The Plain Dealer flushed down the toilet. "This used to be a newsroom."

Submitted by Gone Fishin on Fri, 01/17/2014 - 17:29.

 

‘This used to be a newsroom’ — the scene at the Cleveland Plain Dealer

 

This photo explains a lot.  If the Plain Dealer wasn't in bed with local politicians, this might not have happened.

 

As a major reorganization of the Cleveland Plain Dealer takes shape, veteran reporters are adjusting to “backpack journalism,” the division of staff into two companies, a looming move to a new office, and demands to post stories more quickly.
At the same time, they are memorializing their old newsroom in striking images that are circulating on social media and in email chains. The photo above was sent to CJR by a former Plain Dealer employee with the subject line, “This used to be a newsroom.”   http://www.cjr.org/united_states_project/newsroom_culture_is_gone_at_cleveland_plain_dealer.php?page=all
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Plain Dealer compromised standards of truth & fairness

Submitted by Gone Fishin on Fri, 01/17/2014 - 20:18.

 

At the Cleveland Plain Dealer, there was the sense that the newspaper had sold out, compromising its standards of truth and fairness. This pattern seemed to extend from one generation of management to the next at the paper - with Newhouse's ownership as the common link.

 

Do you ever wonder why The 'PLAIN DEALER' never runs stories about union or government corruption - ignoring it - as if it doesn't exist? There's a very good explanation that will help readers understand.



In the 1980's, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a Newhouse paper that held a monopoly like in Portland, went through a humiliating ordeal that placed this topic off-limits.



Jackie Presser was an International Brotherhood of Teamsters official in Cleveland who became president of the mob-infiltrated union in 1983. Prior to his ascension, the Plain Dealer ran a lengthy, meticulously-researched exposé revealing that Presser had long been employed by the U.S. Government as an informant. But the Teamsters had endorsed Ronald Reagan's election, and if the story had been allowed to stand, Presser would likely have been "taken out" of the running, or worse.



Si Newhouse, at the behest of his boyhood friend and politically-connected mob lawyer Roy Cohn, ordered a retraction/reversal of the story, and the Publisher complied. As a result, there was a walkout and near-mutiny by the honorable professionals of the Plain Dealerwho knew the denial was completely false. (For more on the Presser issue, see Time Magazine, 6/18/84.)



The editors of Newhouse papers, including The Oregonian, learned a lesson: do not ever risk incurring such censorship ordered by the owners. The safer path for obedient, risk-averse corporate managers is ... self-censorship. Thus, politically powerful groups in Oregon will never be the subject of investigative reporting - or even serious critique - by the state's dominant news organ. That treatment is reserved for the less-powerful, especially those who dare challenge The Establishment's entrenched interests. This unwritten policy goes well beyond advertiser favoritism. If you've read Newhouse chain papers like The Oregonian - you know who gets protection and who gets pilloried.

 

http://nottheoregonian.blogspot.com/2006/12/si-newhouses-mob-story.html

 

 

 

 

 

* My blogs expressing my Freedom of Speech Rights, especially on matters of public concern, are my opinion and not the opinion of my friends, family or employer*

Empty news room cubicles - looks like East Cle / Kinsman/ Mt Ple

Submitted by Jeff Buster on Mon, 01/20/2014 - 22:30.

 I was in this room 10 years ago - right about the time Norm was firing up Realneo. 

down the toilet is rignt.   

And, unfortunately, the Dirty Dealer's butt headed business plan pulled much of the community down with it. 

"Opportunity Corridor" is just one example. 

Paid for reporting.

Lot's of Downtown Cleveland Alliance crap.   Paid for.   Like prostitute Steve Litt

Driving people out of NEO while the stupid paper lost circulation....lost more circulation...

Sure papers across the country have shrunk like the DDealer....

But, my sincere observation over the last decade is that the DD - with it's crazy support of every nutso levy, with its sports centric idiocy, has castrated itself. 

Opportunity Corridor with Mr. Egger. What?

Anyway, now the dirty traffic streaks on the office rug remind me of streets off Euclid in East Cleveland.  

Desperate decay.  

Lives spent there making the dirty streaks.  Making the patterns.  All empty now. 

The Dirty Dealer building - once gleaming - now just a bunch of wasted crap office furniture and coiled up blue CAT 5 cables ...

And on we go...