we saw that...

alexandria landlord gayle underwood call for federal investigation into city of alexandria government!

we agree. although, most likely not for the same reasons.

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alexander fulton hotel, downtown alexandria, la. 18 august 2011
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click here to skip ahead to ms. underwood's call or fast forward to 4:00 minutes
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related posts

rod noles: tax credit housing competes with alexandria landlord gayle underwood's rental properties

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meme that sheriff wagner lowered patrols to rural rapides parish, la., R false

link to audio download page

this morning [730-8] on the ksyl talk back preshow [podcast friday's show when/if available] a caller phoned in to recite the old line that rapides parish, la., sheriff chuck wagner stopped the rural patrol and closed substations.

while we're not totally sure about substation closings, we havent heard of any closing, the part about sheriff wagner decreasing or stopping the rural patrol is provably wrong.

under the previous sheriff, who was sheriff for sixteen years, william earl hilton, rural areas rarely saw a patrol car go by, which is not a bad thing -- no one is complaining about that. but, why would wagner detractors insist in repeating this line when anyone who lives in a rural area of rapides parish can tell you that sheriff wagner has not in any way that a regular citizen can tell, stopped or cut back rural patrol but in fact appears to have implemented one!

since sheriff wagner came into office three years ago, its become routine for rural rapides parish residents to see a sheriff deputy over the course of the day out on patrol 4 - 6 times. over night probably more.

the rural patrol deputies that we've personally encountered have been extremely helpful and kind. when we had jury duty the bailiffs and other court personnel under the sheriff were all very professional and courteous in moving things along.

for the record though, the rapides parish sheriff's office has had great people as far back as we can remember to sheriff marshall t. cappel.

as far as closing the substations, if any were indeed closed, perhaps, rpso is converting that money into manpower for rural patrols.

local blogger pawpaw's house recently recounted an rpso deputy's first visit to the main office in awhile, who was impressed by the recently added technological innovations.

one criticism we can offer on sheriff wagner is that so far he hasnt lifted one finger to have that illegal and immoral 2003 sheriff's office 1% in perpetuity sales tax rescinded and put on the ballot at regular intervals for a vote of the people like its supposed to be.

in case you didnt know it, the in perpetuity slave tax was promulgated by sheriff wagner's predecessor now turned opponent william earl hilton aided and abetted by the rapides parish police jury.

so on principal we wont be voting for william earl hilton.(or jamie floyd in the clerk of court race.)

its possible that a few surprise candidates enter the race.

rapides parish sheriff's election 2011 kicks off

william earl hilton made his candidacy official, gannett/the alexandria daily town talk repeated, 05 may 2011.

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this 2007 chuck wagner for sheriff political sign cleaned up pretty well.
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hilton for sheriff signs going up around the parish this week

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and the baden jogger.

other than some anonymous flyers which appeared last year, this year the 2011 rapides parish sheriff's race has been mostly quiet up till now that elect william earl hilton sheriff signs began appearing around the parish.

for the past month or so, we've noticed by referral logs an increasing interest by googlers from around cenla and the state for any tidbit on the 2011 race.

this is seen in the many recent commentators in several of our threads from the 2007 sheriff election like these:

2011 RSPO Race commented on - we saw that...

Hilton is smiling all the way to the bank!!! He is no idiot, he knows how to raise money for elections. Not everyone donates by a check, he likes CASH. CASH for deputy position with benefits is a worth plenty of CASH!!! He failed during his last term as Sheriff, letting his blackmailer, Mike Slocum, take over the department. It was obivious he was supporting Slocum under duress. Our RSPO was held hostage because of his greed and fear of Slocum. They supported each other in public, but cussed each other in private. Our Parish is on the right track now, and the is no reason to open the door the corruption that follows Hilton and Slocum. WHy did Hilton have to buy 60 new police cars a year?? Sheriff Wagner has averaged about 10 new vehicles a year saving over $1,000,000 annually just there!

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Keep Wagner Sheriff commented on - we saw that...:

I heard Slocum and Hilton both pocketed over $50,000 cash each in 2007 when they tried the flim flam to let Slocum run instead of Hilton because Hilton had made his contribution as Sheriff and was ready to retire and take it easy. Now that they know Slocum could never become Sheriff, Hilton is the front man in this year's flim flam to make it look more sensible. Wagner has a strong record as our Sheriff.. So understand that all the whispering and rumors that will be spread by Hilton supporters are lies, and don't be fooled. Fear is the greatest motivator to get someone to do something. The parish is better off financially than when Hilton was Sheriff and much safer! Sheriff Wagner has stepped up all services by his office on about $2 Million less in tax revenues due to the economy.

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WE'RE BACK commented on - we saw that...:

You say hilton was good for a few years? He was sheriff alittle longer than a few years he ran the department right and was good to his people, he took care of us and we will take care of him. All of you ignorant people can keep tellin lies after lies but the truth will all come out in the end and when ya'll are cryin and wagners at home eating his pain pills and hugged up to his girlfriend i'll be sittin back laughin, o and il be getting my job back, YALL JUST COUNT DOWN THE DAYS BOYS WE ARE COMIN BACK..... - rapides parish sheriff's race: hilton strikes back

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believe it or not, they're not all by the same person either. so do you know of any forums, websites, articles, documents, etc. focusing on the 2011 rapides parish sheriff election that might be of interest?

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mayor of new orleans primary returns

mayor of orleans final

http://staticresults.sos.louisiana.gov/262010_36.html
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absentee
source: nola.com -- politics
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rapides parish sheriff's office new drug detector dog

kalb's mike magnoli reports on one of the new rapides parish sheriff's office new $12,500 drug detector/narcotics dog named max.

although law enforcement likes to promote k-9 units as some sort of untrickable, super drug detector, former longtime texas narcotics officer, barry cooper says that nothing could be further from the truth.

mr. cooper tells how unscrupulous police officers may on a whim -- like for instance, they dont like how you look or what race you are -- can and will make their narcotic detector dogs "false alert" so that they will have probable cause to search your automobile.

mr. cooper an eight year police veteran trained his own narcotic detector dog "and soon became one of the top highway interdiction officers in east texas. although barry had less than five miles of highway to practice seizing narcotics, he held a county record of nearly one- hundred drug arrests and a record marijuana seizure."

mr. cooper discovered that he had principles and a conscience:

"barry now admits during his tour of duty in the war on drugs his conscience often bothered him while seeing everyday, hard working, non-violent citizens torn from their children and spouses and placed in jail during a raid or traffic stop.

barry explains, "i knew what I was doing was wrong but my need for fame, adrenaline and peer acceptance overrode my good conscience." barry now realizes this is a war on people not a war on drugs. he explains "this war on people is a failed policy. we have more prisoners of this war in jail then ever before yet even the dea admits we have more potent drugs and a larger supply of drugs available than ever before."" see about barry cooper

kalb getting set to do another fluff piece on rapides parish sheriff chuck wagner

in the easter sunday 10 pm news cast, kalb's leigh culbert announced that kalb will be sitting down this week with rapides parish, louisiana sheriff chuck wagner. you can tell its gonna be a fluff piece by the way its announced in that ms. culbert recites the obviously erroneous line that the staff changes are "part of the normal process any police agency goes through in its day-to-day operations." this is a patently disingenuous thing to say, considering all the documented evidence to the contrary. all kalb is trying to do here is subliminally plant that seed in your mind that everything is ok, its just normal bidness.

rapides parish sheriff links page 2008

gannet/town talk drops a dime on sheriff wagner/media general/kalb/emails/p.i.o. scam

ya know, if the town talk continues to read blogs - thats blogs plural, they might finally learn just what their readers expect of them and how to do investigative journalism.

in todays town talk (see link) reporter abbey brown apparently delivers the goods. for instance we learn that a chuck wagner campaign worker: mr. heath crawford, was hired by media general/kalb on 12 november 2007 which was five days before the run-off election and three days before kalb news director michele godard went on ksyl radio to talk about kalb's hi-falutin media standards.

after reading ms. brown's town talk story one is left wondering whether or not mr. crawford gave ms. godard any tips on what to say in her interview or if he gave any suggestions to any of the pro-wagner supporters, like for example karla ryder and her husband kurt ryder who called in that morning.

ms. godard's own words in that interview would seem to indicate that media general/kalb was unethical in hiring a wagner campaign worker during a political campaign and while at the same time they were engaged in a major media campaign (err hatchet job, err news report) against mr. wagner's opponent - mike slocum.

media general/kalb/mike magnoli fluff piece on chuck wagner/heath crawford rapides parish sheriff email scandal

the above clip aired tonight on kalb-tv on the 6:00 pm news. the complete thirteen minute nine second interview is found on kalb.com at this link.

first off this is nothing but a fluff piece designed to make the sheriff look good while totally ignoring or intentionally misdirecting the public's attention away from more important questions like on what date exactly was heath crawford employed by media general/kalb. was it before the run-off election of 17 november 2007? the only mention to that is briefly in mr. magnoli's write-up for the interview:

Sheriff Wagner says Heath Crawford (who was briefly employed in KALB's Marketing Dept) was not authorized to contact the news media with any statements for RPSO.

and yesterday:

notice that brenda kaiser even saved at least one of our posts to her computer's hard drive:

close-up
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the town talk too

why wont kalb go ahead and fess up and tell us the dates of mr. crawfords employment -- the sheriff went ahead and owned up to mr. crawfords working for his campaign even if he tried to minimize it. so kalb needs to come clean - especially after all the hullabaloo kalb caused during the sheriff race.

mr. magnoli asked sheriff wagner who is the current public relations officer for the sheriff's office and sheriff wagner replied that its herman walters. now thats odd especially when you recall the interview then sheriff hilton gave around 05 november 2007 to mr. magnoli's boss, kalb news director michele godard. in that interview sheriff hilton insinuated that mr. walters had mental problems and did go so far as to state that mr. walters is "paranoid" and that mr. walters "was imagining [things] that was happening -- that wasnt happening..." now we learn that mr. walters is the public relations officer? that doesnt make any sense and tends to strongly suggest that sheriff wagner does play the political payback game...which leads us back again to whats the real story with mr. crawford?

later on in mr. magnoli's interview sheriff wagner says that he wants to do something about the drug problem knowing full well no police force anywhere is gonna do a damn thing about drugs. for one thing the federal government isnt gonna let them stop the availability of drugs.

sadly, but not unexpectantly, nowhere in the interview, does sheriff wagner make any mention whatsoever about investigating any of the political, governmental and white-collar criminals or crime arising out of rapides parish, louisiana. thats because the sheriff's office just like the rapides parish district attorney's have always cast a blind eye towards the blueblood criminals -- although, if they did do something about political, governmental and white-collar crime that would probably take care of about ninty percent of the "drug problem."

this interview of mr. magnoli's was nothing but an attempt at a whitewash on kalb's part generally and bullshit specifically.

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see also central la politics blog
sheriff wagner's 'crawford-gate'

in which that blog points out that kalb and mr. magnoli didnt even bother to get mr. crawford's side of the story for this piece.

snip:

Something else is also clear. KALB Television's credibility has sunk to new lows, if that is possible [...] (KALB) does its fluff piece interview with Wagner, without even checking with Crawford for his side of the story and documentary evidence, like Abby (sic) Brown of the Town Talk did.

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related posts

latest gannett/town talk/wagner/kalb/crawford story leaves more questions than answers

cynthia jardon: kalb 'beyond the pale'

did the central la media and sheriff wagner just get punk'd?

did media general/kalb fail to disclose a conflict of interest in the 2007 rapides parish sheriff race?

crystal meth is rapides champaign powder

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latest gannett/town talk/wagner/kalb/crawford story leaves more questions than answers

once again the town talk's half-assed and shoddy reporting is apparent. in their most recent 'news' story posted to the town talk's website this morning (see link). again the town talk fails to get to the bottom of the heath crawford's r.p.s.o. employment/kalb/wagner campaign/email status.

why wont the town talk release or at the very least state from where mr. crawford's email(s) originated? oh and now we learn that mr. crawford faxed some news releases so what telephone number did these faxes originate from? this shouldnt be that hard to figure out since most fax machines stamp the originating telephone number at the top of the fax. as far as the emails thats even easier- did they come from an rpso email account and if so, then how did mr. crawford gain access to an rpso email account if he wasnt employed by or authorized by proper authority (the sheriff) to do so?

notice that the town talk has never bothered to print the dates of mr. crawford's kalb employment other than his last day at kalb was friday 15 february 2008. the town talk dont dare print that because if it is true that mr. crawford worked for kalb during the sheriff election then people would be questioning the town talk why they didnt report that a media general/kalb employee was working for the wagner campaign back during the sheriff election campaign. after all, the town talk endorsed mike slocum - or at least pretended to.

you think that central louisiana's media community dont know each other and know what the other is up to? they might not know what specific stories the other is working on at any given time but they do know each other and talk to each other. michele godard in her 15 november 2007 ksyl interview said that she talks to the town talk's abbey brown [.mp3 clip 560kb] who just happens to be the very same reporter who's writing these crawford/wagner stories.

dont forget the husband and wife team of jim leggett and babs zimmerman. jim leggett was at the town talk while babs zimmerman worked at kalb. isnt it reasonable to assume that they talked about developments with each other? perhaps even coordinating their respective 'news' organizations individual reports to sculpt the message about any given 'news' event?

its looking to us like the town talk probably inadvertently blew the lid off a massive scam involving kalb and the wagner campaign (notice that sheriff wagner has never denied that mr. crawford worked for his campaign) and now they cant do anything but offer up absurd, half-assed 'news' reports in an effort to control and misdirect the attention away from the real story at least until public attention wanes.

cynthia jardon: kalb 'beyond the pale'

a gannett/town talk editor, cynthia jardon, takes the rapides parish sheriff's office and some local media to task over the developing heath crawford/p.i.o. scandal.

the thing is though, is that the media, the town talk included, will not release mr. crawford's original and complete email(s) that touched off the firestorm to begin with.

for instance, if the media would release the complete email(s) with the headers intact, the public could see if the email(s) were sent by mr. crawford from an official rapides parish sheriff office email account such as webmaster@rpso.org [source: contact r.p.s.o.] or did they come from a non-rpso account such as a hotmail or yahoo email account. we could also check the originating i.p. number contained in the email header to see if it resolves from an official rpso email server or not.

in a 'news' article published by the town talk today it points out:

In an interview with The Town Talk on Friday regarding the e-mail sent by Crawford, Wagner did not mention that Crawford was not employed as the director of public affairs.

sheriff wagner released the above very oddly worded statement sometime yesterday that a town talk story chat commenter "rpcitizen" remarked:

The "letter" from the sheriff posted by the Town Talk reads as though it were written by a child. The letter (actually a paragraph) is written in both first and third person format, and there is no clarification at all regarding the employment of Heath Crawford.

meanwhile, kalb's mike magnoli is supposed to 'interview' sheriff wagner this morning about all this to be aired tonight at 6:00 pm.

did the central la media and rapides parish sheriff chuck wagner just get punk'd?

UPDATE :cynthia jardon: kalb 'beyond the pale'

did media general/kalb fail to disclose a conflict of interest in the 2007 rapides parish sheriff's race?

UPDATE: did the central la media and sheriff chuck wagner just get punk'd?

in the 2007 rapides parish sheriff's race much ta-doo was made over a rumor that should he win, kalb news director michele godard was going to become chuck wagner's public information officer. these rumors began around the time that ms. godard and kalb aired what some called hit pieces against mr. wagner's opponent mike slocum.

the first one called "race for rapides sheriff political maneuvering" was posted to kalb.com on 02 november 2007 on 05 november 2008 sheriff hilton responded with "rapides parish sheriff hilton responds to threat allegation" and that was followed on 07 november 2007 by "rpso deputies speak out."

on 13 november 2007 kalb hosted "rapides parish sheriff candidate debate" later that night on the 10:00 p.m..news, ms. godard and kalb general manager les golman in "kalb responds to biased reporting allegations" made a big deal out of reporting among other things that "mr. slocum’s campaign made demands on news channel 5 for the removal of its news director michele godard from the scheduled debate"

there is probably a lot more sheriff race news videos on kalb.com and dont be surprised if they all suddenly disappear from kalb.


on thursday 15 november 2007 two days ahead of the run-off election ms. godard appeared on local talk radio station ksyl. according to the above clip from that appearance ms. godard was there to "represent the television station to clear up a couple of things." the very first question posed to her by dave graichen before even a good morning was "ok the big question i got michele are you going to go work as p.r. for the sheriff's department?" after a round of laughter by all, ms. godard responds "no of course not i'am not qualified for that job...i wouldnt even know how to be a p.i.o. i have some suggestions of course"

the end result was that chuck wagner prevailed over mike slocum by some 1,398 votes. on electronic voting machines we might add.

link

on election night, saturday 17 november 2007, michele godard interviewed chuck wagner [video] among the first words out of sheriff-elect wagner's mouth were "i want to thank bill [robinson] and his family and his supporters for coming out and getting behind us and we're just truly blessed." that night the last question asked of mr. wagner by ms. godard was "alright let's clear the air here - are you going to hire me as your p.i.o.?" mr. wagner said "thats not true. i know the rumors going around but you know i've put everything in writing, what i was going to do. it's on my website, if you havent seen it i encourage you to go look at it and thats what i did i put it in writing, so i can be held accountable and thats what government needs to do - not only the sheriff's office, but any office needs to be held accountable and i look forward to that." in lightof recent revelations, one has to wonder if the viewers werent the butt of a huge inside joke that night.

now flash forward to 16 february 2008 and the town talk story by abbey brown "new policy restricts media's access to employees of sheriff's office" (download two page .pdf here) we learn that the sheriff wagner's new p.i.o. is heath crawford. the town talk reports that mr. crawford "most recently worked at kalb-tv as a producer and in marketing." no thanks to the town talk and their trademark half-assed reporting (notice how they always leave out the most obvious and most important parts of stories) doesnt bother to find out or if they did find out the town talk suppressed the date that mr. crawford began work at kalb.

although the town talk reported that mr. crawford said that "his last day at kalb was friday." which would have been friday 15 february 2008 there is some confusion there too, because a press release from the rapides parish sheriff's office by mr. crawford dated thursday 14 february 2008 is posted to kalb.com:

link

not much is known about mr. crawford. the internet movie database mini-biography entry for 'director heath crawford' ends in 2004. although, the filmography lists mr. crawford as working in 2006 and 2007 as a camera operator for several episodes of "my own" jennifer lopez.

link

mr. crawford's myspace is set to private but a blurb that is publicly viewable, mr. crawford assures us that he is "a lover not a fighter...but i'll still kick your ass!!"

mr. crawford's website at www.outoflinefilms.com doesnt have contain any biographical information either. it does list two addresses in the contact information, one in north hollywood, california and one in alexandria. louisiana.

so the obvious question that everyone should be asking is when did mr. crawford go to work at kalb? was he working at kalb during the 2007 rapides parish sheriff race when he was also candidate bill robinson's campaign manager and then chuck wagner's campaign manager? did he produce any of the news stories or the candidate forum 'debates'? if so, why wasnt any of this disclosed by kalb?

these are important questions that need answering especially due to mr. crawfords profession as a "director" and "producer" and his hollywood connection. the kennedy-nixon presidential debates in 1960 showed the power of television as an instrument of political manipulation...

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related posts

did the central la media and sheriff chuck wagner just get punk'd?

cynthia jardon: kalb 'beyond the pale'

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RUMOR: KALB has been sold

.mp3 clip

this morning on the ksyl bob and dave show, bob madison announced that he had "heard from three different people that kalb has been sold."

kalb parent media general inc ceo is 'puzzled'

with this news article (see link) we see that at media general, inc. managerial 'puzzlement' starts at the very top of this company and extends downward into the management at its local properties such as kalb-tv.

media general's stock has been in a virtual free-fall for the past year declining according to the news article almost 50%. as recently as 09 january 2008, media general's stock hit a 52 week low of $15.75.

nine days later, on the 18th january 2008, it was reported that harbert management corp. through its hedge fund, harbinger capital partners, had increased their holdings in media general from 9.9% to 18.4%.

harbart/harbinger didnt waste any time because on the 21st, it was reported that they wanted to "share ideas on value" with media general.

Harbert Management Corp., the second-largest shareholder of Media General Inc., may seek a transaction that would boost the stock price of the Richmond-based newspaper and television company.

Harbert, an Alabama-based investment management company, said Monday in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that it may contact management, directors and shareholders about steps Media General can take to "maximize shareholder value." The firm also said it may nominate candidates for election to the board. ~ source

according to the winston-salem journal, eugene davis is the chairman of pirinate consulting group; jack liebau is the president of liebau asset management and j.daniel sullivan is a media investor. ~ source

see also harbinger capital partners master fund i ltd./ harbinger capital partners special situations fund lp:
notice of nomination

Marshall N. Morton, president and chief executive officer, said: "We are frankly puzzled as to what Harbinger hopes to achieve by its hostile actions. The Harbinger hedge funds appear to have a high portfolio turnover rate, rotating out of numerous holdings every six to twelve months. A Board member or members having such a short-term perspective would be disruptive to our company and, in our view, be adverse to the legitimate, long-term interests of all Media General stockholders.

"Since Harbinger first disclosed this past summer that it had acquired a 9.1 percent stake in Media General's public, Class A stock, including last week, when Harbinger disclosed through an amended filing that it had increased its economic interest in that stock to more than 21 percent, we have sought repeatedly to talk with Harbinger and learn what is on their mind. Harbinger, however, has persistently refused to return our calls.

Mario Gabelli, the biggest investor in Media General Inc., backed calls for changes to the newspaper publisher’s board after shareholder Harbinger Capital Partners proposed replacing three directors.

Gabelli hasn’t decided whether to back Harbinger’s entire slate of nominees to replace directors elected by common shareholders, he said yesterday in an interview. He did say he supports Jack Liebau, one candidate for the nine-person board.

“I do think it’s time for a change for this board,” said Gabelli, whose Gamco Investors Inc. owned a 20.9 percent stake in Media General in November. “We’re not sure how we’ll vote on this proposal - we might abstain. But we do think change would be good here.” ~ source

Harbinger should cease its “ill-advised, hostile and thoroughly unwarranted course of action.” Harbinger has a “short-term perspective” on Media General and hasn’t considered the steps the company is taking to improve its operations, Morton said.

In the past several years MEG's stock has plummeted from about $70 a share to $15 a share, although it's up to $19 or so last time I checked. It is true that plenty of media companies have trouble but I don't believe they have seen so much market cap disappear at once as MEG's has.

MEG's problem is that it is based on cost-cutting, not growth. The leadership has no ideas. They pushed "Convergence" and "Clustering" about 10 years ago, but they haven't worked. These involved trying to trade content across print/tv/Web but instead of creating new and valuable content, they were just dicing up stale content again and again. Clustering involved buying up dinky papers in the Southern exburbia. Neither strategy has worked, as the stock price shows.

Morton, let's not forget, is from the textile industry, which is not exactly known for successful growth strategies. He complained last week that the hedge fund didn't appreciate "a research-driven understanding of our local markets" or the "heightened focus on customers" or the "continually growing number of new products and new sources of revenue, or the "successful "Web-First" approach to local news reporting that is generating increased page views and visitors" and the "new partnerships, diversification and regulatory gains that have strengthened and validated our convergence strategy."

What a pile of nonesense. Take their Web pages. They are horrible! Just about any regional media firm is far ahead. MEG is where The Virginian-Pilot was 10 years ago and that might insult the Pilot!

Look at the Times-Dispatch. There is a massive rush for the exits as experienced reporters flee from the hare-brained news policies of Thomas A. Silvestri and his new management crew. Just look at Sunday's front-page. Obama's win in S. Carolina was huge. Yet, the TD editors gave 75 percent of the front page to the mock convention held at Washington & Lee in which they nominated Hillary. Huh? Let's have Frazier Millner, their marketing expert, explain that one. Also don't know if you've noticed but there's one heck of a lot less content in the TD than ever. The "2-Minute TD" is more like the "30-second TD."

MEG has been in a tailspin for several years now. Nevertheless, Marshall Morton tried to get his corporate officers a bonus a couple of years ago, until Mario Gabelli, another rogue investor, put a stop to it.

Best thing that can happen is if the Gabelli's and hedge fund folk get rid of the current management. Let's wish them well. Maybe they can put a stop to the arrogance and the incompetence.

another reason alexandrian's should resoundlingly reject the redflex scam

redflex redlight cameras: "this could be something that could be another revenue source for the city." - alexandria city councilman louis marshall ~ alexandria city council public safety / transportation committee meeting 20 november 2007 link

video: hilton and slocum discuss sheriff race loss

rapides parish sheriff race: wagner wins!

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according to the complete but unofficial results from the sec'y of state website, chuck wagner has defeated maj. mike slocum to become rapides parish's next sheriff.

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chuck wagner election night