Now that the Minnesoros “Independent” has accomplished its mission of serving as a local-regional propaganda outlet for the mid-to-far left – a sort of local analogue to “Media Matters” and “MoveOn”, even as far as sharing some of the same funding sources – and the election is over…<\/p>\n
…the reason for having <\/em>the “Independent” has apparently passed.\u00a0 The Center for “Independent” Media has yanked the budget leash on its’ “independent” The first sign?\u00a0 The “Independent” has started whacking its staff<\/a>:<\/p>\n A couple more names are victims of budget-cutting at Minnesota Independent<\/a>: full-timer Andy Birkey and politics freelancer Britt Robson.<\/p>\n Birkey had covered LGBT issues for the site since its August 2006 inception; he was one of two staffers axed, along<\/a> with reporter Molly Priesmeyer.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The last time I\u00a0knew anything of the “Independent”‘s financials, the “writers” got a stipend for working part-time for the glorified blog.\u00a0 I’d suspect – and will try to dig\u00a0up info – that when they brought on former journalist and ex-City Pages<\/em> editor Steve\u00a0Perry, it came along with a big, and currently unnecessary, jump in funding.<\/p>\n But I’ve come to look forward to staff departures at the “Independent”, because it seems that’s when the actual truth comes out.\u00a0 When Eric Black left, he let slip<\/a> the Mindy’s Soros connection<\/a> (the worst-kept secret in the Twin Cities alt-media).\u00a0<\/p>\n And now, Britt Robson – one of the Mindy’s Robson became a casualty when MnIndy’s parent, the D.C.-based Center for Independent Media (CIM), eliminated the freelance budget entirely…However, Robson \u2014 who writes about arts for MinnPost and sports for The Rake \u2014 was caustic in his view [of] MnIndy’s Capitol overlords. He says CIM’s national staff was less interested in the organization’s professed <\/strong>mission<\/strong><\/a> \u2014 “a<\/strong> nonpartisan nonprofit organization that operates an independent online news network in the public interest”\u00a0\u2014 than boosting the party of Barack Obama<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n “I was working with them fairly closely during the Republican convention and privy to interoffice emails,” Robson explains. “The type of things non-local editors were into were very party-race stories, particularly stories that embarrassed Republicans and promoted Democrats.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Wow.<\/p>\n Kinda exactly like the Mindy’s critics have been saying all along, you mean?<\/p>\n Robson believes the local staff chafed at this purposefulness; they consider themselves progressives, not DFL party hacks. He points to Perry’s tenure as City Pages editor, when staffers went after Republicans hard but regularly gnawed the legs off local Democrats such as R.T. Rybak.<\/p>\n A reflexively pro-Dem agenda “is a bias that’s reflected more in the national echelons,” Robson says. “We both know Steve Perry; he probably has as little use for Democrats as Republicans, that’s his reputation.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n That was<\/em>\u00a0Perry’s reputation.<\/p>\n My opinion:\u00a0 when the Mindy got started in 2006 under original “editor” Robin Marty, it was amateurish but earnest.\u00a0 It had<\/em> journalistic ambitions, of sorts.\u00a0<\/p>\n When Perry took over, whether in spite of his presence or because of it, the paper’s tone became more shrill, more propagandistic; it read less like an earnest college newspaper staffed by newbies, and more like a dumb<\/a>, trite<\/a>, phoned-in<\/a>, ill-informed<\/a>,\u00a0propagandistic<\/a> leftyblog.<\/p>\nvassals<\/strike> affiliates.<\/p>\nfew capable<\/strike> better writers, unencumbered by having to carry the water for his overlords in DC, lets fly (emphasis added):<\/p>\n