Pillar to Print First Issue Tuesday
By JEREMY G. BURTON AND JENNIFER NIELSON | Nov. 22, 2004UB students can expect on Tuesday to pick up the inaugural issue of The Pillar, a new student newspaper that aims to provide a greater conservative voice on campus."My belief was that in this political season there is an array of extremely left newspapers on campus, and there is no conservative voice," said Howard Londin, editor in chief of The Pillar.Londin pointed to Generation, The Spectrum and papers like the New Federalist as examples of the right wing's under-representation in print, although he said that non-student papers like the New Federalist are in a category all of their own on the far left."My opinion is that The Spectrum is not fair to the right side in stories and point of view," Londin said.George Zornick, editor in chief of The Spectrum, said he understands why his paper might seem liberal."I acknowledge that The Spectrum's opinion page usually has more liberal opinions, but that's a mere function of the people who are on the editorial board," he said.Zornick said that he has no idea what the political views are for 99 percent of his 60-plus student staff, which writes the bulk of the stories.While calling for a stronger conservative representation, editors and writers for The Pillar say their new paper is not meant to be a right-wing publication."The goal is to be balanced," Londin said.According to Duncan Stanley, treasurer for the College Republicans and business manager for The Pillar, the paper is being funded by a conservative think-tank and through selling ads."With the help of a generous grant given to us from the Leadership Institute and the amount of advertisements we have sold across various local businesses, we are well off," Stanley said.Londin said although The Pillar is being funded by the Leadership Institute, which urges on its Web site to bring the "conservative revolution" to college campuses, the goal is to put out a fair and balanced newspaper.Londin said he and his colleagues told the institute in their request for funds that they were not writing a right-wing paper, but rather were starting it to combat the unbalanced liberal point of view at UB.
