Escalante's legacy*

On tonight's "Which Way, LA?", Warren Olney talks about Jaime Escalante's impact on teaching in Los Angeles with Washington Post education columnist Jay Mathews, who wrote "Escalante: The Best Teacher in America"; decorated elementary school teacher Rafe Esquith, and two of Escalante's former students, East Los Angeles attorney Sandra Munoz and Garfield High School administrator Javier Gonzalez. Escalante died Tuesday at age 79.

The shows runs at 7:30 p.m. tonight on KCRW 89.9 FM and can be streamed or podcast at www.kcrw.com/whichwayla.

*Update: A memorial for Escalante will be held at Garfield High School, 5101 E. Sixth St., on Thursday, April 1, at 7 p.m.

Public radio's ratings game

Some good news (and job security) out of the recent ratings results for KCRW. First, the overall numbers, as reported by Jim Rainey at the LA Times:

General Manager Ruth Seymour of KCRW-FM (89.9) told me last year she didn't think much of Arbitron's new Portable People Meter. The meters counted just 289,000 weekly listeners for KCRW in August, well behind another public-radio fixture, KPCC-FM (89.3), which had 549,000. Though Seymour has retired, she owes me a "toldya." The most recent Arbitron report puts KCRW at 514,000 weekly listeners, right on the tail of KPCC's 544,000.

In addition, Public Radio International, which distributes KCRW's "To The Point," reported a 28-percent increase in ratings for the national syndicated talk show. The increase was largely due to WNYC in New York putting TTP back on the air, although there was growth in Washington and Dallas as well.

Four in the morning

1. Former LA Times and Weekly reporter Daniel Hernandez and others offer some righteous criticism of the "immersion" journalism practiced by The Entryway. LAO

2. The Voice of San Diego has advertised an opening for "engagement editor." Nieman Journalism Lab explores what the job title means. Nieman Lab

3. "Can the iPad feed a Slow Journalism movement?" and eight other questions answered about how the iPad could change news. Ken Doctor

4. MOCA wants kids to break some rules. LA Downtown News

Tumulty jumps to Washington Post

Karen Tumulty will leave her job as national political correspondent for Time magazine, where she's led coverage of health care reform, to become the national political correspondent for the Washington Post. Politico

Rumblings

Heard through the grapevine that the New York Times and the Texas Tribune are considering a collaboration, possibly something like what the Times has done with locally produced content in San Francisco and Chicago.

Bankruptcy costs

From the Chicago Tribune:

In the 15 months since Chicago-based Tribune Co. filed for bankruptcy, law firms and other professionals have billed the media conglomerate $138 million, or about one-quarter of the company's cash flow last year, an analysis of court documents shows.

(via Romenesko)

O'Keefe gets charges reduced

Anti-ACORN pimp James O'Keefe won't be facing felony charges after all for allegedly trying to tamper with Sen. Mary Landrieu's office phones. Justice Department prosecutors have decided to reduce the charges against O'Keefe and his three cohorts to one count each of entering real property of the United States under false pretenses, a misdemeanor. TPM

The nine

The LA Weekly evaluated budget planning in the cities of Los Angeles, San Jose and Pasadena and came up with a list of nine mistakes L.A. made on its way to this year's budget crisis. LAW

Giving credit

The Los Angeles Times scolds Variety for failing to give credit to other publications when they follow a story. From the Times:

If Variety really wants to improve its showbiz coverage, it should stop ripping off other publications' stories without giving any credit to where the original post appeared. As I pointed out recently, Vulture had the news that Ivan Reitman was directing a new romantic comedy with Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher hours before Variety's version of the story appeared. But the trade didn't credit Vulture for being there first. And the Wall Street Journal had a terrific article last Friday about Wal-Mart doing a huge merchandising partnership with DreamWorks to promote "How to Train Your Dragon." Variety followed the article on Sunday with a less-than-terrific story of its own on the same exact subject, again without offering any credit to the Journal for having been there first.

So before it complains about being scooped, Variety should get in the habit of doing the right thing itself. When the paper is so clearly following in other people's wake, it should start giving other publications credit when they clearly get to the story first.

I suspect there are a few journalists out there at smaller Southern California newspapers who would love it if the Times followed its own advice.

(found via LA Observed)

Another Daily Journal memo

The California Real Estate Journal, a sister publication of the Los Angeles Daily Journal, is folding, according to a memo obtained by LA Observed. The editor of the shuttered trade paper, Michael Gottlieb, will take a job as associate editor at the Daily Journal and several CREJ reporters might follow.

The memo, written by DJ editor David Houston, has some other news as well. First, DJ reporter Evan George won a national award for his health care coverage. Second, Houston praises the DJ as the future of newspapers and recommends reporters read the Wall Street Journal and beat-related blogs.

Finally, Houston admonishes reporters to get into the office by 9 a.m. and to email to their assignment editors by 9:15 a.m. with an update on what the reporter is working on that day. I'd guess the email plan will last a week. Maybe two.

Misery's company

Maybe you were up late last night obsessively going over your lede in your head, or wondering if the verb you chose to describe a politician's decision on a controversial item truly captured the audacity of the moment without stepping over a line.

Was it an "avenue" or a "boulevard"? Was he accused of three felonies or four? Should that quote have gone higher up in the story?

Well, Jack Shafer at Slate does a good job describing something that most non-journalists don't get about the job and it's worth sharing. It's from a piece on Politico and The Atlantic publishing a memo they could not authenticate.

Not to let Politico and the Atlantic off lightly, but show me a journalist who has never published something he later regretted, and I'll show you a piker or a liar. The conscientious journalist—no matter whether he does his work on the Web, in print, or via broadcasting—goes to sleep every night with the dread, boiling in his belly, that he didn't check this thing or that thing closely enough before he filed his story.

Enjoy the glamor, citizen journalists.

On abortion

National Public Radio has adopted new etiquette for discussing the abortion debate. "Pro-choice" and "pro-life" are out. "Abortion-rights advocates" and "Abortion-rights opponents" are in. NPR

(found via Romenesko)

The Bay Citizen lands Fainaru

Former Washington Post reporter Steve Fainaru, who won a Pulitzer Prize for a series he did on the abuses of Blackwater and other private contractors, has taken over as managing editor of the nonprofit journalism site The Bay Citizen in San Fransisco.

(found via fishbowlLA)

More public broadcasting money for local journalism

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting has $7.5 million to pay public radio and television stations to do original reporting on issues of local interest, the New York Times reports.

The seed-money-to-foster-local/national-collaboration sounds quite similar to NPR's Project Argo, which was launched last summer with money from CPB and the Knight Foundation.

Also, "collaboration" is the trendiest word in public broadcasting these days.

Back to the House

Senate Republicans forced two minor changes in the health care reconciliation package, which means the House will have to vote one more time on the bill:

http://s.nyt.com/u/6tW

-- Post From Phone

Mistake on California's political map*

In his column today, calling for a "A Tea Party Without Nuts," New York Times columinst Thomas Friedman commends the passage of California's Proposition 11 as a way to deal with gerrymandered districts around the country. Unfortunately, he gets the facts wrong.

Here's the erroneous passage:

First, let every state emulate California’s recent grass-roots initiative that took away the power to design Congressional districts from the state legislature and put it in the hands of an independent, politically neutral, Citizens Redistricting Commission. It will go to work after the 2010 census and reshape California’s Congressional districts for the 2012 elections. Henceforth, districts in California will not be designed to be automatically Democratic or Republican — so more of them will be competitive, so more candidates will only be electable if they appeal to the center, not just cater to one party.

Except that Prop. 11 explicitly exempted Congressional districts from citizens' commission oversight. State lawmakers will continue to draw federal legislative districts, and they will continue to cut deals to protect incumbents and maintain the balance of party power in Congress. Prop. 11 only affects state Senate and Assembly districts.

The art of redistricting has gone from art to science in the past two decades, as sophisticated computer models give map drawers the ability to surgically carve up neighborhoods in ways that ensure Democratic districts stay Democratic and Republican districts stay Republican. This not only gives incumbents a great deal of protection in future elections, but keeps the majority party in the majority. Critics complain that the maps starve voters of real choice in elections and create primary election battles that reward the most ideologically pure candidates. Whether Prop. 11 significantly alters the political landscape in California remains to be seen.

Meantime, signatures are being gathered to put a measure on the November ballot to give California's citizens' commission authority to redraw Congressional districts. There's also a campaign being pushed by Rep. Howard Berman, D-Los Angeles, to undo Prop. 11 and put the redistricting back in the hands of the state Legislature.

Things aren't so simple here in California.

*A correction has been appended to Friedman's column:

An earlier version of this column misstated the terms of a recent California initiative. It will reshape districts for the state legislature, not Congressional districts.

KPCC into expansion

The Pasadena-based pubic radio station KPPC has moved into a new building, plans a new morning show, and has expanded its newsroom. From the LA Times:

At a time when many public broadcasters are financially strapped -- reliant on shrinking government funds, meager college support, and subscription drives dreaded by listeners -- KPCC has thrived by tapping a board willing to write big checks and hit up their rich friends for contributions. Taking the lead are Gordon Crawford, managing director of the Capital Group, the Los Angeles investment fund manager, and Jarl Mohn, who built E! Entertainment Television.

-snip-

In the last 10 years, KPCC has won more than 230 regional and national journalism awards, and grown from a weekly audience of about 200,000 to nearly 600,000, second in size only to WNYC-FM in New York among news and information public radio stations and consistently ahead of KCRW-FM locally. (Classical music programmer KUSC-FM is the top rated public radio station in Southern California.)

SCPR has about 30 reporters, with bureaus in L.A., Orange County, the Inland Empire and Washington. (Times columnists Patt Morrison and David Lazarus and other staff members are frequent contributors to KPCC programming. Times reporters and editors appeared on KPCC programs about 150 times in 2009.)

Unbankrupt

MediaNews Group emerged Friday from bankruptcy and cleansed of about $765 million in debt, Bloomberg reports.

The Chapter 11 filing included a reorganization of the company's board. Dean Singleton and Jody Lodovic will continue to run MediaNews, while the banks and lenders took a bigger chunk of the ownership. As Editor & Publisher reports:

Secured lenders exchanged their debt for an 89% stake in the company, but Chairman William Dean Singleton remains in control of the chain with the power to appoint four of the seven directors.

Whether the reorganization plan affects newspaper operations over the long term remains to be seen. Bank of America and the other major creditors probably won't be very patient about seeing returns on their investment after forgiving so much debt.

MediaNews is the second largest newspaper publisher in the country. Holdings include the Los Angeles Newspaper Group, which publishes the Daily News, Daily Breeze, Pasadena Star-News and six other dailies.

Chicken wars

The family tragedy that's gripped Zankou Chicken (written by fellow TTP producer Darrell Satzman). LAT

Pulling back the shroud on the Fed

A federal appeals court has ordered the Federal Reserve to disclose the names of financial firms that benefited from a $2 trillion loan program designed to prop up ailing companies after the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

From Bloomberg:

The Fed had argued that it could withhold the information under an exemption that allows federal agencies to refuse disclosure of “trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person and privileged or confidential.”

The U.S. Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, “sets forth no basis for the exemption the Board asks us to read into it,” U.S. Circuit Chief Judge Dennis Jacobs wrote in the opinion. “If the Board believes such an exemption would better serve the national interest, it should ask Congress to amend the statute.”

An appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court seems likely.

Supervisors' slush funds probed

The L.A. District Attorney's Public Integrity Division has asked the county counsel's office to explain under what authority members of the County Board of Supervisors spent $3.4 million of public money on private projects, and will examine whether the board violated state open-meetings law by spending the money without a public vote. LAT

Less means more for some

Gannett rewarded CEO Craig Dubow with a $1.4 million bonus in 2009 after he "engineered record layoffs and other cost cutting across the company," Gannett Blog reports. Dubow's total pay for the year was $4.7 million. It appears Dubow's cost-cutting boosted the value of stocks, for which he and several other execs were compensated.

From Gannett Blog:

The figures, disclosed in the annual shareholder's proxy report, came after Gannett shed more than 6,000 jobs during the year through cuts that included a broad layoff in July. The company also imposed two rounds of furloughs and a one-year wage freeze for employees in the U.S. newspaper division and elsewhere. Combined, those moves helped drive Gannett's stock to yesterday's close of $16.78 from a 2009 low of $1.85.

Gannett is the largest newspaper publisher in the country. The company's papers include the Desert Sun in Palm Springs.

Ailes to Fox staff: Don't talk about Fox

After the Washington Post reported on a rift within the Fox News staff over the rise of host Glenn Beck, Fox News chairman Roger Ailes told his employees to shut up about family matters. Or, as Mediabistro quoted him saying:

"I was brought up to defend the family. If I couldn't defend the family I'd leave. I'd go to another family."

In other words, family values means sharing opinions about your political rivals, even in newscasts. Sharing opinions about the way in which these opinions shape Fox News and its overall coverage is anti-family.

Michaels to staff: We're cool

Last week, Tribune Co. CEO Randy Michaels admonished his radio staff not to use certain words and phrases on the air, and encouraged them to tattle on colleagues who broke the ban. When his memo outlining the new rules got leaked, he upbraided radio execs for running a sloppy ship.

To counter the bad publicity he sent out a second memo, obtained by Kevin Roderick at LA Observed, that says Tribune isn't really into "rules."

Here's a portion of the memo, in all its Baby Boomer guiltshame:

The point is...we don't have a lot of rules around here.

But, not everyone has gotten the message. We've heard from employees who say their business unit still has a strict dress code (we don't). Others have told us they can't hire someone because he or she might fail the new employee drug test (we don't drug test unless it's required by law or the person being hired is operating machinery, driving a truck, or handling a lot of cash). Some say they are afraid to speak up or present a wacky idea for fear of retaliation (nothing will squash creativity and innovation faster).

Roderick's post about the memo tells a slightly different story, at least when it comes to the Los Angeles Times, where top editors face retribution for exercising good judgment and standards continue to slip as the paper tries to cope with cutbacks.

NYT political team

Beat changes continue at the New York Times.

With chief political writer Adam Nagourney slated to become the paper's L.A. bureau chief, White House correspondent Jeff Zeleny will be elevated to lead political writer for the paper, Politico reports. Matt Bai, who writes for the New York Times Magazine, will become a regular columnist/analyst for the paper, and Jim Rutenberg will do political investigations.

This is a boon for the Times. For my money, Bai is second only to Ron Brownstein when it comes to smart political analysis.

(found via Romenesko)

California's center-left looking center-right

A new Field Poll has former eBay executive and Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman far ahead of her primary challenger, Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner.

This comes as no surprise.

What does is the news that Whitman edges out Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown, who had until recently been seen as the overwhelming favorite going into November.

From the Sacramento Bee:

Whitman ... overtook Brown in a possible general election matchup, winning the support of 46 percent of likely voters compared with Brown's 43 percent, the poll found. Brown had led Whitman by 10 percentage points in the January poll and by 21 points in October.

Apparently, independent voters are leaning conservative in this election, which means Brown will have to step up his campaign earlier than he might have otherwise.

News on the lack of news

On Tuesday's "Which Way, LA?," host Warren Olney talks with Martin Kaplan, head of USC's Norman Lear Center, and Stacy Woelfel, chairman of the Radio, Television and Digital New Association, about last week's "Local TV News in the Los Angeles Media Market" report, which found very little news, local or otherwise, on local television news broadcasts. Here's a link to the segment, which begins about the :28 minute mark.

(Coincidentally, LA Times media critic James Rainey weighs in on the report here.)

Doctor Dean

MediaNews Group chairman Dean Singleton will receive an honorary doctorate in business from the University of Utah. The ceremony is scheduled for May 7. From the press release:

Singleton began his newspaper career at the age of 15 as a part-time reporter in his hometown of Graham, Texas, and bought his first newspaper at age 21. He served on the board of the Newspaper Association of America from 1993 until 2004, and is the former chairman. He is chairman of the Associated Press Board of Directors. In addition, he is on the Board of Trustees for the Rocky Mountain Multiple Sclerosis Center, the National Sports Center for the Disabled Board, The Helen G. Bonfils Foundation and The Denver Center for the Performing Arts and the Winter Park Recreational Association Board. Singleton is the recipient of the 2009 Mizel Museum-Community Cultural Enrichment Award recognizing outstanding contributors to the arts and the 2008 Master Editor Publisher Award of the Utah Press Association. In 2009, MediaNews Group transferred ownership of The Salt Lake Tribune's unabridged collected works from 1871 to 2003 to the University of Utah, where they are being conserved and digitized for a public searchable data base.

Singleton's daughter, Paige, is a junior at UU.

Report of District Weekly's demise

LA Observed reports that the three-year-old District Weekly in Long Beach could be on its way to extinction. LAO

Quake

Much of Los Angeles was jolted awake shortly after 4 a.m. by a 4.4-magnitude earthquake centered near Pico Rivera. Here in Silver Lake, it was a short, sharp shock.


-- Post From Phone

Andrew's ankles

Atlantic magazine asked conservative firebrand Andrew Breitbart what he's reading. Apparently, he has a "secret wire" that's three minutes faster than everyone else's and a nose for email-inbox gold.

Also, if you've had a Twitter spat with Breitbart, it's only because he thinks he's better than you:

I use Google Alert for my name to start fights with people in comment sections or on Twitter. It's clear that Keith Olbermann's strategy to get noticed was to attack people above him. I have precisely the opposite strategy: to go after the mosquitoes that bite my ankles. I'm not sure it's a good business model but I'm a petty enough man to indulge them.

Breitbart also labels Gawker as an ankle-biting enterprise - which it is, but this seems a bit of a pot-kettle thing.

Four in the morning

1. The Daily News looks at dismal results of a recent USC study of local television news and asks backers what they plan to do about it. DN

2. After someone leaked his 119 words and phrases that should be banned from radio, a cranky Tribune CEO Randy Michaels met with staff to show them his thin skin. Vocalo

3. The annual "State of the Media" report is out from the Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism. Every media sector is losing money except for cable news. Pew

4. Fox News host Glenn Beck cries even during rehearsals. Howard Kurtz

A Pasadena journo in Bangkok

Todd Ruiz, former City Hall reporter for the Pasadena Star-News and current expat, is filing dispatches on the anti-government protests in Thailand from his home in Bangkok. From the latest entry:

A red riot of celebration erupted along Rajdamnoen as demonstrators hoping to bring down the government reveled in their strength of numbers and unity.

Turnout is difficult to gauge and always subject to spin, especially in a country where sources can essentially smile and say whatever they want without being pressed further. The government is playing it down in the tens-of-thousands range; UDD organizers are claiming half a million. Based on my own experience with such things, I'd estimate well over 100,000.

Most of the red constituency are readily filed into handy categories. "Rural" and "poor" being the adjectives within easiest reach.

Ruiz is blogging at Reporter in Exile. His latest updates can be found here and here.

Hear Jerry run

California Attorney General Jerry Brown talks about his race for governor on "Which Way, LA?" with Warren Olney. The interview starts at the 27 minute mark.

Local television news is rarely local and hardly news

A USC journalism school study of local television news (which can be found here) finds little in the way of local news ever makes it to air. The average half-hour news broadcast spends more time on teasers than it does on business or the local economy. Less than 2 percent of total airtime (minus those teasers) pertains to local government.

Here's part of the summary:

An average half-hour of L.A. local news packed all its local government coverage – including budget, law enforcement, education, layoffs, new ordinances, voting procedures, personnel changes, city and county government actions on health care, transportation and immigration – into 22 seconds.

But crime stories filled 7 times more of the broadcast, averaging 2:50. Sports and weather took the most time: 3:36. Soft news – human interest, oddball stories and miscellaneous fluff – took up the next-largest chunk after crime, averaging 2:26.

Other highlights:

Coverage of business and the economy in Los Angeles averaged 29 seconds. Teasers (“coming up on the Southland’s best news…”) lasted more than four times that amount (2:10).

The time spent on ads (8:25), teasers, and sports and weather takes up nearly half of a typical half-hour of local news. Of the time left for everything else (15:44), almost half (8:17) was made up of stories taking place outside the L.A. media market.

If you add up all the time given to all stories focused on L.A. government, business and economy; all crime-related stories of civic importance (e.g., rewards offered, public corruption, police shootings); all stories about people dealing with local issues like traffic and the environment; all local public health news; and all coverage of the L.A. wildfires and water main breaks (which occurred during the study’s sample), all that news combined took up about 4 minutes of a composite half-hour.

The study, which was done by Martin Kaplan and Matthew Hale of USC's Norman Lear Center, confirms what most local TV news watchers already knew - there's not much there there. As a point of comparison, the study also looked at local news coverage in the Los Angeles Times:

The L.A. Times devoted 10% of its front page stories to local government, compared to 2.5% of TV news lead stories about it.

The paper allocated 7.8% of its news hole to L.A. business and economy, compared to TV’s 2.3%. Six percent of the Times’s front page stories focused on local business and economy, compared to 0.5% TV leads about L.A. business/economy.

TV spent 9 times more of its news hole on soft, odd, and miscellaneous stories, and almost three times more on crime, than the paper. Fourteen percent of the paper’s front page stories were about crime, compared to more than a third of TV’s lead stories.

The internet safety net

Bobby Iafolla, who plans to leave the Los Angeles Daily Journal after the paper announced it would cut one of its two DC reporter positions, has turned up as a contributor to the news website True/Slant.

(Corrected to reflect that Iafolla has not yet left his job with the DJ)

Nagourney looks westward

Adam Nagourney, chief political correspondent for the New York Times, has indicated he's going to step out of the position and move to Los Angeles, possibly to become the Times' LA bureau chief. Jennifer Steinhauer, who currently holds that position, is expected to head back to Washington to cover Congress, Politico reports.

The Politico article mentions White House correspondent Jeff Zeleny and political correspondent Jim Rutenberg as possibly Nagourney replacements. I'd throw White House reporters Peter Baker into the mix as well. Of course, much depends on how the Times decides to structure the beat.

Another possibility is Matt Bai, who writes chiefly for the paper's Sunday magazine. Bai is one of the smartest political analysts out there.

One lingering question is whether this transfer means the New York Times plans to challenge the Los Angeles Times more directly on its turf?

Four in the morning

1. Meg Whitman wants media attention, but not media questions. Chronicle

2. Bonuses for Orange County Register employees. LAO

3. The new editor of the Pasadena Star-News says he's back in the USSR. Star-News

4. The Los Angeles Daily Journal eliminates one of two D.C. reporter positions, prompting reporter Robert Iafolla to quit, and adds a labor and employment beat to the legal paper. LAO

A new show in town

KPCC has tapped former "Day to Day" co-host Madeleine Brand to host a new one-hour show that will run in her old time slot, starting at 9 a.m. Currently, KPCC runs BBC at that time.

From the press release:

SCPR will immediately begin building a staff for this currently unnamed program. The staff will include producer/reporters, online, technical and support staff. The program itself will cover a wide range of topics, but all with a distinctive Southern California perspective.

I expect that a flurry of resumes from former NPR West producers and unemployed/underemployed/unhappy L.A.-area reporters is already on its way to KPCC's new Pasadena offices.

(found via LA Observed)

The 119 words you can't say on (Tribune) radio

Randy Michaels is a list maker.

The CEO of Tribune Co. drew up a list of 119 words and phrases he never again wants to hear on the company's talk radio station, WGN-AM (720), and has asked staff to rat each other out if any of the banned "newsspeak" gets uttered on air.

The list is a mix of AP style and personal irritants. Most examples are perfectly reasonable, such as bans on the meaningless "going forward" and cliche "perfect storm." Some are oddities, such as banning "white stuff," which I assume is used to refer to snow. Then there are words that no one wants to use but are sometimes unavoidable, such as "reportedly" and "officials."

The whole list is here.

(found via Romenesko)

And the winners are...

CNN anchor Anderson Cooper, KCBS reporter Dave Bryan, and NPR correspondent Anne Garrels will receive top awards from the Los Angeles Press Club at the group's annual gala on June 27. From the press release:

Cooper will receive the President's Award, for his impact on the media. He was the first American TV reporter on the scene in Haiti, following the devastating earthquake in January. Since the launch of Anderson Cooper 360° in 2003, Cooper has covered nearly all of the major news events around the world, often reporting from the scene.

Bryan, a TV reporter for more than 30 years at KTTV and now at CBS2News, will receive the Joseph M. Quinn Award for lifetime achievement.

Garrels is the 2010 recipient of the Daniel Pearl Award for courage in recognition of her selflessness in pursuing difficult, often dangerous stories over the years around the world.

Variety fires critics, will use freelancers

Variety has fired its theater and film critics and will use freelance reviews from now on. LA Observed has the story here.

"I acknowledge the stackability of newspapers..."

Yet another newspaper crisis in the making, from the Onion.

Texas oil looks to influence California law

California environmental laws are some of the toughest in the nation, and are often copied by other states, much to the consternation of energy and automobile companies.

Former LA Times reporter Robert Salladay reports that two Texas oil firms appear to be funneling money into California for an initiative that would undo the state's landmark greenhouse gas legislation, known as AB 32.

From California Watch:

Two Texas oil companies have been evasive about whether they are backing a California ballot initiative that would suspend the state's landmark global warming law, signed with fanfare by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006.

But it wouldn't be surprising if Tesoro Corp. and Valero Energy Corp. were behind the initiative to delay AB 32.

The Texas companies – which operate refineries in Benicia and Wilmington, Martinez and Los Angeles, and hundreds of gas stations throughout California – have been well-known players in the fight to weaken global warming legislation at the federal level, and they are major donors to state politicians working for the same goals.

Read the rest of the story here.

Sen. Ashburn says he's gay

State Sen. Ray Ashburn, R-Bakersfield, told a conservative radio host today that he is gay. The Sacramento Bee reports:

Ashburn's announcement follows reports that Ashburn was leaving a gay club before he was arrested for driving under the influence last week.

The Bakersfield Republican, who has consistently voted against gay-rights measures, said his votes were a reflection of how the majority of voters in his conservative district would have wanted him to vote.

Earlier, the Bee reported that Ashburn was already in trouble with conservatives over a budget vote that included tax increases:

State GOP activist Jon Fleischman, who runs the conservative Flash Report Web site, said Ashburn's career in politics was already damaged because he angered GOP loyalists by voting for a tax increase last year.

"That puts you in a coffin," Fleischman said. If Ashburn is gay, he said, "it's like hammering nails into it."

It's Wonderland, Russ

Los Angeles Times editor Russ Stanton let it be known that he opposed Friday's takeover ad, which featured a mock front page with a giant picture of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter alongside recent Times' articles, but said he got overruled by the suits.

From the New York Times:

The top editor of The Times, Russ Stanton, and several of his deputies vigorously opposed the ad before it was published, but they were overruled by the paper’s business executives, according to people with direct knowledge of the dispute, who were granted anonymity to discuss private conversations.

Mr. Stanton said only, “Obviously, it was not my decision.”

John Conroy, a spokesman for The Times, said, “Stretching the boundaries was what we were going for.” He said Eddy W. Hartenstein, the publisher and chief executive, and other executives would not comment.

Conroy goes on to say the paper wants website advertising to set the tone for the way ads are presented in the newspaper, rather than have the newspaper set the standard.

Asked to comment, Geneva Overholser, director of USC's school of journalism, seemed resigned to the new world order: "This isn’t newspapering as it used to be, but that can’t be the determinant any more." At least one reporter, who spoke confidentially, accepted the move as a necessary, money-making evil.

LA Weekly editor hospitalized

fishbowlLA has the story.

Bankruptcy plan for MediaNews Group approved

A Delaware bankruptcy judge has approved a Chapter 11 reorganization plan for MediaNews Group, despite a trio of objections from the newspaper company's creditors.

From the Denver Post:

The plan, approved by judge Kevin J. Carey of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware, reduces the company's debt from $930 million to $165 million and paves the way for the company to emerge from Chapter 11 six weeks after filing.

LAT's Greg Miller heads to Washington Post

Greg Miller, who covered national security and intelligence issues for the Los Angeles Times and co-wrote "The Interrogators: Inside the Secret War Against Al Qaeda," is leaving for the Washington Post, where he'll cover national security.

Miller's exit from the Times' Washington bureau follows the recent departures of Josh Meyer, Peter Wallstein, Peter Spiegel, Sebastian Rotella and deputy editor Aaron Zitner.

Blogger candidacy

Political blogger Mickey Kaus wants to be a candidate for U.S. Senate. LAO

Daily News' landlord objects to bankruptcy filing

Two more objections were filed in the MediaNews Group's Chapter 11 bankruptcy case. One of them comes from the Los Angeles Daily News's landlord.

From the Denver Business Journal:

Warner Gateway Partners, the Daily News’ landlord, asked the Bankruptcy Court to require proof that Los Angeles Daily News Publishing Co. can pay the lease on its building, or else to reject an effort by its parent, MediaNews, to reassign the lease to it.

The Los Angeles Daily News occupies about one-quarter of the Warner Gateway project in Woodland Hills. MediaNews Group holds a 15-year, $27.6 million lease that expires in 2022, according to the filing.

The filing says representatives of the debtor began discussing a possible lease modification in January, but never made an offer, and provided information showing that the Daily News had lost $5 million over the past two years.

Bank of New York Mellon Trust filed the other objection, asking the court to ensure its "fees and expenses" are paid.

Last week, GreenCo filed the first objection in the case. The company says it is owed at least $8.4 million for an option it has held since 1998 to buy all of the Daily News' assets.

An eye on Chile

Journalist Marc Cooper has written a number of posts about the Chilean earthquake and its aftermath. Cooper has a long history with the country:

Since the moment the monster quake hit in Chile I sort of self-appointed myself as a translator/aggregator for Chile-related Twitter activity. You can find my long list of tweets here. I'm a former translator to Chilean president Salvador Allende and have been married into a Chilean family for 36 years so it's a place I know something about.

I won't link to all of the individuals posts, but his website is here.

Star's opinion editor departs

Ventura County Star opinion-page editor Marianne Ratcliff has decided to take a buyout from the paper. Former Star cartoonist Steve Greenberg reports:

Marianne is still fairly young, with two kids (ages 6 and 9), and her immediate focus will be to spend more time with them and with her husband Kevin, who’s had to take on more of the child-rearing duties given his wife’s unrelenting deadlines. Some suspect she left the Star over dismay at all the cuts in personnel, features, budgets and overall quality, but she declares she just needed a breather and more family time. She states, “I have no idea what I will do next” but expects to be connected with journalism in some way.

(found via fishbowlLA)

Where we're getting our news - and what we're doing with it

Most people continue to get their news from local and national television broadcasts, but the Internet continues to surge as a source, according to a Pew Research Center survey. The survey finds that on a typical day 61 percent of people get at least some of their news online (weather reports are the top subject matter for online consumption).

The survey also claims that online is now the third most popular platform for news, behind local and national television. The finding isn't clear cut, however, since Pew splits local and national newspapers into two categories. Depending on the amount of overlap, the number of newspaper readers could be as high as 67 percent, although it's probably less. Online comes in at 61 percent and radio is fifth, with 54 percent of people getting some amount of news there during a typical day.

From the survey:

More than half of American adults (56%) say they follow the news "all or most of the time," and another quarter (25%) follow the news at least "some of the time." Asked specifically about their news habits on "a typical day," the results are striking -- 99% of American adults say that on a typical day, they get news from at least one of these media platforms: a local or national print newspaper, a local or national television news broadcast, radio or the internet.

Only local and national TV news, the latter if you combine cable and network, are more popular platforms than the internet for news. And most Americans use a combination of both online and offline sources. On a typical day:

• 78% of Americans say they get news from a local TV station.
• 73% say they get news from a national network such as CBS or cable TV station such as CNN or Fox News.
• 61% say they get some kind of news online.
• 54% say they listen to a radio news program at home or in the car.
• 50% say they read news in a local newspaper.
• 17% say they read news in a national newspaper such as the New York Times or USA Today.

The survey shows that online news consumption is often complimentary to more traditional media sources because it provides consumers with different experiences, such as the ability to get a quick news update (weather, headline, sports score, etc.), share an article or link, or offer an opinion in a comments section. Many people also find news updates on their computer's home page, in their email box, on Twitter feeds, and on social media sites - "more than 8 in 10 online news consumers get or share links in emails," the survey finds.

Traditional sources are less interactive and more reflective. They continue to be the headwaters of news, with their original reporting flowing out onto the web to be shared or hashed over in pools of social networks.

Interestingly, these social networks appear to be less interested in hashing over local news. From the survey findings:

The most popular online news subjects are the weather (followed by 81% of internet news users), national events (73%), health and medicine (66%), business and the economy (64%), international events (62%), and science and technology (60%).

Asked what subjects they would like to receive more coverage, 44% said scientific news and discoveries, 41% said religion and spirituality, 39% said health and medicine, 39% said their state government, and 38% said their neighborhood or local community.

*Edited