More Gannett cuts

Gannett hardly invented the nut graf. It goes back about a hundred years before anyone heard of Gannett. And it's completely arrogant to think that you can't combine good writing with a nut graf that quickly tells the reader what the story is about.

 

Joe Biddle and Brian Mullen whacked at the Tennessean. So says the Nashville Post.

 

Two of the nicest guys in the business.

Mully is such a good dude. And a damn good writer.

Shame on you, Gannett. Again.

 

If I'm following along correctly, the editorial department at The Tennessean now contains one person.

The letters editor got the sack on Thursday, and it was jiust down to her and the editorial writer, a guy I went to college with. Their other colleague had retired recently ahead of the tsunami. The next step, I suppose, will be to abandon the editorial page altogether.

When I started work at The Tennessean in 1979, the editorial department was on the same floor as sports and, as I recall, there were perhaps six people in the department, including the secretary who edited the letters and the fulltime cartoonist. (The two of them, some years later, would get married.)

 

Gannett has done a lot of dumb things that hasn't brought one subscriber to the paper, but I don't think inventing the nut graf is one of them.

 

Didn't Mullen do NHL? The name definitely rings a bell...

I'm stunned to see someone Biddle's age let go. Usually they're scared shitless of those over 55 and Biddle has to be at least a decade older than that.

 

I think many people here are off the mark on age discrimination issues. There is not a law that says people over 55 cannot be terminated, or that they deserve special consideration. Some of the views here on that are just wrong. I have, painfully, let men go who were 62 and 69, respectively. Their termination was no different than anyone else's.

Legal problems begin when you single people out because of their age. But when you are laying off a variety of people -- from 22 to 62 -- the older workers are treated the same under the law.

Again, problems begin when a laid-off worker can allege that he and other older workers were singled out and let go because management wanted to fill their spots with younger, cheaper workers. That's age discrimination.

 

I believe Biddle is 56, or at least that's what I was told.

And Music City USA no longer has a writer who covers music.

Excellent[/sarcasm]

 

Anyone over 40 is part of a "protected class" that gets more protection than younger workers. Doesn't mean you can't terminate someone over 40, but you have to be more careful.

 

Biddle was a teammate of Steve Spurrier's at Science Hill High School, so no, he's not 56 years old.

Believe he was a year behind the Ol' Ball Coach.

 

There are writers at the Nashville Scene who might differ on that assessment, but I know what you mean.

 

Spurrier has got to be at least 65.