Friday, March 25, 2005

No Matter How Low One's Expectations of the LA Times Are -- The Times will Always Manage to Undercut Them

In the previous post of yesterday, I predicted that the LA Times would dismiss the major revolution in city government proposed by Mayor Hahn (his giving the Neighborhood Councils unparalleled powers) with a few paragraphs while they would likely play up the Maxine Waters endorsement of his opponent.

Well, I was wrong.

This tectonic shift of power in this city didn't even rate a single sentence of its own. Instead the Neighborhood Councils were parenthetically grafted onto the butt end of a sentence about Maxine Waters's endorsement. So an announcement of how one politician will vote - which in itself has nothing to do with what either candidate will do once in office - is given two pages of coverage, while a major policy shift that will forever change how Los Angeles will work - was virtually ignored.

So when one reads Kevin's post today on LAOBSERVED about how the LA Time's circulation is now down to what it had been in 1968 - it is clear that the LA Times has been and is still increasingly losing touch with the city purports to cover. I know if I want to know what is happening in LA - it is now down to the 5th source I would check with.

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