6/28/2002
Managing Editor Rosemary Armao resigns from the Sarasota Herald-Trib over her response to a Katherine Harris profile.
The profile was something of a puff piece which treated Harris as the congressman-elect and barely condescended to mention that there is another party that had the temerity to run a candidate.
When a Democratic reader complained, she explained the facts of life to him -- Dems aren't numerous enough to matter here; Katherine is a celebrity and the paper will afford her celebrity treatment; no, I won't vote for her, either; we're not going to pretend we don't already know the outcome of the election. Here's the offending e-mail and responses.
She shouldn't have been fired; she was merely treating the reader like a grown-up. A reprimand -- "don't tell readers the real reasons we do things" -- would have been enough.
The profile was something of a puff piece which treated Harris as the congressman-elect and barely condescended to mention that there is another party that had the temerity to run a candidate.
When a Democratic reader complained, she explained the facts of life to him -- Dems aren't numerous enough to matter here; Katherine is a celebrity and the paper will afford her celebrity treatment; no, I won't vote for her, either; we're not going to pretend we don't already know the outcome of the election. Here's the offending e-mail and responses.
She shouldn't have been fired; she was merely treating the reader like a grown-up. A reprimand -- "don't tell readers the real reasons we do things" -- would have been enough.
