Annals of embarrassing cross-promotion
How was the Herald’s March 5 cover lame? Let us count
the ways. There was the schoolyard tone of the headline: WHACK JOB! OUR
GUY HOWIE’S HOWLIN’ MAD, WANTS FINNERAN JAILED FOR HIS ON AIR ‘HIT’
JOKE. There was the great big photo of Howie Carr, the pugnacious Herald
columnist, looking delicate and sensitive and haunted. There was the
obvious promotion, not just of Carr's radio show on WRKO-AM, but of
Finneran's WKRO show as well. (The WRKO microphone in the lower
left-hand corner was a nice touch. Remember the Herald this Christmas, Jason Wolfe and Julie Kahn.)
And then, beneath Finneran's pic, there was this sober synopsis of the story in question: “Herald
columnist and WRKO talk-show host Howie Carr wants a judge to throw
radio colleague Tom Finneran — the former House Speaker and a convicted
felon — in jail for joking on air about having Carr whacked and stuffed
in the trunk of Gov. Deval Patrick's Cadillac.”
Judging from reporter Laurel Sweet’s “exclusive”
on page three, the premise is this: since Finneran, the
ex-Massachusetts House Speaker, is currently on probation for
obstructing justice in connection with the state legislature’s 2002
redistricting, the joke should land him behind bars.
Maybe Carr really thinks WRKO fucked up by
hiring Finneran. And whether he’s motivated by genuine outrage or just
looking to pad his ratings, Carr has every right to cultivate a public
feud with his co-worker. But does the Herald really need to play along
and put this stuff on the cover, for God’s sake?
Here’s what Herald editor Kevin Convey tells the Phoenix:
“The bottom line is, tabloids have to splash with something. . . .
Howie has a huge radio audience and a huge audience of people who love
him here at the paper, and the times we’ve splashed with him before,
we’ve gotten a good response. In fact, if you take it strictly in terms
of readership, that was the most highly read story online [at
BostonHerald.com] that day.
“On a news basis, it’s not that big a deal,”
Convey admits. “As far as news stories go, I wouldn’t class it with the
news coming out of Iraq. But the truth is, on a slow Sunday, you have
to make a choice, and that was the best choice we had at the time.”
Okay, Kevin. We forgive you. But Carr is another
matter. Let’s all remember that, as Finneran prepared to join him on
the WRKO payroll, Carr trotted out some nasty ad hominems via his Herald column. For example:
Tommy Finneran always thought he was the smartest guy in the State
House. But yesterday, the former speaker started crying as he cops a
plea at the federal courthouse, and this was all he has to say in his
own defense. I was an idiot. I was a bad boy, a very bad boy. I am
very, very sorry. And then he started choking up, and blubbering, and
melting into a puddle, and from now on you can just call him Boo Hoo.
I know, I know — that’s what Howie does.
Presumably he knows Finneran is just responding in kind, and all this
outrage is just a ploy to garner some free PR. If not, the situation’s
even more embarrassing than it seems.
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