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22 October 2009

The Chron Caucasian Think Tank's rough couple of days

The Chronicle's Caucasian Think Tank has had an erratic few days (maybe that should be, "even more erratic than usual").

Yesterday, they came out in favor of Mayor Bill White's Veterinarian Shakedown Revenue Stream.

That's hardly surprising, since the CCTT is frequently a cheerleader for Mayor White. But check out the error in this graf:

[T]he Bureau of Animal Regulation and Care has been overwhelmed by the number of abandoned and abused pets, with its primary business being the gassing of thousands of animals a year. Lack of a dedicated funding source has contributed to substandard and inhumane holding facilities.

BARC is certainly a hellhole (whose hellishness endured through Mayor White's three terms), but it does not gas animals. They are killed by lethal injection. Thousands and thousands.

While the lack of a dedicated funding source may have contributed to BARC's problems, we question whether it is the job of our area's doctors of veterinary medicine to act as the city's revenue collection agency. We think they have trained for much more important work.

On the other hand, Mayor White has shown he can be very effective at raising money for his priorities. Take a look at ~~the Marvy Finger Park~~ Discovery Green and all the funding that Mayor White has secured. Or take a look at all the money he's raised for his U.S. Senate campaign while moonlighting as Houston's mayor this year. If funding BARC had been a priority for Mayor White, he surely would have found the cash. Leave it to the CCTT to blame veterinarians instead of Mayor White for BARC's enduring problems!

The CCTT apparently is also confused about geography and political subdivisions. In an editorial today, they duplicated the gaffes on Chron.com last night:

After a 10-day span without a murder reported in the city that once made headlines as the murder capital of the country, a woman's body was discovered north of downtown Houston Wednesday with a bullet wound in the head.

If the death is ruled a murder, it would end a moratorium that had cops and police reporters searching their memory banks for any comparable murder hiatus. Harris County is still enjoying its grace period, with no murders reported by the Sheriff's Department for more than a month.

The last time we checked, north of downtown Houston was part of Harris County. So if the death is a murder, Harris County is no longer enjoying a murder-free period.

The CCTT may have meant to refer to unincorporated Harris County, but that's not what they wrote.

And finally, Texas Watchdog broke an interesting story today on controller candidate Ron Green's back-tax problem. Texas Watchdog used public documents available to anyone for their reporting. Apparently, the CCTT, which endorsed Green, either missed that issue during their vetting, or didn't think it important enough to mention.

Are there any actual copy editors, fact-checkers, or researchers still employed at 801 Texas Avenue, and do they ever check the work of the CCTT?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/22/09 09:56 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

15 October 2009

Are there any editors left at the local newspaper?

Yesterday, the Chron ran one of its most amusing corrections since the latest recipe debacle:

A story about funding for a segment of the Grand Parkway on Page B1 Saturday misspelled the name of the chair of the Citizens Transportation Coalition, an advocacy group. She is Robin Holzer.

The newspaper only seems to have the same three or four sources on mobility issues. It's sad when they can't even get those limited, go-to sources right.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/15/09 07:44 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

07 October 2009

Chronically out of touch (the "well-off endowment fund manager" edition)

A few months ago, the Chronicle ran a story about how tough government has it in these rough economic times.

It was one of those stories for and of the newspaper's sources -- and of little use or interest to the poor guy trying to pay his mortgage, or find a new job, or pay for his kid's college, etc. The sorts of people who actually purchase the newspaper, in other words.

Yesterday, the Chronicle had another one of those stories for and of the newspaper's sources -- this time focusing on how tough these uncertain economic times have been on university endowments.

We hear from Scott Wise (identified by the Chron as "the president of Rice Management Co., the investment arm of Rice University"). We hear from Carl Carlucci (identified as UH's executive vice chancellor for administration and finance). We hear from Kevin Hegarty (identified as UT-Austin's vice president and chief financial officer). We hear from Bruce Zimmerman (identified as "chief executive of the University of Texas Investment Management Co., which manages investments for all UT system schools and for the Permanent University Fund"). And finally, we hear from Ken Rudd (identified as the director of research and policy analysis for The National Association of College and University Business Officers).

We don't hear from anyone who explains what exactly these tanking endowments mean in terms of potential cutbacks at universities (or, more likely, tuition and fee increases). We don't hear from the working mom wondering why the Chronicle is asking her to feel bad about tanking endowments when her kid's tuition has skyrocketed every year thanks to deregulation. We don't hear from the student who has had to attend the local community college this year, because the big university has gotten too expensive. In short, we don't hear from anyone who might make this story more human, and less about the higher-ups at big Texas universities.

Why did anyone at the Chronicle think this half-finished, dull story was front-page material?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/07/09 09:07 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

05 October 2009

Area transportation gets the ChronDiary treatment

We frequently refer to the Chronicle's junior metro/state columnist as a diarist, because so many of her columns resemble the personal diary of a teenager.

Unfortunately, that style of "journalism" seems to be spreading at the ever-shrinking newspaper.

Last Monday, the Chronicle's transportation column (hereafter to be known as the transportation diary) began as follows:

I shudder when I recall the "distracted driving" behaviors I engaged in as a 16-year-old in suburban St. Louis.

I would often eat a bagel as I sped (late) to school. In a stick-shift car. I remember applying mascara in the rearview mirror. I hope I only did this while at a stoplight, but I can't say for sure.

Once I ran a red light while chatting intently with a friend in the passenger seat. Luckily, no one was crossing. A collision could have been deadly.

And here's the start of this week's transportation diary:

I'll quit tomorrow.

Isn't that what smokers sometimes say? I recently chatted with a woman who was "getting ready" to quit when she began her vacation. She told me this while puffing away during a coffee break.

I felt like that this week. I couldn't break my cell phone habits in the car. Today is the start of "Heads Up Driving Week," and I've pledged to turn off the phone while behind the wheel. So I thought I'd practice last week, get ready for the Big Unplug.

If all this column is going to be is a personal diary and a vehicle to quote Christof Spieler/Robin Holzer* ad nauseam, wouldn't the newspaper be better off killing the thing and redeploying the news resources? Wouldn't readers be, as well?

Dear Diary image by flickr user incurable hippie, used via a Creative Commons license.

01 October 2009

Chron's multipurpose muni reporter travels state with Senate Candidate White

The Chronicle's Bradley Olson traveled with Senate Candidate Bill White outside of Houston recently, and reports on the experience here.

For those keeping score at home, that means Olson now seems to be manning the Senate Candidate White, City Hall, municipal elections, court report, and boat rescue beats for the Chronicle.

Jeff Cohen may want to get this guy some help at some point, before he collapses in a hard-working heap!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/01/09 09:10 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (7)

22 September 2009

Chronicle is (quietly) looking for some reporters

We've been hearing rumors from journalist friends attending conferences that the Houston Chronicle has been quietly advertising some jobs for a while now, but hadn't been able to track down anything concrete (the Chron "reader rep" doesn't answer our emails, which makes it hard to get questions answered).

Until yesterday, that is. Chron business editor Tara Young was tweeting about attending a seminar with other journalists, and announced:

Folks were surprised to hear that the Houston Chronicle is hiring. But it's true! We need: an oil and gas, a county and a political writer!

All of the people laid off in March must be heartened to know that the Chronicle is in growth mode again.

Come to think of it, maybe THAT is why the positions aren't showing up on JournalismJobs.com!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 09/22/09 09:51 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (4)

14 September 2009

Chron editorial board struggles with basic facts (again), should have just linked to local blogs

The Chronicle's Caucasian Think Tank* had a few problems in their one editorial in today's tiny newspaper.

The trouble starts with the lede:

Houston Community College Board Chairman Abel Davila pulled one of the more dramatic no-shows in Houston's electoral history last week, when he failed to file for re-election.

The problem is that the filing deadline wasn't last week, but on 2 September -- nearly two weeks ago.

The Chronicle reported on the filings, but local bloggers actually described the significance of the Davila maneuver before the newspaper, which got around to that angle in a 5 September story.

And that brings us to the second problem with today's editorial:

A Chronicle op-ed written by Davila effusively praising HCC Chancellor Mary Spangler that ran the day after he failed to file contained no mention that he wouldn't be around to enjoy her future company at board meetings.

The op-ed actually ran in the 5 September edition, the same day as the belated Chron news story on the filing intrigue (but several days after the filing deadline). This was also noted on local blogs at the time.

Is it too much to ask for timely topics and minimal fact-checking from the Chronicle editorial board?

Apparently so.

They would have been better off outsourcing to local bloggers on this one.

* Cory Crow's amusing nickname for the editorial board that was formed after the March 2009 bloodletting.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 09/14/09 09:13 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

07 September 2009

Better wait a few days before trying the Chron recipes (cont'd)

The Chronicle corrections page (which frequently declines to correct factual errors like this one) is usually pretty good about correcting errors on previously published recipes (doh!), which occur with such regularity that we recommend waiting at least a week before trying any recipe published in the newspaper. Here is the latest correction, from the 3 September 2009 edition:

A recipe for pesto on Page B6 Wednesday left out an ingredient. For the complete recipe, see Page B8 today in the Letters column.

Thanks!

Surely most Chron readers already look to the letters column several days later to see why the recipe they pulled from the Chronicle wasn't a big hit. *eyeroll*

Or not. As a friendly Public Service Announcement to all, we would suggest once more that it's a really good idea to wait at least a week -- and to check the corrections section during that time -- before trying any recipes published in the Houston Chronicle.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 09/07/09 09:05 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (6)

20 August 2009

Another Chron adventure in bad journalism (cont'd)

Earlier this week, the Chronicle's junior metro/state diarist Lisa Falkenberg ran with a truly unfortunate "gotcha!" that backfired. Badly.

Falkenberg used her column effectively to accuse a U.S. military veteran of lying about his service:

On Twitter, where “Fleckman” has more than 6,600 followers, Fleckenstein identifies himself as a resident of Phoenix, husband, father of two, lover of the beach and “former Marine.”

That last phrase gave me pause, since no Marine I've ever met used the word “former” to describe his service in the esteemed military branch. I tried to verify [Peter] Fleckenstein's service with the Marine Corps' Washington-based public affairs office and 1st Lt. Joshua Diddams said the office could find no record of a Peter Fleckenstein having served in the Marines.

Perhaps there's an explanation, such as a name change. I may never know.

As it turns out, there was an explanation, but because Falkenberg and her editors ran with their feelings instead of fact (or, things people "know"), a veteran was smeared unnecessarily.

Here is the "clarification" that the junior metro/state diarist was forced to issue (although it really should be called a correction, and the newspaper really should apologize for smearing a veteran):

On Tuesday, 1st Lt. Joshua Diddams informed me that Fleckenstein had called the Marine office after reading my column and provided a Social Security number, which verifiers used to confirm that he was indeed a Marine. Diddams said there was a mistake in the military record in which Fleckenstein’s last name was misspelled as “Fleckenstien.”

So, here's the recent scorecard for the Houston Chronicle on basic fact-checking:

When the newspaper should have been skeptical of the credentials of a not-doctor who testified at a town hall in favor of radical healthcare legislation, the Chronicle reporter and editors took the woman at her word instead of definitively vetting the information. They never issued a formal correction.

When presented with a man who identified himself as a Marine on a social networking site, the Chronicle diarist and editors had enough doubts to smear the man without definitively vetting the information. Falkenberg later issued a "clarification, " rather than a correction.

And, of course, there was the recent Andrew Prieditis experience (although in fairness, he also fooled much better newspapers than the Chronicle).

Are there any grownups overseeing the "journalism" at the Chronicle these days?

UPDATE (08/21/09): David Jennings, the hardest-working citizen-journalist in town, points us to the veteran's response to Falkenberg's shoddy journalism.

Dear Diary image by flickr user incurable hippie, used via a Creative Commons license.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/20/09 10:30 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (14)

13 August 2009

Another Chron adventure in bad journalism (updated)

It has not been a very good week or so for the Houston Chronicle.

Recall that the newspaper recently violated their own letters policy by running two letters by Andrew Prieditis within several days. As it turns out, Prieditis apparently doesn't even live in Houston, and had the same letter about Sarah Palin published in several U.S. newspapers, portraying himself as a resident of those cities. Indeed, he has had letters published in newspapers all over the world, claiming to be a resident of each newspaper's city. A cursory google search could have headed off this embarrassment, but that didn't seem to happen*.

On Tuesday, Richard Connelly posted that both a reporter and editor for one of the Chronicle neighborhood editions seemed to have some real problems with the basics of journalism.

The Chronicle's fact-checking/vetting has taken an even bigger hit with today's definitive reporting by the Lone Star Times that a woman who spoke in favor of health care reform at Rep. Sheila Jackson's Lee's town hall Tuesday and who was identified by the Houston Chronicle as a pediatric primary care physician turns out not to have been a doctor at all.

I emailed Chronicle reporter Cyndi Horswell early Wednesday afternoon about "Dr. Roxana Mayer" (as she had been identified in the story), basically asking Horswell if she knew where Mayer practiced medicine or where she was licensed, since my search of the Texas Medical Board database didn't turn up any physician by that name licensed in this state. Horswell never responded to that email.

Horswell did, however, respond to a similar query from Bramanti. Clearly, neither she nor any Chron editors bothered to do any verification of not-doctor Mayer's details. "This is the information that the woman gave at the meeting," Horsewell emailed Bramanti. "I would hate to think someone misrepresented themselves. She also told me that she had been an Obama state delegate," Horswell concluded.

People misrepresent themselves all the time. That's why professional journalists are supposed to verify key information. Indeed, the Chronicle gave every impression that they had vetted not-doctor Mayer's background. Here's the telling excerpt from their reporting:

One supporter, Dr. Roxana Mayer, a physician who does not live in Jackson Lee's district, praised the reform plan for overhauling a broken system.

“I don't know what there is in the bill that creates such panic,” she said.

Had the Chronicle simply described her as "a woman who identified herself as a physician," that would have been bad enough -- but the newspaper instead gave credence to what turned out to be a completely fabricated story.

Earlier this year, some Chronicle suit ordered all references to this blog removed from Chron.com. Now that Lone Star Times has exposed the newspaper's fact-checking as nonexistent, we suppose they might be next to be banished from Chron.com.

Wouldn't it be much nicer if some Chron suit could wave a magic wand and just as easily make all their junk journalism disappear?

It might even improve the bottom line of the ever shrinking enterprise.

* We emailed the Chronicle about their letters policy and their vetting, but their reader-rep-by-committee didn't deign to answer our questions.

UPDATE: The shenanigans also drew the attention of Patterico, who is not impressed from afar by Houston's Hearst daily. Trust us, the local view is worse!

UPDATE 2: And now, Chron.com has changed the erroneous reporting on both their story and their photo with no formal correction or indication the text has been changed. That's whitewash journalism, Chron-style, and it's dishonest.

BLOGVERSATION: Unca Darrell, Texas on the Potomac (Chron.com), Texas Sparkle, Lose an Eye, It's a Sport.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/13/09 12:14 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (7)

11 August 2009

Houston Press documents two Chron adventures in bad journalism

The Chron's junior metro/state diarist Lisa Falkenberg ventured outside of her comfort zone today to try, once again, to cover a grownup topic.

The effort wasn't much more successful than her first foray into the wonders of BARC (OMG!), as evidenced by her glowing profile of new BARC "change agent" (and self-promoter) Gerry Fusco:

“I think I'm gifted by God with very, very special talents,” said the 60-year-old turnaround consultant and volunteer career coach who says he experienced a spiritual awakening several years ago following two bouts with kidney cancer and a nasty divorce. “I've taken care of people and God has said to me now, you need to take care of the animals.”

[snip]

“You will find that I'm The One,” he tells me.

He says God has blessed him with “elite” communication, people and “visionary” skills. “I believe I have a unique ability to see and act quicker than others,” he says. “I'm a good judge of people.”

And maybe it ain't bragging if it's true.

Maybe (OMG)! But after this waste of space in the ever-shrinking Tuesday newspaper, readers still have no greater sense of Fusco's actual accomplishments in the business world, or why Mayor Bill White bypassed Council to rush him onto the job.

Craig Malisow, the Houston Press journalist who has owned this story, posted a lengthy critique here. Be sure to read the comments!

Elsewhere on the Hair Balls blog, Rich Connelly reports that both a Chronicle neighborhood edition reporter and an editor seem a little confused by the facts that reporters are not expected to hand out prefabricated quotes to people and ask them to fill in their names, or to report on, say, places where they work on the side.

Connelly does cut the Chronicle a little slack because the reporting was for the weekly zoned neighborhood section and not the big newspaper, but were we Jeff Cohen, we probably wouldn't be so tolerant. If the Houston Chronicle name is on the thing, the journalism ought to meet some standards, we would think.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 08/11/09 11:16 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

13 July 2009

What is this Chonicle?

If you're diminutive Chronicle editor Jeff Cohen, how do you know if you've finally fired too many essential staffers (say, copy editors and web editors)?

10 July 2009

It's a good thing there are layers of editors and fact-checkers...

The Chronicle print edition (and, by extension, e-edition) does something peculiar on its editorial page. For its op-eds, an editor apparently summarizes each story, in the form of those graphical blurbs that allegedly make the newspaper easier to read (at least easier to read for easily distracted people who don't much like reading). Some newspapers might actually take the time to find a representative quote from the op-ed, and feature it -- but not our Chron. They want to summarize the thing for you.

Unfortunately, when people who aren't that great at reading or writing try to summarize those who are good at these things (or at least people who are good enough to be syndicated), it can produce comical results. Here's a partial screencap of a qualifying summary that appeared today:

Note the summary. Compare it with the headline (which should have been the first clue to the person who wrote it). Then compare it with the third full paragraph in the second column.

The Chron summary doesn't actually summarize the column (available on Chron.com here, if you care to read it for yourself). Doh!

In other solid Chron work today, a story by Harvey Rice on a federal judgeship moving from Galveston to McAllen concluded as follows:

President Barack Obama will nominate a judge to fill the vacancy created by Kent’s resignation. The nomination must be approved by a two-thirds vote of the Senate.

The last time we checked, a federal judge wasn't a treaty. Therefore, a simple majority of the Senate (not two-thirds) is required for confirmation. It is true that the threat of filibuster means Presidents may need a cloture-proof majority for nominations, but that's not two-thirds either. Doh!

UPDATE (07/25/09): Two weeks later, the Chronicle posted a correction to the judicial confirmation gaffe.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 07/10/09 09:19 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (0)

25 June 2009

Chron adopts reader representative by committee, neglects to inform readers

Over the years, we've had some useful interaction with the Chronicle reader representative, the individual who received reader (customer) complaints and queries about the newspaper and at least tried to provide a response (if not resolution -- unlike their San Antonio Hearst sister paper, for example, the Chronicle never has liked to admit cases of staff plagiarism). We've at least appreciated someone who would answer questions about the newspaper (James Campbell was generally good about this; Steve Jetton and subsequent replacements, not so much).

For quite a while now, the reader representative has seemingly gone missing. Emails to the reader representative email address are not answered, and the reader representative blog has not been updated in some time. We were wondering if it was time to put the reader representative back on one of those "Missing" notices on milk cartons. Lone Star Timesman Matt Bramanti got to the bottom of the problem on twitter yesterday, when the Chronicle's Dwight Silverman admitted to him that the newspaper doesn't really have a reader representative any more:

@mattbramanti We don't have one reader rep. Senior editors are now responding directly to reader concerns.

Note the clever wording. He didn't say "directly to readers." And if you've emailed the Chronicle reader representative lately, you probably haven't gotten an email response. People we know generally don't (nor do we, but we are an un-blog to the Chronicle). We are told that support staff simply compile emails/phone messages to the reader representative daily and distribute the report to senior editors for perusal (we can't verify that because, well, our emails to the reader representative tend not to get a reply).

The Chronicle continues to act as if it has a single reader representative however, as Jim Newkirk's name is still listed in the e-edition (and presumably print editions) of the newspaper:

We're not sure we would have minimized what has effectively been a customer-service position at a time when so many customers are dropping the newspaper, but it seems especially strange for a newspaper to tell customers there is a reader representative when there isn't one.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 06/25/09 08:15 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (6)

22 June 2009

Chron.com makes a mess of columnists page, again

Chron.com recently updated its columnists page, after a similar update in May.

Austin politics reporter Peggy Fikac is now listed on the page, as is sports reporter "Gerald" Solomon.

Unfortunately, the RSS feed for Fikac's individual columns is broken, and "Gerald" Solomon's name is actually Jerome Solomon.

The food and wine columnists, who were added to the page in the last update in May (including a photo of Alison Cook that appeared for a short time, inexplicably), have been removed from the page for unknown reasons (it's probably best to add those respective RSS feeds to a reader and forget trying to find them on Chron.com).

Does anyone check these web revamps before they go live?

UPDATE (06/23/09): Solomon's name is fixed now (thanks for reading, guys! Glad we could help *wave*). Now about that Fikac RSS link?

UPDATE 2 (06/23/09): And now, the Chron.com web team has replaced some of the old orange-dominated design with.... a hideous, clashing green:

Chron.com goes green... and orange... ewww!

Do any grownups with taste preview these changes before they go live?

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 06/22/09 10:10 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (6)

18 June 2009

How does he REALLY feel about the city's efforts?

Here's a fun lede from the Chron's Bradley Olson:

Houston has moved heaven and earth to expand its recycling programs this year after a trade publication ranked it at the bottom of all major U.S. cities in 2008.

Heaven and earth!

No need for the editorialists to weigh in now. The "news" lede says it all!

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 06/18/09 10:11 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

17 June 2009

Chron.com "as good an example of what not to do with a newspaper site as any"

Banjo Jones notes some recent ratings of newspaper websites by Douglas McIntyre of Wall Street 24/7.

McIntyre is not a fan of Chron.com, giving the site a D+:

This site is a bit of a mess and is as good an example of what not to do with a newspaper site as any in this survey. The navigation across the homepage includes twenty five tabs some of which are labeled poorly enough so that it is hard for the reader to understand what they are. The front page really does not have a headline per se. The stories at the top of the page are features which don’t appear to be chosen to compel the reader to go further into the website. Some of the stories near the top of the page are from the Associated Press, an indication that the editors don’t feel that they have enough compelling content of their own. The stories do have the basic social network and reader interaction tools including the ability to comment on stories and share them on Twitter or Facebook. The large sections of the paper like “Business” are only a long list of headlines, some of which have brief story summaries. The only illustrations on many of these pages are low resolution headshots of bloggers. The main news page has nearly no illustrations at all. Multimedia features are completely missing, a sign that Chronicle management treats the online paper as an after-thought. Entertainment sections are the only well-designed portions of online newspaper. Most Chron.com sections look like cheap blogs. The site runs a fair amount of local advertising, much of it not very well designed.

The main problem that we -- as serious newsies -- have with Chron.com is that news is so difficult to find amidst the tacky features, user party pics, and other fluff content. It's not at all clear what the people in charge of Chron.com are trying to accomplish with their website (a localized version of MySpace?), but the news seems to be one of many competing priorities.

We must correct McIntyre on at least one bad assumption, however (bolded, above). The folks at 801 Texas Avenue do take the web seriously, in terms of resources and focus. Chron.com is no afterthought. Rather, it is apparently the Houston Chronicle management's vision of a contemporary newspaper website.

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 06/17/09 09:43 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (2)

28 May 2009

Chron.com: Where people go to die twice!

A reader alerts us to this death notice currently on Chron.com (dated May 27, 2009):

Ted Busch, a former first assistant district attorney of Harris County who had a reputation as a dedicated, demanding prosecutor, has died. He would have been 76 on the Fourth of July.

"He was a career prosecutor and smart and extremely dedicated to helping provide a quality prosecutors' office while seeing that justice was done," said friend and former colleague Bert Graham, the current first assistant DA.

Former Harris County District Attorney Carol Vance called Busch "a real pro" and "one of the most beloved and unforgettable characters to grace the halls of the DA's office."

People we respect say Busch really was a fine prosecutor for the citizens of Harris County.

They also tell us he died nearly a year ago. Here is the story that the Chronicle ran back then.

Apparently, Chron.com is not just for screaming baby photos. It is also a place where a person can die several times!

Here is a screenshot of today's Chron.com deaths page:

Ted Bush has died twice, according to Chron.com

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 05/28/09 07:53 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (1)

27 May 2009

Chron.com: Dumbed down and trashed up (cont'd)

It's almost become passé to mock the confused jumble of user party photos, journalist and reader blog content, tacky ads, and (oh yeah!) links to news stories that occupy the front page of the website of the area's newspaper of record.

Sometimes, though, content like this merits a shout-out (click here for an enlarged view):

In case the image isn't clear enough for you, the text that accompanies that featured bit of news is as follows:

Pics of screaming babies: hilarious!

Photos of other people's kids throwing fits will make you feel better about your own little devils. Take a look at some of the best temper tantrums caught on film. It's OK to laugh.

It's a good thing that the Chron.com web team scrubbed the site of all references to this little blog a while back, so the Chronsters could narrowly focus on the community's more *ahem* legitimate news and commentary.

UPDATE: KHOU.com has posted an amusing, somewhat related AP news story ("Chron.com, other newspapers consider charging fees for Web sites").

Posted by Kevin Whited @ 05/27/09 11:57 AM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (7)

25 May 2009

What Memorial Day means to the Chronicle editors

Unca Darrell has the sorry details of the Chronicle's Memorial Day editorial. Here's a taste:

The Chronicle simply does not share the intense love of country and respect for our military that most Americans feel. Patriotism exists in vestigial form at the Chronicle, but it is always expressed in qualified and conditional ways, with the head turned away. One imagines their saying to a beloved on an anniversary, "This is the day for expressing affection, and that's fine, but you could afford to lose a few pounds."

As we have witnessed countless times before, the Chronicle editors are incapable of honoring the meaning behind almost any holiday. Their own agenda must take precedence.

Posted by Anne Linehan @ 05/25/09 12:01 PM | Houston Chronicle | Technorati | Comments (4)

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