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HomeNewsworthyOpinionAward-Winning Writer Steve Nicklas' Farewell Column to Left-Wing News-Leader

Award-Winning Writer Steve Nicklas’ Farewell Column to Left-Wing News-Leader

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By Steve Nicklas

As a community, Fernandina Beach is taking a hard left turn, like a NASCAR driver heading into a curve. Up ahead, a roadblock of liberalism impedes the city’s future. And there is no pit stop for relief.

The liberal onslaught is in plain sight. Printed in the bold black ink of the newspaper of record, the Fernandina Beach News-Leader.

The oldest weekly newspaper in Florida preserved its objectivity for most for 170 years. But it too has succumbed to the contagion of liberal bias infecting media outlets in our country — at a pandemic’s rate.

I was along for a thrilling ride for the last 34 years. But my ride has ended as abruptly as Dale Earnhardt’s. Now I’m pursuing a new track for my popular financial/business columns. I’m joining celebrated columnists Dave Scott and Ken Timmerman at The Yulee News, an upstart newspaper with both colorful print and electronic editions. And bold, enterprising ideas and plans. My columns are also carried by the Nassau County Record in Callahan and the online Citizens Journal Florida, which likewise is finding a conservative niche here.

For me, it’s out with the old, staid News-Leader, and in with the thriving newer media outlets. I’d rather ride the energetic colt than the aging mare. And Yulee’s growth rate is infinitessimally higher than Fernandina Beach’s, even though the city’s bulging budget does not reflect this fact of life.

I have fond memories at the News-Leader, coming here from within the New York Times newspaper group in 1989 to become executive editor. I was the youngest editor in the once-thriving group, full of vigor and bright-eyed ambition. We had an enterprising newsroom, as we won 12 Florida Press Association awards one year and 15 more the next. We had good material, however.

An ambush attack on four white residents by a black gang was covered as the “Citrona Slayings,” followed by the FBI’s conviction of former sheriff Laurie Ellis for distributing cocaine on our city streets. My headline above Ellis’ picture in handcuffs read: “It’s a Sad Day,” quoting an FBI agent crucial to the conviction.

I’ve been writing columns under various headings for 30 years now, since transitioning from executive editor to the financial field. I most recently won three successive “Best of the Best News-Leader columnist” awards, so someone was reading and reacting to my columns. I’ve also won numerous Associated Press writing awards in my career.

Unfortunately, an undercurrent of liberal leanings took out my legs. A new editor, Tracy Dishman, came aboard and pretended to be balanced for her first year. Then the silk gloves came off. She saddled the editorial page with two far-left columnists who moved here from New York, and found a young woman (also from New York) to write something about nothing. 

But it wasn’t that. A steady barrage of critical letters to the editor finally broke my back, like a camel’s. Ironically, most of these critics are friends of Dishman’s, so it appeared orchestrated or at least encouraged.

With inuendo and falsities, letter writers can say anything they want under Dishman’s guidance. It was clear she didn’t like my column, and it was clear I didn’t like her — and I didn’t respect her knowledge. You didn’t need to call in the Long Island medium to discover this dysfunctional relationship.

Apparently Dishman came from a magazine that covered recipes and washed-up whales and pillow talk. Hard news is not her priority, and the decline in subscriptions shows this. Meanwhile, she has storied publisher Foy Maloy bent over an ink barrel with the DEI restrictions.

Dishman thought she was feeding her readership with soft stories about whales and foxes and tattoo artists. Actually, she is starving the readers of real information in what is still a conservative town. Not by much, but still conservative. 

Allowing critics to openly criticize me for my conservative leanings and writings was like playing the sitting duck. They took shots at me without return fire. I was swimming upstream while critics on the banks hurled rocks and insults at me.

These unhappy cretins are the rot in our idyllic community. They move here from places they’ve left in ruins, and proceed to tell us how to live and what to believe. 

They say misery loves company. But not even misery loves their company. To most normal people, they are as popular as potholes. They hide behind a keyboard and launch negative attacks, as keyboard kamikazees.

We should start a misery index, occupied by miserable people like these. The more far-left people who move here, the higher the misery index goes. It is currently at a tipping point. Like never before here.

 Fernandina Beach has changed more than the weather over the last 30 years. It used to be a hard-core conservative mill town. Now it’s watered down and polluted by these left-wing snowflakes. Who have no credibility or appeal.

The News-Leader is falling into the societal cracks fostered by the liberal assault. The once-heralded paper is headed toward a crash like Tiger Woods on a winding road. A pileup of cancelled subscriptions and financial struggles will ensue. 

At least now I can avoid the wreckage.


Steve Nicklas is the managing partner of Nicklas Wealth Management in Fernandina Beach. He is also an award-winning columnist. His columns regularly appear in weekly newspapers in Northeast Florida and in Southeast Georgia, and on his website at www.SteveNicklasMarketplace.com. He has published a book, “All About Money,” of his favorite columns from the past 20 years. The book is available on Amazon. He has also done financial reports for area radio stations and for National Public Radio in Jacksonville. He can be reached by email at [email protected] or by phone at 904-753-0236.


The views expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Citizens Journal Florida.

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