Star-Ledger Death Watch - The Bleeding Continues

No Real Transfusion Here

On both Thursday and Sunday, the Star-Ledger ran the exact same story signed by its publisher heralding "a new and improved Star-Ledger." On Thursday said story ran on the front page of the newspaper.  Yesterday it ran on the front of the paper's 'Perspective" section, which purports to be its weekly collection of op-ed material.

But it was the exact same story. Which is important to note because, really, what newspaper is apparently so lacking for inspiration that it basically runs a press release twice? They can't even change things somewhat to allow for the presumed differences between the groundlings who read the front page and Thursday and the more thoughtful types who lap up the op-ed material on Sunday?

Anyway, the newspaper uses these two occasions to announce "a reading experience we hope you will enjoy." By which, however,   -  and this is important, folks  -  they don't mean a newspaper akin to the Star-Ledger of just a few years ago which had some heft and serious, statewide reporting to it. Rather, they mean a Star-Ledger "improved" somewhat since the last major round of cuts at the paper of  approximately a year ago. So they're adding a page (a page! Yeehah, buckaroos!) of local news to their Monday edition. Plus "new puzzles and games." (Yeehah again!) They also promise a re-design.

Ominously, however,  Richard Vezza's statement adds "let me tell you what is not changing - The Star-Ledger's newsstand and home delivery schedules." Since nobody to my knowledge has bothered to ask the Star-Ledger about this (does anyone ever dare "demand" anything of the Star-Ledger?), one logical assumption is that the Star-Ledger has itself discussed changing those schedules. Remember, too, that in the wonderful cutback-mad world of Newhouse-owned newspapers, there is already precedent for cutting a paper's publishing schedule. The New Orleans Times-Picayune only in fact publishes three times a week these days. So a similar retrenching is probably in the works, especially if the Star-Ledger's attempt to re-invent itself here falls flat on its face.

(Nettlingly to me, however, the Star-Ledger has not yet deigned to announce the full and complete interment of its sports "columnist emeritus" Jerry Izenberg. Who continues to get to choose his gigs and always opts for the high-profile events. God but I wonder what this man has on his ostensible superiors. It sure isn't his great literary gifts.)

Were I at the Ledger (let's be familiar with the old biddy), and were I as aware of the futility of attempting to stave off death as they must be there, I'd probably swing for the journalistic fences the last few months of life. You know: call politicians nitwits and slackers if they deserve it (and so many seem to in NJ); print scandalous (but true) stories about their sex lives; complain about everything and anything in sight; even, to cite something the Ledger never ever does, get critical of the seeming bozos who run Atlantic City's casinos and politics and sold us the white elephant of casino gambling.

Not gonna happen, I'm sure. It'd be fun to read. But it's not going to happen. So the Ledger will instead go on wheezing out for its last months of life without making any real dent. But with improved design, more puzzles and games and an extra page per Monday of local news.  The newspaper's extended, sad death rattle continues.

Oh, and the Ledger,  claiming to have come to the realization that its readers  "no longer utilize printed television listings  in favor of onscreen listings provided by cable operators," is now, after a free two-week preview, going to charge the interested 67 cents a week for a  new TV listings magazine. (Actually, because it takes forever to scroll through listings for all those hundreds of cable channels, I prefer its current newspaper listings format for its ease and brevity.)  This in a publishing
environment in which TV Guide has been dying for years itself. Such brilliance to thus launch a competitor to it!

The Ledger is sorely lacking in editorial verve and imagination, on that I hope we can all agree. Watching its drawn-out demise is akin to being a mongoose getting off on a cobra it's toyed with slowly bleeding to death.  The fun never stops.