I once got the following advice from a Globie: Every now and then, when it's warranted, point out something the paper's done well--and leave it at that. No asterisks, disclaimers, snide asides, etc.

Binyamin Appelbaum's* troubling examination of the housing projects in Barack Obama's former Illinois state senate district, and of Obama's relationships with the developers who've renovated and operated those projects, certainly deserved this treatment. But I didn't laud it when it ran last week--and now, unfortunately, there is a big fat asterisk. According to sources inside the Globe, Appelbaum (who still qualifies as a recent Globe hire) is leaving the paper for the Washington Post.

One Globe staffer who spoke with DQM linked Appelbaum's departure to the Globe's worrisome financial arc. A second disagreed, saying that the Post has had its eye on Appelbaum ever since his coverage of sketchy homebuilder Beazer Homes USA garnered the Charlotte Observer a Polk Award and a Pulitzer-finalist slot. I tried to reach Appelbaum earlier today, but haven't heard back; if I do, and if he's willing to discuss the reasons for his departure, I'll post them here.

UPDATE: "I've accepted a position as the Post's national banking reporter," Appelbaum says via email. "It's an exciting opportunity for me, not a reflection on the Globe. I am in journalism largely because I grew up reading the Globe, and I continue to be inspired by the journalism produced here."

* Not "Applebaum," as I originally (and incorrectly) wrote.

Seriously, have you read McClatchy's big expose on post-9/11 detainees? Because you really should. 

Maybe you thought Barack Obama's fake presidential seal was just a stupid gaffe, kind of like Mitt Romney's podium screw-up back in 2006. But no! It's much, much more than that. Mickey Kaus, take it away:

[T]he faux seal was a disaster not just for the reason I gave (that it suggested Obama is "stuck up"). It also carried this counterproductive connotation: that there is a separate Obama Nation, grown up in opposition to Bush's nation. Obama Nation has its own insignia and its own reality. It is somewhat alarmingly devoted to its leader. And this blue tribe is about to completely conquer the current ruling red tribe. ... Voters didn't much like this kind of revolutionary swagger in the 1960s. They may not like it now.

Whoa.

Even without the Dylan link, that's some wild shit.

In a post yesterday, I implied that the Boston Globe was the first to report the Herald's big upcoming wave of layoffs. In fact, the Boston Business Journal got there first--last Friday, to be precise. My apologies.

That, according to two Globe employees, was one big question raised at the Monday "town meeting" at the paper's Morrissey Boulevard headquarters.

When a possible sale of the Globe by the NYT Co. came up, one employee says, Arthur Sulzberger replied: "As you can imagine, we can't get into that whole thing.... We can't go down that road. That's why CEOs go to jail.... We do face a raft of challenging issues. That's the hand we were dealt." The focus, Sulzberger added, should be on "fixing the Globe and making the Globe the paper it should be...to get the Globe moving on a trajectory that offers growth and stability." Talking about a possible sale is "muddying the waters," he concluded.

Janet Robinson's answer was shorter. "Our focus has to be strengthening our business," she reportedly said. "We must do so in a way that's right for the Globe."

By way of comparison, contrast these non-denials to Robinson's November 2006 response to the Jack Welch/Jack Connors/Joe O'Donnell group.

That's the goal described in the June 18 letter from Globe senior VP Gregory L. Thornton, president of the Boston Newspaper Guild, that officially proposed a 10 percent wage cut for most Globe employees.

"As we shared with you and other union leaders [at a June 3 presentation], despite constant and relentless cost cutting, Globe revenues continue to decline and continue to be less than needed to support the expense load of our current organization," Thornton wrote. "The only way for this newspaper to ameliorate the current financial situation is for us collectively to create a far different and more efficient business model that can continue to produce the award-winning journalism that has taken us into the 21st century. We continue to believe that we should be the newspaper of record in New England and are determined to make the necessary changes to ensure that."

The possibility of a ten-percent wage cut was also discussed at a Monday afternoon "Town Meeting" at Globe HQ that featured Janet Robinson and Arthur Sulzberger. Robinson and Sulzberger apparently fielded questions for an hour, with Globe publisher Steven Ainsley occasionally commenting as well.

According to a Globe staffer who was there, when a mailroom employee asked about the possible cut, Ainsley stressed that nothing had been decided: "It's part of a collective bargaining process," he reportedly said. "There is significant financial pressure. It's not a fact, it's a proposal."

Sulzberger then added: "We have to redefine what it means to be the Boston Globe.... Some of the levers relate to cost. We're trying to do more with less.... We have to redefine what the Boston Globe is in a new universe."

According to a story in today's Boston Herald, Boston Newspaper Guild president Dan Totten is determined to fight Globe management's request for a 10 percent reduction in employee wages."The Boston Newspaper Guild has given enough in the name of company equity," Totten told the Herald. "Globe and New York Times management must now give back."

But an email Totten sent to the BNG's membership earlier this morning suggests that the union's position on the wage cut may still be undecided. Here's what Totten said today:

Dear Colleague:
 
The Globe has requested to reopen our contract for the purpose of seeking a 10% wage cut.
 
Our contract is scheduled to expire on December 31, 2009; it does allow for an economic wage reopener on January 1, 2009.
 
This current request from the Globe is separate from that clause.  The Globe has cited declining revenues as the reason for this emergency request to reopen our contract.
 
The union’s Executive Committee has made no decision on this issue at the moment.  We’re discussing this matter with BNG legal counsel.
 
No decision will be made without discussion and input from our Governing Board.  I urge all members to make your thoughts and opinions known to myself, any BNG executive officer or your delegate.  We will also reach out to you directly, most likely in some combination of General Membership meetings, emails, or small group meetings to hear from you directly.  More information on this matter to come.
 
In closing, I thank you for your patience in what is a very difficult time for all of us.
Please do not hesitate to contact myself, BNG executive officers & delegates as we move forward.
 
In solidarity,
 
Daniel B. Totten

More as it develops, obv. 

Earlier today, the Boston Globe reported that the Boston Herald will be laying off up to 160 people and outsourcing its printing.  But it wasn't clear--at least to me--whether those layoffs would be hit the editorial side or not.

According to Herald editor Kevin Convey, it's the latter. "The answer is, no editorial layoffs--none now and none contemplated," he tells the Phoenix.

Meanwhile, the Boston Business Journal is reporting that the Globe may "consolidat[e]" its own printing operations. “We’re taking a look at consolidation opportunities and we haven’t made any final decisions yet,” spokesman Al Larkin tells the BBJ. No word in that article on how many job cuts this consolidation might entail; there is, however, some additional info on the Herald's plans (as well as a clarification about the editorial layoffs, or lack thereof).

As I narcissistically keep tabs on who's saying what about my story this week--i.e., the one on the old media-new media sportswriting feud--I'm noticing a theme: there's a lot of disagreement out there about what, exactly, "blogs" and "bloggers" are.  By way of example, here's a comment posted to a column by Salon.com's King Kaufman (whom I quoted in the piece, and who returned the favor by writing about it today):

I'm sorry Mr. Kaufman, but I don't consider you a blogger. I think of you as a columnist that is published on the web. You write in complete sentences and paragraphs. Your columns can each be read as an independent entity - you don't have to be in on the joke to understand them fully.

The idea that anything published on the web is a blog is absurd and irrelevant. Good writing is good writing, whether it is chiselled into stone or streamed directly into the readers brain via web 9.0 or some other future technology.

On that last point--"[G]ood writing is good writing, etc."--I wholeheartedly agree. Some of the other stuff, not so much. Who decided, for example, that writing like a grown-up means you're not blogging? Or that writing pieces that stand on their own means the same thing?

To my mind, something's a blog if it's A) published online and B) subjected to less editorial oversight than an article that runs in print (though not necessarily no editorial oversight at all). It's hard to come up with a narrower definition. Most blogs allow comments; some don't. The author's point of view is usually dominant, but not always. Some are self-published by amateurs; some are written by professional journalists for their employer. Some are obscene and juvenile; some are high-minded and esoteric.

That's precisely why anyone who makes blanket statements about what blogs are and aren't risks looking like a jackass. You wouldn't condemn "newspapers" after reading Page Six, or "radio" after listening to Michael Savage. Same deal here.

Godspeed to Boston magazine senior writer John Gonzalez, who's leaving that post to write a sports column for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

It's a great move for Gonzalez, who'll be joining his hometown paper in an extremely high-profile position. But it's a real loss for the Boston media market. When he was on--and he usually was--Gonzalez may have been the most entertaining writer in the city. Consider, for example, some highlights from his August '06 piece on the Herald's Inside Track Gals, which highlighted both Gonzalez's prose skills and his willingness to pick a fight:

In December 2004, in one of the more infamous public floggings in recent memory, the Gals announced that longtime Channel 4 sports anchor Bob Lobel was having an affair “with a woman some 20 years younger.” The item also gleefully informed us that Lobel’s third marriage and his career were in jeopardy (if they weren’t already, they probably were after the item appeared). The fact that the Gals and Lobel share the same agent apparently wasn’t enough to squash the story. “It was too good not to print,” says a source. “He’s a household name.” The same source adds that it was Lobel’s failure to make sufficient deposits in the Track’s favor bank that made him a target. “If he had helped them before, maybe they wouldn’t have burned him. See the difference? If you’re not doing favors for them, if you’re not on their good side, you’re fucked.”

Lobel won’t talk about the incident. Johnny Damon’s wife, Michelle, a long-time Track whipping girl, also declines to comment. Sports reporter Hazel Mae—the subject of a recent blind item in the Track about her giving pet names to her breasts—isn’t speaking either. To openly challenge the Track, after all, might inspire the Gals to don their brass knuckles and throw down.

To wit: When I first began reporting this story, I received multiple phone calls saying the Gals were on to me. Before I’d written a word, my boss had received four calls, one of them to inform him that I’m “a punk.” Restaurant owner Joe Cimino sent a letter to this magazine, insisting his name not appear in the article. Before long, disparaging comments about my loyalty to Boston magazine started seeping into our office. (If you see me panhandling outside Store 24, drop something in my cup.) George Regan, one of the Gals’ PR buddies (who, incidentally, represents BoMag and the Herald), asked me to come down to his gym to “settle this.” He also issued a fatwa against me, sending out a companywide directive that no one at his firm talk to me. Ever. (Regan confirms he sent the memo “with pride,” before announcing that any employee who does talk to me will be out of a job.)

In person, the Gals are quite amiable. They’re quick with a joke and chatty when it suits them. When I ask if they have any regrets about what they’ve written, though, they almost laugh me out of the room. But then, hardened cynicism is to the professional gossip what makeup is to the rodeo clown—which is why the Gals often play up their mean streak. “We’ve gone to events where we know we’re two skunks at a garden party,” Raposa says. “There are some people out there who don’t like us—and with good reason.”

Excellent.

Boston magazine now has some pretty big holes to fill: in addition to Gonzalez, DQM hears that John Wolfson, one of BoMag's three senior editors, is leaving as well.

As for Gonzalez, perhaps you're wondering: any connection between his sudden departure and his simmering feud with Globe metro columnist Kevin Cullen? He insists the answer's no. "You know what?" Gonzalez says. "If Kevin Cullen could chase anybody out of town, he'd be that much better. Just kidding, Kevin! Call me!" 

In which I analyze the animosity between old-media sportswriters and their new-media counterparts--and argue that a truce might just be in the offing.  

This may be obvious to some users, but it wasn't to me: to comment with this new blog engine of ours, you need to scroll down to the lower-right-hand corner of the post and click on "with no comments" (or "with one comment," etc.). You'll then be taken to a comment screen where you can speak your peace.  

As you've probably noticed, there's some serious blog flux going on over at Phoenix HQ. The good news is that, if you're reading this, you've found the new Web home of Don't Quote Me, nee Media Log. Also, after disappearing for a few days, the last few months of posts have returned.

Now for the bad news. DQM's fancy new logo--which had been visible over the last few days at the old URL, thephoenix.com/medialog, but isn't any longer--has yet to make its way to the new URL (i.e., thephoenix.com/blogs/dontquoteme, where you are now). In addition, while the AWOL posts have resurfaced, the comments to those posts are still missing. But they should materialize soon. I think.

Confused? You and me both, pal. So let's move on to another topic. Did anyone else notice the message emblazoned on the shirt of the woman depicted in the Globe's "On My Mind" feature yesterday?

That message--which is a little easier to see here--seems to be, "Cops are no pigs. Pigs are much more civil!"

The weirdest thing isn't that the Globe published the pic in question. It's that, when the woman (Clara Hendricks) explained what was "on her mind" at the time, she didn't mention anything police-related. Instead, she offered this:

This morning was the first time that my previously neglected, very shy guinea pig let me hold her. It was a really beautiful moment and it just made me so happy that in the last couple months she has gotten this comfortable with me.

Good to know, I suppose.

Thanks to the various readers who've noted the disappareance of a few months of Don't Quote Me content.

But fret not! I have it on good authority that said content isn't gone for good; instead, it's apparently in some sort of Internet limbo, and will be re-appearing before too long. 

Last summer, Slate's Jack Shafer wrote a very funny column about Russia: Beyond the Headlines, a cheesy newspaper-style advertising supplement that ran in the Washington Post and was packed with Soviet-style propaganda.

Judging from the inaugural issue of Moscow Open City, which arrived at the Phoenix earlier this week, not enough people in the Russian P.R. world read Shafer's piece. MOC, which was founded by Moscow's Committee for Telecommunications and Mass Media, is a visually beautiful publication. But it's packed with tendentious, grammatically tortured, utterly laughable prose. Not only is it not an improvement over RBH; it actually seems to be worse.

Take the editor's note (please!):

Dmitry Medvedev has become the youngest Russian leader (if one is not to take into account inborn rulers of the Russian Empire.)

As many as 71% of Muscovites, who will always express their discontent for any given reason, voted for the new President. This confirms that Medvedev is good for much better than any polls.

This raises two questions: 1) Huh?; and 2) Didn't Medvedev win because he was the handpicked successor of Vladimir Putin, who's used intimidation and violence to turn Russia into a one-party dictatorship?

Nyet!, says the magazine's first article. "The new Russian President won his election campaign as early as the first round," this (unbylined) piece explains. "However, it was not because the powerful state machinery backed him up. He promised to follow the same course the country had been developing for the previous eight years. His victory became a sort of national referendum." There you have it.

The aforementioned article is titled "Power does not exist for itself: Theses from the Winner's Election Program." Awkward and Marxist-sounding, to be sure--but it positively rolls off the tongue compared to some of the other titles in MOC. My favorites:

Who is Mr. Medvedev? By the way, many people do not think that this question which many observers asked when Putin came to power is actual anymore

Goujon the Frantic: There was no figure amongst the Moscow merchants more picturesque than the owner of the metallurgic plant Yuliy Goujon

Mercedes for the price of one coin: Do you think it is impossible? You are wrong!

And, my personal favorite:

The land flowing with milk and honey: Horned creatures from abroad yield tasty milk. Each Muscovite can make sure of this soon

Now, I'll admit that my Russian-language skills are nonexistent. But I have studied a couple of foreign tongues in my time, and I wouldn't dream of writing for a non-English-speaking audience without enlisting a native to smooth out my shitty prose. The powers behind Moscow Open City obviously have plenty of money to spend. Before the next issue rolls off the presses, I'd suggest they find a good proofreader--who grew up speaking English.

Big loss for the Boston Herald: Casey Ross, who's done a fine job covering the State House for the past year and half, is leaving that paper to join the Globe.

The Herald-to-Globe path is pretty well worn: current Globe staffers who've followed it include metro columnist Kevin Cullen, magazine writer Charlie Pierce, and legal reporter Shelley Murphy. That said, given the Herald's already-anemic staffing--and the lingering effects of Tomase-gate--this is a real setback for the tabloid.

UPDATE: Caleb Solomon, the Globe's managing editor for news, says Ross "will be covering commercial real estate and the nexus of business and politics"--which suggests he'll be a sort of Tom Palmer-Steve Bailey hybrid. "It's a great job, and he's really well suited to it," Solmon adds. Also, Boston Daily's Amy Derjue reports that Hillary Chabot will replace Ross as the Herald's State House bureau chief.

A few weeks back, I urged the political press to pursue 10 John McCain stories--including the dissolution of his first marriage and its implications for the McCain Myth.

This story from Britain's Mail on Sunday does exactly that. The whole piece is worth reading, but here's a lengthy excerpt:

McCain likes to illustrate his moral fibre by referring to his five years as a prisoner-of-war in Vietnam. And to demonstrate his commitment to family values, the 71-year-old former US Navy pilot pays warm tribute to his beautiful blonde wife, Cindy, with whom he has four children.

But there is another Mrs McCain who casts a ghostly shadow over the Senator’s presidential campaign. She is seldom seen and rarely written about, despite being mother to McCain’s three eldest children....

She was the woman McCain dreamed of during his long incarceration and torture in Vietnam’s infamous ‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison and the woman who faithfully stayed at home looking after the children and waiting anxiously for news.

But when McCain returned to America in 1973 to a fanfare of publicity and a handshake from Richard Nixon, he discovered his wife had been disfigured in a terrible car crash three years earlier. Her car had skidded on icy roads into a telegraph pole on Christmas Eve, 1969. Her pelvis and one arm were shattered by the impact and she suffered massive internal injuries.

When Carol was discharged from hospital after six months of life-saving surgery, the prognosis was bleak. In order to save her legs, surgeons had been forced to cut away huge sections of shattered bone, taking with it her tall, willowy figure. She was confined to a wheelchair and was forced to use a catheter.

Through sheer hard work, Carol learned to walk again. But when John McCain came home from Vietnam, she had gained a lot of weight and bore little resemblance to her old self....

After her first series of life-saving operations, Carol was told she may never walk again, but when doctors said they would try to get word to McCain about her injuries, she refused, insisting: ‘He’s got enough problems, I don’t want to tell him.’....

Carol remained resolutely loyal as McCain’s political star rose. She says she agreed to talk to The Mail on Sunday only because she wanted to publicise her support for the man who abandoned her.

Indeed, the old Mercedes that she uses to run errands displays both a disabled badge and a sticker encouraging people to vote for her ex-husband. ‘He’s a good guy,’ she assured us. ‘We are still good friends. He is the best man for president.’

But Ross Perot, who paid her medical bills all those years ago, now believes that both Carol McCain and the American people have been taken in by a man who is unusually slick and cruel – even by the standards of modern politics.

‘McCain is the classic opportunist. He’s always reaching for attention and glory,’ he said.

‘After he came home, Carol walked with a limp. So he threw her over for a poster girl with big money from Arizona. And the rest is history.’

Today, the New York Daily News considers the subject as well--and some readers aren't happy. "As an Obama supporter, I just want to say one thing... Who cares," writes one online commenter. "A divorce is a divorce."

Here's the problem: As the Mail on Sunday's story reminds us, McCain goes further than most politicians in casting himself as a moral exemplar. (Just look at the books he's written.) And this, in turn, makes it completely fair for the media to examine whether this self-description holds up.

[Via Gawker]

Granted, today's Sidekick centerpiece is a lite little affair aimed at updating the rivalry between Boston and Los Angeles. But it still seems weird that the first thing Mark Shanahan cites in Boston's favor is...Whitey Bulger.

Here's Shanahan's homage:

All of the great LA gansters--guys with noir names like Mickey Cohen, Jack Dragna, and Jimmy "The Weasel" Fratianno--are long dead. But Boston bad guy Bulger is still at large, so turn your eyes east, James Ellroy. It's been entertaining to watch the Energizer bunny of the underworld outrun the feds and pop up periodically in Europe with his platinum pal Catherine Greig. We'll be looking for these two fugitives amid all the celebs at the Staples Center.

You do that, Mark. In the meantime, here--courtesy of the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list--is a quick reminder of why the word "entertaining" should be used sparingly where Bulger is concerned:

James J. Bulger is being sought for his role in numerous murders committed from the early 1970s through the mid-1980s in connection with his leadership of an organized crime group that allegedly controlled extortion, drug deals, and other illegal activities in the Boston, Massachusetts, area. He has a violent temper and is known to carry a knife at all times. Considered armed and extremely dangerous.

 But hey, he's our gangster.

--Tony Massarotti: he made a heroic return from injury. 

--Basketbawful: he got freaked out and then realized he was actually okay. 

--Bill Simmons: maybe that, or maybe he was genuinely hurt, but whatever. 

--Bill Plaschke: he's a shameless exaggerator.

--Jalen Rose: ditto (click "NBA Finals" and "Paul Pierce: Hurt or Injured?")

Let me be clear: right now, I wouldn't want State Senator Jim Marzilli within 100 feet of any female family members or friend.

Having said that, I'm struck by the fact that there's almost no media discussion of the fact that Marzilli's ongoing implosion could be linked to a serious mental problem. Jim Braude alluded to this possibility on his WTKK show today; Howie Carr mocked it in today's column; and there's an ongoing discussion at Blue Mass. Group. But as far as I know, that's about it.

The thing is, it's such an obvious angle to explore. Here, for example, is a relevant section of the Merck Manual's description of mania, which usually occurs as a symptom of manic depression:

The person may believe he is being assisted or persecuted by others or have hallucinations, hearing and seeing things that are not there. The need for sleep decreases. A manic person is inexhaustibly, excessively, and impulsively involved in various activities (such as risky business endeavors, gambling, or perilous sexual behavior) without recognizing the inherent social dangers. In extreme cases, mental and physical activity is so frenzied that any clear link between mood and behavior is lost in a kind of senseless agitation (delirious mania). Immediate treatment is then required, because the person may die of sheer physical exhaustion. In less severe mania, hospitalization may be needed during periods of overactivity to protect the person and his family from ruinous financial or sexual behavior. [emph. added]

It's possible, of course, that Marzilli is simply a loutish jerk. But his behavior--which is indefensible, period--could also stem from a genuine, serious psychological condition. And this bears mentioning.

P.S.--Before any conservative readers ask the question: yes, I'd be making this same point if Marzilli weren't a lefty.

As an obsessive reader of TrueHoop, ESPN's fine basketball blog, I was somewhat dismayed by author Henry Abbott's initial response to Boston:

Anyone who has lived in New York, I suspect, finds Boston to be unbelievably ... tidy. New York is a city where respectable upper class people have favorite graffiti artists. It's also a place where you can hardly go a block without hearing an epithet or two. It's salty. It's grimey. (I once heard some comedian say that New York is the only city in the world where you have to say "Hey, that's mine. Don't pee on that.") I'm sure Boston is like that to some degree too ... it's still life ... but I have been here about 24 hours, but I drove around a little last night, through a dozen different neighborhoods. In every one of them everything seemed so tidy. I guess you'd call it gentrifed, but I'm not sure it was ever not like this. Just about everyone I saw seemed to have on something plaid, or something khaki, or most likely both. Here's some video I shot out the car window of a typical Boston street scene.

Okay, the video thing is pretty funny. But it seems pretty clear that Abbott needs to expand his horizons while he's in town for the NBA finals. (Also, the video reminds me a whole lot of Manhattan, but that's another topic.)

I've already told Abbott he should head to Roxbury for a Speed's hot dog. I'd also suggest grabbing a beer at Sligo in Davis Square, or JJ Foley's in the South End, and maybe just hanging around Boston Common after dark.

Now, though, I'm looking for a few more destinations that'll broaden Abbott's mind and preserve Boston's honor. So, readers: what other destinations should be on Abbott's list?

In which I explore the press's muted coverage of a possible attack on that country.