Miami Herald federal courts reporter Jay Weaver...
The Miami Herald's federal courts maven Jay Weaver penned a short item for today's paper on the selection of former U.S. attorney Kendall Coffey to a "statewide commission in charge of recommending candidates for top federal prosecutor jobs and judgeships."
Kendall CoffeyBut nowhere in the story does Weaver mention Coffey's resignation in 1996 as U.S. attorney after a run-in with a stripper named "Tiffany.""Ejected from [a strip] club after his failed attempt to kiss the stripper ended with him biting her instead, he used a credit card to pay the $900 bill. Later he sent his father to the bar to buy the credit-card slip back at a premium price of $1,200, which tipped the irate stripper and her even-more-irate husband off that they'd been dealing with someone anxious to conceal his identity. Their complaints eventually attracted an investigators from the office of the U.S. Justice Department's inspector general, and Coffey was soon toast."
Questionable behavior and attempts to cover it up which got him thrown out of the U.S. attorney's office; Yup, that's the kind of guy we want picking our judges and prosecutors!
As with many online Herald stories, you can only get the full story by reading the reader comments.
C'mon Jay, you can do better than that!
Kyle Munzenrieder at Miami New Times is reporting that the Miami Sun Post is out of business.
We're not surprised. We reported back in August of last year that things were looking grim for the weekly paper. Back then checks were bouncing, names were disappearing from the masthead and the paper had slimmed down to 32 pages an issue.
Still no confirmation on this from anyone at the Sun Post but a disconnected phone is not a good sign!
Photograph by Todd Heisler/Rocky Mountain NewsFrom yesterday's NY Times:By ELISABETH BUMILLER
WASHINGTON — In a reversal of an 18-year-old military policy that critics said was hiding the ultimate cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the news media will now be allowed to photograph the coffins of America’s war dead as their bodies are returned to the United States, but only if the families of the dead agree.
The story goes on to say that defense secretary Robert Gates was “ 'never comfortable' with the ban, [and] tried to have it overturned a year ago. But he said he encountered resistance in the Pentagon, and so he 'demurred.' ”
Some want the ban kept in place.
In 2005, a newspaper photographer and reporter "chronicled a year in the life of Major Steve Beck, a Marine casualty assistance officer, as he guided several families through the grief and ritual of saying goodbye to loved ones lost in Iraq." They were awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2006 for their work.
The images, in my opinion, are some of the most searing, powerful and dignified photographs ever published in a newspaper.
You can read the story here and see the images here.
The reporter who wrote the story was Jim Sheeler and the photographer was Todd Heisler.
Both worked for the Rocky Mountain News, which published its final edition today after serving Denver for 150 years.
Back on Jan. 6 I asked why the Herald was ignoring South Florida bloggers.
I know that many people at the Herald read my blog.
But just to make sure my question didn't go unread I sent a link to my post to the Herald's Rick Hirsch who is the Herald's Senior Editor for Multimedia.
The next day Rick sent me an e-mail asking if I'd like to meet him for coffee to discuss a few things they were working on.
Apparently I was reading some one's mind at the Herald when I made my Jan. 6 post.
When we met Rick informed me that they were moving ahead with adding a blog aggregator feature to the Herald's website that would look something like this page on the website of the Knoxville (Tenn.) News.
I asked Rick if it would be OK to post the news but he told me they were still working out the details.
A few weeks later I asked him for a progress report and he told me they were still working on contract specifics and set up.
Well, this morning we get word from the other Rick at SFDB the the Sun-Sentinel has rolled out a feature called the "Blog of the Day." And it looks like the Sun-Sentinel is putting together the "Ultimate South Florida Blogroll."
I've always liked some of the features of the Sun-Sentinel's website so I'm looking forward to seeing how this shapes up.
In the meantime I dropped Rick Hirsch at the Herald another note and asked him how the aggregator was coming along.
He responds:"Thanks, Bill. Still moving forward on the blog exchange, by the way. really is going to happen."
To be fair, the people at the Herald have a lot on their plate.
Parent company McClatchy has ordered another round of company-wide cuts and many Herald staffers are just waiting for the other shoe to drop.
So blogs and blogging probably aren't at the top of their list of concerns right now.
...
UPDATE: In what some may call a natural extension of blogging, the NY Times is launching two websites Monday that will feature "local citizen journalism."
Bloggers or citzen journalists. Doesn't seem like there's a whole lot of difference to me!
Apparently overthrowing a dictatorial tyrant, while satisfying, doesn't pay a whole lot!
Val Prieto at Babalublog.com shares a tale of woe with his loyal readers. Seems his trusty Nissan Pathfinder just refused to start one day. Also seems that Val wasn't exactly flush with cash.
But leave it to his homeboy Roger at Sierra Auto Service - 3695 SW 7th St. **thankyouverymuch** - to come to the rescue!
Val saves the best for last. Seems he's so broke he can't afford a haircut either!"Oh, and just above that new ad [for Sierra Auto Service] is the donation button, please consider dropping a few bucks in the old till. It would sure help me out right now to be able to afford stuff like, say, a haircut. I haven't had one since December and I'm looking a lot like Link from the Mod Squad."
I admire Val's desire to rid Cuba of Fidel, but I doubt that donating to Babalublog is going to do much to hasten his demise.
In Val's world it's OK to donate money so he can get a haircut but just don't send any of that money to Cuba or you'll be branded as a loser!
But here's a thought. Why not stop getting your hair cut until Fidel dies? Or just try Supercuts! Only 15 bucks!
In any event Val - in the words of Bill Clinton - "I feel your pain!" Literally.
...wasn't written by a Herald staffer.
Channel 10's Michael Putney - who wrote for the Herald in the 70's and 80's - pens a column today that proves he's still got game.
Putney looks at the riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma that is Gov. Charlie Crist.
Putney told me by phone today that he decided to write the column after interviewing the governor last week. "It dawned on me that even though I've known Crist for 20 years, I really don't know him," said Putney.
One thing you can always count on when you read a Putney column is that he'll throw in a few of those 50-cent words that make you run for the dictionary. Today's word: éminence grise.
Some of my favorite lines:
"He's also eternally cheerful and almost depressingly optimistic."
"His glass is not just half-full; it's always two-thirds full..."
"Is Charlie the genuinely concerned Republican moderate/populist he professes to be (``I work for the people, they're my boss'')? Or is he a slightly ditzy, disconnected lightweight who has succeeded on the strength of great political instincts..."
"And yet I'm not sure I really know him. He is at once ubiquitous and hard to pin down, simultaneously transparent and opaque. He seems to be exactly what he appears to be, but then will disappear for a moment into an otherness that's hard to pierce."
