Thirty days after April Fool's Day, Editor N Publisher magazine named Orange County Register boss Nelson Christian Anderson “Publisher of the Year” for the entire nation.
Though you may have laughed, that wasn't the inadvertent chuckle line about Anderson, who could pass as the father of both unruly Senior Deputy DA Brian Gurwitz and twin Newport Beach Superior Court Judge Craig Robison.
The magazine, through some doofus named Mark Fitzgerald, went on to assert this absurdity: “It's no exaggeration to say that an amorphous area known for Disneyland, orange groves, and pretty much nothing else, became 'The O.C' in large part because of the work of Chris Anderson and the Register . . .”
Well, if we're noting Orange County characteristics while Anderson's been sitting at his desk in Santa Ana with a calculator and worry beads, why not credit him with our beautiful sunsets, sandy beaches and surfer waves too?
Or our insane traffic congestion, sickening bigotry, corrupt cops, certifiable politicians, money-driven school administrators, vicious gangs, lazy bureaucrats, unchecked pollution and a journalism community so emanored with the powerful that it's favorite position requires knee pads and spit or lube.
(I've seen countless members of Anderson's reporting/editing crew apply either substance to satisfy local powerbrokers. Except for Mike Schroeder and Donald Bren–kings of all OC kings–who apparently reach ecstasy merely by the Reg staff assuming the position. Of course, no offense intended to Mike or you Reg folks I love and respect. You know who you are…)
Editor N Publisher went on to credit Anderson for personally taking “a mediocre daily” paper and making it great.
Hmmm.
Three quick points: Anderson presides over a website so difficult to navigate it should come with four Excedrin tablets and a cup of water. His news boys and girls rely on police press releases, insider gossip and Republican Party talking points for “news.” Much of the best Reg reporting each year is done in spite of management.
CNN-featured investigative reporter R. Scott Moxley has won Journalist of the Year honors at the Los Angeles Press Club; been named Distinguished Journalist of the Year by the LA Society of Professional Journalists; obtained one of the last exclusive prison interviews with Charles Manson disciple Susan Atkins; won inclusion in Jeffrey Toobin’s The Best American Crime Reporting for his coverage of a white supremacist’s senseless murder of a beloved Vietnamese refugee; launched multi-year probes that resulted in the FBI arrests and convictions of the top three ranking members of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department; and gained praise from New York Times Magazine writers for his “herculean job” exposing entrenched Southern California law enforcement corruption.