Re: Altersuck

[Jim Farmelant <farmelantj@xxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, 27 Oct 2003 20:14:54 -0500 Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx> writes:
> Jeff Rubard wrote:
> >Mr. Proyect, the composite hatchet job you do on Alternet (no great
>
> >shakes) here does not answer the question of whether a nuanced
> critique of
> >the United States occupation of Iraq is in order; furthermore, it
> raises
> >more questions about a national indymedia combine than you may
> >realize.  Your juxtaposition of articles from the *Bay Guardian*
> and
> >*Boston Pheonix* is liable to create confusion due to two different
> local
> >news cultures; "a sweetheart deal with the Presidio" is something
> like
> >"not a whole hell of a lot, but we have to make a juicy tick-mark"
> (ever
> >been to the Presidio?)
>
> I remember the Boston Phoenix from my days up there in the early
> 1970s. It
> was an "underground" newspaper inspired by the antiwar movement and
> the
> hippies. Like the Village Voice and the Los Angeles Weekly, it has
> morphed
> into a kind of yuppie taste-maker that stays afloat with personal
> and
> massage parlor ads.

The Boston Phoenix is owned by Steve Mindich who
has long aspired to become a local media magnate.
He also owns several radio stations in New England.
And as long as you were asking he is also an ardent
Zionist.

There used to be several such papers in the
Boston area.  Back in the late '60s there used
to be Boston After Dark, which was eventually
taken over by the Phoenix.  During the
'70s a labor dispute at the Phoenix led most
of the staff to leave that paper and start their
own which was called the Real Paper.
It was founded as a collective, owned by its
staff.  Later it received backing from one of
the younger Rockerfellers.  It flourished for
about a decade and was I believe bought out
by the Boston Phoenix.

A number of journalists got their
start at the Phoenix and the Real Paper,
including some who have attained national
prominence.  Who can forget Sidney Blumenthal
who used to write leftist political commentary
for those two newspapers?  Then Blumenthal
went on to The New Republic where he became
notorious for habit of kissing Bill Clinton's
bum whenever the opportunity presented itself.
Eventually that paid off for him in the form of
a White House job.  He went to get his fifteen
minutes of fame during Monicagate when
Christopher Hitchens ratted Blumenthal out
to the House Judiciary Committee which was
then considering the impeachment of Clinton.

Jim F.

> Although I don't know much about the SF Bay
> Guardian,
> the politics of this particular article seemed radical enough. The
> only
> reason I cited the Phoenix is that this is what came up when I did a
> google
> search on "Hazen" and "Soros".
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Louis Proyect, Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
>
>

________________________________________________________________
The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand!
Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER!
Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today!


~~~~~~~
PLEASE clip all extraneous text before replying to a message.