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There seems to be an interesting rule of thumb lately in the newspaper business. Whenever a publisher delivers a pep talk about how well they are doing or about their future plans for improvement, it always signals bad news in the near future. And the more fervent the pep talk, the steeper the circulation plunge. This certainly has proved true with the Miami Herald. Here is a video from late March of the Herald publisher, David Landberg, boldly promising better things in the future for that ailing newspaper: We've all been dealing with a pretty steady diet of difficult financial...

The Miami Herald finally has added not one, but two, conservative columnists, and in the second month of the change I judge it a resounding success. This doesn't mean that I agree with Jackie Bueno Sousa and Glenn Garvin, but that they have brought interesting, lively points of view that represent the sensibilities of large parts of South Florida's readership -- and challenge the rest. ''A true conservative is not afraid of the reaction to the truth,'' wrote reader Jaime Basagoitia in welcoming them. But no opinion would be appropriate without an opposing one. Reader Scott J. Siegel wrote, in...

Want to know what is going on in Cuba? Well, the Miami Herald is feeding its readers propaganda printouts from the Communist government's Cuban News Agency (ACN) and passing it off as legitimate news. What also makes this practice especially insidious is that the pages on which these stories appear makes it seem as if they are Associated Press stories (AP). Note the prominent capitalized "AP" in the URL of the Herald's most recent ACN story: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/cuba/AP/story/969447.html. And despite that "AP" this is not an AP story. It is strictly a copy and paste story from ACN or, more accurately,...

Remember Baghdad Bob? He was the Iraqi press spokesmen who caused much amusement in the West because of his unrealistically upbeat pronouncements when Iraq was invaded by the United States and its allies in 2003. Among Baghdad Bob's funnier announcements was his declaration that no Americans were in Baghdad at the same moment when American troops were patrolling the streets of that city just a few hundred yards from where he was holding that press conference. Well, the newspaper industry has its own Baghdad Bob in the form of McClatchy CEO, Gary Pruitt, who in early 2007 gave his own...

The McClatchy Co., burdened by debt and a steep slide in newspaper advertising, wants to sell one of its most prized properties, The Miami Herald, according to people briefed on the company's plans. McClatchy, the nation's third-largest newspaper chain, has approached potential buyers for The Herald, said these people. But they said they knew of no serious offers for the paper, reflecting the evaporation of major investors' interest in buying newspapers. The company refused to discuss the matter. Elaine Lintecum, the treasurer, said, "We do not comment on market rumors."

The Dallas Morning News endorsed McCain on Oct. 18

Perhaps it is time for the remaining Miami Herald employees to break out the Santeria rooster once again. Just three months after announcing job cutbacks in June, the Miami Herald has just announced that it is axing another 119 employees (emphasis mine): Three months after announcing plans to trim 250 jobs, the Miami Herald Media Co. said Tuesday it is cutting another 119 positions, or about 10 percent of the remaining workforce.Eighty full- and part-time employees will leave the company, while other, vacant jobs will be eliminated, Miami Herald President and Publisher David Landsberg said.

Miami Herald Publisher David Landsberg announced in an email to employees this afternoon that the newspaper is cutting 119 jobs in what amounts to the third round of buyouts, according to two newsroom sources. The cuts are being made across the McClatchy Company, which in total is slashing 1150 positions across the chain. Landsberg's explanation to employees, issued today at about 4:30 p.m., was dictated to the Pulp by one reporter. "Today we are announcing plans to reduce our worforce by 119 full-time equivalents, or about 10 percent of all employees," Landsberg wrote. "About 80 full-time and part-time employees will...

If you are wondering why the stories in your local newspapers are starting to look so similar to other newspapers, it might be because they are following the new business model of South Florida newspapers: eliminating competition. All the major South Florida newspapers, Miami Herald, Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel (now called SunSentinel), and Palm Beach Post have had big staff cutbacks recently. So who is left to cover the news? The skeleton crews still working at the newspapers don't have the capability so they came up with a solution: pool their resources and share their stories. A story in Friday's Sun-Sentinel,...

Can anybody out there figure out whom "undecided" Miami Herald columnist Myriam Marquez will ultimately vote for in the November election? Gee. It is really tough to figure it out but perhaps we can investigate a few elusive clues starting with the title of her column, "McCain must move past old Bush mantra." Hmm... Not enough information there. Perhaps we can discover Marquez's preference by analyzing her column which discusses the appearences of both candidates at the VFW convention in Orlando. First the money quote from Ms Marquez: Still on the fence, like so many other undecided Americans, I'm hoping to see McCain...

The Miami Herald has reacted to charges that one of its opinion page contributors was a Cuban espionage agent with an article that is both low in substance and high in anger. The background to this story, about how the media is using "expert" analysis from professors identified by the U.S. government as Cuban spies, was reported last Tuesday in NewsBusters by Lynn Davidson. This is Davidson's description of that Herald opinion page contributor: Marifeli Perez-Stable is a Florida International University sociology professor, a Council on Foreign Relations member and a media darling who sees Cuba in a “different light.” She contributes to the Miami...

Take a look at this VIDEO of a Santeria replica rooster at the Miami Herald. The Miami Herald employees turned to a replica rooster sanctioned by a Santeria priest in the hope that they would be spared large job cutbacks. You can read details about this over at NEWSBUSTERS. Bottom line is that the replica rooster did not work as you can see from this Miami Herald ARTICLE titled, "Miami Herald to reduce its staff by 250," that was posted earlier today by John Dorschner. See, here's the deal. If you are going to invoke Santeria, you're just going...

Miami Herald employees, worried about retaining their jobs due to severe cutbacks in the newspaper industry, have now looked to a Santeria 'rooster' (photo) for help. The rooster is actually a life sized replica with a note attached that says: Brought in by a Santeria priest (the real deal from Hialeah) to help save our jobs. Leave an offering. The rooster and the offerings were placed on a fifth floor counter last Thursday facing an elevator bank in the Herald building in Miami. Among the offerings placed on the counter by the end of that work day were coins, cigars,...

It often seems to be the attitude of the MSM to marginalize Republicans as some sort of square alien creatures who are not really hip like the rest of us...meaning Democrats. Such was the assumption of Miami Herald columnist, Beth Reinhard, when she began My search for cool among Republicans. Her search was inspired by a Sunglass Hut billboard in South Forida that suggests that even Republicans could look hip with the right shades: The good-looking hipster with the slicked back, slightly mussed hair looks out from his dark shades.''He's a Republican,'' reads the billboard spotted around South Florida in recent weeks. ``But...

The night started like many for John Lovell, a 71-year-old ex-Marine and helicopter pilot who served two presidents. Late dinner alone at a Plantation Subway shop -- veggie sub, soda, oatmeal cookie. Wednesday night, though, Lovell's meal was interrupted by an armed robbery. Two gunmen stormed into the sandwich shop at about 11 p.m., robbed the cashier and tried to shove Lovell -- the lone customer -- into the bathroom. Two bullets later, one gunman was dead, another was wounded and Lovell was being hailed as a hero. ''There's no such thing as an ex-Marine, and he typifies this,'' said...

Great going, Miami Herald. There's a really "unbiased" article title for you, Want storm info? Fire gasbag Limbaugh, WIOD told. This is why I am using the "unbiased" Newsweek cover photo above of a sinister looking Rush Limbaugh with smoke curling up (photoshopped?) over his face asking, "Is Rush Limbaugh Good For America?" And in case the there were any completely CLUELESS readers out there, Newsweek conveniently tells you what they think the answer should be with this addition to the title: "Talk radio is only the beginning. Electronic populism threatens to short-circuit representative democracy." Well, I have a...

CHICAGO The Mexico edition of The Miami Herald, Mexico City's only English-language daily, is folding on June 1, the paper announced. "Unfortunately due to economic considerations the paper will close until further notice," the paper said in a note to readers. There was no further information on the shuttering. The paper was launched four years ago in a partnership with the big Mexico City daily El Universal. It was not clear who made the decision to pull the plug on the Herald. A McClatchy Co. spokesperson said he had no information on that. Officials involved with the newspaper at the...

MIAMI, Nov 24 (Reuters) - A man possibly carrying a machine gun entered the headquarters of the Miami Herald newspaper on Friday, forcing some workers to evacuate the bayfront building in downtown Miami, police and newspaper officials said. The man, who was wearing camouflage, was identified by Herald employees as Jose Varela, a cartoonist who had worked for the Herald's Spanish-language sister publication, El Nuevo Herald. "We believe he's armed with what the security guard is describing as a machine gun," Miami Police spokesman Delrish Moss told CNN. No one was was being held hostage and no shots had been...

MIAMI — An man claiming to be armed entered The Miami Herald building on Friday, causing the evacuation of employees from the newspaper's offices on the sixth floor. Herald employees identified the man as El Nuevo Herald cartoonist Jose Varela, according to newspaper. Some news reports say the man is armed with a shotgun. Police were on the scene and set up a perimeter around the downtown Miami building that houses The Miami Herald and its Spanish-language publication El Nuevo Herald. It was not immediately known if there were injuries or hostages in the building. It was not immediately known...

LAT tops in circ drop Among big-city newspapers, only the Miami Herald (8.8%) lost a bigger percentage of its daily readers than the Los Angeles Times (8%) in today's new numbers. The Times, of course, led in raw numbers of readers lost with a daily circulation now of 775,766. Remember that it's only since Tribune took over that the daily count fell below a million, and the last pre-Tribune CEO, Mark Willes, even talked boldly (some might say insanely) about going for two million. Instead, daily circulation is now far below the national big boys: Wall Street Journal, USA Today...