors Bio:

Walter Brasch is an award-winning journalist and professor of journalism emeritus. His current books are Before the First Snow: Stories from the Revolution , America's Unpatriotic Acts: The Federal Government's Violation of Constitutional and Civil Rights, and 'Unacceptable': The Federal response to Hurricane Katrina, available at amazon.com, borders.com and most major on-line bookstores. BEFORE THE FIRST SNOW is also available at www.greeleyandstone.com (20 discount)

Walter Brasch, a deeply valued Senior Editor at OpEdNews passed from this world on February 9, 2017, age 71, his obituary follows:

Walter M. Brasch, Ph.D., age 71, of 2460 Second Street, Bloomsburg (Espy), died Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, at Geisinger Medical Center, Danville surrounded by his family.

He was an award-winning former newspaper reporter and editor in California, Iowa, Indiana, and Ohio; professor emeritus of mass communications and journalism at Bloomsburg University; and an award-winning social issues journalist and book author.

Walter was born March 2, 1945, in San Diego, the son of Milton Brasch and Helen (Haskin) Brasch and was a 34 year resident of Espy.

In his early years he was a writer-producer for multimedia and film companies in California, and a copywriter and political analyst for advertising and public relations companies. For five years during the late 1990s, he was the media and social issues commentator for United Broadcasting Network. He was also the author of a syndicated newspaper column since 1992 and the creative vice-president of Scripts Destitute of Phoenix.

Dr. Brasch was a member of the Local Emergency Planning Committee and was active in the Columbia County Emergency Management Agency. He was vice-president of the Central Susquehanna chapter of the ACLU, vice-president and co-founder of the Northeast Pennsylvania Homeless Alliance, a member of the board of the Keystone Beacon Community for healthcare coordination, and was active in numerous social causes. He was co-founder with his wife Rosemary Brasch of The Oasis, a biweekly newsletter for families and friends of personnel stationed in the Persian Gulf. Later, during Operation Iraqi Freedom, they published The Oasis 2, for families of persons in combat zones. They were supported by the Bloomsburg Chapter, America Red Cross and Geisinger Medical Center, Danville.

He was the author of 20 books, most which fuse historical and contemporary social issues. Among his books are Black English and the Mass Media (1981); Forerunners of Revolution: Muckrakers and the American Social Conscience (1991); With Just Cause: The Unionization of the American Journalist (1991); Sex and the Single Beer Can: Probing the Media and American Culture (1997); Brer Rabbit, Uncle Remus, and the 'Cornfield Journalist': The Tale of Joel Chandler Harris (2000); The Joy of Sax: America During the Bill Clinton Era (2001); Unacceptable: The federal Response to Hurricane Katrina (2005); America's Unpatriotic Acts: The Federal Government's Violation of Constitutional and Civil Rights (2006); Sinking the Ship of State: The Presidency of George W. Bush (2007);  and Before the First Snow (2011). He was co-author of The Press and the State (1986), awarded Outstanding Academic Book distinction by Choice magazine, published by the American Library Association.

His last book is Fracking America: Sacrificing Health and the Environment for Short-Term Economic Benefit (2015), a critically-acclaimed novel that looks at what happens when government and energy companies form a symbiotic relationship, using "cheaper, cleaner" fuel and the lure of jobs in a depressed economy but at the expense of significant health and environmental impact.

During the past two decades, he won more than 150 regional and national media awards from the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, Society of Professional Journalists, National Federation of Press Women, USA Book News, Independent Book Publishing Professionals Group, Pennsylvania Press Club, Pennsylvania Women's Press Association, Pennsylvania Associated Press Broadcasters Association, Penn-writers, International Association of Business Communicators, Pacific Coast Press Club, and Press Club of Southern California. He was recognized in 2012 by the Pennsylvania Press Club with the Communicator of Achievement award for lifetime achievement in journalism and public service.

He was an Eagle Scout; co-recipient of the Civil Liberties Award of the American Civil Liberties Union, 1996; and was honored by San Diego State University as a Points of Excellence winner in 1997. In 2000, he received the Herb Caen Memorial Award of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. For the Pennsylvania Humanities Council he was twice named a Commonwealth speaker. He also received the meritorious achievement medal of the U.S. Coast Guard.

At Bloomsburg University, he earned the Creative Arts Award, the Creative Teaching Award, and was named an Outstanding Student Advisor. He received the first annual Dean's Salute to Excellence in 2002, a second award in 2007, and the Maroon and Gold Quill Award for nonfiction. He was the 2004 recipient of the Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Service Award. For 22 years, he was Editor-In-Chief of the awarding-winning Spectrum Magazine, part of the journalism program of the Department of Mass Communications, Bloomsburg University until his retirement in 2010.  The community magazine was published twice a year by students for residents of Columbia and Montour counties in northeastern Pennsylvania and one of the few to be inducted into the national Associated Collegiate Press hall of fame. The magazine was also a consistent award winner in competition sponsored by the Society of Professional Journalists, Columbia Scholastic Press Association, and the American Scholastic Press Association. He primarily taught magazine editing and production, public affairs reporting, feature writing, newspaper editing; every Fall, he taught a 250-student section on mass communications and the popular arts.

 Dr. Brasch was co founder of the qualitative studies division of the Association for Education in Journalism, president of the Keystone State professional chapter and for three years deputy regional director of the Society of Professional Journalists, from which he received the Director's Award and the National Freedom of Information Award. He was president of the Pennsylvania Press Club, vice-president of the Pennsylvania Women's Press Association, and founding coordinator of Pennsylvania Journalism Educators. He was a featured columnist for Liberal Opinion Week, senior correspondent for the American Reporter, senior editor for OpEdNews, and an editorial board member of Journalism History and the Journal of Media Law and Ethics.

He was a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists, Author's Guild, National Writers Union (UAW/AFL-CIO), The Newspaper Guild (CWA/AFL-CIO), and the Society of Environmental Journalists. He was a life member of the service fraternity Alpha Phi Omega, and was indicted into the national scholarship honor societies Phi Kappa Phi (general scholarship), Kappa Tau Alpha (journalism), Pi Gamma Mu (social sciences), and Kappa Tau Alpha (sociology.) He is listed in Who's Who in America, Who's Who in the East, Contemporary Authors, Who's Who in the Media and Who's Who in Education. Dr. Brasch earned an A.B. in sociology from San Diego State College, an M.A. in journalism from Ball State University, and a Ph.D. in mass communication/journalism, with a cognate area in both American government/public policy and language and culture studies, from The Ohio State University.

He is survived by his wife of 34 years, the former Rosemary Renn the most wonderful thing that happened in his life and whom he loved very much; two sons, Jeffery Gerber, Phoenix AZ and Matthew Gerber and his wife, Laurel  (Neyhard)  of Bloomsburg, a sister, Corey Brasch of Sacramento, Calif; a niece, Terri Pearson-Fuchs, Calif, numerous cousins; and his beloved dogs Cabot and Remy.

Funeral services will be held on Wednesday, at 2:00 p.m. at the Dean W. Kriner Inc. Funeral Home & Cremation Service,  325 Market St., Bloomsburg with family friend, Nathaniel Mitchell officiating. Interment in Elan Memorial Park, Lime Ridge.

Friends may call at the funeral home on Tuesday from 6 - 8 p.m. or Wednesday from 1-2 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be sent to the Walter M. Brasch Scholarship Fund,

c/o First Keystone Community Bank, 2301 Columbia Blvd, Bloomsburg, PA 17815 or to

Mostly Mutts, 284 Little Mountain Rd., Sunbury, PA 17801