Free Republic

Your damn right Helen Thomas should be fired for making this kind of remark: [VIDEOS AT SITE] Telling the Jews to get the hell out of palestine? Any other reporter would have been let go 5 minutes after the news hit but not this worthless lady. Ari Fleischer said she should be fired: But even as she was trying to walk back the remarks, calls for her firing mounted. Among the more vocal was former Bush Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, who claimed to have a close relationship with Thomas when he was manning the daily briefings. “She should lose her...

Three 16th century oil paintings that have been hanging in William Randolph Hearst's famous castle at San Simeon belonged to a Jewish couple who were forced to give them up during the Nazi reign in Germany, authorities said Tuesday. Two of the three paintings, visible to guests and millions of tourists at Hearst Castle since 1935, will be returned Friday to the heirs of the rightful owners, both of whom died during the war, one in the death camp at Auschwitz.

Hearst Newspapers is refusing to say whether it will stand by White House veteran reporter Helen Thomas in the wake of conservative outrage over her remarks about Jews leaving Palestine and going back to Europe.

Hearst's Seattle Post-Intelligencer Announces End to Print Edition By SHIRA OVIDE The Seattle Post-Intelligencer announced it will stop publishing its print edition on Tuesday and convert to an online-only news operation. The move had been anticipated since early January, when Hearst Corp., owner of the Seattle P-I and 15 other newspapers, announced it would shift the Seattle paper to a Web-news outlet or shutter the operation entirely, if a buyer wasn't found in 60 days. Hearst said it couldn't continue to absorb the P-I's losses, which the company says reached $14 million last year.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- The San Francisco Chronicle joined the lengthening list of imperiled newspapers Tuesday as its owner set out to purge the payroll and slash other expenses in a last-ditch effort to reverse years of heavy losses. If it can't reduce expenses dramatically within the next few weeks, the Hearst Corp. said it will close or sell the Chronicle, northern California's largest newspaper with a paid weekday circulation of 339,430. Hearst didn't specify a savings target nor a deadline for wringing out the expenses. A Hearst spokesman didn't immediately respond to messages Tuesday. But management made it clear...

Hearst Corp. said it may close its San Francisco Chronicle newspaper unless it can quickly slash costs at the money-losing daily. Hearst said it will seek "critical cost-saving measures," including a steep reduction in the Chronicle work force. If it can't reach its cost-saving target "within weeks," it will seek a buyer for the newspaper, Hearst said. And if it can't find a buyer -- at a time when few investors are shelling out money for big newspapers -- it will close the paper. The possible closure of the Chronicle, the 12th-largest daily in the country and Northern California's largest...

Hearst to Slash, Sell or Close the Chronicle By SHIRA OVIDE Hearst Corp. said it may close its San Francisco Chronicle newspaper unless it can quickly slash costs at the money-losing daily. A vendor sells a copy of the San Francisco Chronicle at his newsstand in the San Francisco Municipal Railway station. Getty Images A vendor sells a copy of the San Francisco Chronicle at his newsstand in the San Francisco Municipal Railway station. A vendor sells a copy of the San Francisco Chronicle at his newsstand in the San Francisco Municipal Railway station. A vendor sells a copy of...

NEW YORK -- The Hearst Corp. today announced an effort to reverse the deepening operating losses of its San Francisco Chronicle by seeking near-term cost savings that would include "significant" cuts to both union and non-union staff. In a posted statement, Hearst said if the savings cannot be accomplished "quickly" the company will seek a buyer, and if none comes forward, it will close the Chronicle. The Chronicle lost more than $50 million in 2008 and is on a pace to lose more than that this year, Hearst said. Frank J. Vega, chairman and publisher of the Chronicle, said, "It's...

The Hearst Corp. said Tuesday that unless the San Francisco Chronicle can undertake "critical" cost cutting measures including job cuts within weeks, the company will be forced to sell or close the newspaper. Hearst said the Chronicle lost more than $50 million last year and added that, "this year's losses to date are worse." The Chronicle has had major losses each year since 2001, Hearst said. The closely-held media company said cost reductions including an unspecified reduction in union and non-union employees are needed to restore the Chronicle to health.

When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined Minnesota freshman Rep. Keith Ellison for his recent swearing-in ceremony, the controversy over his taking the oath of office on the Quran overshadowed his earlier role in supporting a terrorist whose group tried to kill policemen and allegedly twice tried to murder Pelosi's fellow San Francisco lawmaker Sen. Diane Feinstein. On Feb.12, 2000, Ellison joined Bernadine Dohrn, one of the founders of the 1960s radical group the Weather Underground, and several other speakers at a fundraiser for recently arrested Kathleen Soliah, a.k.a. Sara Jane Olson. Kathleen Soliah, a.k.a. Sara Jane Olson Soliah – who...

The recently freed Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt has urged an end to the Colombian government's "vocabulary of hate" against her former captors. Ms Betancourt, a former presidential candidate, was held hostage for six years by Marxist Farc rebels. But, while praising President Alvaro Uribe's work towards her release, she said it was time to end "extremist" language towards the Farc. Ms Betancourt is in Paris, where she flew after her release on Wednesday. "I think we have reached a point where we must change this radical, extremist vocabulary of hate of very strong words that intimately wound the human being,"...

Patty Hearst's bulldog wins at WestminsterFebruary 12, 2008 Patricia Hearst poses for a picture with her French bulldog, Diva. (AP) NEW YORK---- Uno the beagle turned Madison Square Garden into his own big, green backyard. He barked and bayed. He nipped at a newly printed sign. He tried to grab his leash. He took a flying leap at a piece of filet mignon. ''Snoopy would be proud,'' handler Aaron Wilkerson said Monday. ''He was being his merry little hound self.'' He also did something out of character: He became the first beagle to win the hound group at the Westminster...

The Hearst Corp. is weighing a sale of The Chronicle building at Fifth and Mission streets and adjoining properties in the city's SoMa district in a bid to take advantage of the area's surging commercial real estate values, a top company official said Wednesday. The company is committed to keeping The Chronicle in San Francisco, said Stephen Hearst, vice president and general manager of San Francisco Realties, the Hearst Corp.'s West Coast land management unit. But he provided no details about a potential new location. "We've spoken to some leading developers in the last 30 days ... and will likely...

1974: Hearst 'ransom' provokes violence There have been near-riots in Los Angeles as the food distribution demanded as a ransom for kidnapped newspaper heiress, Patty Hearst, turned into farce. The $2 million (£870,000) food handout has been called the most bizarre ransom ever paid, and was in response to demands from Miss Hearst's kidnappers, the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA). Distribution points were set up in slum areas throughout Los Angeles and San Francisco at the request of Randolph Hearst, Miss Hearst's father and the son of flamboyant tycoon William Randolph Hearst Long queues formed as up to 1,000 people gathered...

Papers face new request Temporary halt to discussions sought in court - Carolyn Said, Chronicle Staff Writer Thursday, November 23, 2006 Click to View A federal judge is pondering a new request by San Francisco businessman Clint Reilly to temporarily put the brakes on a complex deal among the owners of almost all the daily newspapers in the Bay Area. Reilly, a real-estate investor and former candidate for mayor, filed an antitrust suit in July against Hearst Corp., publisher of The Chronicle, and MediaNews Group, publisher of the San Jose Mercury News, Contra Costa Times, Oakland Tribune, Marin Independent Journal...

Backers of a measure that would hit energy companies drilling in California with $4 billion in new taxes planned to start running a hard-hitting TV ad across the state today urging voters to "make oil companies pay.'' There's nothing subtle about the new ad, said Paul Begala, a consultant for Proposition 87. "We're not shy; our most important goal is to get California off its dependence on oil,'' said Begala, a former Clinton White House aide and CNN television commentator. "If you want support, you have to build support.'' Prop. 87 would tax companies for oil pumped in California, based...

WTAE-TV has shuffled its weekday news anchor lineup, ending a 13-year relationship with anchor Scott Baker, promoting Wendy Bell and moving sports director Andrew Stockey to the morning news desk. The changes to the Channel 4 Action News team will become effective Monday, but it appears Baker has already left the station. Baker had no comment yesterday, and news director Bob Longo said he could not comment on personnel matters, saying only that Baker is "no longer going to be an anchor with the station." Baker's bio has already been removed from the station's Web site.

Scooping up the San Jose Mercury News and the Contra Costa Times gives Dean Singleton a mammoth cluster of newspapers in the San Francisco Bay Area and poses a significant challenge to the San Francisco Chronicle. By Charles Layton Charles Layton (charlesmary@hotmail.com)is an AJR senior writer. Most major newspapers came of age in big cities, surrounded by smaller papers in the suburbs and outlying towns. These rivals may have nipped at their heels and cut into their circulation, but they never threatened the big papers' market dominance. But now, in the San Francisco Bay Area, a cluster of suburban papers...

Newspaper circulation fell 2.6 percent in the six-month period ending in March, according to data released Monday, as the industry continued to struggle with competition from other media outlets and the Internet. The decline in average paid weekday circulation was about the same as the previous time newspapers reported six-month circulation figures for the period ending last September, according to the Newspaper Association of America, a trade group. The NAA reported that average paid circulation at Sunday newspapers fell 3.1 percent versus the same period a year ago, also a comparable decline with the last time circulation figures were reported....

Denver's MediaNews Group agreed to buy the San Jose Mercury News and the Contra Costa Times -- the Bay Area's second and third largest newspapers -- from McClatchy Co., the companies said today. New York's Hearst Corp., publisher of The Chronicle and SFGate, is buying the Monterey County Herald and the St. Paul Pioneer Press of Minnesota from McClatchy and will transfer ownership of those papers to MediaNews in exchange for a stake in MediaNews' operations outside the Bay Area. The deal for all four papers was valued at $1 billion -- 11.5 times the paper's earnings before interest, taxes,...