I know that most of you are thrilled about me being here to report on developments at The Kansas City Star, where I worked for a mostly happy 36 years.
If I wasn’t here, a lot of you wouldn’t know about things like this:
Starting today, The Star has eliminated its Op-Ed page on Mondays. That means that henceforth on Mondays, we’ll only be getting one page of editorial content, instead of two.
The nub: The ever-shrinking Star gets even thinner on Monday, when it already hung in the air for several seconds before landing like a feather on the front lawn.
For those of you who might not be familiar with the lingo, the Op-Ed page is the page that is opposite the main editorial page, which, itself, is home to editorials written by editorial board members; letters to the editor; and Lee Judge’s editorial cartoon.
The Op-Ed page is where you find the syndicated columnists — Paul Krugman, David Brooks, Nicholas Kristof, to name a few — along with excerpts from other papers’ editorials; syndicated cartoons; and commentaries submitted by local residents. (Usually, those run under the “As I See It” heading.)
In a puzzling move, I thought, the Monday reduction was made with no accompanying note or explanation. In the past, when The Star has made significant content changes, it has usually offered an explanation…like several years ago, when the paper eliminated the stand-alone Metro section and collapsed the local news into the A section.
The editors rationalized that by telling us we were going to get a heftier A section, chock full of news from everywhere. Gradually, of course, the A section drifted back to its customary page count (which varies one day to the next) and The Star saved money by using less newsprint.
I presume that’s what’s behind the new Monday reduction: cost saving.
But this time The Star didn’t bother to inform readers about the switcheroo. I guess I understand the rationale: There’s no way to put a pretty face on it, so why would you want to tell readers you’re giving them less?
Ah, but fortunately for you, my readers, JimmyC is here, watching like a line judge at Wimbledon.
As soon as I got to the editorial page today, I knew larceny was afoot.
On the plus side, the page featured two editorials that stretched from the top of the page to the bottom. From there, though, it went downhill. Instead of a half page of letters to the editor, which is not unusual, it featured one letter — bottom right — which was dubbed “Letter of the Week.” That letter, about the new Southwest High School plan, was laid out across two columns, instead of the customary one-column format for letters.
(Can hardly wait for next week’s “letter of the week,” I tell ya.)
Above the letter was a syndicated editorial cartoon, and above that, at the top of the page, was a column by public editor Derek Donovan. It was a banner day for Derek! He hasn’t had play like that on the editorial page for years!
…Despite the conspicuous format changes, I still wondered if, maybe, this wasn’t just an aberration — an odd circumstance that would be rectified next Monday.
So, I sent an e-mail to editorial page editor Miriam Pepper, inquiring about the change.
Didn’t hear back. Well, it’s summer, she’s probably on vacation.
Later, I sent an e-mail to managing editor Steve Shirk. I got an auto-reply saying he was out of the office this week.
Not to be denied, I donned my Sherlock Holmes disguise and worked my way into the bowels of The Star’s editorial operation. And there I got confirmation that it wasn’t temporary at all; alas, it’s permanent.
So, go ahead and cry your eyes out, readers. Mondays just got a little grimmer for us dead-tree-media folks.
JimmyCsays: At the juncture of journalism and daily life in KC 
They could increase the paper’s reputation overnight by eliminating the editorial board and the editorial page completely. As for Miriam Pepper, has she written anything in years? Rich Hood used to write a regular editorial column as did Steve Winn, his associate. Both were outstanding editors who were a joy to write for, However, both are gone and the editorial page has become little more than a home for the Star’s affirmative action babies.
(Continuing to flog dead horse) Fire the lot and hire back real reporters, or demote the bunch back to being reporters. They did it to Hendricks and he became when of their better reporters. If you still want some local editorial content, hire local bloggers by the column. They’ll have more credibility, be more interesting and be far cheaper.
Face it, even the NYT is facing a palace revolution of folks who want to take an axe to their editorial page, in an age where anyone can start up a blog, the only area left for newspapers is original reporting and if they’re too stupid to figure that out, they ought to die.
What will I do without Yael’s weekly childish ranting at the University of Kansas and their fans? Wait…….there’s another one today. Rinse, repeat. Get paid.
At least when Whitlock wrote a column for the sole purpose of getting a reaction from the readers it was on a topic that people could talk about.
Yael, OTOH does it because he’s a _________.
Dear commenters: I said “cry” not rant!
Yael’s one redeeming quality was sitting through and reporting on the tedium of city council meetings. Sanchez is bright and could possibly be used as a reporter as could Shelly. Lewis just needs to go away and does anyone actually think that Donovan has an ounce of credibility left? That particular show was over when he went nuts a couple of years ago. As for Pepper, she’s on welfare now, why not make it official and let the feds take over the job. They’re all examples of the Peter Principle and the entire editorial page looks like the Special Olympics of journalistic opining.
Rich Hood had the right idea when he was there, find people who represent the paper’s consituencies and let them write occasional columns. KC Confidential’s writers along with Tony and this blog are the main things worth reading around here. I check The Star out so infrequently that it doesn’t even come up on autofill in Chrome when I start typing in the name.
Think about it, when was the last time you heard your neighbors, or people at work reference anyone on The Star’s editorial page positively, or negatively with regard to some local issue (aside from Fitz, God bless you for your compassion.) The one possible exception is when they make their predictable endorsements and then everyone gets a laugh for a day, or two and moves on.
Trying to lighten things up here…Could this joke be relevant to the post?
A newsboy was standing on the corner with a stack of papers, yelling, “Read all about it. Fifty people swindled! Fifty people swindled!”
Curious, a man walked over, bought a paper, and checked the front page. Finding nothing, the man said, “There’s nothing in here about fifty people being swindled.”
The newsboy ignored him and went on, calling out, “Read all about it. Fifty-one people swindled!”
Oh sure, throw red meat out to the ravenous hordes and then stand back and giggle as we fall victim to your ruse. You’ve become an agitator in your declining years, you have.
Duly noted…except for the declining part.
“Reclining” is more like it. It’s Wednesday and Lewis is BAAAACK!
Good news, The Star just got better.
http://www.tonyskansascity.com/2014/07/tkc-breaking-and-exclusive-news-another.html
TKC is reporting Pepper is OUT! Can you confirm?
My guess is she retired. Hell, she’s in her early or mid-60s. I don’t know a thing, but I would be extremely surprised if this was anything but a voluntary move. In my opinion, she has done a good job and handled herself well in a difficult spot.
Relax, Miriam, and enjoy your retirement.
What did she do? Hood and Winn wrote regular columns, she wrote nothing. Hood and Winn respected diverse opinions, Pepper, like Abouhalkah, like Donovan is a Stalinist. Pepper was purely affirmtive action in practice and it showed.
She wasn’t canned, but that’s not exactly a compliment to the Star. She should have been – long ago.
Apparently she put together the Monday Op-Ed page, John, whenever she wasn’t busy slaughtering millions of Russians.
I just want you to know not all of us are right wing anti-affirmative action readers. Diversity is here to stay so quit crying. I’m upset at the cutting back of the op-ed page too. We need more discourse not less.
Thank you
It took four days, but we’ve finally got these comments headed in the right direction. Thanks, Harvey Lee!