http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/cbc/080908/canada/stjohns_westcott_conservatives_1
Well now, talk about an exciting campaign, right from the get go! We now have both Ryan Cleary and a former co-worker of his, Craig Westcott, running for a Federal seat. This is the most excitement I've had in my outport life for at least 15 days (hubby home again in five)
Wonder how the hunters will handle being the hunted down the road when the spotlight is on them? Cleary is not a man to buckle under pressure and from what I hear (and read) neither is Westcott.
What an election this is shaping up to be.
Like me ma used to say...better than sex my dear, better than sex!
ST..JOHNS (CBC) - A journalist who has often been a thorn in Danny Williams's side will represent the Conservatives in St. John's East, in part to challenge the Newfoundland and Labrador premier.
Craig Westcott, who publishes the Business Post newspaper and who is a commentator for CBC Radio, said he made the decision last week over Williams's "anyone but Conservative" platform, in which the premier is encouraging Newfoundland and Labrador voters to boycott Conservative candidates in the Oct. 14 election.
Williams has been furious with Prime Minister Stephen Harper since 2006, when Harper walked away from written election promises to exclude non-renewable resources - which include Newfoundland and Labrador's offshore energy reserves - from the equalization formula.
Westcott, who has sparred with Williams for years, said voters should be careful about the consequences of following Williams's advice on the so-called ABC campaign.
"Who is going to speak for Newfoundland and Labrador if we have nobody inside that government?" Westcott said.
"It's just - I think it's unconscionable on the premier's part to put Newfoundland in that very, very weak position," said Westcott, who nonetheless said his campaign will be based on running for the Conservative Party of Canada, not against Danny Williams.
Williams, who led his Progressive Conservatives to a landslide victory in last October's provincial election, has vowed to deliver a "big goose egg" to the federal Tories.
In part because of Williams's ABC campaign, federal Conservatives have been unable to find candidates in some ridings, including in St. John's East, currently held by retiring Tory Norm Doyle.
In fact, Westcott did not make a decision about running until he interviewed Doyle last Thursday.
"And then there was this big pregnant pause, this moment, where, you know, we both kind of realized that I would be a good candidate for this federal election," said Westcott.
A former reporter with the St. John's Telegram, Westcott has often written critically of Williams and his governing style at the Business Post, as well as with regular radio commentaries. He said he had been considering a political run for a while, and made the decision after no one else stepped forward.
"Someone has to bite the bullet," he said.
Westcott will face Liberal candidate Walter Noel, a former provincial cabinet minister.
The New Democrats have not yet nominated a candidate, although former provincial NDP leader Jack Harris - who represented St. John's East in the House of Commons for a year after winning a 1987 byelection - is expected to seek the party's nomination.
Meanwhile, the Conservatives appear to have lined up a candidate for the adjacent riding of St. John's South-Mount Pearl, which is represented by retiring Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn.
Merv Wiseman, president of the Newfoundland and Labrador Federation of Agriculture, is poised to become the party's candidate, sources said. When contacted by CBC News, Wiseman would neither confirm nor deny that he will run in the election.
Westcott is not the only St. John's journalist running in the general election. Ryan Cleary, editor of the St. John's Independent, which closed this summer, is representing the NDP in St. John's South-Mount Pearl.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Sunday, September 7, 2008
The Current: The Demise of The Independent; Ryan Cleary
http://www.currentmag.ca/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/curretnv10_issue18-3.pdf
FALL OF THE
INDEPENDENT
Ryan Cleary, former
editor-in-chief of the upstart
weekly,on why the paper
hasn't risen from the dead
(again).
First of a two-part series
For all its fighting Newfoundlander guts and
glory, after four and a half years The Independent
went down in mid July with barely a whimper. Or
so it must have seemed, the paper's apparent
gentle slide into that good night.
Behind the scenes attempts were made for weeks
to revive the newspaper. At least three parties
were eager to invest, and one group was interested
in stepping in and taking over, but no one was
prepared to pay publisher/owner Brian Dobbin
$250,000, his asking price.
They saw the amount as out of the question for a
money-losing newspaper. According to Dobbin's
own numbers, The Independent lost more than
$2 million under his wing, and while losses had
leveled off and the break-even point was within
reach, the paper was still operating in the red
when it went down.
Some people saw the high price tag as Dobbin's
way of ensuring that no one succeeds where he
did not. Dobbin, nephew of business legend
Craig Dobbin, is best known for Humber Valley
Resort just east of Corner Brook, which recently
announced layoffs under a major restructuring
plan. Dobbin is no longer directly involved with
his west coast brainchild, or his other business
baby, cod farming, and has become bitter about
the province's overall business atmosphere.
To quote his front-page column in the paper's
final issue on July 18th: "Newfoundland and
Labrador is a barren place to try to grow significant
industry."
In a recent column for the Northeast Avalon
Times, Ray Guy, who wrote a once-a-month column
for The Independent, said the paper suffered
from the "heir to the Dobbin millions playing
newspaper dilettante -hey look, I'm a newspaper
owner."
Some rich guys buy nice cars, Brian Dobbin
bought himself a newspaper. All flash and pink,
white and green colour. There may have been a
bit of that, but there were deeper motivations.
Dobbin, a closet journalist, got into the newspaper
business partly out of a passion to expose the
Hibernia story and the tens of millions of dollars
that were wasted on the construction project in
the mid-1990s. Cost overruns had to be paid off
before governments saw any real royalties. And
those overruns were said to be ridiculous and
massive.
Dobbin's biggest disappointment with The
Independent (besides the fact it didn't break even
before he ran out of cash), may have been the
fact the paper didn't crack the Hibernia story. We
got a piece of Terra Nova - including details of a
1998 meeting between former premier Brian
Tobin and oil executive Dick Cheney, who went on
to become vice-president of the United States, to
"trade off" gold-collar engineering jobs - but that
apparently was only the tip of the iceberg.
From my perspective, I say that Dobbin put a high
price on the paper to ensure that any new owner
was serious about the newspaper business.
Dobbin told me he didn't want to see the paper
flounder for a few months after a quick cash
injection only to close again. The paper meant
too much to him for the death to be drawn out.
The expensive asking price would take care of
that.
The owner of a start-up newspaper must have two
things: money and patience. The owners of The
Independent have had neither.
The paper was all set to close in March 2004 -
five short months after it first opened - because it
ran out of money. What the hell were the owners
thinking?
Dobbin came in at that point, but he cut off his
support and closed the paper just over two years
later in April 2006. The paper reopened a week
later with an appeal for public support by the editorial
department.
Dobbin lost $250,000 between then and when
the paper closed this past July. It's that money he
wanted repaid with any takeover. I personally
made a formal request to buy the rights to the
masthead for $25,000, but Dobbin turned me
down flat, saying an offer that "in some way deals
with the most recent $250,000 loan I have given
to the newspaper may be better received."
And so here we are today. The Independent's
office equipment has been sold and the pink,
white and green decals have been peeled from
The Independent jeep. I have looked at starting a
new weekly paper from scratch - I'm fond of The
Guardian for a name - but was unable to attract
the necessary money and patience.
Newspapers are dying out, this is a common
refrain. I don't agree. The Saturday Telegram is
worth its weight in gold and there's money to be
made.
A week after The Independent closed, Geoff
Stirling, owner of the NTV/OZ FM empire/dimension,
called me to offer his condolences. But he
said he was confused and couldn't figure out The
Independent's mandate. "Seriously buddy, was
the paper's purpose to be a voice or to make
money?"
"Both," I said, but I've been thinking about my
answer ever since.
The Independent was often complimented about
its look and feel, about the columnists and stories
that called it home. But the paper couldn't be
considered a success until it held its own financially.
We were getting there; circulation was up by
almost 10 per cent when the paper closed. There
was a hell of a lot more work to be done, and the
staff was up to the challenge, only the horse got
shot out from under us.
Part two of the series will focus on the challenges
that faced The Independent, and the measures
taken by Transcontinental, the Quebec-based
chain that owns most newspapers in the province,
to protect its monopoly.
Ryan Cleary is the former editor-in-chief of The
Independent.
rryancleary@gmail.com
FALL OF THE
INDEPENDENT
Ryan Cleary, former
editor-in-chief of the upstart
weekly,on why the paper
hasn't risen from the dead
(again).
First of a two-part series
For all its fighting Newfoundlander guts and
glory, after four and a half years The Independent
went down in mid July with barely a whimper. Or
so it must have seemed, the paper's apparent
gentle slide into that good night.
Behind the scenes attempts were made for weeks
to revive the newspaper. At least three parties
were eager to invest, and one group was interested
in stepping in and taking over, but no one was
prepared to pay publisher/owner Brian Dobbin
$250,000, his asking price.
They saw the amount as out of the question for a
money-losing newspaper. According to Dobbin's
own numbers, The Independent lost more than
$2 million under his wing, and while losses had
leveled off and the break-even point was within
reach, the paper was still operating in the red
when it went down.
Some people saw the high price tag as Dobbin's
way of ensuring that no one succeeds where he
did not. Dobbin, nephew of business legend
Craig Dobbin, is best known for Humber Valley
Resort just east of Corner Brook, which recently
announced layoffs under a major restructuring
plan. Dobbin is no longer directly involved with
his west coast brainchild, or his other business
baby, cod farming, and has become bitter about
the province's overall business atmosphere.
To quote his front-page column in the paper's
final issue on July 18th: "Newfoundland and
Labrador is a barren place to try to grow significant
industry."
In a recent column for the Northeast Avalon
Times, Ray Guy, who wrote a once-a-month column
for The Independent, said the paper suffered
from the "heir to the Dobbin millions playing
newspaper dilettante -hey look, I'm a newspaper
owner."
Some rich guys buy nice cars, Brian Dobbin
bought himself a newspaper. All flash and pink,
white and green colour. There may have been a
bit of that, but there were deeper motivations.
Dobbin, a closet journalist, got into the newspaper
business partly out of a passion to expose the
Hibernia story and the tens of millions of dollars
that were wasted on the construction project in
the mid-1990s. Cost overruns had to be paid off
before governments saw any real royalties. And
those overruns were said to be ridiculous and
massive.
Dobbin's biggest disappointment with The
Independent (besides the fact it didn't break even
before he ran out of cash), may have been the
fact the paper didn't crack the Hibernia story. We
got a piece of Terra Nova - including details of a
1998 meeting between former premier Brian
Tobin and oil executive Dick Cheney, who went on
to become vice-president of the United States, to
"trade off" gold-collar engineering jobs - but that
apparently was only the tip of the iceberg.
From my perspective, I say that Dobbin put a high
price on the paper to ensure that any new owner
was serious about the newspaper business.
Dobbin told me he didn't want to see the paper
flounder for a few months after a quick cash
injection only to close again. The paper meant
too much to him for the death to be drawn out.
The expensive asking price would take care of
that.
The owner of a start-up newspaper must have two
things: money and patience. The owners of The
Independent have had neither.
The paper was all set to close in March 2004 -
five short months after it first opened - because it
ran out of money. What the hell were the owners
thinking?
Dobbin came in at that point, but he cut off his
support and closed the paper just over two years
later in April 2006. The paper reopened a week
later with an appeal for public support by the editorial
department.
Dobbin lost $250,000 between then and when
the paper closed this past July. It's that money he
wanted repaid with any takeover. I personally
made a formal request to buy the rights to the
masthead for $25,000, but Dobbin turned me
down flat, saying an offer that "in some way deals
with the most recent $250,000 loan I have given
to the newspaper may be better received."
And so here we are today. The Independent's
office equipment has been sold and the pink,
white and green decals have been peeled from
The Independent jeep. I have looked at starting a
new weekly paper from scratch - I'm fond of The
Guardian for a name - but was unable to attract
the necessary money and patience.
Newspapers are dying out, this is a common
refrain. I don't agree. The Saturday Telegram is
worth its weight in gold and there's money to be
made.
A week after The Independent closed, Geoff
Stirling, owner of the NTV/OZ FM empire/dimension,
called me to offer his condolences. But he
said he was confused and couldn't figure out The
Independent's mandate. "Seriously buddy, was
the paper's purpose to be a voice or to make
money?"
"Both," I said, but I've been thinking about my
answer ever since.
The Independent was often complimented about
its look and feel, about the columnists and stories
that called it home. But the paper couldn't be
considered a success until it held its own financially.
We were getting there; circulation was up by
almost 10 per cent when the paper closed. There
was a hell of a lot more work to be done, and the
staff was up to the challenge, only the horse got
shot out from under us.
Part two of the series will focus on the challenges
that faced The Independent, and the measures
taken by Transcontinental, the Quebec-based
chain that owns most newspapers in the province,
to protect its monopoly.
Ryan Cleary is the former editor-in-chief of The
Independent.
rryancleary@gmail.com
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