Blogs

In Sunday's newspaper, Sun-Sentinel Editor Earl Maucker gave us a tutorial on what sells in the business of journalism, or, more precisely, what doesn't sell. Namely "sensational" news, or at least not in a "meaningful" way. Note to Earl: Sales have nothing to do with meaning -- you either get them or you don't. Here's a key graph:

Yes, a major story like the tragedy at Virginia Tech will make the front page, but day in and day out, we gear our content to be helpful and useful for the readers we serve. That's what our readers have told us they want.

Here we go again -- more "Help Team" babble. Well, I think we can officially call the marketing-driven Help Team experiment a miserable failure -- not only in terms of quality journalism but in the realm of sales that Maucker apparently knows so much about. From Editor and Publisher today:

The South Florida Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale was down 8.6% to

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Tomorrow, the Society of Professional Journalists will host a discussion on network news featuring appearances by CNN's Susan Candiotti, NBC's Mark Potter, and ABC producer Arash Ghadishah. The title: "How to Break Into Network News ... AND STAY THERE." Still not sure if that's a promo or a threat.

Should be interesting. It's from 1 to 3 p.m. at Jazziz Bistro at the Seminole Hard Rock.

Also tomorrow, as has already been mentioned on this blog, there'll be a game of "Ethics Hold 'Em" at Dave & Busters at I-95 and Stirling. This is a Michael Koretzky special where he'll teach journalism ethics through gambling. Brilliant, I say. This one is from 1 to 4:30.

Why SPJ is sponsoring two events at essentially the same time is beyond me, but hey, I just work here.

You have your only-in-South Florida stories and your only-in-Miami stories. This is an only-in-Miami story.

What the flying hell is this new company in West Palm Beach called "Smallponds"?

WPLG political reporter and sunday show host Michael Putney decided not to take that job with the investment bank after all, reports the Miami Herald's Christina Hoag.

Writes Hoag:

Putney originally said he did not see a conflict since he has never covered banking, nor did he see a conflict in working in journalism and public relations simultaneously.

But questions were raised about the arrangement after the initial announcement was posted on MiamiHerald.com.

''I believed everything had been settled and agreed to by Local 10 before I approved [Wednesday] morning's announcement by Ladenburg Thalmann. Evidently, it wasn't,'' Putney wrote in a statement Wednesday afternoon.

``After reflection and talks with Local 10 top management, I've concluded that serving as a media consultant, even in an area of journalism I do not cover, would raise the appearance of a possible conflict of interest. Therefore, I will not be joining Ladenburg Thalmann in a consulting capacity, and I wish them well.''

Oh, that's a little embarrassing. I wonder if it never occurred to Putney that the investment bank he would be working for has interests in all kinds of businesses, including gambling companies, that he might touch on as a reporter? Or if he just thought it would slide in the ethically loose subtropical region of Florida.

The following was sent to me via a third party from Fort Lauderdale Mayor Jim Naugle. He apparently thinks it's powerful enough to spur converts to the Republican Party.

Father-Daughter Talk A young woman was about to finish her first year of college. Like so many others her age, she considered herself to be a very liberal Democrat, and was very much in favor of the redistribution of wealth. She was deeply ashamed that her father was a rather staunch Republican, a feeling she openly expressed. Based on the lectures that she had participated in, and the occasional chat with a professor, she felt that her father had for years harbored an evil, selfish desire to

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Maybe the Sun-Sentinel, which is losing circulation like a crack whore loses teeth, has hope after all. In a story on page 2B of today's edition, Ihosvani Rodriguez writes about Hollywood Mayor Mara Giulianti getting a whopping $22,250 from plumbers around the country associated with the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipefitting Industry. Why? Because she's supporting a $300 million expansion of a the Westin Diplomat Resort in her city which is owned by the union's pension fund.

In addition to heightening our inherent distrust of plumbers, the article also revealed that the mayor has a new policy.

"Giulianti declined to comment Wednesday," Rodriguez wrote. "She said it is now her policy not to answer questions from South Florida Sun-Sentinel reporters."

But the mayor couldn't help but comment on why she won't comment.

"The paper is conducting a witch hunt on me and I won't be

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This just in from the Miami Herald website: Channel 10's Michael Putney has accepted a job as a media consultant for Ladenburg Thalmann Financial Services, an investment bank.

The kicker: He's keeping his job at Channel 10 and op-ed column for the Herald while he works to promote Ladenburg Thalmann to the media. That doesn't sound kosher to me. In my view, you're either a flack or you're a journalist and never the twain shall meet.

Below is the YouTube of Alec Baldwin's speech in Glengarry Glen Ross. The reason I posted the little homage yesterday is that if you listen to the phone message, it's like he's channeling this character. Little known fact about Glengarry Glen Ross: The Baldwin role and speech, probably the most memorable thing in the movie, weren't in the original Mamet play. It was added to the film to up the stakes for Jack Lemmon et al.

No, that headline isn't fair, but it's about as balanced as the front-page Sun-Sentinel obituary on the Deerfield Beach billionaire. The article almost completely avoided the darker side of Moran, who died Tuesday at the age of 88. It mentioned briefly that he pleaded guilty in 1984 to evading income taxes but you had to read Patrick Danner's story in the Herald to find out about some of his other misdeeds.

... troubles began in 1984, when Moran pleaded guilty to seven counts of income-tax evasion. He got probation, paid a $35,000 fine and started the Youth Automotive Training Center to train troubled youths in car repair.

Soon after, a flurry of lawsuits was filed by dealers who accused JM Family of threatening to cut off supplies of Toyotas if they didn't steer business to his other firms. Later, Moran faced accusations that he denied Toyota dealerships to qualified black applicants, which sparked a congressional hearing in 1992.

The verdicts and settlements totaled more than $100 million, the Daily Business Review reported at the time. Around the time of congressional hearings, Moran created the African-American Achievers awards.

Danner played it about right -- telling of the man's truly incredible success but not making him out to be a fairy tale. Moran started as a used car salesman in Chicago and he was a damn good one. Then he went to Japan, hooked up with Toyota, and helped make sure there was a Corolla in every driveway (my first car, incidentally, and a damn good one). He became an automotive king -- and in the mid-1980s apparently became a tad bit tyrannical. But during the past two decades he has been South Florida's top philanthropist, with Women in Distress, the Youth Automotive Training Center, and countless other charitable acts. I've been to the automotive training center in Deerfield Beach and know that it's been a beacon and possibly even a lifesaver for a lot of economically disadvantaged black kids. And Women in Distress has been a refuge for countless women when they need it most.

What I like about Moran is that he was a salesman and businessman through and through. He wasn't like some other billionaires we know who want to own all the politicians, try to build ungainly developments, scam the public with a bad arena deal in Sunrise, run our sports teams, and pollute the political system with lobbyists. Sure Moran flexed his muscle in Deerfield and elsewhere at times, but he wasn't a civic vampire. As far as billionaires go, Moran wasn't bad at all. In fact, he was a damn good one.

So, like so many others, I was feeling sorry for Alec Baldwin this morning. What, you can't chew out your daughter without the whole world talking about it? So I contacted Baldwin's agent, who arranged a two-minute interview. "Two minutes," said the agent, who strangely wouldn't provide me his name. "You go over that, Alec flies down there to straighten your ass out good."

Alec called five minutes later. I could hear New York traffic in the background.

"Do you consider what you said to your daughter abuse, because --"

I wanted to say that I didn't, but Baldwin was clearly wound up and interrupted me.

"You see this watch?" he asked.

I started to tell him no, because we were on the phone, but he bulled forward.

"That watch costs more than your car. I made $970,000 last year. How much you make? You see pal, that's who I am, and you're nothing. Nice guy, I don't give a shit. Good father, fuck you! Go home and play with your kids! You wanna work here, close! You think this is abuse? You think this is

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The Dade County Bar Association was outraged by a Daily Business Review story by Forrest Norman about insurance fraud cases. In the April 16 article, Norman quoted the general counsel of an insurance company was quoted as saying:

"When we get cases in front of juries, we were like 80 percent successful. But now the judges don't let that happen. They either grant motions for summary judgment or they somehow take it away from the jury's discretion. I think the judges are being paid off, but I can't prove that." (I added the italics).

The quote came from Charles Grimsley, who works for United Automobile Insurance, which is trying to remove Judge Jacqueline Schwartz from its cases, claiming she is biased. Bar President Merrick L. Gross wrote the newspaper to complain that "the inclusion of an unsubstantiated quote directly attacking the integrity, independence and fairness of the trial judges of the Miami-Dade County Circuit and County Courts is reprehensible."

The Bar wasn't the only entity upset with Grimsley's words. The insurance company itself took out a full-page ad in the Daily Business Review saying the suggestion of bribery "does not remotely reflect the opinion of

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About six weeks after New Times Broward*Palm Beach editor Tony Ortega was tapped to take over the Village Voice in New York, VVM has named his successor, Robert Meyerowitz, who comes to South Florida via the Anchorage Press.

Here's the announcement from VVM Executive Associate Editor Andy Van De Voorde:

April 20, 2007

To: Broward Editorial Staff

From: Andy Van De Voorde

Folks,

I was hoping to make this announcement in person, but am equally happy to do it by email.

I’m pleased to announce that we have found you a new editor. He will start in mid-May, so it won’t be long before you have a chance to meet him in the flesh.

He is Robert Meyerowitz, a veteran journalist who has plied his craft in environments ranging from the shooting wars of Latin America to the wilds of Alaska.

Meyerowitz is an experienced adventurer, writer, editor, and manager, and most recently has served as editor-in-chief at the Anchorage Press, a weekly paper well-known to us given that our old pal David Holthouse once toiled there. Under Robert’s stewardship, the Press has won numerous awards for news and feature writing, and even garnered praise from the local daily for producing “thoughtful and provocative journalism” that brashly defied industry trends toward consultant-driven blandness.

I believe that same description applies in spades to your own paper, and in that sense I think you will find Robert a kindred spirit.

He was born at Ft. Bragg, North Carolina and raised in upper New York State. He attended New York’s Bard College, an enclave of original thinking located at Annandale-on-Hudson. After getting out of school, he says, “I really needed to see what war was like, so I decamped for Nicaragua. I wanted to get shot at, and

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Corrie

The following comes from a Miami playwright now living in New York in regards to My Name Is Rachel Corrie, the production that was shitcanned at the Mosaic Theatre after Jewish groups complained and its sponsor, American Heritage School (also in Plantation), cowardly pulled its support.

I think it provides a strong rebuttal to some of the comments in the Corrie post below (read more her death here).

I saw this play and the American Jewish Federation should be scared of it. It is powerful, sharp, shocking and pierces through the gauze that blankets this country. I'm not surprised they've tried to get it banned every where. I'm a little disappointed at how successful they have been because it shows a lack of backbone in the arts. I'm not against Israel or for

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Former Miami Herald general counsel is officially in charge as the new owner of the Broward Times. In the article announcing the change, Beatty, described by his newspaper as one of the "one of South Florida's top legal minds," tells us what led to the move.

For the last six years, he had been vice president of public affairs and general counsel for The Miami Herald. But his job was eliminated in November, five months after the McClatchy Co. bought the newspaper from Knight Ridder Inc., and decided the paper no longer needed an in-house lawyer.

“From November 06 to January 07 I did nothing but think about what I want to do when I grow up,” Beatty said.

The answer, he said, came to him after months of thought, research, inner conversation and prayer: Buy a

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