[livius drusus]

Gene Weingarten gives a commencement address to the U of M School of Journalism grads.

lollerskates

My point is, this is a challenging time for journalists.

And because you are word people, you understand that "challenging time" is a euphemism often used to describe disasters of epic proportions. For example, Richard Pryor was facing a "challenging time" when he ran down the street half-naked and on fire.

[...]

Two decades ago, I worked with your dean, Tom Kunkel, at the Miami Herald. Back then, the Herald was a newspaper the thickness of the Singapore telephone directory. Today, when carriers fling the Herald onto suburban driveways, it settles to the pavement gently, like a sycamore leaf in the breeze. When Tom and I worked there, the Herald was the flagship of the Knight Ridder newspaper chain, which no longer exists, having recently been purchased by the McClatchy chain, which sold some of the papers to the MediaNews chain, which sold some of the papers to the Kmart chain, which is using them as packing material for Scooby-Doo sippy cups. My point is, and I mean this sincerely, this is a challenging time for newspapers.