Early reports are confused and conflicting, but from what we can gather Philadelphia Newspapers CEO Brian Tierney is meeting with Daily News peeps as we type this, to discuss folding the Daily News into the Inquirer…DEVELOPING
UPDATE: Just got off the phone with a DN newsroom source and here’s the deal: Starting March 30th, The Daily News will become ‘an edition of’ the Inquirer. This is largely a technicality, meaning no job cuts, both papers function pretty much as is, separate news staffs and managers, both competing for stories, etc. By making DN an ‘edition of’ The Inquirer, Philadelphia Newspapers saves money on wire service subscriptions, gives the ad reps more flexibility in terms of selling ad space across both papers, and the Inquirer circ goes up from 330,000 daily to 430,000 with the addition of the DN’s 100,000 daily circ., which, again, helps the ad folks. No one is saying it out loud, but this seems like a first step towards desegregation.
WILL BUNCH: In 1984, I wanted to work for the Phila. Inquirer in the worst way…now in 2009 I sort of do finally work there. [via TWITTER]
DAILY PENNSYLVANIAN: “The Inquirer, either way, will survive. The question is will The Daily News survive.”– Brian Tierney, CEO/Publisher, Philadelphia Newspapers
PHILLY.COM: The Company Line
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DOJ Releases Discarded Bush Era How-To-Build-A-Police-State Memos
ASSOCIATED PRESS: The Obama administration threw open the curtain on years of Bush-era secrets Monday, revealing anti-terror memos that claimed exceptional search-and-seizure powers and divulging that the CIA destroyed nearly 100 videotapes of interrogations and other treatment of terror suspects. The Justice Department released nine legal opinions showing that, following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the Bush administration determined that certain constitutional rights would not apply during the coming fight. Within two weeks, government lawyers were already discussing ways to wiretap U.S. conversations without warrants.
The Bush administration eventually abandoned many of the legal conclusions, but the documents themselves had been closely held. By releasing them, President Barack Obama continued a house-cleaning of the previous administration’s most contentious policies. “Too often over the past decade, the fight against terrorism has been
viewed as a zero-sum battle with our civil liberties,” Attorney General Eric Holder said in a speech a few hours before the documents were released. “Not only is that school of thought misguided, I fear that in actuality it does more harm than good.”
The legal memos written by the Bush administration’s Office of Legal Counsel show a government grappling with how to wage war on terrorism in a fast-changing world. The conclusion, reiterated in page after page of documents, was that the president had broad authority to set aside constitutional rights. Fourth Amendment protections against unwarranted search and seizure, for instance, did not apply in the United States as long as the president was combatting terrorism, the Justice Department said in an Oct. 23, 2001, memo. “First Amendment speech and press rights may also be subordinated to the overriding need to wage war successfully,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo wrote, adding later: “The current campaign against terrorism may require even broader exercises of federal power domestically.”MORE