Mark’s Soap Box

The Publisher of the Orange County Register has resigned. He is credited with turning it into an award winning and “professional” paper.

N. Christian Anderson III, 57, named in May as publisher of the year by industry magazine Editor & Publisher, will leave Orange County’s largest newspaper Sept. 15.

Anderson was hired as Editor in 1980. He came in and made many changes. One was to modify the news wording. It was “libertarian” IN THE NEWS COVERAGE. I would say it was honesty. This change was of course cheered by the liberal media.

The paper was known for staunch libertarian views that played not only in its editorial pages but also in its news stories, referring to public schools as “taxpayer-supported schools.”

Remember that it’s O.K. for liberals to do push their views in the news sections but not Conservatives.

Anderson put a stop to that practice, pushed for visually enticing design and fought to change the paper’s name, to the Orange County Register, according to an Editor & Publisher story.

So Reagan comes to power, and this mental giant decides to veer left, or is that what the LAT wants you to think? And are they trying to say that Conservative only want flashy graphics and vacuous stories?

Anderson hired “a more aggressive and professional staff to bolster the Register’s hold,” said Jeff Brody, a Cal State Fullerton professor of communications and former Register reporter. The paper won the first of its three Pulitzers in 1985 in spot news photography.

You could argue he created the first USA Today style of paper, heck even a ‘web-style’ of paper. He also saw the future of newspapers; local, local, local.

“I make no bones about it. . . . The Los Angeles Times gave them a run for the money, but Chris Anderson understood Orange County,” said Robert Scheer, a USC journalism professor and former Times columnist. “He did local, local, local, and they were very good at it.”

In other words a flashy, clone of the Los Angeles Times without the ponderous National and International coverage. No doubt due to Conservatives being idiots.

WASHINGTON (AP) - Liberals read more books than conservatives. The head of the book publishing industry’s trade group says she knows why—and there’s little flattering about conservative readers in her explanation.

“The Karl Roves of the world have built a generation that just wants a couple slogans: ‘No, don’t raise my taxes, no new taxes,’” Pat Schroeder, president of the American Association of Publishers, said in a recent interview. “It’s pretty hard to write a book saying, ‘No new taxes, no new taxes, no new taxes’ on every page.”

…

She said liberals tend to be policy wonks who “can’t say anything in less than paragraphs. We really want the whole picture, want to peel the onion.”

See, conservatives are dunces, and liberals created great papers that win News Awards. Don’t think the OC Reg is a Conservative paper, it’s chock full of liberals (mostly unionistas) like this guy (or is it?):

This month, the Register cut about three dozen newsroom jobs. One reporter said staff members saw some justice in Anderson’s departure because it “wasn’t just the workers who produce the paper every day who were forced to sacrifice.”

Well good! It’s “fair” therefore it must be right! Rejoice the Darth Vader of papers got the boot! Pffft. That is one of those “professionals” they discussed earlier. Wonder if he cheered at Rove’s resignation? Clearly the LAT is attempting to blame this on the Publisher, whilst getting in their liberal “fair” bull.

Let’s dispel some rumors. Yes the Editor (at the time Anderson) did remove the less neutral words. Not that they were incorrect, but they offended the liberal media, so no awards. See it’s O.K. for liberals to use inflammatory or emotional language but not Conservatives.

The OCR is still very much libertarian. That is why why they are kicking the crap out of the LAT. It’s not the flashy graphics and light news they imply, it’s the fact that the OCR understand the county. OC can’t stand LA, that is why they live in OC, duh.

The LAT implies that the failures of two recent projects are to blame for Anderson departing. this seems to be nonsense. He quit because he did not get the promotion he was expecting.

In recent months, Anderson had suffered major setbacks. He was supposed to drop his publisher title and continue to oversee a corporate division. However, the company’s choice as his successor in June turned out to have fudged her resume. And Anderson’s latest attempts to lure readers — a pair of tabloids with big photos and short stories — flopped.

Well that is very muddled paragraph. Did his successor cause him to lose the promotion? Did the recent hiring cause concern? Or was it he was going to have to stay in his Publisher role and not oversee the corporate division?

Very spotty reporting. Not specific, and very little follow up. Seems to me that LAT is just taking a shot at the OCR.

“There’s no optimism here,” a Register editor said. “Everyone knows that things are going to get worse before they get better. Everything that we hear is just more bad news on top of bad news.”

No names, hmm.

The LAT does wait until late in the piece to quote circulation of 300,000 (#32 in nation). The LAT get 1.2 million, and they are a national paper covering LA which has 10 million plus residents. That means that the OCR which competes with the LAT in OC is getting penetration roughly equivalent to the LAT.

That not too bad considering the number of towns in the OC area, and expanse of area the paper must cover.

Previously on the Island

Have Money, Print News…sorta — beaches, money, media wars on a small scale.
Media is liberal says UCLA - gee, really?
WaPo — can’t live by it’s own rules — of course not
WaPo — corrupt to core — defend the indefensible
USA Today and Photo-gate — it was a mistake. bull.
The Media failed? — well duh.

Tags: orange county, California, los angeles times, media, liberal media, orange county register