The Tribune Company, following the same media manipulating savvy that led Britney's advisors to announce her divorce today, waited for election day to fire LA Times editor Dean Baquet, who'd been fighting against further staff cuts at the paper, which posted an operating profit margin of 20 percent last year. It takes a true lack of class to fire a newspaperman on the day he's most needed, just to ensure no one sees the story. Then again, given that the TribCo bought the Times in 2000 largely on the half-baked theory of creating an economy of scale by sharing news between papers in different cities—and now that that's failed is looking to sell off its assets in whole or part—it wouldn't have been fair to expect more.

On the plus side, they haven't yet followed the lead of Memphis' Tri-State Defender, which is offering a package deal for advertisers to purchase both ads and favorable front page stories. (Hat Tip: 13th Floor) Then again, anyone who thinks that's not already how the game is played, if less directly, should sit in on a few editorial meetings sometime.