This blog is mainly about the spectacular train wreck at The Sacramento Bee and its parent company, the McClatchy Company. But I also post about current events, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, politics, anything else that grabs my attention. Take a look around this blog, hope you enjoy it.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Friday April 24 -- Got news or an update?
If you have news or an update, leave it in comments. . . .
35 comments:
Anonymous
said...
♫ It’s Not Easy Being Green ♫ ------------------ CBSNEWS: Obama Earth Day Flights Burned More Than 9,000 Gallons Of Fuel... ----- Where is Algore? This can't pass the smell test. Perhaps Algore is busy paying his $90,000 a year electric bill? Ya think!
-J-School Enrollments Soar As Jobs Vanish- I hope everyone realizes we are subsiding colleges in one way or another. These foolish young people are going into debt with student loans, and will cry about not receiving even a living wage, so they can pay the loans back. There are no journalism jobs for most of these graduates. Now, Barry-O wants more money for these unemployable college students. The world has gone mad.
Some Denver journalists bravely stepped into the new online media, but admit the customary monetary payment for their work, won’t be forthcoming anytime soon.
This is a good online subscription news model to watch. Area commenters say the talent is definitely there for a successful venture. The question is, do people really care enough to pay for subscription news? One of the continuing words of advise from potential customers was that the news should remain fair and balanced. Like Duh! ***** -Only 3,000 subscribers signed up for the new online InDenverTimes - Westword "We didn't reach our subscription goal of 50,000, which was the basis for our original business model," says InDenverTimes investor Kevin Preblud.
MNI IS NOT BIASED, WE DON'T USE DNC TALKING POINTS (AHMED), AND WE WON'T DEFAULT ON OUR LOANS. (MUSIC PLEASE)
McClatchy Employees Cheer Iraqi Shoe Tosser as Stock Plunges 99% By P.J. Gladnick | December 25, 2008
I applauded this act. I don’t care that it is rude. Why are we concerned about etiquette when a country was destroyed? Did Bush ever apologize to the Iraqis for the hundreds of thousands of dead? Bush is an occupier, a clown pretending to be a hero, so enclosed in his own little self-certain world he probably was surprised an Iraqi could be that angry.
I am not surprised. I am only surprised such a thing did not happen earlier.
...the McClatchey reporters covering Bush’s visit to Iraq laughed when he got a shoe thrown at him....laughed out loud mind you!....at their President being insulted by foreigners....F**k McClatchey!....I can’t wait for their bankruptcy.
Re: “.. the news should remain fair and balanced.” *** I serious doubt they know what fair and balanced news means. Many journalists are still in denial about their part in the fraud election. I don’t think the old media has a chance until they clean house with new journalism standards. Their coverage of the tea parties has enraged millions of taxpayers. Janeane Garofalo has become a disgusting spokesperson for the loony left. The leftist loons that have taken oven the Obama administration will be his downfall. Votes the bums OUT!
"This is a good online subscription news model to watch. Area commenters say the talent is definitely there for a successful venture."
"Only 3,000 subscribers signed up...We didn't reach our subscription goal of 50,000"
Translation: Subscribe because our bias and DNC talking points are better than our non-existent competitors.
Further, although you can get the same news for free at DNC.com or CPUSA.com, or anywhere else on the web, pay us because we are the real biased, Marxist commies that had to call ourselves unbiased at the old paper.
So subscribe, and remember, we don't just chant "death to America", we print it!
7:00 Your phony non sequitur is exactly the kind of crap we're used to getting when we talk to our newspapers about bias. "Well, if you don't like my stuff, you're just a dittohead." Fairness is not a light switch, it's a continuum.
When I first listened to Limbaugh and then compared what I was hearing on the nightly news what impressed me was how much more I knew of both sides of the argument than what I got from the nightly news.
Limbaugh used to have a policy (don't listen as much anymore, so don't know if it's still there) of putting liberals to the front of the queue. The ones who called in tended to be articulate and civil and usually provided far more information on a topic from their perspective than one got on the news.
What the news gave me was glimpse of the liberal argument and nothing of the conservative.
But let's move to local news. I've been involved in politics for decades and I can tell you that if I were to make a list of journalists that I felt were fair and someone on the left did the same, there would be an intersection of reporters that both sides trusted and felt did a good job. That's what fair and balanced looks like.
The problem with The Star is that they'll take the work of one their better reporters and then add in stuff from one of their hacks to give it their spin. We've also caught editors inserting their own opinions into the product without telling the reporter.
On more than one occasion, I've confronted a Star reporter on some aspect of their story only to get the response "I didn't write anything like that" and then we find out that that's what their editor thought was going on and inserted it without any research.
I've also confronted some of their reporters on events that I knew were happening and that The Star wasn't covering. That's why I said the other day that it was easy to compete with The Star even with limited resources because there are so many restrictions on what they're allowed to cover.
I've actually had some of the reporters refer me to the players on those issues so I could go research the stuff myself. The biggest crime at The Star is that they have (had) some very talented people and yet wouldn't let them do their jobs because the stories didn't fit The Star's corrupt (not leftist, corrupt) agenda.
Well, then, maybe you'll answer the question: What's an example of "fair and balanced"? Limbaugh? Hannity? Savage? Faux News? Some other print or Web publication?
Butt-boy’s intentionally confusing bias reporting in newspapers, who claim to be not bias “truth to power” and “Fit to print”, with television personalities who don’t claim to be fair and balanced.
We've also caught editors inserting their own opinions into the product without telling the reporter.
----------------- Amen to that. It was this very sort of incident that ended my desire to be a "Journalist" for all time. It's like a slap in the face to turn something in and read it the next morning where the only thing you recognize is the byline and first sentence.
Anon: 7:00 AM, Are you are suggesting that Limbaugh and Hannity are newsmen? I think most people realize they are conservative opinion, radio hosts. They don’t try to fool people into thinking they are unbiased, to my knowledge. BTW: Fox News creams its competitors, and is growing while CNN drifts into sorted oblivion. There is a big difference between the media as government watchdogs, setting out as a whole, to destroy anyone that doesn’t bend to their Socialist agenda, and a couple of radio shows hosting political commentary. Geeez!
I remember the insane Rev. Wright in a so-called sermon damning the ’Fix news,’ and I wondered why a man of God would be saying such a thing. I still wonder why a so-called Christian would stand for such unchristian-like talk while attending church? One thing for sure, my children would not hear talk like that for more than one minute. I wonder how Wright is getting along in Tinley Park? Leaving his beloved South Chicago for a white, privileged, golf course, gated community. The hater of white people chooses a mansion among them, while South Chicago remains a killing field. There must be some moral to that story.
Anon 8:49, of course Limbaugh and Hannity aren't newsmen. They state their opinions. And Lokeman and Abouhalkah are/were on the opinion pages or on blogs, stating their opinions. So I guess the names they have been called here are OK only if you don't agree with them.
Moody's just downgraded MNI debt, and says the company will be restructured in the next two years. I think they will split the company into two -- those newspapers really making money, and those only marginally so. Then they will cut the marginally so adrift to fend for themselves.
Rhonda Lokeman was a crude, unqualified writer. She used the KC Star’s circulation numbers to boost her sorry career. Without Zieman she would have remained in obscurity forever. She was dishonest in her writing, and is just plain low class. Now that we know she is a drunk, that might explain part of her problem. I wouldn’t use Rhonda as a example of anything excerpt the pitfalls of affirmative action, and where sleeping with the boss will take you. She is loathsome, disgusting person, and you will find very few people that think differently.
I think Abouhalka is a Knight Ridder holdover. There are these strangely biased hacks hanging around, and ruining so many McClatchy newspapers. I don’t bother with his stale opinions. He writes like an old-timer, and I doubt the new media will not tolerate his obvious bigotry.
Although splitting up into two papers seems plausible, I think the two new entities will be one paper for the Trotskyites, and the other for the DNC perverts.
Still Ignorant About Saddam’s Ties To Al Queda -Jonathan Landay and McClatchy Newspapers
Flopping Aces | Scott Malensek
Earlier this week an article by Jonathan Landay was published by the [failing McClatchy Newspapers.] The article asserted that innumerable people had been tortured with the intent and purpose of proving a tie between Saddam Hussein’s regime and the Al Queda network of terrorist groups.
The article asserted that there never were any ties between the two, and that the torturing of captured Al Queda terrorists was done largely to create a fictional narrative that would support the case for invading Iraq (let’s ignore that the alleged “torture” happened AFTER the invasion of Iraq-just as was done in the article)....
I think they will split the company into two -- those newspapers really making money, and those only marginally so. Then they will cut the marginally so adrift to fend for themselves. ------------------
Creditors will never agree to this. There is no way that they would allow the loss of tangible assets such as bricks and mortar to be spun off into a separate entity, straddled with debt that ensures failure.
They may however agree to the immediate closure and liquidation of all non performing companies which would reduce MNI to about half their holdings.
I think Yael goes back all the way to Cap Cities and perhaps beyond. Knight Ridder bought The Star from the Mouse and I believe it was the Mouse that made Art Brisbane publisher starting the decline of The Star as a newspaper.
Oh and just for informational purposes as memory serves. Before Tully it was Hale and as I recall he was a home spun guy who was around forever.
Disney was hands off during their ownership. They never wanted anything to do with the newspaper assets (liabilities)and placed them on the selling block the very same day they removed the Capital Cities name from Cap Cities / ABC.
Are you sure you don't have Tully and Brisbane switched? I believe it was Brisbane, then Tully , then Zieman, but I could be wrong.
And I was told just the opposite, that "the Mouse has needs" and while it may not have cared about running the papers, it cared that certain things appeared in the papers.
The reason I think Tully came after Brisbane is that I think he came after I was down there. He was an ad guy and the saying was that an ad guy would always make sure you had a paycheck. however, Zieman is one of Brisbane's butt boys, so it's possible that he could have followed Art after he was kicked up the ladder to KR corporate. Art was then dumped as soon as McClatchy came in. From what I'm seeing, that was probably the only good decision they've made since acquiring the KR properties.
Also, I think Hale was the last publisher to turn out a good paper.
It's hard to point out a single organization where the entire product is fair and balanced. The closest I've seen to that was The Kansan under Roy Teicher and The Lawrence Journal-World during the era when Mike Shields was editor and Dave Ranney and Scott Rothschild were reporting.
The Kansan is now an online only publication and Ranney and Shields left journalism to put out a health care advocacy paper of some nature. Teicher was fired after Carol Marinovich (successfully ) threatened to "bury The Kansan" and is now a Democrat campaign consultant.
In eras past, some towns had both a Democrat and a Republican newspaper and you took both and created your own "fair and balance by reading both sides. I grew up in such a community and it was sort of interesting then to go somewhere where there was only one newspaper and it was bad.
In a case like Kansas City, we have two main papers, the Star and The Sun, and they're both lackeys for the establishment, and that establishment is very, very corrupt. Indeed, in general , journalism in Kansas is pathetic. The Harris papers are just horrible and my concept of the Reverse Nuremburg ("we give no orders")was developed dealing with their management.
That said, there are people tilling in the vineyards out here who are trying desperately working for complete assholes like Steve Rose and Mark Zieman who try each and everyday to produce a quality product and commit acts of journalism. One such was my hero, Rick Alm, who was just dumped in the last purge at The Star. There are other still there, and I respect what they try to do working inside the belly of the beast.
That's the best I can do. I think there are reporters out there even at PMSNBC and CNN that you could point to and say "this guy/gal does good stuff".
the paper turned to crap under Brisbane the corrupt who followed his namesake's tradition of mouthing socialist platitudes out of one side of his mouth whilst whoring for the establishment out of the other (if memory serves, the lawn jockey at The River Club is named for him). Tully then came along and did nothing to change Brisbane's orientation of the paper (given that Brisbane was higher up at that point) and instead focused on profits. He was replaced by Zieman, Brisbane's butt boy in the news division.
You're right my mistake. I am getting old and mix up my ad guys on a regular basis these days.
Now, as far as Disney goes. Nothing could be further from the truth. Disney didn't give one iota of what went on at the Star, however Eisner was universally hated so they were a very convenient target for any of the Cap Cities (star-telegram) pukes with a complaint. In fact it was the Cap Cities bunch that decided to destroy the unions and it was them that were responsible for all the hate and discontent. I have to admit, I didn't care for Eisner either after suffering through his tour, but Disney wasn't even around long enough to legitimately take the blame for anything.
Thank you. That's quite interesting. I thought I was the only one in the world that hated Eisner. Talk about running a brand name into the ground.
Unfortunately, he made Disney a bunch of money. It's sad to think that slugs like Eisner are what it takes to succeed. I hope not. Again thanks for the interesting insights.
Unfortunately, he made Disney a bunch of money. It's sad to think that slugs like Eisner are what it takes to succeed. I hope not. Again thanks for the interesting insights. ----------- Eisner was actually hated by huge numbers of shareholders and employees alike. He did make a lot of people, myself included an obscene amount of money with the with the Cap Cities / ABC deal but if you didn't get out your returns were flat for the next 8 years of his reign of terror. He had stacked the BOD with his own hand picked cronies and just damn near drove the company into the dirt.
Thank god for Roy Disney though. The company is back on track, back to it's roots and Genghis Kahn is no longer ordering the toilet paper, and designing the sets of their productions.
35 comments:
♫ It’s Not Easy Being Green ♫
------------------
CBSNEWS: Obama Earth Day Flights Burned More Than 9,000 Gallons Of Fuel...
-----
Where is Algore? This can't pass the smell test. Perhaps Algore is busy paying his $90,000 a year electric bill? Ya think!
-J-School Enrollments Soar As Jobs Vanish-
I hope everyone realizes we are subsiding colleges in one way or another. These foolish young people are going into debt with student loans, and will cry about not receiving even a living wage, so they can pay the loans back. There are no journalism jobs for most of these graduates. Now, Barry-O wants more money for these unemployable college students. The world has gone mad.
Some Denver journalists bravely stepped into the new online media, but admit the customary monetary payment for their work, won’t be forthcoming anytime soon.
This is a good online subscription news model to watch. Area commenters say the talent is definitely there for a successful venture. The question is, do people really care enough to pay for subscription news? One of the continuing words of advise from potential customers was that the news should remain fair and balanced. Like Duh!
*****
-Only 3,000 subscribers signed up for the new online InDenverTimes -
Westword
"We didn't reach our subscription goal of 50,000, which was the basis for our original business model," says InDenverTimes investor Kevin Preblud.
MNI IS NOT BIASED, WE DON'T USE DNC TALKING POINTS (AHMED), AND WE WON'T DEFAULT ON OUR LOANS. (MUSIC PLEASE)
McClatchy Employees Cheer Iraqi Shoe Tosser as Stock Plunges 99%
By P.J. Gladnick | December 25, 2008
I applauded this act. I don’t care that it is rude. Why are we concerned about etiquette when a country was destroyed? Did Bush ever apologize to the Iraqis for the hundreds of thousands of dead? Bush is an occupier, a clown pretending to be a hero, so enclosed in his own little self-certain world he probably was surprised an Iraqi could be that angry.
I am not surprised. I am only surprised such a thing did not happen earlier.
...the McClatchey reporters covering Bush’s visit to Iraq laughed when he got a shoe thrown at him....laughed out loud mind you!....at their President being insulted by foreigners....F**k McClatchey!....I can’t wait for their bankruptcy.
@ Romenesko
"Your daily fix of media industry news, commentary, and memos.
WSJ charts "adverse events" at newspapers from 2006 to 2009
WSJ.com
The graphic shows staff reductions, reduced print days and other cuts at the top 100 newspapers."
Re: “.. the news should remain fair and balanced.”
***
I serious doubt they know what fair and balanced news means. Many journalists are still in denial about their part in the fraud election. I don’t think the old media has a chance until they clean house with new journalism standards. Their coverage of the tea parties has enraged millions of taxpayers. Janeane Garofalo has become a disgusting spokesperson for the loony left. The leftist loons that have taken oven the Obama administration will be his downfall.
Votes the bums OUT!
Anon 5:59: NICE FIND
"This is a good online subscription news model to watch. Area commenters say the talent is definitely there for a successful venture."
"Only 3,000 subscribers signed up...We didn't reach our subscription goal of 50,000"
Translation:
Subscribe because our bias and DNC talking points are better than our non-existent competitors.
Further, although you can get the same news for free at DNC.com or CPUSA.com, or anywhere else on the web, pay us because we are the real biased, Marxist commies that had to call ourselves unbiased at the old paper.
So subscribe, and remember, we don't just chant "death to America", we print it!
Anon 6:43, what's an example of "fair and balanced"? Limbaugh? Hannity? Savage? Faux News?
7:00 Your phony non sequitur is exactly the kind of crap we're used to getting when we talk to our newspapers about bias. "Well, if you don't like my stuff, you're just a dittohead." Fairness is not a light switch, it's a continuum.
When I first listened to Limbaugh and then compared what I was hearing on the nightly news what impressed me was how much more I knew of both sides of the argument than what I got from the nightly news.
Limbaugh used to have a policy (don't listen as much anymore, so don't know if it's still there) of putting liberals to the front of the queue. The ones who called in tended to be articulate and civil and usually provided far more information on a topic from their perspective than one got on the news.
What the news gave me was glimpse of the liberal argument and nothing of the conservative.
But let's move to local news. I've been involved in politics for decades and I can tell you that if I were to make a list of journalists that I felt were fair and someone on the left did the same, there would be an intersection of reporters that both sides trusted and felt did a good job. That's what fair and balanced looks like.
The problem with The Star is that they'll take the work of one their better reporters and then add in stuff from one of their hacks to give it their spin. We've also caught editors inserting their own opinions into the product without telling the reporter.
On more than one occasion, I've confronted a Star reporter on some aspect of their story only to get the response "I didn't write anything like that" and then we find out that that's what their editor thought was going on and inserted it without any research.
I've also confronted some of their reporters on events that I knew were happening and that The Star wasn't covering. That's why I said the other day that it was easy to compete with The Star even with limited resources because there are so many restrictions on what they're allowed to cover.
I've actually had some of the reporters refer me to the players on those issues so I could go research the stuff myself. The biggest crime at The Star is that they have (had) some very talented people and yet wouldn't let them do their jobs because the stories didn't fit The Star's corrupt (not leftist, corrupt) agenda.
Well, then, maybe you'll answer the question: What's an example of "fair and balanced"? Limbaugh? Hannity? Savage? Faux News? Some other print or Web publication?
John 7:41: (Clapping) John, Bravo! If only we had real newspapers! Sigh!
7:00 shows what happens when they let perez hiton run the show
Butt-boy’s intentionally confusing bias reporting in newspapers, who claim to be not bias “truth to power” and “Fit to print”, with television personalities who don’t claim to be fair and balanced.
We've also caught editors inserting their own opinions into the product without telling the reporter.
-----------------
Amen to that. It was this very sort of incident that ended my desire to be a "Journalist" for all time. It's like a slap in the face to turn something in and read it the next morning where the only thing you recognize is the byline and first sentence.
Anon: 7:00 AM, Are you are suggesting that Limbaugh and Hannity are newsmen? I think most people realize they are conservative opinion, radio hosts. They don’t try to fool people into thinking they are unbiased, to my knowledge.
BTW: Fox News creams its competitors, and is growing while CNN drifts into sorted oblivion. There is a big difference between the media as government watchdogs, setting out as a whole, to destroy anyone that doesn’t bend to their Socialist agenda, and a couple of radio shows hosting political commentary. Geeez!
I remember the insane Rev. Wright in a so-called sermon damning the ’Fix news,’ and I wondered why a man of God would be saying such a thing. I still wonder why a so-called Christian would stand for such unchristian-like talk while attending church? One thing for sure, my children would not hear talk like that for more than one minute. I wonder how Wright is getting along in Tinley Park? Leaving his beloved South Chicago for a white, privileged, golf course, gated community. The hater of white people chooses a mansion among them, while South Chicago remains a killing field. There must be some moral to that story.
Anon 8:49, of course Limbaugh and Hannity aren't newsmen. They state their opinions. And Lokeman and Abouhalkah are/were on the opinion pages or on blogs, stating their opinions. So I guess the names they have been called here are OK only if you don't agree with them.
Moody's just downgraded MNI debt, and says the company will be restructured in the next two years. I think they will split the company into two -- those newspapers really making money, and those only marginally so. Then they will cut the marginally so adrift to fend for themselves.
WSJ link on Moody's Downgrade of MNI:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,BT-CO-20090424-711444,00.html?mod=wsjportfolio
Rhonda Lokeman was a crude, unqualified writer. She used the KC Star’s circulation numbers to boost her sorry career. Without Zieman she would have remained in obscurity forever. She was dishonest in her writing, and is just plain low class. Now that we know she is a drunk, that might explain part of her problem. I wouldn’t use Rhonda as a example of anything excerpt the pitfalls of affirmative action, and where sleeping with the boss will take you. She is loathsome, disgusting person, and you will find very few people that think differently.
I think Abouhalka is a Knight Ridder holdover. There are these strangely biased hacks hanging around, and ruining so many McClatchy newspapers. I don’t bother with his stale opinions. He writes like an old-timer, and I doubt the new media will not tolerate his obvious bigotry.
Abdullah must be one of those Alger Hiss kind of guys doing good work for his handlers.
Anon 10:15
Although splitting up into two papers seems plausible, I think the two new entities will be one paper for the Trotskyites, and the other for the DNC perverts.
Still Ignorant About Saddam’s Ties To Al Queda -Jonathan Landay and McClatchy Newspapers
Flopping Aces | Scott Malensek
Earlier this week an article by Jonathan Landay was published by the [failing McClatchy Newspapers.] The article asserted that innumerable people had been tortured with the intent and purpose of proving a tie between Saddam Hussein’s regime and the Al Queda network of terrorist groups.
The article asserted that there never were any ties between the two, and that the torturing of captured Al Queda terrorists was done largely to create a fictional narrative that would support the case for invading Iraq (let’s ignore that the alleged “torture” happened AFTER the invasion of Iraq-just as was done in the article)....
***I think Abouhalka is a Knight Ridder holdover. There are these strangely biased hacks hanging around,***
Are Limbaugh, Hannity, and Savage "strangely biased hacks"?
I think they will split the company into two -- those newspapers really making money, and those only marginally so. Then they will cut the marginally so adrift to fend for themselves.
------------------
Creditors will never agree to this. There is no way that they would allow the loss of tangible assets such as bricks and mortar to be spun off into a separate entity, straddled with debt that ensures failure.
They may however agree to the immediate closure and liquidation of all non performing companies which would reduce MNI to about half their holdings.
"I think Abouhalka is a Knight Ridder holdover."
I think Yael goes back all the way to Cap Cities and perhaps beyond. Knight Ridder bought The Star from the Mouse and I believe it was the Mouse that made Art Brisbane publisher starting the decline of The Star as a newspaper.
Anon 12:07 I love this part!!!
They may however agree to the immediate closure and liquidation of all non performing companies which would reduce MNI to about half their holdings.
he Star from the Mouse and I believe it was the Mouse that made Art Brisbane publisher starting the decline of The Star as a newspaper.
------------
Nope Brisbane was a Knight Ridder guy. Tully was before him and a Cap Cities, Knight Ridder advertising dude from the Star-Telegram.
Oh and just for informational purposes as memory serves. Before Tully it was Hale and as I recall he was a home spun guy who was around forever.
Disney was hands off during their ownership. They never wanted anything to do with the newspaper assets (liabilities)and placed them on the selling block the very same day they removed the Capital Cities name from Cap Cities / ABC.
Are you sure you don't have Tully and Brisbane switched? I believe it was Brisbane, then Tully , then Zieman, but I could be wrong.
And I was told just the opposite, that "the Mouse has needs" and while it may not have cared about running the papers, it cared that certain things appeared in the papers.
The reason I think Tully came after Brisbane is that I think he came after I was down there. He was an ad guy and the saying was that an ad guy would always make sure you had a paycheck. however, Zieman is one of Brisbane's butt boys, so it's possible that he could have followed Art after he was kicked up the ladder to KR corporate. Art was then dumped as soon as McClatchy came in. From what I'm seeing, that was probably the only good decision they've made since acquiring the KR properties.
Also, I think Hale was the last publisher to turn out a good paper.
What is "fair and balanced"?
It's hard to point out a single organization where the entire product is fair and balanced. The closest I've seen to that was The Kansan under Roy Teicher and The Lawrence Journal-World during the era when Mike Shields was editor and Dave Ranney and Scott Rothschild were reporting.
The Kansan is now an online only publication and Ranney and Shields left journalism to put out a health care advocacy paper of some nature. Teicher was fired after Carol Marinovich (successfully ) threatened to "bury The Kansan" and is now a Democrat campaign consultant.
In eras past, some towns had both a Democrat and a Republican newspaper and you took both and created your own "fair and balance by reading both sides. I grew up in such a community and it was sort of interesting then to go somewhere where there was only one newspaper and it was bad.
In a case like Kansas City, we have two main papers, the Star and The Sun, and they're both lackeys for the establishment, and that establishment is very, very corrupt. Indeed, in general , journalism in Kansas is pathetic. The Harris papers are just horrible and my concept of the Reverse Nuremburg ("we give no orders")was developed dealing with their management.
That said, there are people tilling in the vineyards out here who are trying desperately working for complete assholes like Steve Rose and Mark Zieman who try each and everyday to produce a quality product and commit acts of journalism. One such was my hero, Rick Alm, who was just dumped in the last purge at The Star. There are other still there, and I respect what they try to do working inside the belly of the beast.
That's the best I can do. I think there are reporters out there even at PMSNBC and CNN that you could point to and say "this guy/gal does good stuff".
More info on sequence of publishers.
Hale, Woodworth, Brisbane, Tully, Zeiman.
the paper turned to crap under Brisbane the corrupt who followed his namesake's tradition of mouthing socialist platitudes out of one side of his mouth whilst whoring for the establishment out of the other (if memory serves, the lawn jockey at The River Club is named for him). Tully then came along and did nothing to change Brisbane's orientation of the paper (given that Brisbane was higher up at that point) and instead focused on profits. He was replaced by Zieman, Brisbane's butt boy in the news division.
You're right my mistake. I am getting old and mix up my ad guys on a regular basis these days.
Now, as far as Disney goes. Nothing could be further from the truth. Disney didn't give one iota of what went on at the Star, however Eisner was universally hated so they were a very convenient target for any of the Cap Cities (star-telegram) pukes with a complaint. In fact it was the Cap Cities bunch that decided to destroy the unions and it was them that were responsible for all the hate and discontent.
I have to admit, I didn't care for Eisner either after suffering through his tour, but Disney wasn't even around long enough to legitimately take the blame for anything.
Thank you. That's quite interesting. I thought I was the only one in the world that hated Eisner. Talk about running a brand name into the ground.
Unfortunately, he made Disney a bunch of money. It's sad to think that slugs like Eisner are what it takes to succeed. I hope not. Again thanks for the interesting insights.
Unfortunately, he made Disney a bunch of money. It's sad to think that slugs like Eisner are what it takes to succeed. I hope not. Again thanks for the interesting insights.
-----------
Eisner was actually hated by huge numbers of shareholders and employees alike. He did make a lot of people, myself included an obscene amount of money with the with the Cap Cities / ABC deal but if you didn't get out your returns were flat for the next 8 years of his reign of terror. He had stacked the BOD with his own hand picked cronies and just damn near drove the company into the dirt.
Thank god for Roy Disney though. The company is back on track, back to it's roots and Genghis Kahn is no longer ordering the toilet paper, and designing the sets of their productions.
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