Huh? I wasn't paying attention. Something something newspapers? Yeah who reads? Send me a text message on that. Peace out.

PP "heather" took the words right off my keyboard. I'm a 36-year-old editor. I love to read the news, but I haven't subscribed to a daily in years for the very reasons described. Newspaper journalism may still be vital and alive in other countries, but it's dead here.

Salon, which is still featuring the "pink ghetto" Broadsheet, publishes an article deploring the dumbing-down of the news media. And the article is written by Farhad Manjoo, whose approach to serious issues like election theft is "can't be bothered to be bothered by it".

Irony is not dead. It is, however, willfully ignored by the staff of Salon.

The Fix Jessica Simpson caught cheating? Michael Jackson rescued from financial ruin. Plus: Kid Rock and Scott Stapp's icky, icky sex tape

All the posts that begin with, "Great article, Farhad!" or that slam print media as being exactly what Farhad claims it to be. That's who gets the Teacher's Pet awards.

No irony. No shame. No class. No reporters. Kudos for reprinting the abuse pix, but WTF is up with all the self-congratulatory articles about how brave and bold and daring that makes this site?

Hey, I was about to congratulate Salon for not printing any Ayelat Waldman drivel for 2 whole weeks...but yesterday I saw Michael Chabon's books in the remaindered bin at Borders and Barnes & Noble. Aha! He's no longer fashionable; therefore she's no longer someone to kiss up to in hopes of landing a 'serious' writer back on your staff.

Will the last one our please turn out the lights?

I enjoyed the letter from the Utica resident exposed to a Gannett newspaper. I worked for a Gannett newspaper back in the 80s, long enough to lose my idealism about journalism. Editors continually reminded us that we were to limit stories to 12 inches of copy, use shorter and shorter words, and that "The average reader has a 10th grade education!" I tried pointing out that the local yellow pages were full of doctors, attorneys, architects, engineers and other professionals who had gone beyond 10th grade, but got nowhere.

Newspapers adhere to the idea that "the readers are stupid" because most of the editors and reporters have insular lives, coming home from the newsroom, getting up and going back to the newsroom. If I pointed out technical errors in articles (such as confusing gun caliber in inches with metric calibers) I was told that wasn't important and besides, nobody really cares about that.

On the other hand, if it's something that everybody but an editor knows about, it must be new. After the victory in the world cup soccer matches by the U.S. women's team (and Brandi Chastian's exuberant voctory gesture), the local wrap sent a reporter out to ask people if a sports bra is considered outwear. Haven't any of these guys seen the ubiquitous runners in this town?

I'm a weekend athlete. Can I find anything in a Sports section about running, triathlon, cycling, windsurfing or fitness? Nope, but I can sure find plenty of detailed coverage of the three big ball sports, football, baseball and basketball. Once I took a look at the physiques of most of the sportswriters, I understood why. These were what I called "ESPN jocks," more comfortable with a remote than endorphins.

The mush that is churned out by formulaic newsrooms is then spread over traditional formats. It's hard for nerwspapers to argue that they are keeping up with the trimes when they use broadsheet formats because that's what newspapers did in the 1820s. When Jesse Jackson visited the area, I suggested to an editor a different way we could display the article, highlighting his stock phrases in a sidebar. "No, we're going to do it the way we always do it!" he said. I pointed out if that was the case, they would have to say "Jess Jackson, Negro...." as the paper had doen not too many years earlier.

I'm squarely in the demographic that newspapers seem to fretting over, and from a young age the newspaper was one of the most constant small pleasures of my day. The morning ritual of sitting down at a coffeeshop and reading the local daily and the NYT anchored me through high school, college, and the first years of my professional life. I loved discussing the news with the other smart young people around me -- we would analyzing and debate the revelations of the day with pleasure and interest.

Then the consolidation started.

Now, here in Austin, the quality of our daily paper is somewhere between a church newsletter and People Magazine. I stopped buying it the day after an article above the fold on the front page noted that "Jesus, who died for our sins..." without warrant or attribution. A year or so later, I stopped buying the NYT when I could no longer finish an article before being jarred by glaring errors or omissions. I experienced both as horrible losses -- as a former idealistic journalism student, newspapers have always represented Civilization in my mind. I knew it was an antiquated system, but so comforting somehow the idea that a stack of paper would arrive each day, containing up-to-the-minute information and opinion to help me reach decisions relevant to my life and my ideals.

I found solace for a few years in Salon -- an echo of the gravity and independence so necessary to speak truth to (and about power), a hint of the idealism that shines light into dark places -- but as we all know, that was not to last. That loss was visceral, laid over the too-new scars of the first.

Newspapers aren't being killed by the Internet, and we aren't too young or too disconnected or too poorly educated to comprehend what print and online "news" sources are trying to tell us. Celebrity-obsessed though our culture is as a whole, a very significant number of us would rather hear about matters of true importance and substance. The news sources have killed themselves through corporate consolidation and shabby, sloppy editing that smacks of pandering to the lowest common denomenator.

I still read the BBC, online, as often as I can, but I doubt there is time or intitiative for newspapers to turn themselves around and regain my trust -- our trust.