Cranky Greg's View

Robert Novak: RIP

Robert Novak, the old conservative journalist, died today.  He was a cranky old bastard, which is precisely the reason Cranky Greg was so fond of him.

Cranky Greg recently read Novak's autobiography, The Prince of Darkness, and it was an excellent read for those of you who are interested in America's political history of the past 50 years.  It was the one autobiography where the author really revealed warts.  Most autobiographies make Cranky Greg laugh, but not this one.

In any case, Novak will be missed by those like Cranky Greg who get so tired of hearing the conventional wisdom and who detest "journalists" who fail to scrutinize those they like, such as Barack Obama.

Novak was his own man, and did his own thing, and his reporting was accurate.  He didn't care if his reporting hurt a Republican's political career or a Democrat's political career.

He was definitely a man of the old school.  Smoking, drinking, reporting.

Cranky Greg is going to miss Robert Novak, and it is too bad that Novak is going to probably be remembered for the Valerie Plame affair, which was ridiculous in its own right - not because of anything Novak did.

The recent passing of Walter Cronkite had the MSM in a frenzy of self-adulation and worship of Walter Cronkite who mostly wrote and read scripts.  Novak was more valuable to Americans in his day because he was a reporter.

But MSM won't slobber over themselves at Novak's passing.  Which explains everything.

Prescience

Wow!  So the newspapers should have seen it coming....this story is from KRON in San Francisco in 1981.  Cranky Greg remembers moving from Dallas to Sacramento in 1988 and using StarText by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, which was on online service to access the Star-Telegram's news.  It was totally ASCII which meant that it was not a graphical interface.  CG used it in Dallas before he moved and thought it would be a great way to stay in touch with the goings-on in DFW.  CG had a 300 baud modem, and it would take about one minute to download an average article about the Dallas Cowboys, for example.  CG used to sit there and think it was the most amazing thing he ever saw!!  But CG stopped using after a month or two after he got to Sacramento after paying the outrageous long-distance bills!  Remember long distance?  Anyway, this KRON video is outstanding and it makes CG wonder why has the Star-Telegram and other newspapers that were apparently on the cutting edge in the early 1980's failed to deal with the Internet.  Probably because since then they were bought out by big-ass corporations with clueless management.

This is cool, too!!

Dallas Morning News on the Brink?

A. H. Belo Corporation announced that it is laying off another 500 employees.  Belo owns The Dallas Morning News, which used to be a good newspaper but now sucks.

It's website is awful.

It's just a matter of time before this paper goes under.  Too bad that the fine folks at the DMN can't get a handle on this technology thing.  A look at the DMN website proves that Belo is behind the curve.

Cranky Greg likes the look of The New York Times website. Just not the content, though.  But it's easy to navigate and find what you want.

The bad thing about papers like the DMN becoming irrelevant is that newspapers used to be such a large part of local communites.  Now they aren't, but they still could be.

The Death of Newspapers

The Dallas Morning News and the Fort Worth Star-Telegram are shuffling things around with their sports coverage.  According to this blurb, the Star-Telegram will stop assigning beat writers to cover the Dallas Mavericks and the Dallas Stars and the Morning News will no longer assign a beat writer to cover the Texas Rangers.

What these newspapers are going to do is to share coverage.  Which only ensures mediocrity or boring writing.

Both papers will continue to cover the Dallas Cowboy, however.  (Can't stay away from Valley Ranch with all the B.S. going on out there!)

That means the death of these papers.  They will not long survive because if they are sharing information, there is no use reading any of them.  Might as well check the Internet.

Cranky Greg has fond memories of the olden days in the 1970's and 80's when there was a real competition between the papers in DFW.  Cranky Greg remembers when The Dallas Morning News hired Skip Bayless as a sports columnist.  A couple of years later, the now defunct Dallas Times Herald hired Bayless away.  Blackie Sherrod's column in the DMN was a must-read.  And at DMN Galloway was promoted to columnist (he used to be a beat writer covering the Texas Rangers).  Then the Star-Telegram hired Galloway away from Dallas.

Cranky Greg's recent visit to DFW in November was the first time in about 5 years that he read the printed versions of the DFW papers.  He was shocked at how thin the papers were, and the lack of stories other than reprinted stuff from the newswires.

It is now only a matter of time before the Morning News and the Star-Telegram close their doors for good.

Jon Stewart on BIGMEDIAPRESS

 Jon Stewart had breakfast yesterday with some journalists in Denver who are there covering the "It Should Have Been Hillary" National Convention.  Jon Stewart made some excellent points when he spoke to the journalists.  For example, regarding the CNNFOXNEWSMSNBC crowd:

We've fallen into this false sense of urgency that they create. That idea that everything is breaking news and that if you're not watching us, you're going to miss this thing.

But nothing they're saying is of any import because nobody filters it. (Print reporters) are able to step back for a moment and think. They're not. They're just pointing a camera and saying, 'What do you think that is? I don't know. Let's go to 'The Situation Room.' "

Cranky Greg could not agree more.  Fox News is especially ridiculous on this issue.  Every damn news story is a FOX ALERT!!  It's the Boy Who Cried Wolf thing.  That's why Cranky Greg hardly watches TV anymore.

Mark Vasché's Propaganda

Cranky Greg complained the other day about The Fort Worth Star-Telegram and the other newspapers controlled by McClatchy and their impending demise.

Cranky Greg has received several e-mails from McClatchy employees about the situation.  Cranky Greg has his opinions, and apparently, several McClatchy employees agree.

Cranky did get an e-mail tip about this piece that appeared in The Modesto Bee on Sunday.

Cranky Greg read it and had to laugh at its transparent CYAness.  The ModBee head honchos sound like Soviet propaganda ministers.  They say they will be around for a long time, which seems amazing, since they don't seem to have a realistic plan.  They say they are consolidating their printing with the Sacramento paper, and yet they seem to have no other plan than that.

And is that really a good plan?  To delay the paper distribution in the Internet Age?

Sounds silly to Cranky Greg.  But according to this BS article, Editor Mark Vasché will have more news in the future.

Cranky Greg can't wait for that!

Down in the Dumps at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram announced today that it is offering a "voluntary separation program" to all of its employees, including reporters and everyone else.

That newspaper might as well close its doors now and stop accepting money for its lousy product.

Cranky Greg received an e-mail from a long-time employee there and that reporter is devastated.  The FWST laid off other workers earlier in the year and instituted a wage and hiring freeze. The morale is as low as it can be.

It's sad to see some of the newspapers going out of business.  There is a human cost to the business failure, but on the other hand, they should have seen it coming.  The Star-Telegram used to be a decent paper.  Cranky remembers back in the 1970's that it had a morning and afternoon edition.

But that was before the Internet.  And corporate buy-outs and takeovers.

The Star-Telegram, once owned by Knight Ridder and now by McClatchy, was homogenized by the corporate fat cats.  Forget about regional differences, these fat cats said.  Just as local radio was destroyed by corporate buyouts, so was the newspaper business.  All Knight Ridder papers looked the same.  All McClatchy papers look the same.  Their websites are useless and look the same.  There is nothing to distinguish the Fort Worth Star-Telegram from any other newspaper website out there.

And therefore, the Star-Telegram is likely to be out of business soon.

Newspapers should not become irrelevant simply because of the arrival of the Internet.  The Internet should have been used to enhance the papers.  The Fort Worth Star-Telegram should have emphasized its Fort Worthness.  It should have been the single most important place to turn to if one wants information of Fort Worth.

Instead of carrying a bunch of national and world news on the website, it should all be local.  It should be easy to find where the restaurant reviews are.  It should be easy to find entertainment and sports information.  It should be the one place that Texas Rangers fans turn to find out about the Rangers.  It should be the place for local and state politics.

The paper should have a weekly or bi-weekly legal section to discuss local news in the legal community.  It should be supported with a blog on the website where people can comment.  There should be a section for the medical industry, real estate, food, travel, etc...

And it should have extensive coverage of local high school sports.

But the fat cats killed the paper by de-emphasizing its most important feature: its Fort Worthness.

Why buy a Star-Telegram now when it offers nothing original?

Instead of whining about the Internet, the fat cats should ask themselves if anyone would feel as if they missed something by not subscribing to the paper.  In the Star-Telegram's case, Cranky Greg doesn't think most people would feel they missed a thing by not reading or subscribing to the thinning rag.

And who says the Star-Telegram has to be delivered in print?  Make it available on the Kindle and on Blackberries and on IPhones.  Be on the cutting edge.

Or go corporate and become irrelevant to the local scene and go out of business.