Posted inStatesman Journal

Breaking news: Michael Davis is out as Statesman Journal executive editor

Ah, it gives me great pleasure to scoop the Statesman Journal on a story -- especially since it involves one of the newspaper's top staff, executive editor Michael Davis.  Who is gone. Fired seemingly is a more accurate word.  I first broke the news on this last Wednesday, in a Facebook post. Confirmation of Davis' departure comes from a comparison of the Statesman Journal's editorial board composition on consecutive days. Wednesday, October 5, Michael Davis was listed. Thursday, October 6, Michael Davis is gone. The reason(s) for his departure aren't known yet. They might have something to do with his…
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Posted inChamber of Commerce Police facility Statesman Journal

Either Chamber of Commerce is wrong, or Statesman Journal is deceitful

"What the ___?!" (I'll leave it to you to imagine a proper profanity to fill that blank.) That was my reaction when someone sent me the message below from the Keep Salem Safe folks who are advocating for passage of a way over-priced and poorly planned $82 million police facility bond measure on the November ballot.  They're telling people that the Statesman Journal has endorsed Measure 24-399. But clearly, this isn't true. The link circled in red below leads to a newspaper editorial that talks in a confusing fashion about "lowest common denominator" and earthquake safety, but doesn't call for a…
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Posted inStatesman Journal

Statesman Journal gets fooled by misleading Republican poll

Shocker! Or so it seemed at the time.  "Poll: Richardson leads Secretary of State race." That link is to a Google cache version of a story that has been taken down by the Salem Statesman Journal.  I read the story online last night. It really surprised me that supposedly Republican Dennis Richardson was leading Democrat Brad Avakian 47% to 38%. A Republican hasn't won a statewide office in Oregon for a long time. And the story by reporter Gordon Friedman said: The numbers suggest the first time in nearly a decade that a Republican has led in polls in a…
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Posted inPublic Safety Statesman Journal

Statesman Journal editorial about Orlando killings irritatingly silent on solutions

After so many tragic mass shootings in this country, I've got no patience left with the "thoughts and prayers" crowd -- unless their thoughts and prayers are accompanied by a strong call for action. This is why I found a recent Statesman Journal editorial so irritating. A few years ago I wrote about this in "Why I don't like 'Our thoughts and prayers are with you.'" After the [Boston] bombing I came across a Twitter Tweet by someone I follow, "scriptdave" here in Salem. He's a screenwriter with a great sense of humor. Also, some wise observations. He tweeted: I…
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Posted inCarole Smith Chuck Bennett Statesman Journal

Statesman Journal is source of a lie a SJ editorial railed against. So sweet!

This is SO beautiful for a snarky blogger such as moi: discovering that the source of a Big Political Lie railed against in several Statesman Journal stories came from... (drum roll, please) A story in the freaking Statesman Journal itself! This fills me with so much pleasure, because there's nothing I enjoy more -- well, actually this isn't true, but let's pretend it is -- than criticizing our town's pitiful excuse for a community newspaper. So if you sense joy oozing from the words you're reading, you're correct! If you followed goings-on in the recent race for Salem Mayor between…
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Posted inStatesman Journal

Dick Hughes tries (and fails) to defend Statesman Journal editorial board

I called the Salem Statesman Journal editorial board a "farce" in a recent post. It bothered me that all six members of the editorial board are newspaper staff (no community members), and three of the six are from the news side of the Statesman Journal. Realizing that one of the editorial board members, Kaellen Hessel, covers goings-on at City Hall for the newspaper, I emailed her this message after writing the blog post. Ms. Hessel, I suspect you went to journalism school. (Me too, sort of; I was a journalism major at San Jose State for my first semester.) I’m…
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Posted inCity Council Statesman Journal

Statesman Journal “Editorial Board” is a farce — all members are newspaper staff

In its bi-ennial ritual of kissing up to the Salem Chamber of Commerce and their biggest advertisers, the so-called Statesman Journal Editorial Board is rolling out its endorsements for Mayor and three contested City Council races. (So far they're two for two in endorsing Chamber candidates; in 2014 the newspaper was four for four.) I feel justified in using the term so-called to describe the Editorial Board, because all of the six members are employed by the newspaper. No community members are on the Editorial Board.  So when the newspaper says, "The Editorial Board endorses...," it would be more accurate…
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