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Casino jobs without an actual casino

The $1 billion casino that will never be built in Middleborough is already producing jobs, according to reporters George Brennan and Stephanie Vosk of the Cape Cod Times:

Consultants providing legal, lobbying and public relations services were paid $2.2 million by investors, according to internal financial records for fiscal 2008. In total, the casino investors provided $4 million for the [Mashpee Wampanoag] tribe’s budget including nearly $1 million for pay and benefits of tribal council officers and staff members.

Nice to see that the South African moguls who are the real forces behind this miserable idea are providing some much-needed economic stimulus.

Once was enough

The Boston Globe has a terrific story today on a small group of backpackers who hike “the grid.” There are 48 mountains in New Hampshire with an elevation of 4,000 feet or more. The idea is to hike each of them during each month of the year — 576 summits, in other words. Why? Who knows?

Given that it took me from 1968 to 2007 to do all 48 peaks just once, the grid is not on my horizon. Earlier this year, though, when I went to a recognition dinner for those who had completed the 48 (cold pizza in a high school cafeteria), I was struck by how mundane my achievement seemed.

There were people who’d hiked all 48 peaks in the winter. People who’d hiked all 4,000-foot peaks in New England, or the 100 highest in New England. I, on the other hand, was in by far the largest and least-distinguished group.

Yet I felt liberated. I’m never able to go hiking as often as I’d like, and for years I had planned my trips around the need to check off a particular peak or peaks. Now I can hike wherever I want to. And I’ve found that I enjoy the Appalachian Trail in the Berkshires and Vermont as much as the White Mountains, but for different reasons.

The hiking is less intense (not such a bad thing now that I’m in my 50s). You’re closer to roads and small villages, yet there are fewer hikers. And if it’s summer, you don’t have to worry about freezing to death above treeline, always a concern at the White Mountains’ higher elevations. Sorry, but no grid for me.

The Globe story, written by Tom Haines and photographed by Mark Wilson, appears in “g,” the new, tabloid-size home for features and arts. Strictly from an aesthetic point of view, the story justifies the format change — it takes up the entire centerspread, with a post-to-post graphic across the top featuring all 48 mountains. It never would have looked this good on a standard newspaper page.

More: I was remiss in not noting that the Globe story is accompanied by a slideshow, an interactive graphic and a video. I would have liked to see more video, though.

Jerry Schechter

Media Nation’s best wishes go out to Danny Schechter and his family. Danny’s father, Jerry, died on Tuesday at the age of 90. Danny writes:

He had achieved all that he wanted when confronted with the reality of a terminal illness. He decided to prolong his life as long as he could and enjoy it as much as he could. He did. He wanted to die at home. He did. He wanted to be surrounded in his last hours by his family. He was. He wanted to avoid becoming dependent. He never complained, and faced his fate calmly. He was philosophical and practical about it. He left us in dignity and without pain. He was gutsy throughout. He had even instructed us to have the body removed immediately so no children in the neighborhood had to be scared by the sight of a dead person. All of the nurses, doctors and health workers who helped him became his friend and he ended up helping many of them. He was like that.

Three years ago I met Jerry Schechter, who lived in Brookline, when Danny was up from New York to speak at Northeastern. Despite his advanced age, he was sharp and energetic. I know Danny had been dealing with his father’s illness for a long time. But that doesn’t make it any easier to lose a parent.

Purcell and Murdoch, together again

And no, I have no idea what it means. But Boston Herald publisher Pat Purcell is going back to work for his old boss, Rupert Murdoch, becoming executive chairman of Ottaway Newspapers next month.

Ottaway’s community papers are a subsidiary of Dow Jones — Murdoch’s accidental acquisition when he purchased the Wall Street Journal a couple of years ago.

Purcell says he may be able to foster some sort of relationship between the Herald and Ottaway’s Massachusetts papers — among them the Cape Cod Times, the New Bedford Standard-Times and the Nantucket Inquirer & Mirror. But this isn’t a natural partnership, to say the least.

Ottaway’s Barnstable Patriot has more.

A little reality

In my latest for the Guardian, I take a close-up look at a story in the Washington Post Magazine about a teenage girl with dwarfism who underwent dangerous, painful surgery in order to become taller.

The Post story is an extraordinary achievement. At root, though, it stands as an argument that dwarfism is a difference that ought to be fixed. Our experience in raising a daughter with dwarfism tells us that’s exactly the wrong approach.

David Gregory to host “Meet the Press”

I could snark away, but I’d prefer to give David Gregory a chance to prove himself as the new host of “Meet the Press.” The announcement should come soon, according to the Huffington Post.

Of the Politico’s list of people who didn’t get the job, I’d have preferred almost any one of them — Gwen Ifill, Chuck Todd, John King, Katie Couric or Ted Koppel, though not Andrea Mitchell. But Gregory always appeared to be the leading contender, so the pending announcement is no surprise.

Gregory’s got the chops. My main problem with him is that he seems as though he’d rather be boiled in oil than be accused of liberal bias, which occasionally leads to his tying himself in knots to avoid acknowledging reality.

The late Tim Russert was not perfect. He was tough on Republicans but tougher on Democrats, and his prosecutorial style of questioning — “You said this in 1987, so why are you saying that now?” — often devolved into self-parody. But his enthusiasm, respect for his guests and engaging personality overcame his shortcomings, and I miss him. It looks like I’m going to keep missing him, though Gregory could grow into the job. If not, there’s always Bob Schieffer. (Sorry, but Media Nation is a Stephanopoulos-free zone.)

So now Tom Brokaw retires once again. I thought he was an ideal placeholder after Russert’s death, someone with the stature to maintain the “Meet the Press” brand while holding the infighting at bay until after the election.

Instead, Brokaw too often projected laziness, lack of interest and — in moderating the second presidential debate — even petulance. Brokaw was a fine anchor and he’s got a record he can be proud of. But he can’t go back to being an elder statesman soon enough.

The corruption of Gen. McCaffrey — and NBC

To me, the most reprehensible aspect of retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey’s behavior, documented in a massive front-page story in Sunday’s New York Times, wasn’t that he used his military connections on behalf of his military-contractor clients, and then didn’t disclose those connections during his paid appearances on NBC News.

That’s bad enough. But what was truly the most corrupt about McCaffrey’s behavior is that he deprived NBC’s viewers of his honest opinion at a time when it might have mattered. Worst of all: NBC executives knew it and did nothing.

The story, by David Barstow, is a follow-up to a long piece he wrote last April about conflicts of interest among paid television commentators with military background. At the time, I called it “as sickening a media scandal as we have seen in our lifetime.” Unfortunately, it pretty much disappeared without a trace.

McCaffrey, a four-star general, may be the worst — or at least the most prominent — of them all, sucking up to the military in order to serve his clients among military contractors, and going on NBC News to offer his expert opinion. Most telling is what happened when he momentarily deviated from the official line, early in the war:

Only when the invasion met unexpected resistance did General McCaffrey give a glimpse of his misgivings. “We’ve placed ourselves in a risky proposition, 400 miles into Iraq with no flank or rear area security,” he told Katie Couric on “Today.”

Mr. Rumsfeld struck back. He abruptly cut off General McCaffrey’s access to the Pentagon’s special briefings and conference calls.

General McCaffrey was stunned. “I’ve never heard his voice like that,” recalled one close associate who asked not to be identified. He added, “They showed him what life was like on the outside.”

Robert Weiner, a longtime publicist for General McCaffrey, said the general came to see that if he continued his criticism, he risked being shut out not only by Mr. Rumsfeld but also by his network of friends and contacts among the uniformed leadership.

“There is a time when you have to punt,” said Mr. Weiner, emphasizing that he spoke as General McCaffrey’s friend, not as his spokesman.

Within days General McCaffrey began to backpedal, professing his “great respect” for Mr. Rumsfeld to Tim Russert. “Is this man O.K.?” the Fox News anchor Brit Hume asked, taking note of the about-face.

For months to come, as an insurgency took root, General McCaffrey defended the Bush administration. “I am 100 percent behind what the administration, what the president of the United States, is doing in Iraq,” he told [Brian] Williams that June.

There should be firings at NBC News for the failure to disclose McCaffrey’s work for military contractors. Then again, as Beth Wellington reminds us at NewsTrust, NBC’s corporate owner, General Electric Co., is itself a major military contractor, and thus had its own conflict of interest with which to contend (or not).

The FCC is investigating, although it’s hard to imagine that it will dig as deeply as it ought to.

“On the Media” recently rebroadcast an interview it conducted last spring with one of television’s compromised analysts, Maj. Robert Bevelacqua, formerly of Fox News.

Ted Turner’s so-called thoughts

Tom Brokaw yesterday conducted what might be described as an odd interview with CNN founder Ted Turner on “Meet the Press.” Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say he conducted an interview with CNN’s odd founder, Ted Turner.

Anyway, here is the oddest part, which comes after a section in which Turner sings the praises of Vladimir Putin, even to the point of calling the KGB “an honorable place to work.”

MR. BROKAW: Your friend, Jimmy Carter, tried to be friendly with Leonid Brezhnev, and for his friendliness what did Brezhnev do?

MR. TURNER: Hell, I don’t remember. It was before I …

MR. BROKAW: He invaded Afghan …

MR. TURNER: … got involved.

MR. BROKAW: He invaded Afghanistan.

MR. TURNER: Well, we invaded Afghanistan, too, and it’s a lot further — at least it’s on the border of the Soviet Union or the former Soviet Union or Russia. A lot of these countries have changed names several times.

Good stuff if you enjoy train wrecks.

A laugh-out-loud take on Chuck Turner

Adam Gaffin presents “Quite possibly the worst column that will ever be written about Chuck Turner.” Which can only mean one thing: Joe Fitzgerald is writing again. You’ve got to love Fitz’s shoutout to Louis Farrakhan.