Friday, February 13, 2009
Media / Woods Clint Brewer Out as City Paper Editor
Posted by Jeff Woods on Fri, Feb 13, 2009 at 3:44 PM
Comments (18)
Showing 1-18 of 18
Very unfortunate. Clint is one of the best journalists in town. Sorry for both sides that this didn't work out.
like
dislike
Clint was not a journalist. He was a self absorbed, bow tied douche who liked to pontificate. His commentary was never journalistic, just the musings of a delusional self righteous hack, who wouldn't know know a news story if it hit him on the back of the head.
Good Riddance. Maybe the CP will be able to turn the corner without that dead weight.
Didn't live in Nashville either. How can you know what the "city paper" needs if you're not in the city?
I don't know who this angry Bob guy is talking about in the previous post. Is that you, BHo?
Clint is a good journalist who knows his way around the city and state's political scene well enough that the CP beats the Tennessean on....well, everything. I hope this doesn't mean the CP is about to go.
Sad.
Clint is not quite the last of a dying breed.
Great reporter. Great editor. Dedicated to a 19th and 20th century profession and an industry in crisis.
A few years ago two guys I was friends with when I was a reporter in the early '80's got fired. They had been at WSM for almost their entire careers. Until one day a guy in a bad suit walked in and told them to put their personal crap in a box and leave the building. One of them ended up in North or South Dakota. Don't know what happned to the other one.
Seeing these papers die is sad for anyone who ever put ink on paper and signed their name.
I manage to disagree with almost all the posts I see above.
* Fletch, to hear you talk of excellence in journalism just reminds me of what you did to Susan Lavery of WPLN when you were Boner's henchman. Unforgivable. She has turned out all right, but Nashville lost that talent because you ran her out. (Yes, some folks here have long memories about such things.)
* Sad, you flatter B-Ho overly. The Woodward post was too well-put and too close to the truth to be his work. To me, it has the authenticity of someone's real experience working with Clint.
* That said, Woodward, you're mean. I can dislike the way a guy did his job while still feeling for him at a time like this. You didn't have to vent those feelings, however widely they are shared.
It's a sad day for sure. The City Paper will miss Clint but I'm sure he will land on his feet.
Clint Brewer is an ignorant ass, he nearly ruined the online version of the NCP, when he first took over. He banned several posters for their political views and purged the archives of their posts. I know, I was one of the first to be thrown out (my username was "Loner") and I have only recently been re-admitted to the NCP forums.
The NCP did have one of the best online posting communities, before the bow-tied buffoon hacked it to pieces.
Clint Brewer should write for some right-wing, white supremacist rag, he does not belong on the pahyroll of any legitimate newspaper, IMHO.
fwiw, announcement is
here.
"NashvillePost.com Editor Geert De Lombaerde and Business Tennessee Editor Drew Ruble have been named respectively the editors of the Monday and Thursday editions of The City Paper."
Note to both the recently fired Brewer and Lawson:
Maybe the city wasn't quite as bad in the last 9 years as you two made it out to be...
What really irked me about Brewer was his tendency to log on and rile up the posters on his website. I liken that to the editor of the Tennessean arguing publicly with the letter writers. The ultimate in unprofessional behavior - in my humble opinion.
Not to mention his numerous affiliations. Most people expect journalists to remain impartial in public and in private - that includes Facebook and other groups.
Guys like Clint do best in the small towns at small papers where they can be the big fish. Hope he goes back to and does well.
Meanwhile: keep print alive! Buy a newspaper!
As they say in the legislature, I'd like to associate myself with the remarks posted by "The City of Nashville" above.
Brewer, like Lawson, lacked insight into Nasvhille, what makes it tick, it's great gains in recent years, and the real underlying dynamnic of our politics. How often have you read an editorial or collumn by these folks at said, WTF are they talking about? Driven by ego, myopia, and a reliance on agaenda-driven sources, these guys just didnt' get it. Lawson cold at leaset write a coherenet paragrpah. Clint, no so much. If content is king, this rag had become the lowliest of paupers. Many, many folks are glad to see them both gone.
City Paper once again has a chance to become the real paper of record in this town. Good luck, Chris, Tom, Geert, Dru, Ken, et al--- we need a strong City Paper.
Looks like there are some some here who were definitely on the other side of Brewer and Lawson. Both have readers who follow them and pay close attention to what they write. Everyman and The City of Nashville clearly need to read more. Brewer and Lawson know a helluva a lot about this city and have a tremendous amount of insight. Look at Lawson's column today. That is perspective that no other writer in this town could do. He's the only writer in town the didn't fall for developer Alex Palmer's nonsense. There are clearly people out who would prefer that everything that is written sing everyone's praises and be totally positive. I've seen them write both positive and negative stuff. Lawson in particular is relentless questioner. I know I've been on the receiving end of it. An interview can be like having a conversation with Columbo. I haven't always liked everything they've written. But with both of them, you got a lot more perspective than you would have gotten anywhere else. It appears that the negativity toward the two has more do with not seeing things written as you would please. That's unfortunate and myopic on your part. It appears that there are people here who prefer shallow journalism. The comment about it becoming the lowliest of paupers is idiotic. Who's there to write decent stuff now? Monday's stories look like the same shallow, boosterish dribble in the business journal. So I seriously doubt that "many" are glad to seem them gone. I'd put it in the category of a "few."
Homer, you clearly aren't reading both the Monday Citypaper and the Business Journal. The Business Journal is full of press releases. PR firms love it, no one else cares.
Obviously, Homer, one can view some of these things differently. But under Brewer, no one took seriously the paper's editorial persepctive. Some of the news coverage is fine. Rau has gotten much better, William Williams is solid on business, and Amy G. had done great things on the education beat. But the Brewer inflenced opinion peices were a joke, wildly missed the mark, at least when one could understand them, and undermined the paper's effectiveness overall. Rex was often grossly wrong and te patent effort to assert a political presense was pathetic and misguided. Good journalism and a sound editiorial voice would have been welcome. The City Paper once embodied that approach. You'll just have to trust me: I'm not an outlier on this.
Rau has gotten much better. Griffith is getting better. But William? His stuff is fluff. There are readers for that I'm sure. And if you never figured it out Rex is all the writers not just Brewer.
Uh, thanks for the hot tip on Rex, Homer. No duh. But Clint started it, edited it, and controlled the content. It was a good idea poorly executed. The point is that the editorial aspects of the paper were sophmorish and generally disregarded by everyone in this town. Doesn't have to be that way. Good stuff is appreciated. Goofy, egotistical stuff is not. Guess we just disagree.
