Boston Dailies Both at Top of the Hub

January 5, 2015

The hardreading staff is pleased to announce that for once the stately local broadsheet had no ad-vantage over the feisty local tabloid.

From yesterday’s Boston Globe page 3.

 

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From yesterday’s Boston Herald page 3.

 

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Cheers!


The Two Faces of Deval

January 5, 2015

The Boston Sunday Globe featured Michael Levenson’s swan song for two-term Gov. Deval Patrick.

The Patrick legacy: history and headwinds

Governor made good on much he’d promised, but fractious ties with legislators, and economy’s plunge, held him back

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Deval Patrick looked out on Boston Common, presiding not only as the incoming governor but as the leader of a movement that had upended politics. Thousands from across the state cheered and held up cellphone cameras — people of every kind and color, young and old, jubilant multitudes never before seen at the State House.

At his first inauguration under uncommonly fair skies in January 2007, the man who a year earlier had been dismissed as a hopeless romantic with no chance of victory carried with him limitless hope for the future — for better schools, fairer housing, racial healing.

 

And etc.

Nice sendoff, except . . .

 

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Exhibit Umpteen, from Saturday’s Boston Herald report about Patrick “denying [chairwoman of the Sex Offender Registry Board Saundra Edwards’] claims he had a personal ax to grind in firing her after he said she ‘inappropriately’ tried pressuring an official to classify the governor’s brother-in-law as a sex offender.”

“Your paper has done a whole lot to make a mess of his life,” he said, turning to a Herald reporter yesterday. “That’s certainly been on my mind. I didn’t want to stir all that up again. But we cannot have officials inappropriately interfering with the independence of hearing officers.”

 

But he doesn’t want to stir all that up again.

Ave atque vale, Deval.

Ye harldy knew us.


Boston Dailies Outsourced Mario Cuomo Obits

January 3, 2015

From our Late to the Late Mario Cuomo desk

Mario Cuomo spoke in poetry, but lived in prose.

Exhibit A: His Hamlet on the Hudson forever fluttering.

Maybe that’s why the local dailies didn’t bother to compose their own obituaries of the former New York governor, but cherry-picked them from other news outlets.

The Boston Globe, on the one hand, plunked the New York Times obit on its front page.

 

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The Boston Herald, on the other hand, plucked the Associated Press.

 

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Hey – that’s show biz.

(To be fair, today’s Globe has this laudatory editorial and this less-so column by Michael A. Cohen. The Herald has this  farewell from Ray Flynn.)


Boston Dailies Swimsuit Edition!

January 3, 2015

From our Late to the Pool Party desk

While the hardreading staff noted the degrees of difference in yesterday’s local coverage of the traditional Southie Polar Bear Plunge, we regrettably failed to note the swimsuit disparities between the two Boston dailies.

Boston Globe:

 

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Boston Herald:

 

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One town, two different whirls, eh?


Boston Dailies Can’t Even Agree on Temperature

January 2, 2015

As the hardreading staff has often noted, the local dailies have created One Town, Two Different Worlds more days than not.

But . . . One Town, Two Different Thermometers?

Boston Herald Page One:

 

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Boston Globe Page One:

 

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Not to get technical about it, but . . .

 

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Right – it’s not just the air temperature they differed on, it was the water temp too.

Frosty local tabloid again:

Brrave bunch!

Hundreds of L Street Brownies braved the bitter cold to take the traditional Southie Polar Bear Plunge on 010115coldswimmg008.1New Year’s Day.

“It was warmer in the water because the air temp was down to the teens with the wind chill,” said Freddy Ahern, coordinator for the BCYF Curley Community Center. The water was a balmy 37 degrees.

 

Happy New Year to all! Keep up the good work.


Hark! The Herald! (Tsarnaev Defense Edition)

December 30, 2014

Today’s edition of the selfie local tabloid once again demonstrates its Heraldcentric theory of the universe, as it reports that the trial of  alleged Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is all about, well, the Boston Herald.

Lawyers blast feds over Herald column

Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s lawyers have again asked a judge to postpone his trial, challenging Dzhokhar Tsarnaevprosecutors’ claims about their preparation process and slamming a Herald column that criticized the defense’s repeated efforts to seek delays.

In the motion filed yesterday, Tsarnaev’s legal team disputes the government claim that they have refused to stipulate to any evidence — an acknowledgement that would preclude bringing in officials to testify about how it was acquired and handled.

 

The Herald column in question? This one:

 

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According to today’s report, “[t]he defense motion cites Herald reporter Bob McGovern’s Dec. 26 Full Court Press column, which referred to the defense’s ‘foot-dragging’ and ‘stall tactics’ as an example.”

Jackpot!

As you might expect, crosstown at the Boston Globe there’s nary a word about foot-dragging or stalling or stipulating . . . or the Herald.

Tsarnaev defense renews pitch to delay trial

Says prosecutors sent thousands of documents late

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Attorneys for Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev renewed their push Monday to delay his death penalty trial, set to start in one week, until the fall.

In papers filed in US District Court, the attorneys for the 21-year-old, who is accused of detonating two bombs at the 2013 Marathon finish line along with his late brother, Tamerlan, said the government has handed over thousands of documents to them at the last moment.

As a result, the attorneys wrote, there is no way they can be ready to defend Tsarnaev both during the trial, and if he is convicted, during the penalty phase, where jurors will be asked to decide whether the former Cambridge resident deserves the death penalty.

 

One town, two different trials, eh?


New Balance Balances Local Dailies in ‘Heroes’ Ad

December 30, 2014

From our Late to the Parity desk

Local shoemaker New Balance yesterday saluted “each and every police officer, firefighter, first responder and service man & woman” in this full-page ad that ran in both – say it again, both – Boston dailies.

 

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Truth to tell, the ad also ran in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

But as the Heraldnix might say, why get technical about it.


Herald Hit on Hillary ‘Warrens’ a More Honest Look

December 20, 2014

The Boston Herald jumps all over some Kennedy-on-Clinton action today, giving Page One over to Joe K 3.0.

 

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Inside, reporter Matt Stout elaborates:

Kennedy: ‘Companies clearly create jobs’

U.S. Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy III said yesterday that “companies clearly create jobs,” putting distance between himself and potential presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, whose controversial comments on the Screen Shot 2014-12-20 at 12.29.35 PMsubject are expected to be fodder for Republicans this upcoming election cycle.

One of the Bay State’s rising political stars, Kennedy said in a Herald interview yesterday that Congress needs to embrace policies geared toward economic equality as it prepares to return next month under Republican control. But he said helping businesses, big and small, to “flourish” needs to remain part of that, as Democrats — increasingly galvanized by the populist bullhorn wielded by U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren — try to beat back criticism that they’re anti-business.

 

We-think-she’s-nuts graf:

Republicans once galvanized by President Obama’s “You didn’t build that” comment in 2012 were re-energized in late October when Clinton sent shock waves through the Twittersphere when she told Democrats in Boston, “Don’t let anybody tell you it’s corporations and businesses that create jobs.”

 

(Columnist Joe Battenfeld piles on with this piece, in which he speculates that Joe K 3.0 “may help derail Clinton’s White House path by endorsing her potential 2016 opponent, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, much the same way the late U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy backed Barack Obama in 2008.”)

The problem with this Hill-steria on the Herald’s part is that it conveniently overlooks this:

 

 

Yeah – that was Elizabeth Warren two years ago, not two months ago like Clinton. So you could say Warren was the Granny of that particular sentiment.

But the Herald wouldn’t say that. Doesn’t fit their storyline, does it?


New School of Advertising: UMass Boston(Globe)

December 18, 2014

As we’ve previously noted, the Boston Globe has been rather – how shall we put it? – ad-aptable lately with UMass, from a special supplement masquerading as editorial content to, most notably, the pimping out of the Globe banner last month.

A splendid reader now sends this to the tsktsking staff:

[H]ave you noticed recently the UMass-Branded Business section in the Globe? I know they’re doing a lot (a lot!) of advertising in the Globe, but the UMass logo placement next to the “Business” banner on the front page of the new section makes it seem almost like a paid advertising section. I saw it there yesterday, and again today. I believe 2-3 times more in the last 10 days.

 

Here’s the one from today:

 

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The splendid reader is correct: The bug also appeared in yesterday’s edition, as well as last Wednesday through Friday. Oddly, on none of those days did UMass run an actual, old-fashioned ad.

And the splendid reader is likewise correct that the bug makes the Globe’s Business section look like a partly owned subsidiary of the Massachusetts higher ed system.

In fairness, though, the Boston Herald looks like a totally owned subsidiary of Suffolk University. So maybe this is just Business as usual.


Globe Runs Five-Ring Circles Around Herald

December 17, 2014

From our One Town, Two Different Worlds desk

The Yes Boston Olympics group (not its real name) made its 2024 Summer Games pitch to the US Olympic Committee yesterday and got very different receptions in the local dailies.

Boston Globe Page One:

Boston still in hunt for 2024 Summer Olympics

US panel votes to submit bid for Summer Games, will select from field of four cities next month

The US Olympic Committee’s board of directors voted unanimously Tuesday to submit a bid for the 2024 boston-cutSummer Games and next month will choose one candidate from among Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C., to join what is expected to be a crowded international field.

The committee gave no indication of a favorite among the four cities. USOC chief executive Scott Blackmun said the contenders were in “a four-way tie.’’

 

Boston mayor Marty Walsh added that “it shows you that this puts Boston on a stage. Whether or not we get the Olympics, to be able to be in the same conversation with other cities around I think says an awful lot about the strength of the city of Boston.”

Or its business community anyway.

Crosstown at the Boston Herald, the bid got significantly less play. Like page 21 play.

 

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Can we made Dirt Digging an official Olympic event? That’ll jumpstart the fizzy local tabloid, eh?