The Orange County Register Steals Oakland Raiders' Punchline

May I briefly steal you away from your present obsession about Janet Jackson bitch-slapping Paris and Kristen Stewart's untimely cheating?

Okay, Orange Countians, you can finally sigh in relief:

Irvine-based Freedom Communications and its Orange County Register are now officially in the hands of Boston businessman Aaron Kushner.

What does this mean? Will the newspaper's decline finally end? Will Kushner boot a couple of hand-wringing knuckleheads running the paper?
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If the company's July 25 press release announcing the completion of the
transaction is any clue, expect lots of fancy talk but few if any
positive changes.

The Register, the paper's management wants everyone to know, has already been committed to “excellence”–a line that would have made Oakland Raiders founder Al Davis roll over in his grave if he hadn't himself abused the notion by fielding horrible teams over multiple years.

The paper's new brain trust must have gotten together and decided to steal Davis' inadvertent punchline.

(It's with deep, painful sympathy to colleague Matt Coker that I note the Raiders' version of excellence was losing only 99 of the past 144 games.)

Here is Mitch Stern,
the outgoing Freedom chief executive officer: “Over many decades,
Freedom Communications has been a name recognized for the excellence of
its journalism as well as the depth of its commitment to engagement with
its communities.”

Compare that statement to Kushner's quote in the same press release:
“For many years, Freedom Communications has stood for journalistic
excellence and dedication to the communities that it serves.”

Does this signal another lame era of robotic nonsense at the county's flagship daily paper?

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