Beware the Kaneohe Christmas Parade this morning. Traffic becomes a nightmare during the couple of hours of the parade. We’re just going to hunker down until it’s over before venturing out of Kaaawa.

Don’t miss this one–“The chickens come home to roost at Gannett“, which appears on another fine Seattle blog, Rogue Columnist, by former reporter/editor Jon Talton.

And I have to mention Talton’s brief biographical statement.

I’ve been a working journalist for 27 years. Most recently, I spent seven years as a columnist at the Arizona Republic in Phoenix, standing up to that state’s numerous cranks, haters, sleazy ‘businessmen’ and right-wing thugs.

I was also an editor and columnist at the Charlotte Observer, Cincinnati Enquirer, Rocky Mountain News, Dayton Daily News and what is now the North County Times in San Diego. I specialized in the economy, business, energy, urban issues, politics and sustainability.

Now I’m not a 22-year-old HTML kid and have little interest in writing about Britney’s panties. So no newspapers are calling. I’m a writer living in Seattle. Aside from the risk of living under a bridge, I’m free to write the truth and raise hell. That was once the calling of the best newspapers. Now a few of us will try to carry it on as guerrilla journalists and rogue columnists.

Well said.

Am I feeling geeky this morning? Apparently so. I followed my nose through several issues and ended up speculating on the Star-Bulletin’s back issues. First, I noticed the Advertiser story yesterday on the newly released LBJ tapes failed to include a link to the recording of the president urging Senator Hubert Humphrey to consider Dan Inouye as his running mate, while the Star-Bulletin version this morning managed to assist readers by prominently displaying links to the LBJ Library and the specific recording containing the VP discussion.

Then I noticed the Star-Bulletin using new URL styles. Each story URL now includes a long title reference similar to those created by blog software.

http://www.starbulletin.com/news/20081206_Tapes_reveal_Inouye_had_LBJ_pushing_him_for_68_ticket.html

I hadn’t paid attention to this before.

Noodling around on starbulletin.com, it appears that until September 24, 2008, the URL to individual Star-Bulletin stories had a standard format. For example:

http://starbulletin.com/2008/09/23/news/story02.html

On 9/24, they shifted to the new format with the blog-like look. Was there a software change that accounts for the shift?

Another change is found in the URL for stories in back issues. Previously they retained their original URL, making it very simple to look up old news. However, the S-B has now changed that filing system with a new archive format. That last example is now found at the following address:

http://archives.starbulletin.com/2008/09/23/news/story02.html

It’s not necessarily a big change, but it could have real implications. It makes me wonder whether the S-B might be preparing to charge for access to stories from its archive, as the Advertiser already attempts to do, or perhaps is outsourcing the archive maintenance. I’ll have to ask around.

And I also noticed that the S-B is now using its own version of TinyURL to create shorter links (see www.hsblinks.com).

Happy Saturday.

The Rocky Mountain News is the latest newspaper up for sale.

E.W. Scripps Co. (SSP) said it will seek to sell its largest newspaper, the Denver-based Rocky Mountain News, along with its stake in a joint operating venture with the rival Denver Post amid an increasingly bleak outlook for the U.S. newspaper industry. The company, which has owned the paper since 1926, is cutting expenses and conserving cash amid the global financial crisis and economic slowdown that has been particularly hard on advertising markets. The company last month said it would suspend its quarterly dividend only three months after its board of directors authorized it. It also cut 10% of its newspaper jobs and froze senior managers’ pay for 2009. “This is a hard-headed and pragmatic decision for the management of a company to make when it has owned an asset for 80 years,” said Barry Lucas, analyst with Gabelli & Co., a broker-dealer affiliate of Gamco Investors Inc .

I just noticed the 52-week high and low prices for Scripps stock:

52wk Range: 2.18 – 147.78

Is that a mistake or has their stock fallen from a high of nearly $150 to just $2 a share?

In any case, the sale apparently calls into question the future of the Denver Joint Operating Agreement.

Closer to home, a reader wonders why the shifts of less known local news anchors get eagerly reported by there’s been scarce reporting on all the well known news personalities who have exited from the Honolulu Advertiser this year?

Meanwhile, Star-Bulletin owner David Black’s Sound Publishing Inc., which owns a string of community newspapers in the Pacific Northwest, has announced it is seeking to cut costs by closing one printing plant, moving to a tabloid format, and shifting several of its newspapers to weekly publication from their twice per week schedule.

As budget cuts start working their way through the system, the lobbying to save programs is well underway. Here’s a plea circulating in the arts community.

Dear Arts Alliance Action Network,

The next stage of budget negotiations related to allocations to the State Foundation of Culture and the Arts 2009-11 Biennium Grants program. As previously reported, the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts is being asked to cut its Grants programs – over $1.3 million – which is an extreme and disproportionate cut for the arts and arts community. We all feel a cut of 15 – 20% – which all State agencies are facing – should be shared equitably, but this recommendation represents 62% of the SFCA’s General Fund budget, and is unfair and unwise.

We have been meeting with public officials over the course of the last few weeks to advocate on behalf of all the arts and the devastating impact that this budget cut would have on the arts and culture community.

Despite these efforts, the latest recommendation from administration is to completely zero out the grants program – and this final budget recommendation will be incorporated into the Governor’s administraton budget – to be sent to the legislature in the next 10 days.

Now is the time for the administration to hear from you, someone who knows that arts and culture are vital to our economy, to our children’s education, and to our quality of life.

Please help by submitting a letter of support for the survival of the SFCA’s grants programs to the Governor’s office – by December 11.

The legislative session is probably not going to be a very pretty picture with the agenda dominated by “what to cut” issues in every sector.

Finally, once again, I’m embarrassingly short on cat photos this week, and Mr. Toby is going to have to stand in for the whole crowd. Here he is posing on the front deck as we returned from the morning walk earlier in the week. Just click for a better view.