Trib layoffs are bad news for the city

... and I have strong words for the online trolls who are delighting in journalists losing their jobs

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Tuesdays at 11:30 a.m. I talk with WGN-AM 720 host John Williams about what’s making news and likely to be grist for the PS mill. The WGN listen-live link is here.

There will be no Picayune Plus or Picayune Sentinel next week as I’m taking my first week-long break since the first issue in 2021. The Picayunes will return on Aug. 12.

Layoffs hit the Tribune after a failed buyout offer from the hedge fund

A social media thread from the Chicago Tribune newsroom Guild that posted Thursday:

Today, the Chicago Tribune laid off five guild staff members in a roughly 10% cut to our newsroom. These layoffs underscore a sad but unsurprising failure of leadership by Alden Global Capital, our hedge fund owner, and local management.

We are losing trusted colleagues who covered housing, criminal justice, Chicago’s food scene, the Bears and a photo editor who helped bring all of those stories and many more to life. It hurts them and it hurts Tribune readers.

Why is this happening? There’s only one answer: greed.

We haven’t gotten meaningful answers on why cuts must be made. This week, our hedge fund owner, Alden Global Capital, put in a $88 million bid to buy another newspaper. They just don’t care about this critical work.

Our newsroom leaders must do more to defend journalism. They haven’t communicated with us through this process or laid out a clear vision for the future.

We call on (Executive Editor Mitch Pugh) to meet with staff and explain the way forward.

We are devastated to lose our colleagues and we stand with them.

These are the journalists without whom Chicago will be less informed, entertained and connected:

Lizzie Kane — our tiger of a housing beat reporter who led a major workplace culture investigation into Guaranteed Rate, has landed one scoop after another, including several just this month, on the Chicago Housing Authority and HUD. (UPDATE — KANE WAS REHIRED SHORTLY AFTER THE LAYOFFS WERE ANNOUNCED) (UPDATE 2x — KANE RESIGNED IN EARLY SEPTEMBER SAYING SHE AND MANAGEMENT HAD FAILED TO REACH “A MUTUALLY BENEFICIAL AGREEMENT” FOR HER RETURN)

Sean Hammond — is a ferociously productive reporter on the most well-read beat the Tribune has — the Bears. His layoff means that subscribers hungry for news and insight on the team will now be less informed. (UPDATE — HAMMOND WAS REHIRED SHORTLY AFTER THE LAYOFFS WERE ANNOUNCED)

Shanzeh Ahmad — has held multiple roles over her time with the Tribune, contributing features about life, food and religion and holding down Saturday shifts in first appearance court to make sure readers are informed throughout the week.

Ahmed Ali Akbar — went deep on all angles of Chicago’s vibrant food scene way beyond the plate — the economic, cultural and political winds that power it, but also the fun and community that springs up around it.

Pinar Istek — anchored the night shift on the photo desk, directing after-hours visual coverage of breaking news. She is a proactive leader who looks out for the whole photo desk and was an essential part of dozens of breaking stories.

Veteran political reporter Ray Long accepted a buyout offer several weeks ago. Non-union members of the staff who will be leaving include Elaine Varvatos, the Senior Manager of Editorial Administration at Chicago Tribune Media Group, metro desk editor Trevor Jensen and Emily Rosenbaum, an editor in the business section.

The union estimates that these developments represent a 10% reduction in the size of the newsroom. This compares to the 20% reduction reported in the Sun-Times newsroom after layoffs earlier this year.

The gleeful comments on social media about the Tribune layoffs have been nothing short of disgusting, with conservatives ululating their glee that employees of what they are calling a “hyperbiased” “woke rag” “leftist” “propaganda” news outlet are now out of a job.

Those laid off are young reporters, you fucking jerks. They have rent and car and in some cases college loan payments to make. They do not set editorial policy — which is decidedly middle of the road and even a bit right leaning. They covered sports, food, housing and other issues right down the political middle.

You’re a shitty person if you revel in the misfortune of hardworking, decent people. And you’re an idiot if you think weakened daily newspapers will improve our city or that circulation and ad revenue problems are related to the political views expressed on the editorial pages or by the columnists.

Shrinking newsrooms are bad for the city and bad for the region. Full stop.

Good editorial / bad editorial

A bouquet…

…. to the Tribune Editorial Board for “Chicago’s taxicab regulations have fallen apart,” a Sunday offering decrying the tendency of city cabbies to ignore the mandate that they turn on their meters and charge legal fares:

As Chicagoans and tourists spilled out of Navy Pier on Wednesday night, a crowd of taxicabs waited for the post-shows and post-fireworks crowd. Their roof-lights all were lit, indicating availability for a ride.

Chicago’s taxicab regulations require those drivers to take folks without prejudice or favor wherever they want to go, to do so by the most expeditious route and to charge them a regulated price, perhaps accompanied by a nice tip for good service. The cost is determined by a meter.

But none of the cabs we tried were willing to use their meters Wednesday night.

Once we saw what was going on, we stuck our heads in and out of more than half a dozen, just to make sure this was not a rogue outlier or two. But it was ubiquitous. … Tourists and Chicagoans alike were forced into sudden negotiations in what clearly has become an unregulated Wild West, more akin to one of those international cities where cabs don’t have meters and routinely prey on visitors.

A newspaper is well positioned to champion the cause of enforcement not only through editorials but also investigative news stories and columns. Blogs and newsletters can cheer them on, but only major media outlets have the muscle to move the city to act.

A brickbat …

… to the Tribune Editorial Board for “About your complaints on Trumpian gerrymandering, Gov. Pritzker,” another obtuse insistence that Illinois unilaterally stop drawing political maps to advantage Democrats — an act they call “indefensible.”

Earlier this year, we urged the Illinois Supreme Court to hear a Republican lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the state’s 2021 political maps affecting state legislative districts. The court declined to weigh in, and that was shameful.

No. What’s shameful is that the U.S. Supreme Court hasn’t acted to rein in this cynical practice nationwide. What’s shameful is “Texas Republicans aim to redraw House districts at Trump’s urging,” a news article that explains how Texas is breaking with the tradition that new maps are drawn every 10 years and attempting a mid-cycle adjustment that will yield more Republican U.S. House members from the Lone Star State. Similarly:

After staving off a ballot measure to expand the power of a mapmaking commission last election, Ohio Republicans hope to redraw their congressional map from a 10-5 one favoring the GOP to one as lopsided as 13-2, in a state Trump won last year with 55% of the vote

And the Tribune wants JB Pritzker and Illinois Democrats to take the high road and unilaterally lower their gloves in what the Editorial Board correctly identifies as “partisan brawling”?

Oh hell no.

I looked at the issue of gerrymandering in 2021 (gift link):

Nationally, Republicans benefit more from gerrymandering than Democrats. The overall advantage is about 16 seats in Congress, according to “Extreme Maps,” a 2017 report from the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law. An Associated Press analysis in 2017 estimated that net advantage at 22 seats, and a Center for American Progress report in 2019 put it at 19 seats.

Illinois doesn’t appear in the top 10 in various rankings of the most gerrymandered states.

Usually on those lists is Wisconsin, where the GOP got 62% of the seats with 51% of the vote in the 2020 U.S. congressional election. And North Carolina, where Democrats won a narrow plurality of votes for U.S. Congress but only 38% of the seats.

At the state legislative level, we see similar patterns. A University of Southern California study of 2018 elections showed that 45% of Wisconsin voters voted for a Republican in state House elections, but the GOP won 65% of the state House seats. In Pennsylvania those numbers were 46% and 54%; in North Carolina, 48% and 54%.

In Kentucky, according to the USC data, 58% of voters chose Republican state Senate candidates in 2018, but Republicans won 89.5% of the races. In Hawaii, Democrats won 60% of the votes but 90% of the seats.

The Tribune ought to apply its high-minded rhetoric toward demanding a national solution to the problem of unfair maps instead of wagging a finger at Pritzker for being willing to fight fire with fire.

Notes and comments from readers — lightly edited — along with my responses

Colbert: A victim of changing media habits or politics?

John Houck — You seem very sure that “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” was put on the chopping block because it was losing $40 million a year. But that claim seem overblown. According to The Medias Touch, Paramount’s loss-leader is their streaming platform division (Paramount+) which lost $100 million in the first quarter of 2025 alone.

Jake H. — Quoting Nate Silver’s Substack:

"Earning $70 million in ad revenues per year is still substantial, especially for a flagship brand that might have a halo effect on the rest of the network. ... To Paramount Global, The Late Show is still just a rounding error: Paramount recorded $29 billion in revenues last year. Here’s where politics could have been a factor, though. The extent to which corporate suits will tolerate a loss from a high-prestige but money-losing division of the company may well depend on both the external and internal political environment. ... If a new division head steps in who wants to rectify the excesses of the previous administration, or a new corporate parent takes over that wants to demonstrate to investors that it can trim costs, you might be a sitting duck so long as the P&L is in the red. ... And if you’re also a political pain-in-the-ass, that might be a decisive tiebreaker. ... You might be able to survive losing money, and you might be able to survive being a political headache for the suits, but probably not both at once."

Garry Spelled Correctly — Hollywood accounting is notoriously suspect. The studios add all sorts of intangible costs to productions that have nothing to do with that specific production, usually they call it "overhead.”

Nancy Meyer — The majority of Colbert’s viewership is reportedly over 65. But what’s the point of dumping geezer-friendly TV shows just to appeal to the young? Why the obsessive competition to win everything instead of appreciating the niche successes you achieve? Seniors do have and spend plenty of money.

K. Mason — Media companies seem to have bought into the fiction that old folks are too set in their ways to be swayed by ads. They ignore the fact that we have a lot more money than most young folks, who are struggling with student debt, high housing prices, and poor job prospects.

Zorn — There’s clearly a lot of market research that suggests advertisers are smart to target a younger demographic whose tastes and preferences are more malleable and who tend to be more open to trying new products. Seniors may have lots more disposable income, but their tastes and brand preferences tend to be fixed. The one category seniors seem to be open to experimenting with is pharmaceuticals, which is why the network newscasts have so many commercials for medicines.

As for Colbert, let’s just keep an eye on Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel to see if their shows — which certainly have similar demographics and similar financial struggles — are cancelled or diminished in the next few years. I suspect they will be.

Felons for Congress?

Michael M. — You reminded us last week of the crimes to which Jesse Jackson Jr. pleaded guilty in 2013 to suggest that the Tribune Editorial Board should not have been so wishy-washy about his upcoming bid for his old congressional seat.

But at the risk of whataboutism, how many other politicians committed similar crimes but knew how to game the system so they weren't caught? Was the investigation and prosecution politically motivated? And after convicts serve their time, should they still be punished?

I guess if I have a choice between letting a Rod Blagojevich or Jackson run for and win an election to federal office, versus not letting them be able to run and win in a fair election, I'll choose the latter option.

Zorn — I do understand the “let voters decide!” sentiment when it comes to felonious pasts, but that sentiment would also require us to get rid of age and residency requirements. My view would be that a felony conviction should bar someone from ever holding political office (and that age and residency requirements are a good thing.)

Let’s simply ban smoking

Steven K. — I could almost get on board with Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson’s efforts to curtail smoking on the CTA. It’s certainly a worthy goal. But sending out social workers to remind people of the health risks of smoking? This would be funny if it weren’t so lame. You could not concoct a better parody of the liberal tendency to approach every single problem with a psyche-soothing soft touch and nurturing balm.

Cigarettes should be outlawed, period. I’ve heard the civil libertarian arguments, and have subscribed to them myself over the years, but we’ve long since accustomed ourselves to the idea that it is within government’s powers to prohibit certain behaviors and substances based solely on the health risks that they pose to their users. Why should opiate, coke, acid and meth users have to go to jail, but nicotine addicts get a pass. At least someone snorting coke or shooting smack isn’t violating me by sullying the air with the noxious residue of their odious vice. It isn’t even a public health issue, it’s an environmental pollution issue. I’m all for letting people do whatever they want as long as it doesn’t impinge on others, but clearly cigarette smoking exceeds those boundaries. There are all sorts of things that used to be common practice and we just accepted, and then we didn’t. Like using racial slurs and dumping toxic waste into rivers and lakes. Cigarette smoking should be relegated to the same cultural curio display of strange things that we used to consider normal, but that we evolved out of.

Zorn — Our nation was so scarred by the failure of Prohibition that this idea seems preposterous and likely to create a dangerous black market. But consider my distillation of the 8,500-work argument made by writer and former three-pack-a-day smoker Patrick Griffin in the Chicago Reader more than 30 years ago. It was written before the implementation of the Smoke-Free Illinois Act in 2008 which banned smoking in most indoor public places.

Why don’t we ban smoking outright? … Smoking is said to kill 434,000 Americans every year… Total up the annual deaths attributable to accidents, homicides, suicides, AIDS, alcohol, and all other drugs combined. Then double it. … One estimate puts the annual health care and lost productivity costs of smoking at $65 billion, or $3 for every pack sold. …

Prohibition, I’ll grant you, was stupid on a scale so titanic that … it still stands as a reproach to incautious idealists and simpleminded reformers everywhere. It’s one of the few episodes in American history that can legitimately be reduced to a “lesson.” … People continued to drink, though less openly, and their drink money bankrolled the rise of a violent new class of criminal middlemen. Law enforcement authorities everywhere were cowed and corrupted. Decent people became hypocrites. …

(But) Tobacco simply doesn’t belong to the family of mind-altering recreational binge drugs, of which alcohol is the most prominent member. If your supply of alcohol is irregular and your routine drinking opportunities restricted — if, beyond the occasional backstairs nip, anything resembling a party has to wait, sometimes for days — well, that’s OK. You can keep that up. In fact, you can sustain quite a little drinking “problem” under those conditions. Your consumption was probably going to be intermittent anyway. …

Smoking, real smoking, is less like drinking than it is like, well, breathing. There’s no cycle of riot and recovery, no rinse and repeat. It’s a way of dreary life. …. Smoking as we know it — that is, mindless, compulsive, ashtray-choking, carton-by-carton consumption — could well come to an end. …

Addictions have to be fed, or they weaken. And a tobacco prohibition, however ineffectual it would be at eliminating smoking overall, could quickly do away with a kind of smoking: namely, the steady, routine, barely conscious kind that sustains the most intense addictions. …

The whole point of a tobacco prohibition would be not to dam up smoking completely but to pose a big, fat, tangled obstacle to it. If veteran smokers, with king-size addictions built up over years of cheap, mindless, hassle-free smoking, were still motivated enough to go around, then so be it, we’d have lost them. But the smokers of tomorrow would never get through.

The most recent estimates from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control put the number of annual deaths attributable to cigarettes smoking at 480,000 and the combined cost in healthcare spending and lost productivity at roughly $600 billion.

More green lights for process videos

Last week I green-lit YouTube videos that show how products are made, and readers submitted a few more suggestions:

• "How It's Made"

• “Modern Marvels”

• “Industry on Parade”

• “Connections”

Public service corner

Jane Schoen — I know you published an email address for contacting the Tribune subscription department to ask that you not be changed for their “premium issues.” I have not been able to find it. I think I saved it in a really great spot and now have no recollection where it is. Could you send it to me please?

Zorn — The address is cswork_level1@tribune.cust-serv.com. Don’t forget the underscore between cswork and level1. I think we can all guess why they don’t make the address simpler to opt out of paying $15.99 up to 15 times a year for the Sunday inserts you probably don’t want. Your other option is to call customer service — 312-546-7900 — and navigate the phone tree.

Unpopular opinions?

At the beginning of my regular weekly appearance with WGN-AM midday host John Williams last Tuesday, he noted that former Sun-Times movie critic Richard Roeper had posted this to Twitter:

I was aghast. Mortified. Stunned. I’d never heard of anyone using utensils to eat popcorn. Popcorn is the quintessential finger food. I said that eating it with a spoon is like eating a hotdog with a fork — stabbing the bun and bringing it to your mouth. Williams suggested this topic as an unpopular opinion and I bit, so to speak.

Last week’s result

I argued “no,” but my view proved decidedly unpopular

Rima -- The protests of the 60s and 70s helped bring a war to an end and bring the concept of Earth Day to many more people. ANY activity/protest/demonstration has value, no matter how small.

Phillip Seeberg -- Protests are successful to the extent that they get new people involved in the political process and from them we can get our future leaders. But for changing opinions of other people? Nope.

Mark K -- I'm increasingly skeptical that protests have any effect at all. The massive "No Kings" protests were just over a month ago and are already a distant memory, winning no changes. Maybe sustaining them at that scale over a long period of time, like every weekend for a year, could have a chance to force the issue enough to be in the media more consistently and have a chance at forcing some change. Sporadic, poorly attended protests might only be a comfort for those involved, but they seem completely ineffectual, even open to derision and ridicule.

Steven K. — A sparsely attended rally is worse than no rally at all. The paltry attendance at Trump’s birthday parade made him look like a much bigger fool than if there hadn’t been one at all.

This occasional Tuesday feature is intended to highlight opinions that are defensible but may well be unpopular. If you have one to add, leave it in comments or send me an email, but be sure to offer at least a paragraph in defense of your view.

NewsWheel

Inspired by the WordWheel puzzle in the Monday-Friday Chicago Tribune and other papers, this puzzle asks you to identify the missing letter that will make a word or words — possibly proper nouns; reading either clockwise or counterclockwise — related to a story in the news or other current event. The answer is at the bottom of the newsletter.

The week’s best visual jokes

Here are some funny visual images I've come across recently on social media. Enjoy, then evaluate:

There’s still time to vote in the conventional Quip of the Week poll!

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Info

Eric Zorn is a former opinion columnist for the Chicago Tribune. Find a longer bio and contact information here. This issue exceeds in size the maximum length for a standard email. To read the entire issue in your browser, click on the headline link above. Paid subscribers receive each Picayune Plus in their email inbox each Tuesday, are part of our civil and productive commenting community and enjoy the sublime satisfaction of supporting this enterprise.

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Answer to the NewsWheel puzzle

SKYDANCE