Gitell.com (left) and Media Nation atI’ve been holding off until it became official, but now it can be told. House Speaker Robert DeLeo has named friend of Media Nation Seth Gitell as his director of communications. DeLeo’s gain is our loss — Seth explains why he’s giving up his widely read blog, in which he expertly covered everything from politics to food.
Seth may be best known as Mayor Tom Menino’s former spokesman, but before that we were colleagues at the Boston Phoenix. Here’s my account of our last road trip — a Rudy Giuliani event in Durham, N.H., in December 2007, which Seth covered for the now-defunct New York Sun and I covered for the Guardian.
Good luck, Seth. And here’s an excellent Web site you can bookmark for your new boss.
Discover more from Media Nation
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Seth’s a nice guy. I miss his annual Latke parties. :-)Good luck Seth!Mark G
I hope he’s not really going to shut it down, but just keep it online without updating it any further.
Ron: Good point, and I just modified the headline.
Without commenting on Mr. Gitell’s positions or writing style…It is interesting that the revolving door between journalism and politics has just welcomed another through the portal.Nothing “wrong” with it…just interesting.
Is that a watch under your sleeve, or are you just happy to see us?
So the House Speaker needs a house speaker, at six figures, no less? And this is something to celebrate as we layoff teachers, police and fire? Spare me.The Patriot Ledger now publishes on its front page a sampling of reader comments originally posted on line. Yesterday, George Griggs of Pembroke was one of those featured. “Businesses are laying off people, so why not them?” was his comment, suggesting legislators on Beacon Hill trim their staffs. I couldn’t agree more.lkcape is on to something as well. There’s something tawdry about the endless sashaying between being a watcher and being the watched. Also, how many years did Gitell do with Menino? Ten years and vested? Must be nice. I hope the media mentions one of their own in the next story on pension scandals.
Ten years! Where do you get this stuff, Fish? Two years, maybe three?
What is the percentage of journalists that end up working for Republicans when they leave their journalism jobs?The obvious one that comes to mind is Tony Snow.But on the Democratic side I can think of (of the top of my head) Richard Chacon, Seth Gitell, Jay Carney, Linda Douglass…. And those are just high-profile recent cases.I think it’s an indictment of the unbiased media that so many of them jump over to Democratic politics when they are finished in journalism.
It takes ten years to vest in the state pension system, Dan. Municipal service is transferable to the state pension system and vice versa. I get all of that from state law. On Gitell’s length of service to Menino, I have no idea and was merely asking, hence the question mark. If he has three years as you say, and works a day in 2009, that leaves six years to go. Again, must be nice to speak for the speaker at $97,538.50 (his predecessor’s 2008 salary).—Mark, add Eric Fehrnstrom to the list of former journalists who went to work for Republicans. I think it’s a bi-partisan problem.
Public service…. Private enrichment.Doesn’t matter which party.Post-Partisan economics.