The winners are all moderates.

This was no "revolution", it was a rejection of Currie's paranoid, divisive nonsense.

What's next an article about unrest on the Sons of Norway board?

I remain convinced that the prior all volunteer board had good cause to look at change at the highest level of the paid staff. That they were unable to make such change probably just means that it is too late, a volunteer board will not be equipped to overcome the relationship the Executive Director has built with the membership at large.

I hope I am wrong, that Chuck will find new pursuits, and Cascade will get a badly needed breath of fresh air. Maybe then we'll see a web site that doesn't proudly proclaim © 2002 and an organization that isn't driven largely by force of personality.

I have my doubts, given Chuck and his loyal staff are paid, while the board are people giving time and energy free of charge.

Hugo: With all due respect, there's no depth to your article. You just state the obvious that anyone can see. In reality a lot more transpired which you don't even allude to. There was a major power play on the part of the previous board, complete with strategic lying and obfuscation.

The board didn't just resign. They were forced to resign because they lost all credibility with membership. Amateur bloggers shed more light on what was really going on.

As one of those amateurs I look to professional journalists like yourself to lead the way in terms of shedding light and revealing why anyone should care about this or other issues. That you're not doing that here on Crosscut is disappointing. It reads like a filler piece. I can understand the reader's comparison of this to troubles at the Sons of Norway.

http://tubulocity.com/?p=2935/

Cascade has 13,000 members and they got ballots from 700 of them. That doesn't sound like a political sea change no matter who was elected.

@Iponder, you must not read Hugo's restaurant reviews...

@orino: should I? I've been considering whether my own comment was too harsh and unjustified. I still think not. I'll expand my criticism beyond Hugo, to most mainstream journalists. I perceive most of what's passed off as journalism as weak tea and undercooked hamburger being passed off as a meal. Where's the beef? Journalism is in a sickly weak state. Instead of seizing the day with power and meaning, many remaining well-trained professionals appear to be half asleep. I use "well-trained" in a derogatory fashion. Well trained enough to provide basic story structure, word count, and typing in a neutral fashion. I believe even political controversy at the Sons of Norway could be reported in a compelling way that would reveal greater meaning. I've got a small sign on my wall for my kids that says "No small parts. Only timid actors". Journalists who want to be read and have jobs as journalists in the future need to not be so timid and show us something of value.

Matt Taibbi, Greg Palast

Now there are a couple of journalists who bother to do the research and write like it matters.

I too found this article to be totally lacking in facts. I think the problem is that all the major news sources have cut back by laying off editors. You know, the people who send drivel back to the writer with comments like, "What the heck do you mean?", "Wheres the meat in this story.", "If you keep this up, we'll assign you to the high school sports desk."

Sorry Hugo, but there was a great uproar at Cascade over the firing of the director. You've failed to tell us why he's still there.

lponder, GaryP - you won't get much of an argument from me. There is plenty more to be told. Perhaps the only humble accomplishment here has been to whet appetites. This particular post aside (it was meant, clearly, mostly as an update, to mark the consequence of past events; so take it for what it's worth), the challenge of publishing quality journalism in this day and age is apparent, sometimes painfully so.

Technology has turned information, like so many other things, into a commodity. We've figured out how to make money from moving it around, duplicating it, sharing it, Tweeting it, etc., but not actually creating it. (Look at the Huffington Post.) But you can only water down the product so much and still expect it to have value.

As our editors have pointed out during the recent membership drive, Crosscut is a media organization that employs exactly one, full-time reporter (not me. Safe to say, the editing staff of two does its very best to do jobs typically done by dozens. Once performed by well-funded, large institutions, journalism is now largely performed by guerillas. I think we strive to do gold-standard journalism, but we're operating on a garage-sale budget.

We can make up for that in some ways, by drawing upon personal experience or expertise, to sacrifice comprehensive coverage for insightful coverage or attacking one particular angle of story rather than all the angles. The results are probably going to be mixed. Sometimes we'll hit upon something rare and wonderful; sometimes, I imagine, we'll come up with something more ordinary than we'd like.

It was once suggested to me that the extinction of journalism's large institutions will be made up for by the evolution of its small, nimble creatures, all the blogs and citizen journalists. I am not yet convinced that this is even remotely true.

All the people who preach that "information wants to be free" miss the point I think. First of all, information does not "want" to be anything. We consumers might want it to be free. But that doesn't mean it will be any good. The facts you spoke of are expensive. They require time and devotion, that no journalist I know is willing to give up for free.

As for this particular posting...Ayers is still there because the most vocal members of the club intervened. The vast majority probably did not care, as long as they get to ride the STP. The most comprehensive piece we've published on this topic was posted Nov. 5 (see link adjacent to this post). We'd like to do more on Cascade and plenty of other subjects.

I can't make any promises, but I will tell you that 20 years ago, the newspaper I worked for had 10 times the resources that Crosscut currently has, just to cover high school sports in one particular part of Broward County. And the coverage was fantastic.

Hi Hugo: Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I apologize if I was harsh or over-generalizing. Though I'm not a pro journalist, my career has been parallel to journalism and affected by the same forces of change. We know the old days are gone.

Since Crosscut is not-for-profit (at this point), I think perhaps the writing can step outside the box in ways that weren't allowed at corporate-owned newspapers. Maybe it needs to be bigger and bolder (without being hysterical or bloviating). Since you're not writing these particular articles for a paycheck, perhaps they can be written from a POV that wouldn't have been tolerated at a corporate paper.

I'm hungry for great local journalism and am hoping a new form emerges that pays and supports dedicated professionals. Since I opened my big mouth and you responded, I'm now compelled to become one of your loyal readers.