Running the numbers on the trade

I've been listening to WEEI Radio (AM 850) on and off for the last hour, and it seems that one early theme has emerged: it was time for Manny Ramírez to go, but the Red Sox gave up too much.

But did they? I don't think so. Clearly they weren't going to get equal value, because the whole world knew that the Sox were trying to dump Ramírez. Even so, they did pretty well — financially, too, despite their agreeing to pay Manny's salary for the rest of the season.

Let's start with the money. The Dodgers get Ramírez for free for the final two months of the year, as the Red Sox have agreed to pay the $7 million he's still owed. Jason Bay makes $7.5 million a year [not quite; see update] and the Sox will have to pay him for the rest of the season, or about $2.5 million. So, in essence, they're paying $9.5 million to have a left fielder for August and September (and, let's hope, October). That's a lot of money.

But turn that around. Bay is under contract for next year — again, at $7.5 million. Up until a few weeks ago, it seemed possible that the Sox would pick up Manny's option for next year, which would have cost $20 million. Manny turns 37 next May. Bay will be 30. Given that differential, there's a good chance that Bay will put up numbers as good as Ramírez next year, and at one-third the cost. And the Sox may be able to sign Bay to a long-term contract at far less than they would have paid to keep Manny around.

So the Sox will take a hit for two months this year, but will benefit hugely next year and perhaps beyond.

As for the prospects, well, Craig Hansen has been a monumental bust, and that's putting it mildly. If he's ever going to succeed, it's not going to be here. He needs a fresh start somewhere else. Pittsburgh will be a nice, quiet place for him to develop. It's only a slight exaggeration to say the Sox were lucky to find a way to get rid of him.

Brandon Moss? He turns 25 in September. Bay was the National League's Rookie of the Year when he was Moss' age. Moss might turn into a useful player, but he was never going to be more than a fourth outfielder in Boston. To get a player as good as Bay, you've got to give up something other than an aging superstar who'll walk at the end of the season (and who does the Pirates no good anyway) and a pitcher who is, at best, a reclamation project.

You never know how these things will work out. On paper, though, I'd say this is a good deal with the potential to be better than good.

Manny's gone after all

And a very good trade it is, given that the Red Sox were not in a position to get equal value:

• Ramírez is out of the AL, so if he leads someone to a pennant, it won't be to the detriment of the Sox. (Should be something if the Sox meet the Dodgers in the World Series, though.)
• Jason Bay's no Manny, but there have been times the last two years when Manny's been no Manny, either. The big thing is that Ramírez's bat has been more or less replaced.
• It's possible that we'll regret this some day, but I've gotten tired of waiting for Craig Hansen to develop into something other than a complete stiff. Best of luck, Craig.
  
• Too bad about Brandon Moss, but he wasn't going to play here.

The Dodgers get Ramírez for free, which stinks, but it looks like John Henry has decided paying Manny's salary the rest of the year is a bargain if it gets him out of town.

And, yes, it's too bad it had to end this way. It seems like it was only a few weeks ago that everyone was raving about the new, outgoing, talkative Ramírez. That all came apart in a hurry, didn't it?

Is Ramírez staying?

No links — things are changing too quickly. It's a few minutes after the trading deadline. Unless the Red Sox have something up their sleeves, it looks like Manny Ramírez is staying.

I think it's a mistake — it's different this time. I'd have made just about any deal I could for Manny. Unless everyone suddenly gets healthy, starts performing up to scratch or both, the Sox aren't going anywhere this year anyway.

Shipping Manny out of town would have sent a message that — if media reports are accurate — a number of Sox players would have liked to hear.

My life, in 140 characters or fewer

I've finally given up on my hope that Twitter would go away. You can find my Twitter page here. Hell, no, I don't know how to use it.

Putting presumption in context

The Boston Phoenix's Adam Reilly weighs in with a well-timed piece on the Republican meme that Barack Obama is too "presumptuous" to be president — and on the media's willingness to play along.

It appears that all of this is being brought to a head right now. At the moment, it's looking like this year's version of Al Gore's lies that weren't, or of John Kerry's flip-flopping and failure to respond adequately to the Swift Boat attacks.

You can talk about the liberal media all you want, and there's no doubt that most mainstream journalists are liberals. But there's also no doubt that there's a tendency among nominally liberal journalists, especially opinion-mongers, to make their bones by mocking liberal politicians.

Exhibit A is Dana Milbank's piece in Wednesday's Washington Post, which begins, "Barack Obama has long been his party's presumptive nominee. Now he's becoming its presumptuous nominee." That might have been the moment when this particular line of attack finally jumped the shark. Or perhaps not.

Adam rushes in where others have feared to tread, writing that criticism of Obama as being narcissistic and presumptuous is, among other things, "a crafty way of playing the race card — of essentially calling Obama an uppity black man without actually using those words." Exactly. Show me someone who's won a major-party presidential nomination and I'll show you someone who's presumptuous. But some of Obama's detractors sound like they're ready to walk right up to the brink of suggesting that, well, he just doesn't know his place.

(Disclosures: Adam's a friend, he cites Media Nation and we talked through some of this while he was doing his reporting.)

Obama's not perfect. As is the case with many ambitious people (like, for instance, John McCain), he has an unattractive tendency to use people and move on. His longstanding association with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright remains troubling, and you can be sure we'll be hearing more about it.

But by hitting him with the Republican Party's sneering talking points, the media are not just doing the opposition's dirty work. They're flirting with something quite a bit uglier as well.

Photo (cc) by Jack Thielepape and republished here under a Creative Commons license. Some rights reserved.

Shopping Manny

Evan Brunell of MVN.com rounds up the trade rumors involving Manny Ramírez: Phillies, Dodgers, Mets and Marlins. He concedes that "the odds that Manny actually moves is rather low. It won't be for lack of trying, though, as Manny has worn his welcome out in Boston."

Arrogance watch watch

I note with interest that Josh Marshall is asking his readers to send in examples of media reports picking up on the Republican meme that Barack Obama is arrogant and presumptuous enough to believe he ought to be president. Why, you'd think the guy had won a major-party nomination or something.

As always, the first casualty

In my latest for the Guardian, I consider the plight of Zoriah Miller, a freelance photographer who's been banned from covering U.S. Marines in Iraq because his images are too graphic. And I argue that the Bush administration's ongoing censorship of the war's photographic record is giving John McCain an unfair advantage.

The pros and cons of Google Reader

Summer is the time for media experimentation, so I'm giving Google Reader a whirl as my RSS aggregator.

Aesthetically it's a much nicer experience than NewsFire. But the disadvantage of a Web-based aggregator is that you don't get to choose how frequently it scours the Web for new material. Stuff I put up a while ago still isn't visible — which makes me wonder about my other subscriptions.

Anyone know how often Google Reader updates your feeds?

A closer look at Obama and the media

No doubt you've noticed that the media are giving Barack Obama far more coverage than John McCain. According to the Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ), Obama's trip to the Middle East and Europe last week ate up 51 percent of all campaign coverage. The PEJ adds:

The trip also helped Obama, for the seventh consecutive week, dominate John McCain in the contest for media exposure. The Democrat was a significant or dominant factor in 81% of the campaign stories studied compared with 53% for McCain. Interestingly, even with all the attention to Obama’s trip, those numbers dovetail closely with the weekly coverage averages since the general election campaign began in June. In that period, Obama has factored in 79% of the coverage with McCain at 52%.

(PEJ director Tom Rosenstiel discusses the findings on this week's "On the Media.")

It's no wonder that the McCain campaign has taken to making videos that mock the media's supposed love of Obama.

But hold on. More coverage doesn't necessarily translate into favorable coverage. As it turns out, a new study by the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA), at George Mason University, shows that coverage of both Obama and McCain has been more negative than positive — but that Obama has clearly gotten the worst of it. ("Media Bash Barack — Not a Typo" is the headline of the center's press release, reproduced in full below.)

The study's findings, reported by James Rainey of the Los Angeles Times, show that of 249 campaign stories airing on the three network nightly newscasts and the first half-hour of Fox News' "Special Report with Brit Hume," Obama's coverage has been 72 percent negative and 28 percent positive, whereas McCain's has been 57 percent negative and 43 percent positive.

The Fox effect does not appear to be too pronounced, as the study finds that "Special Report" was only slightly more negative to both candidates than the three broadcast networks.

How can this be? Well, think about the tone of the coverage in recent weeks. Obama has regularly been criticized for "presumptiveness" and "arrogance" because he has acted as though he might actually be elected president this November.

And think about how many times Obama has been asked if he was wrong about the surge in Iraq. In fact, it appears that he was wrong — but not nearly as wrong as McCain was about the war, which has now resulted in the deaths of more than 4,000 Americans and nearly 100,000 Iraqi civilians. Yet it is rare when McCain is grilled about the single most important issue of the campaign.

All this is having an effect. According to the latest USA Today/Gallup poll, McCain now leads Obama among likely voters by a margin of 49 percent to 45 percent, a swing of nine points over the past month.

McCain is not Hillary Clinton, who, along with her husband, have been despised by the media for years. Rather, McCain has been a media favorite for the past decade-plus. Remember, he once half-jokingly referred to the press as his "base."

The CMPA study is not yet on the organization's Web site. Here is the full text of its press release:

MEDIA BASH BARACK (NOT A TYPO)
Study Finds Obama Faring Worse On TV News Than McCain

Barack Obama is getting more negative coverage than John McCain on TV network evening news shows, reversing Obama's lead in good press during the primaries, according to a new study by Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA). The study also finds that a majority of both candidates' coverage is unfavorable for the first time this year. According to CMPA President Dr. S. Robert Lichter, "Obama replaced McCain as the media's favorite candidate after New Hampshire. But now the networks are voting no on both candidates."

These results are from the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA) 2008 Election News Watch Project. They are based on a scientific content analysis of 249 election news stories (7 hours 38 minutes of airtime) that aired on ABC World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, and Fox Special Report (first half hour) from June 8, 2008 to July 21, 2008. Previously we analyzed 2144 stories (43 hrs 30 min airtime) during the primary campaign from December 16, 2007 through June 7, 2008. We report on all on-air evaluations of the candidates by sources and reporters, after excluding comments by the campaigns about each other.

MAJOR FINDINGS:

Since the primaries ended, on-air evaluations of Barack Obama have been 72% negative (vs. 28% positive). That's worse than John McCain's coverage, which has been 57% negative (vs. 43% positive) during the same time period.

This is a major turnaround since McCain and Obama emerged as front-runners in the early primaries. From the New Hampshire primary on January 8 until Hillary Clinton dropped out on June 7, Obama's coverage was 62% positive (v. 38% negative) on the broadcast networks; by contrast, McCain's coverage during this period was only 34% positive (v. 66% negative).

Obama ran even farther behind McCain on Fox News Channel's Special Report with 79% negative comments (v. 21% positive), compared to 61% negative comments (v. 39% positive) for McCain since June 8. During the primaries Obama had a slight lead in good press on Fox, with 52% favorable comments (v. 48 % unfavorable), compared to 48% favorable (v. 52% unfavorable) for McCain.

Obama's bad press has come at a time when he was much more visible than McCain. Since June 8, he has been the subject of 120 stories on the three network evening news shows, 50% more than John McCain’s 80 stories.

Examples of Obama's evaluations:

Positive: "Obama came to Baghdad and he brought his star power with him ... hundreds of U.S. troops and State Department personnel mobbed Obama at the embassy here." — Terry Moran, ABC

Negative: "You raised a lot of eyebrows on this trip saying, even knowing what you know now, you still would not have supported the surge. People may be scratching their heads and saying, 'why'?" — Katie Couric, CBS

Negative: "Far more Americans say John McCain would be a good commander in chief than Obama." — Jake Tapper, ABC

CMPA has monitored every presidential election since 1988 using the same methodology, in which trained coders tally all mentions of candidates and issues and all evaluations of candidates. For previous CMPA findings on the 2008 elections: http://cmpa.com/Studies/Election08/election08.htm

Cracking down on hit-and-run attacks

Well, I've done it. I just changed the settings of Media Nation so that you now have to register in order to leave a comment. What pushed me to flip the switch were some of the truly ugly comments made about Robert Novak's brain tumor, as well as the news that Universal Hub's Adam Gaffin is going to require registration. A terrific "On the Media" story about commenting on news sites was a goad as well.

The last time I considered this, I was talked out of it by a few smart people who explained the downside of registering with Google, Blogger's corporate owner. (I've given my life to Google, but that's my choice.) But those days are now long gone. In addition to Google/Blogger, you've got five options: OpenID, WordPress, LiveJournal, TypePad and AIM. With all those choices, registration should be a burden to no one.

Nor have I eliminated anonymity. I don't mind pseudonyms. I think someone who adopts a consistent persona, like Mike B1, can be as valuable a contributor as someone who uses his or her real name. It's the totally anonymous hit-and-run attacks I'm trying to eliminate.

There's something in it for you, too. I've also changed the settings so that as long as you are commenting on a post less than two weeks old, it will go up immediately, without my having to moderate it first. Maybe it will work, maybe it won't. We'll see how it goes.

More: I'm not going to be around much today. But if you run into any problems posting comments, send me an e-mail at da {dot} kennedy {at} neu {dot} edu.

Manny-bashing's irrational extreme

Kevin Whalen says he'd rather have seen the Red Sox dump Manny Ramírez than win the 2007 World Series. (Via Hub Blog.)

Earth to Kevin: Manny is not the biggest jerk ever to play for the Red Sox. (Roger Clemens, anyone?) He may not even be the biggest jerk playing for them right now. (Although he probably is.)

Robert Novak has a brain tumor

Here's some bad news. Just a few days ago we were all snickering at conservative commentator Robert Novak after a pedestrian somehow ended up on his windshield without his seeming to notice it.

Now it turns out he's been diagnosed with a brain tumor and is being treated in Boston at Brigham and Women's Hospital.

Media Nation extends its best wishes to the Prince of Darkness, a true American original who helped define the modern political columnist and the television talking head.

Remembering Elizabeth Neuffer

Boston Globe columnist Kevin Cullen offers a heartfelt tribute to the late Elizabeth Neuffer today. Neuffer and her Iraqi translator, Waleed Khalifa Hassan Al-Dulaimi, were killed in a car accident in Baghdad in 2003.

Cullen notes the occasion of accused war criminal Radovan Karadzic's arrest to remind us that Neuffer made her deepest, boldest mark as a foreign correspondent when she covered the genocide in the former Yugoslavia in the mid-1990s.

The International Women's Media Foundation, which offers a fellowship in Neuffer's memory, puts it this way:

Her coverage of the Balkan wars of the 1990's was vivid and intense. And when a tentative peace finally came to Bosnia, she risked her life to track down those responsible for genocide as they returned to civilian life. Her dispatches, sent to members of Congress by human rights groups, helped persuade the U.S. government to make the arrest and prosecution of war criminals a top priority.

The Globe could pay tribute to Neuffer's memory by restoring her coverage of the Balkans to its Web site. The paper does have a nice page here, gathering her Iraqi coverage. But with the Yugoslav tragedy in the news again, it's time to dig into the archives.

What to do about Ramírez?

Yes, Dan Shaughnessy is correct when he observes that Manny Ramírez has wanted out of Boston almost from the time he came here. But he fails to note that, on other occasions, Manny's wanted to stay. Wasn't Manny agitating for the Red Sox to pick up his option just a few weeks ago?

So now Ramírez says he wouldn't mind being traded. It's probably not going to happen. But if the Sox have already decided that this is Manny's last season here, I wonder what would be the smarter move: Hoping he gets hot (actually, he is hot) and carries the Sox into another post-season? Or trading him to shore up the bullpen?

It's a tough call. I would imagine Ramírez's trade value is pretty low, given that he'll be a free agent after the season. I'm not sure the Sox can make it into October either without Manny or with the bullpen they've got.

But if I were Theo, if I could line up a trade for the right relievers, I'd pull the trigger and hope the Sox will somehow find enough offense to get by.

A boost for Internet radio

This is why you shouldn't worry about the FCC's decision to allow the merger of XM and Sirius — or, for that matter, why you'll only have to live with the horrendous state of chain-owned commercial radio for a few more years.

Once it's possible to have low-cost, reliable WiFi in your car, someone will start offering Internet car radios. And that will mark the end of the radio business as we know it.

Further thoughts on Ramírez

If past blowups are any indication, we should assume that Manny Ramírez's semi-annual late-July/early-August unpleasantness is now over, and that he'll return to being a productive hitter the rest of the way.

So what was it all about? There were several factors that struck me as being different from past occasions, including: (1) his still-impressive though declining productivity; (2) the fact that the Sox can walk away from him at the end of the season; and (3) the unusual steps management has taken to make clear that it's had enough of Manny's act.

It's pretty obvious that if Ramírez had taken himself out of the lineup yesterday, he would have been suspended. And if that had happened, I doubt he'd have been back at all.

As great a hitter as Manny is, he's 36 years old, and he's gone from consistent to streaky the past couple of years. If he's on his way to being a .280-25-100 guy, well, that's still good. But you can replace someone like that for a lot less hassle and a lot less money.

That said, I hope he goes on a tear for the rest of the season.

Gordon Edes to leave the Globe

Alert Media Nation reader O-Fish-L reports that Boston Globe baseball writer Gordon Edes' on-again, off-again move to Yahoo Sports is on again. (Via Scott's Shots, which has some quotes from Edes.) Thus we see the continuation of a trend, as sportswriters flock to sports outlets.

I like Edes a lot, but I won't miss him — as long as I remember to bookmark Yahoo's Major League Baseball page, that is.

Apparently there was some unpleasantness over Edes' departure. As I understand it, Edes tried to take the buyout the Globe was offering, but management refused on the grounds that Edes was too valuable. (He was.) So now he's leaving anyway, with the fate of his buyout reportedly subject to an appeal.

Photo of Edes (cc) by ADM, and republished here under a Creative Commons license. Some rights reserved.

Ramírez says he's playing

Here you go. If Sean McAdam and Rob Bradford were right — and I say they were — then it looks to me like Manny just blinked.

Is it over for Manny and the Sox?

Not to be overly dramatic, but it's possible that Manny Ramírez's career with the Red Sox will end a few hours from now. The Providence Journal's Sean McAdam reports that if Ramírez refuses to play in today's game against the Yankees, "disciplinary action — which could include a suspension — will be taken."

McAdam's bombshell is unsourced, but it looks to me like he wouldn't have made such a strong declaration unless it came directly from Terry Francona. Further evidence that Tito's had enough comes in Dan Shaughnessy's column in the Boston Globe. "Manny shut it down in 2006 and he's toying with the Red Sox again," Shaughnessy writes. "In the middle of a pennant race. It is despicable. And the front office and his teammates are burning. Off the record, of course."

I'm not going to endorse Shaughnessy's contention that Ramírez quit on the team in 2006; it seemed at the time that there was a better-than-even chance he had a legitimate injury. I quote Shaughnessy only to point out that he claims both management and players have had enough of Manny's act, even if they're not willing to be quoted. (Is Francona afraid he'll be overruled if he tries to suspend Ramírez?)

At the Boston Herald, blogger Rob Bradford lends support to McAdam's story, saying there are "strong indications" Manny will be disciplined, and possibly suspended, if he won't play today. And columnist Steve Buckley says Ramírez ought to be escorted from the premises right now.

A few observations.

1. I was listening to "The Big Show" on WEEI (AM 850) yesterday when McAdam came on to report that Ramírez had just taken himself out of the lineup. Seconds earlier, the consensus had been that the Red Sox should stick with Manny, and possibly renew his option for next year, because for the first time they control his destiny — no performance, no money. Post-McAdam? Flabbergasted incoherence. I can't say I blame them.

2. Whether Ramírez's injury is legitimate or not (an MRI reportedly showed nothing, but who knows?), he has conducted himself in an unprofessional manner. You can't blame the Sox for believing that Manny is faking it and pouting over the fallout from his pushing incident with traveling secretary Jack McCormick and the recent public roasting he received from principal owner John Henry.

3. Ramírez has been acting strangely for years, but this year is especially odd. On the one hand, he's been much more open. On the other, the incidents with McCormick and Kevin Youkilis are out of character. One possible explanation: He's desperately hoping to get his option picked up, and he senses that age is catching up with him and his skills are deteriorating. Even after a winter when he reportedly worked harder than ever to get ready for the season.

4. The 2008 Red Sox are a good team, but, with all the injuries and bullpen woes, they don't look like they're built to go all the way. If Manny's teammates are as frustrated with him as we've been led to believe, it might have a salutary effect to dump him right now. If Brandon Moss comes through, it might be the spark they need to make it into the post-season. But even if they're destined to finish second or third, management will have made a statement that could pay off down the line.

The Red Sox won two World Series in part because of Francona's ability to keep Ramírez happy and productive most of the time. It might be his single most important accomplishment as manager. Now it looks like it's over.

Photo (cc) by Jeff Wheeler and republished here under a Creative Commons license. Some rights reserved.

Correction

In case you receive Media Nation by e-mail or RSS, I want to be sure you know that I was wrong about the New York Times and Barack Obama's salute to the Berlin crowd.

How stupid can the Times get?*

Very. Walter Brooks explains. And the New York Times, in what may have been a misguided attempt to give Barack Obama some cover, has managed to turn his innocent wave to the Berlin crowd into a Nazi salute. Good grief.

*Correction: I take it back. The front of the Boston Globe shows Obama waving with his right hand, but the "Angola" sign is still backwards. Clearly it was just turned around. How stupid can I get?

Comcast never sleeps

Last Sunday I posted a paranoid lament about Media Nation's wireless- network problems, and wondered whether Comcast's forced march to digital might somehow be responsible. As it turned out, my issues were easily solved (or would have been if I weren't such a tech dolt) by replacing our old AirPort base station with a shiny new AirPort Express.

Before it was over, though, I had received comments from no fewer than two Comcast employees, assuring readers of Media Nation that their planet is a benevolent one whose inhabitants want nothing but the best for humanity. (See this and this.)

I didn't think much about it until last night, when I saw a New York Times story, by Brian Stelter, on Comcast's dogged efforts to track down negative blog posts and respond to them with warm and happy messages. Pretty interesting. Some bloggers told Stelter they found it "creepy." I don't, and I swear I'm not saying that just because I now know Big Daddy Comcast is looking over my shoulder as a type.

Some of the complaints about Comcast's recent behavior are over a move I have only partly addressed — the company's decision to shift MSNBC, CSPAN2 and several other channels to the digital tier, forcing customers who want those channels to get a digital box and pay a few more dollars each month. I did as I was told this past Monday.

There are critics who believe the move was made specifically to marginalize Keith Olbermann, whose "Countdown" program on MSNBC is the most outspokenly liberal talk show on television. This Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editorial, which I found on NewsTrust, attempts to make that case, and does a rather poor job of it.

Media Nation's working hypothesis is that it's always about the money. So when I appeared on Arnie Arnesen's radio show earlier this week to talk about MSNBC, I was pleased to hear that she had hit upon a more likely theory: that Comcast had targeted MSNBC specifically to goad liberal viewers into upgrading and paying for more of those yummy Comcastic services.

This is the reverse of the "Let's Censor Keith" theory. Rather, it's "Let's Use Keith to Choke More Money Out of Those Latte-Swilling, Prius-Driving Elitists." She may be on to something. As a business proposition, it hits just the right middle ground. Move the SciFi Channel (or Comcast's own CN8, which it did) and no one would notice. Move NESN, and thousands of torch-bearing Red Sox fans would storm the local Comcast office. Move MSNBC, though, and liberals would simply grumble and pay up.

And, Frank and Jim, I just want you to know that I would never, ever even look at Comcast Must Die, that nasty site maintained by that awful man Bob Garfield. Really. So please don't take away my MSNBC again. Deal?

Photo (cc) by Steve Garfield, and republished here under a Creative Commons license. Some rights reserved.

Political blogging and community

I've got an essay in the summer issue of Nieman Reports on political blogs and what the traditional media can learn from them.

At their worst, political blogs of the left and right do little more than reinforce their readers' prejudices. At their best, though, they provide a virtual community in much the same way that newspapers at their height served a geographic community, helping them understand the news in the context of what like-minded people are thinking.

The question is whether the traditional media can learn those lessons without giving up their journalistic souls.

The Globe takes the GOP's bait

The Boston Globe takes dictation from the Republican National Committee today, turning an innocuous remark by a Barack Obama adviser into evidence that Obama is so arrogant he's already acting like he's president.

I'll work backwards. In a brief item, the Globe's Foon Rhee notes that the RNC was gleefully passing around a story from the Politico yesterday in which an Obama adviser described the candidate's speech in Berlin, scheduled for Thursday, as the sort that a president might deliver. Here's Rhee:

... Republicans are highlighting any perceived hint of Obama arrogance. The Republican National Committee yesterday sent out a report by the Politico website about an exchange between reporters and an Obama adviser about Obama's speech tomorrow in Berlin that is expected to draw thousands.

"It is not going to be a political speech," the adviser said. "When the president of the United States goes and gives a speech, it is not a political speech or a political rally."

"But he is not president of the United States," a reporter replied, according to Politico.

That's how the item ends. But it looked fishy to me, and I was right. Next stop: the RNC's Web site, which highlights the exchange under its "Audacity Watch," an ongoing feature dedicated to the proposition that Obama is so insufferably arrogant that he believes he might actually be elected president this November.

Finally, going back to the source, here is the Politico story that got the Republicans all excited. You will not be surprised to learn that their faux outrage is derived entirely from a crucial omission. Here's what the Politico's Carrie Budoff Brown actually wrote:

At a morning background briefing, reporters parried with senior advisers on the characterization of Obama’s speech Thursday in Berlin as a campaign rally. The outdoor speech at the Victory Column could draw thousands of people, similar to the size of Obama events in the United States.

"It is not going to be a political speech," said a senior foreign policy adviser, who spoke to reporters on background. "When the president of the United States goes and gives a speech, it is not a political speech or a political rally."

"But he is not president of the United States," a reporter reminded the adviser.

"He is going to talk about the issues as an individual … not as a candidate, but as an individual, as a senator," the adviser added....

After the briefing, Obama spokeswoman Jen Psaki offered a statement from [Obama campaign head David] Axelrod to reporters: "The answer is that, of course, any event outside of a [congressional delegation trip] is a campaign event. But it is not a political rally. He will not engage his American political opponents. It is a speech to our allies and the people of Europe and the world. And as such, we wanted it to be open to the public and not just invited guests."

In other words, the Obama campaign, far from claiming presidential prerogatives, was trying to answer criticism that Obama's Berlin speech will be a campaign rally held on foreign soil. The anonymous adviser tried to draw an analogy to a presidential speech, got cut down and quickly corrected himself. Axelrod then clarified.

If you want to criticize Obama for holding a campaign rally in Berlin, well, be my guest. But the Republicans are dead wrong to label this affair as evidence of Obama's arrogance, and they made their case through dishonestly selective quoting. The Globe should have taken five more minutes to determine whether the attack was fair or not.

Foreign policy

In my latest for the Guardian, I take a look at "The Changing Newsroom," a new study from the Project for Excellence in Journalism, and conclude that the authors get it half-right: metropolitan newspapers aren't dumping foreign and national news because readers don't want it, but because they're getting it elsewhere.

Style question

Another one for the brain trust. When I use block quotes, I do not use quotation marks. I've got an example from this morning — my post on the McCain op-ed. The indented text is a direct quote from McCain's unpublished piece.

Now, that's pretty standard in publishing, whether you're talking about magazines, books or academic papers. But such conventions do not necessarily travel all that well to the Web. I received a comment a little while ago from someone who was confused.

Although I can't scare up an example at the moment, I have seen blogs that use indents for block quotes and quotation marks. It's a little bit like using a belt and suspenders, but I'd rather make it too clear that I'm quoting than not clear enough.

What do you think?

Checking in with ethnic news

I've got a feature on the New England Ethnic Newswire in the new issue of CommonWealth Magazine. The NEWz, a Web site that aggregates the best of the local ethnic press, is expanding into original journalism focused on health care.

"The thing that I think is really intriguing about it is this idea of connecting different communities," says former Boston Globe editorialist Robert Turner, an adviser to the NEWz. "You see over and over again various communities building their own strength as their numbers increase. But how much of an effort around town is there to make cross-connections among them?"

The NEWz is a work in progress, as is the case with most new-media ventures. But it's got the potential to grow into something truly important. Ethnic communities are already speaking for themselves. Now there's a way for all of us to hear them.

Technology Tuesday

We are celebrating in Media Nation. The AirPort Express really did configure itself.

I called Apple customer service, and a terrific guy walked me through it. I think what happened yesterday was (a) I messed around and screwed up the AirPort's internal settings; (b) incompetently performed a hard reset; (c) then did it properly, but couldn't configure the AirPort because it needed to be reset.

Anyway, we are back in business. Now I need to catch up on some e-mail.

McCain's factually inaccurate op-ed

The John McCain op-ed piece that was rejected by the New York Times contains at least one bit of factually inaccurate information about Barack Obama. That alone is sufficient reason to send it back for a rewrite. Instead, McCain has chosen to go public and claim that the Times refused to publish what he had written despite having run a commentary by Obama last week.

Here is the inaccuracy:

The success of the surge has not changed Senator Obama's determination to pull out all of our combat troops. All that has changed is his rationale. In a New York Times op-ed and a speech this week, he offered his "plan for Iraq" in advance of his first "fact finding" trip to that country in more than three years. It consisted of the same old proposal to pull all of our troops out within 16 months. In 2007 he wanted to withdraw because he thought the war was lost. If we had taken his advice, it would have been. Now he wants to withdraw because he thinks Iraqis no longer need our assistance.

To make this point, he mangles the evidence. He makes it sound as if Prime Minister Maliki has endorsed the Obama timetable, when all he has said is that he would like a plan for the eventual withdrawal of U.S. troops at some unspecified point in the future.

The truth, of course, is that Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has indeed endorsed Obama's 16-month timetable for withdrawal. Republicans are now spinning like mad to make it appear that Maliki's remarks had not been properly translated. But this Josh Marshall post makes it clear that Maliki said what he meant and meant what he said.

In fairness, it should be noted, as Time's Joe Klein does, that McCain's piece was rejected last Friday, and Maliki's remarks were not reported until the next day. But Klein goes on to observe that the McCain campaign still refuses to acknowledge that Maliki said what he said. In any case, there's no doubt McCain's op-ed would need to be revised in order to avoid making a false statement about Obama (and Maliki).

According to the Times, the newspaper has published at least seven op-eds by McCain since 1996. I can't imagine that it won't be publishing another one or two before this campaign is over.

But if McCain wants his words published without any editing or vetting whatsoever, then he ought to buy an ad.

Keeping the heat on the heat

In case you missed it, Kevin Cullen has a first-rate column in today's Boston Globe on the death of David Woodman following last month's Celtics victory. Cullen speaks with a fan named John Rufo, who remains incredulous at the aggressive show of force by Boston police at the celebration. Cullen writes:

Now, you can dress this up any way you want: that Woodman had a preexisting heart condition, that it was an unfortunate accident, that it was any number of things. But the bottom line is David Woodman is dead and he died as a result of being taken into custody by some cops who didn't like some kid mouthing off to them.

You will never convince Jim Rufo that David Woodman is dead for any other reason than that the show of force put on by police the night the Celtics won their 17th championship was something of a self-fulfilling prophecy: that if you hype police officers up for battle, if you send them into a crowd of civilians with weapons, you are asking for trouble.

Good for Cullen for keeping the heat on the police.

What liberal media?*

Check out the nominally liberal Boston Globe columnist Joan Vennochi, who absolutely unloaded on Barack Obama in Sunday's paper in a piece headlined "The Audacity of Ego." Ouch.

No doubt Obama is possessed of a healthy self-regard and then some. But isn't it pretty typical for a presidential candidate — especially one who's new to the national political scene — to undertake a foreign trip?

*Eric Alterman wrote the book.

Technology Monday

Which is another way of saying all is not right in Media Nation.

Got the digital box from Comcast this morning. I only had to go back once before everything was working properly.

Now I am dealing with our wireless Internet problem. I picked up an AirPort Express at the Apple Store after talking with a guy at the Genius Bar who seemed pretty knowledgeable (if not quite a genius). Here's what I'm trying to do:

• Attach the cable coming in from outside the house to the back of the cable modem.
• Run an Ethernet cable from the back of the cable modem to the AirPort Express.
• Set up a wireless network using the AirPort Utility software.
  

I've come close a couple of times. I've had a strong signal coming from the AirPort. By all appearances, we should be good to go.

But none of our Macs will connect to the Internet. (For the moment, I'm running the EtherNet cable directly into the back of the family iMac. Very frustrating.) And then sometimes, when I try again, the AirPort doesn't even show up in AirPort Utility.

I've got a 7:15 p.m. appointment at the Genius Bar, and I'm hoping someone will walk me through it step by step.

Comcast paranoia

As many of you know, Comcast is in the process of messing things up even more than it normally does.

Weirdly enough, on Friday night the signal coming out of our ancient, coal-powered Airport base station suddenly dropped to the point where I had to drag my laptop into the same room in order to get a decent connection. I've done enough testing to convince myself that it's the base station and not the laptop. The situation persisted throughout the day on Saturday.

Last night, the problem appeared to have healed itself. Early this morning, too. But now the signal is back to being ridiculously weak.

The family iMac, connected directly to the cable modem, does not seem to be affected.

Is anyone else experiencing this? Is my suspicion that it might be Comcast realistic, or does it stem from my near-total technological ignorance?

Is that all there is?

I'll reserve judgment over the latest contretemps regarding Manny Ramírez. But I do want to flag an unsettling quote from Bob Lobel in Dan Shaughnessy's column today.

It was Lobel, formerly of WBZ-TV (Channel 4), who took to WEEI Radio (AM 850) earlier in the week to report that Ramírez had (a) been fined six figures for shoving traveling secretary Jack McCormick and (b) infuriated management by taking three straight called strikes from Mariano Rivera to protest his punishment. Now Red Sox officials are denying it — especially (b).

Here's Lobel talking to Shaughnessy:

I don't think this is false information. It's not something I'd make up. It didn't come to me in a dream. I know it's not in their best interests to talk about this, but I'm pretty confident with what I said.

Whoa. Lobel doesn't think this is false information? Now, there's a lofty standard. Given that Gordon Edes has reported the fine was about 10 percent of what Lobel claims, I think Lobel owes us more, although he obviously can't out any anonymous sources he may have.

As for Manny looking at three straight pitches, I watched that game, and yes, it was disconcerting. But Ramírez had preceded that with some big-time loosening-up in the on-deck circle. If he were trying to send a message to management, you'd think he'd just kneel there, immobile.

I forget who the television analyst was, but his explanation that Manny was looking for a pitch in a specific location made sense to me. When Rivera is on, he's not exactly easy to hit.

Sorry for the relative dearth of links. I'm having Internet problems today.

Bill O'Reilly and "shut up"

In a letter to the Phoenix, Rich Goggin of Peabody says I was wrong to claim, as I did in the recent Muzzle Awards, that Fox News Channel host Bill O'Reilly "loves nothing more than to tell his guests to 'shut up.'" Goggin instructs me thusly: "Except O'Reilly only did that once, seven years ago."

Really. Now, I'm going to make an assumption, but I'm pretty sure the source of Goggin's misinformation is O'Reilly himself. O'Reilly's claim was included in Robert Greenwald's documentary "OutFoxed." It is followed by a hilarious stream of O'Reilly telling both guests and non-guests alike, over and over, to "shut up." Here is the clip:

As Ronald Reagan once said, facts are stupid things. And if that's not enough for you, Mr. Goggin, Jack Shafer of Slate wrote way back in 2003, "Bill O'Reilly says 'shut up' the way other people say 'um.'" He follows that with one, two, three ... OK, make that 30 examples.

I posted a comment to Goggin's letter, but it doesn't seem to have taken yet. I don't know if he's a Media Nation reader, but perhaps someone will send him this way. Meanwhile, my advice for him is to shut up.

It's all about the debt

Boston Herald reporter Christine McConville quotes me today in a story about GateHouse Media's ongoing financial woes, which have now extended to closing the chain's weeklies in Taunton and Avon.

As best as I can figure out — and I've been making some inquiries — it's all about GateHouse's $1.2 billion debt. But as McConville notes, when you talk to insiders, you can't help but be surprised by lack of panic.

What you hear is that the debt has been structured in a way that makes it quite a bit less onerous than outside analysts assume. The truth? Well, it's out there, I guess.

As for the closing of those two papers, it's always a shame when the doors are padlocked, but this doesn't strike me as a huge deal. The weekly Taunton Call and Avon Messenger operated in the shadow of the Taunton Gazette and the Brockton Enterprise, dailies also owned by GateHouse. The company's Wicked Local Web sites for the two communities remain intact.

Regional publisher Mark Olivieri explains here and here.

The vagaries of search

Yes, I'm looking for help from the brain trust again.

A year ago I published a free, online edition of my book on dwarfism, "Little People." Unfortunately, I've done it in a way that renders it nearly invisible to Google.

Here's how I handled it. I uploaded the book to a subset of my personal Web site. The top page for the book is home.comcast.net/~dkennedy56/littlepeople.html. Then I registered the domain name littlepeoplethebook.com and set it to forward to that page.

My other ventures are not exactly invisible to Google. But when I Google "Dan Kennedy" "Little People", a link to the book doesn't come up until the eighth page. And when I search for text inside the book, it doesn't come up at all.

Interestingly, "Little People" is better represented on Google by Cape Cod Today, whose publisher, Walter Brooks, was kind enough to serialize my book last fall.

Yes, I know I could get a hosted solution, but I'm not willing to spend any money. Would it help if I moved the book to a higher level? (Example: home.comcast.net/~littlepeople.) I could do that, but I don't want to bother unless it's really going to make a difference.

Or I could set it up as a Blogger or WordPress.com site.

Thoughts?

One in five

With the Massachusetts Legislature on the verge of repealing a 1913 law that's made it difficult for out-of-state gay and lesbian couples to marry here, we've reached a remarkable moment in the rise of same-sex marriage — more remarkable than perhaps most people realize.

Yes, only two states allow same-sex marriage: Massachusetts and California. But, since May, the state of New York has recognized same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions, making it possible for New York couples to marry in, say, Canada or Massachusetts.

The combined population of Massachusetts, California and New York is 62.2 million — nearly 21 percent of the total U.S. population of 299.4 million. That means one in five Americans lives in a state where same-sex marriage is recognized.

California voters might repeal same-sex marriage this November. But given that the state's Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, opposes the anti-marriage referendum, there's reason to be optimistic.

A final observation about Massachusetts. Yesterday's state Senate vote to repeal the 1913 law was unanimous. The vote in the House is expected to be overwhelming. Can we finally stop the charade that gay marriage was forced on us by "unelected judges," as critics inevitably charge?

It may have taken the state's Supreme Judicial Court to start the debate. But last year opponents failed to win over the mere 25 percent of legislators needed to place the question on the ballot. And now our elected legislators are taking the final steps toward normalizing same-sex marriage, secure in the knowledge that most of their constituents either support marriage equality or don't strongly object.

More: Esther offers some observations at Gratuitous Violins.

Second least popular, too

Brian Stetler, writing in the New York Times, describes Brit Hume's "Special Report" as the Fox News Channel's "fourth most popular program" in a story on Hume's decision to step aside after the November election.

But Stetler makes this observation in the context of "Fox's 6 to 11 p.m. schedule." That's five shows.

Old ethics and new media (VI)

Howard Owens, GateHouse Media's director of digital publishing, has responded to YouTube's decision to remove the Beverly Citizen's controversial video of the "Horribles" parade.

According to Owens, YouTube acted after receiving a complaint from someone whose face was visible in the video. Apparently YouTube has a privacy policy under which it will take down a video at literally anyone's request. Owens sums it up as follows:

We simply cannot allow YouTube, or any other business partner, to subvert our editorial independence. If YouTube wants to get in the game of hosting video for established news organizations — which it is doing — then it needs to respect the editorial judgment and independence of the news professionals in those organizations. If YouTube is unwilling be a true media partner, then, at least for GateHouse, we will need to seek alternative means of distribution of our videos.

Now, it's easy enough to say that YouTube should act as a common carrier, similar to the phone company, and carry any traffic that comes its way, regardless of content. As a free-speech advocate, I would much prefer a policy like that.

But it's not that simple. YouTube is successful in part because it does a good job of keeping out pornography and graphic violence. It's the PG-13 nature of YouTube that makes it an attractive venue for media companies like GateHouse in the first place.

On the other hand, Owens is absolutely right that if the folks at YouTube are going to remove news videos arbitrarily, then there's no way a news organization can do business with them.

I haven't changed my mind about the video — I still would have edited it to remove the eight-foot-long penis and some of the more offensive signs. But that has to be the news organization's call, not that of the service hosting the video.

I realize this post is entirely one-sided, and I hope YouTube has something to say. Soon.

Wednesday morning update: An unnamed YouTube spokeswoman tells the Boston Herald that the video was "inappropriate," but leaves it at that.

GateHouse financial outlook dims

While we're talking about GateHouse Media, you might be interested in knowing that the bad financial news continues. The trade publication Editor & Publisher reports that the company's stock price is flirting with the $1 mark, which could trigger a series of unfortunate events.

Stock analyst Tom Corbett of Morningstar is quoted as writing that the company's shares "could be worthless," and that it is conceivable that "its debt could become due immediately, resulting in a possible liquidation scenario."

Much as company officials might not want to hear it, Corbett's dire report fits with a recent post on the blog 247WallSt.com, which predicted that the Rochester, N.Y.-based chain — which owns some 100 newspapers in Eastern Massachusetts — could be broken up or worse by the end of the year.

Old ethics and new media (V)

Looks like GateHouse Media has taken matters into its own hands.

If you go to the Beverly Citizen's "Horribles" parade story now, you'll see that the video featuring the eight-foot-long water-spouting penis and the crude signs is back online.

The difference: The video is now hosted by Veoh Networks rather than YouTube.

More on that Obama cover

In my latest for the Guardian, I argue that the Obama campaign and its supporters on the left have made way too much of the New Yorker's satirical cover depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as flag-burning, Osama bin Laden-loving terrorists.

Which puts me at odds with Jon Keller, who included me in a piece on the controversy last night on WBZ-TV (Channel 4).

Who among us hasn't misquoted Kerry?

Boston Herald columnist Margery Eagan today laments John Kerry's loss four years ago, observing that Kerry's brain is "about 100 times bigger than that of our foggy, confused, pushed around by his Machiavellian advisers, can- I- ever- get- a- sentence- out- straight embarrassment of a president."

So why does Eagan think Kerry lost? Among other things, she writes, "Lots of us didn't like Kerry: the faux Kennedy thing. The Brahmin-esque cadence. 'Who among us,' he bellowed as often as McCain says 'my friends.' "

Actually, he didn't. Bear with me. I'm about to write way too much about a small matter, but it galls me. Eagan should know better. We all should know better. To the extent that the haughty "who among us" construction was used to demonstrate that Kerry was not a man of the people, it's important to point out that it was all based on a falsehood.

First, let's deal with the origin of "who among us" — a Maureen Dowd column in the New York Times in which Kerry was quoted as saying, "Who among us doesn't like NASCAR?" She got it wrong. She wasn't even there when he said (or rather didn't say) it. The Daily Howler's Bob Somerby has demonstrated conclusively that Kerry actually said, "There isn't one of us here who doesn't like NASCAR and who isn't a fan." Case closed.

Except that it wasn't. Because the NASCAR quote was used over and over during the 2004 campaign to show that Kerry was a pompous fake who undermined his own attempt to appeal to NASCAR fans with his phony Brahmin language. As Somerby shows, Times people themselves did it over and over, but they were not alone. I dove into LexisNexis and found numerous examples. Here are just a few instances of writers either mocking Kerry's diction or falsely quoting him:

I'm sick of Kerry pretending to be a normal guy. Killing a goose to get the gun vote. Saying, "Who among us doesn't like NASCAR?" to get the racing vote. (Michael Goodwin, New York Daily News, Oct. 27, 2004.)

Unless you're a teetotaling philistine, few things go better together than a good read and a good stiff drink. As John Kerry might say, who among us does not like to curl up with a Tom Clancy novel and can of Bud? (Jerry Salamon, Austin American-Statesman, Oct. 24, 2004)

As John Kerry himself has asked: "Who among us does not like NASCAR?" (Bruce Feirstein, New York Observer, May 17, 2004)

Believe me, this is just a tiny sample, and I'm leaving out what Dowd's colleagues at the Times did, since you can read Somerby for yourself. Which brings me to the next question. The NASCAR falsehood aside, does Kerry favor the "who among us" construction? Not particularly. I did a search from Jan. 1 through Nov. 15, 2004, and came up with just a few examples, all from formal speeches or prepared remarks. Here they are:

In the wake of Sept. 11, who among us can say, with any certainty, to anybody, that those weapons might not be used against our troops or against allies in the region? Who can say that this master of miscalculation will not develop a weapon of mass destruction even greater — a nuclear weapon — then invade Kuwait, push the Kurds out, attack Israel, any number of scenarios to try to further his ambition to be the pan-Arab leader? (Kerry spoke these words in 2002, and they were quoted on numerous occasions during the 2004 campaign to demonstrate that Kerry had believed Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.)

Who among us is more vulnerable today than the 8 million Americans who are out of work? Who is more vulnerable than the 45 million Americans without health insurance? Who is more vulnerable than the parents who have to choose between food and medicine for their children? (From a speech Kerry delivered in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on Oct. 24, 2004.)

Who among us thinks it's right to say so quickly, on short notice, before you even know where your next paycheck's going to come from; before you know, if you haven't been working, what skill you can apply to be able to earn a paycheck; before you've been able to adjust to the loss and begin to be able to get back into life? (From a Kerry speech cited by John Harris of the Washington Post as evidence that Kerry was something of a fumblemouth. According to the text of the speech, Kerry was supposed to say, "Who among us could move on short notice when you don't even know where your paycheck will come from?")

And that's all I could find. That's not to say there aren't other examples out there. But it's ridiculous to think Kerry is wedded to "who among us" as any sort of rhetorical crutch, at least based on the available evidence.

By the way, at the Republican National Convention in 2004, John McCain said:

All of us, despite the differences that enliven our politics, are united in the one big idea that freedom is our birthright and its defense is always our first responsibility.

All other responsibilities come second.

We must not lose sight of that as we debate who among us should bear the greatest responsibility for keeping us safe and free.

Not to pick on Margery Eagan. The journalist who bears the responsibility for this is Maureen Dowd. But can we finally put this urban legend to rest?

Kerry photo (cc) by the World Economic Forum and republished here under a Creative Commons license. Some rights reserved.

Old ethics and new media (IV)

Anyone at GateHouse want to send along the reason that YouTube gave for removing the "Horribles" parade video? YouTube might be in the running for a 2009 Phoenix Muzzle Award if it took down the video because of its allegedly offensive content.

Old ethics and new media (III)

In a weird coda to the controversy over the Beverly Farms "Horribles" parade, a source has informed Media Nation that YouTube has removed the video. Have a look at the Beverly Citizen's story. When you click on the video, you'll receive a message that says, "We're sorry, this video is no longer available."

The GateHouse Media papers, like many smaller enterprises, uses YouTube as a free, easy-to-use publishing platform. Editors upload their videos to YouTube, then embed the code on their own sites. But it looks like publishers who wish to control their content are going to have to figure out a way to do it themselves.

Talking about the New Yorker

I'll be on WBZ-TV (Channel 4) during the 11 p.m. news, talking with Jon Keller about the New Yorker's controversial cover parodying Barack and Michelle Obama.

Radio's challenge to print

You may have heard that two Boston Herald sportswriters, Rob Bradford and Michael Felger, are leaving the paper to join WEEI.com as full-time sports bloggers. The move hasn't gotten much attention, but I think it may prove to be pretty significant in terms of how the media continue to change.

The buzzword for what this is about is "disaggregation." What it means is that the one-stop package that is the daily newspaper — hard news and automobile ads, obituaries and sports, political analysis and comics — is coming apart, with niche media better able to give people what they're looking for.

You can already see this with television sports journalism. The sports segments on TV newscasts have been shortened because the true fans are watching ESPN. Now it's coming down to the local level, with WEEI (AM 850), a phenomenally successful all-sports radio station, taking the first step toward competing with the sports pages of the Herald and the Boston Globe.

This is going to be a challenge for Bradford and Felger in that there is virtually no adult supervision at WEEI. They're going to have to provide their own journalistic standards, and no doubt there will be occasions when they'll have to stand up to management and say "no." In a larger sense, though, I'm fascinated at the notion that a radio station is going to try to fill at least part of the role traditionally held by newspapers.

In that respect, the WEEI move is more significant than Sacha Pfeiffer's decision to switch from the Globe to WBUR Radio (90.9 FM) earlier this year. Pfeiffer's new job, after all, is to be a radio reporter, not a print reporter who writes for the station's Web site. It has more to do with a first-rate reporter moving to a medium whose non-profit business model, built on a foundation of listener contributions and corporate underwriting, is more solid than the newspaper industry's.

Yet here, too, there are developments that bear watching. Every day I receive an e-mail from WBUR with the latest world, national and local news, complete with photos, AP wire copy and sound clips. It is a reasonably comprehensive wrap-up of the day's news, even if it's not quite as detailed as what I find in the Globe.

Currently the Globe offers a six- or seven-minute podcast that is little more than a teaser for what's in the paper. But if WBUR is going to publish what is, in effect, an online newspaper, why shouldn't the Globe compete with a half-hour podcast consisting of a reasonably complete news report, with paid advertising?

If digital convergence gives radio stations the power to become newspapers, then newspapers ought to consider what it would take to become radio stations. In the current environment, no one can afford not to experiment.

More: Dave Scott has some thoughts on what Felger's move means for the local ESPN Radio outlet at AM 890, where Felger had hosted a show, as well as further background on the Bradford-Herald situation.

Firefox downgrade

Well, I've moved back to Firefox 2.0.0.15. Nothing really wrong with Firefox 3.0, and it's definitely faster. But there were some minor compatibility issues, and it wouldn't let me access my Northeastern mail. Definitely an improvement, but not quite ready for prime time.

Another paper goes Web-mostly

It's not yet a trend, but the managers of another daily newspaper have decided to go mostly online, and to scale back their print edition to just twice a week.

This time it's the Daily Telegram of Superior, Wis., joining another Wisconsin paper, the Capital Times of Madison, which made the switch earlier this year.

Like the Capital Times, the Telegram is an afternoon paper owned by a chain co-owned with a larger, more successful morning paper in the same market. The real test will be when someone in a one-newspaper town tries this. Still, it definitely bears watching. (Via Romenesko.)

Firefox upgrade

I normally don't like to use any software whose version number ends in "0." But I was never particularly happy with Firefox 2.x, so I've upgraded to Firefox 3.0. So far, so good. It does seem faster, as advertised, and there have been some cosmetic improvements as well.

A non-disclosure disclosure

The Boston Globe today runs an op-ed piece urging passage of a free-trade agreement with Colombia. The piece, by Marc Grossman, is reasoned and nuanced, celebrating Colombia's rescue of 15 hostages last week while acknowledging that the government of President Álvaro Uribe must continue to improve its human-rights record.

But there's a hidden agenda. The tagline states that Grossman is a vice chairman of the Cohen Group, and is a former undersecretary of state. That's a pretty weak disclosure. In fact, a little Googling reveals that the Cohen Group, founded by former secretary of defense William Cohen, helps private clients do business internationally. Here's the lowdown, taken directly from the Cohen Group's Web site:

The Cohen Group (TCG) assists clients to navigate the political and business landscape in Latin America.

Secretary Cohen and TCG principals have developed and maintain strong ties with political, business, military, and media officials throughout Latin America that can help to accomplish client business objectives in the region. Our understanding of and relationships in the region have enabled TCG to assist numerous firms in the U.S., Spain and elsewhere in Europe that have business interests in Latin America....

Ambassador Marc Grossman, as Under Secretary of State until 2005, worked directly with leaders from across the region on a broad range of political, economic and security issues. For his efforts to promote democracy and fight narcoterrorism in Colombia, he was awarded Colombia's highest civilian honor, the Order of San Carlos.

An opinion piece such as Grossman's is worthless if it's not independent. The Cohen Group would benefit mightily from a free-trade deal with Colombia. Surely there are experts who could have made the case as effectively as Grossman without being tainted by their future earnings being tied up in the outcome of the free-trade debate.

Moving on at the Globe

Adam Reilly has a column in this week's Boston Phoenix that attempts to put talk of a 10 percent wage cut at the Boston Globe in a larger context of union contracts, obsolescence and the future of the newspaper business.

What interested me, though, were the words of an unnamed newsroom insider, who demonstrated that there are some people at 135 Morrissey Boulevard who get it, and who are ready to move on:

It's weird having white-collar and blue-collar workers in the same union, because they think differently. They're trying to preserve something that's dying. We understand it's dying, and we don't want to hang on to it. We want to go forward.

I'm not sure if this is the same source talking, but this, from later on in Reilly's piece, is interesting nevertheless:

There's no financial model that'll stop the bleeding. We deliver a product whose business model doesn't work. Printing a newspaper on paper and delivering it to people is not sustainable.

If the Globe is to survive, it needs to move quickly to an all-online or mostly online model, with the print edition subordinate to the Web. There are still a lot of smart people at the Globe, and I don't doubt that they know this, starting with editor Marty Baron.

What we may be witnessing now, with the losses continuing to mount, is one of those turning points at which a slow transition suddenly becomes a stampede.

Using a blogging tool as a CMS

Blogging tools can only go so far, apparently. I'm the editor of my church's Web site, and I'm planning a relaunch sometime later this summer or fall. At first I thought I would simply do it all in HTML with Sea Monkey or KompoZer.

But I realized I wanted a basic content-management system that could handle menu updates and that would provide a slicker look than I could do on my own. Mainly I need a CMS with short, flat learning curve. That rules out Drupal or Joomla, to name two solutions that webmasters who are smarter than I am get very excited about.

My thoughts turned to a free blogging platform. Naturally, though, neither of the easiest solutions is quite right.

WordPress.com offers the ability to create as many static pages as I want, and even allows me to set one of those static pages as the home page, with the blog residing somewhere underneath. That gets me 95 percent of the way there, and, frankly, it's probably what I'm going to settle on. But customizing the template is, for all intents and purposes, not allowed. I can't make the type size bigger. I don't seem to be able to dump the blog-post calendar, which I'm afraid people will confuse with the church's calendar of events.

I could try WordPress.org, but that would draw me into a world of effort and confusion that I'm trying to avoid. (See Drupal and Joomla, above.)

Blogger.com is much more flexible and easily customized. But it offers no static pages, which rules it out.

Frustrating.

Looking for SAT numbers

I couldn't manage to form the right Google or LexisNexis search to find what I'm looking for — the increase in the SAT participation rate among high-school students over the years. Ideally, I'd be able to nail down numbers for 1990 and 2007, but I'll take what I can get. Any thoughts?

Old ethics and new media (II)

The comments to my earlier post have transformed this into a substantive, productive conversation about journalism and standards in the new-media age. You'll find intelligent posts on all sides of the issue, from outraged readers to GateHouse Media editors and executives.

I'm humbled by how much better the quality of the discussion is compared to my original post. As Dan Gillmor likes to say, "My readers know more than I do."

Old ethics and new media

Let's say some local yahoos decide to rent a truck, bolt a giant model of a penis to the front (complete with squirting water!) and festoon the sides of the truck with messages so crude and offensive that I'm not going to quote them.

Let's say they decide to enter the truck as a float in a parade that is attended by hundreds of families and children.

Let's say, further, that the people on the float decide it would be a fun idea to throw condoms at the crowd.

Of course, you already know this is not a hypothetical.

There are many ways of looking at the fallout from the "Horribles" parade in Beverly Farms, which featured three floats — including the one I just described — that made fun of the Gloucester High School pregnancy story.

Here's another angle: the responsibility of community journalists, who are no longer armed just with a notebook and a pen but with video cameras as well.

The Beverly Citizen, a GateHouse Media paper, is in the spotlight because of a video that it posted showing all the highlights and lowlights, including some close-ups of the aforementioned penis and the signs.

Does the video go too far? I'll take a cue from the Citizen itself. The news story, by Bobby Gates, is almost prissy in its description of the controversy. Not a single offensive sign is quoted from. As for the float, the story rather clinically refers to a "large, realistically shaped phallic symbol spraying water from the front of a truck."

Even more out of sync with the video is a post on the Citizen's blog that asserts the floats "went over the line" by mocking teenage girls. The signs? "And I won't even go into the signs on the floats, which were lewd at best." Well, OK. But the blog post was written by "dmacalpine." And the video was shot by Dan Mac Alpine, whose camera hovered so seductively over the very signs that he (or maybe it was his doppelgänger?) didn't think he could quote in his newspaper's blog.

I'm not sure what the lesson is here. I do know that quick-and-cheap video is posing a challenge to community journalists, who are finding themselves embroiled in controversy for shooting footage of subjects that wouldn't raise an eyebrow if they merely described them in writing. That was the case at another GateHouse paper, the Somerville Journal, a few months ago, when its video of the Naked Quad Run at Tufts University sparked discussion and even outrage.

The current, situation, though, is different, as the Citizen is traveling much further in its video than it dares go in its written description. I'm not sure what to make of that.

Let me go back to my original question: Does the video go too far? I think it does. I haven't checked, but I am confident that neither the squirting penis nor the worst of the signs made it on to any of the local television newscasts. I know that both were left on the cutting-room floor in a news video I watched at the Fox 25 Web site, and it's probably safe to say that no one is going to go beyond our friends at Fox.

Except, it seems, the Beverly Citizen.

Look, it happened. Hundreds of people saw it. Hundreds more heard about it. There's no sense in pretending otherwise. But if they didn't think they should quote from the signs, then they shouldn't have showed them in the video. As for the penis — well, let just say I think the written description was sufficient.

The folks at GateHouse are not bad people. They're hard-working journalists trying to find their way in a news landscape that's changing by the day. I'd rather see them taking too many chances than too few. I'm neither horrified nor offended by what they did. But I do think they made the wrong call in this case.

Update: The Salem News runs a front-page photo of the penis-bearing truck in its print edition. But unless you've seen the video, it's impossible to figure out what you're looking at. Here's the News' story.

High crimes and misdemeanors

In my latest for The Guardian, I dismiss the notion — put forth by the dean of the Massachusetts School of Law — to put President Bush and other top officials on trial for war crimes. But if Nuremberg II isn't the answer, surely there must be some way of holding him — and us — accountable for the past seven and a half years.

Mapping the news

View Larger Map
Among the more important skills that young journalists need to learn is how to incorporate mapping into a news presentation. The easiest way to do this is with Google Maps. I've put together a demonstration based on today's Salem News, mapping the addresses where five stories took place.

This is far from the best application of mapping and journalism. I just wanted to see if I could get it to work. One glitch: Whenever I type in an address, I get a non-removable red marker. Since the Ipswich story is the last one I mapped, you'll see a red marker partially hidden behind the blue marker. Anyone know how to get rid of that?

You'll probably need to click on "View Larger Map" in order to see anything.

Update: Hmmm ... the glitch seems to have magically disappeared.

Disability and difference

I've got an essay (PDF) in the current issue of ArchitectureBoston on the uneasy confluence of dwarfism, disability and difference.

Why ArchitectureBoston? Because the editor, Elizabeth Padjen, asked me. And because the assignment gives me the opportunity to discuss dwarfism as a disability that is socially constructed: take away the fact that the built environment is made for people between five and six feet tall, and the disability goes with it.

Dwarfism as disability and difference is a major theme of my 2003 book on dwarfism, "Little People."

What Ailes a media critic

New York Times media columnist David Carr weighs in with a terrific inside look at how Fox News tries to smother even the mildest of unfavorable coverage with freezeouts, smears and, yes, doctored photos. And, he admits, it sometimes works:

By blacklisting reporters it does not like, planting stories with friendlies at every turn, Fox News has been living a life beyond consequence for years. Honesty compels me to admit that I have choked a few times at the keyboard when Fox News has come up in a story and it was not absolutely critical to the matter at hand.

Carr also cites a Fox News spokeswoman who says the most recent outrage — altering photos of Times media reporter Jacques Steinberg and his editor — was no biggie because cable news programs often engage in such antics for humorous effect.

That, of course, is pathetic. There was nothing funny about the Photoshopping; the two men were simply uglified for an audience that had no idea what they actually look like. Carr finds the plastic surgery done on Steinberg to be anti-Semitic, which is a very tough accusation. But I think he's right.

Thanks to Carr's column, the war between Fox and the Times is now fully engaged. It will be interesting to see what comes next.

Carville without subtitles

Last night I finally saw "The War Room" after all these years. It was OK, though not as good as friends had led me to believe. But I did come away with one question: Why was every word spoken by James Carville perfectly understandable? These days you practically need subtitles to follow him. What happened?