I wish I could say I was surprised.

one wonders if the "O" would have had the story on their front page if it hadn't been on your "front" page first?
Kudos to you!

this is what he gets for letting PPB Officers "Not so Nice" Nice and "Killer-Kop"
Christopher off the hook for their killing of James Chasse...it's called KARMA...what
goes around comes around. Enjoy that dish of karma Tom, we hope there is more dishes yet to be served up for your enjoyment!

Seems to me that the legislators who enjoyed the Maui trips could have used Potter's approach.
Since the trips were free they have no value, thus nothing to report. Well, until you get caught, then pick your own number at a fraction of the value, then have the donor state that those trips are always free so they can't sell them.

Geeze, what a load of politcian's sewage.

On the OL homepage, they're claiming Canzano actually broke the story on Sunday.

"Those 14 to 20 re-designated press row seats would sell for $500 to $700 per game. Except that re-designating press table seating as courtside seating would mean an additional $300,000 to $500,000 in revenue for PAM -- not the Blazers. And that's why, if you attend a home Blazers game you'll notice that those seats, controlled by the Blazers as long as they don't charge for them, are sitting mostly empty, except for Mayor Tom Potter or other local dignitaries who take the free ride."

Funny how that slid by everyone on the editorial side.

Another thought...who are the other local dignitaries Canzano is referencing?

Jack:

I would have been happy to credit you in this morning's story if you had been the one to break the story. As one of your readers pointed out, John Canzano mentioned it last week in a column about the dispute between the Blazers and the arena operators over the press row seats. After the column, we tracked the ethical question in conversations with the mayor's office and state ethics officials. After Potter filed the revised gift report on Tuesday, we decided to push the story into the paper today. I had noticed your post that mentioned the new lobbying report. But by then we were well aware of the ethical questions involved.

Ryan

"After Potter filed the revised gift report on Tuesday, we decided to push the story into the paper today."

How considerate. Touching really.
However, had it been Gordon Smith or Larry George I can't imagine you waiting till a "revised" report was filed.

But that's just me.

Ryan,
Jack wasn't seeking credit for breaking the story. The "Here" was a different color, meaning it was a "link" to another site.
Click on it and see. The Internet is a wonderful thing, which is why the publisher of the New York Times speculates there may only be around 5 years of the printed version left.

Howard:

Just to clarify, we weren't holding the story to protect Potter. The delay was simply because we were focused on other stories in the meantime. The filing of the lobbying report ended up triggering the story today.

Ryan

Bill:

The story you reference was dated Tuesday, two days after Canzano's throw-away line about Potter's free tix. So Canzano still "broke" it, if only accidentally.

The real question now is who else has been using the free tix and when is that story coming out?

ask J Isaac - I'm sure he'll appreciate the publicity.

snicker

I wasn't disputing the part about John Canzano breaking the story. I was just trying to illustrate how links work. The only time I thought John Canzano was an embarrassment was when he took the urine sample from a Blazer to be tested. I said at the time that if you're getting bodily fluids from an athlete, you're way too close to the story.

Yeah, Ryan. Click the darn link. I wasn't claiming credit. But face it, the Portland Feed beat you by 36 hours. And Canzano's column said nothing about Potter's $34 valuation. You were beat.

Jack:

Got it. The Portland Feed. Thanks for making it clear. Either way, my same point applies. We just see it differently.

Ryan

To me, the story was not that Tom Potter went to a Blazer game and sat in the best seats in the house. That's not news, and it was properly buried in a sports column about something entirely different.

The story was that the Blazers paid his way, he didn't report it on his original form, and then he came up with some sort of $34 figure, which is patently absurd. That was old news as of Tuesday night, and nobody heard it first in the O.

The O did great followup work, checking with the state ethics pop stand and determining that there were possible violations of the rules here. But a front page story that implies that this was somehow an Oregonian scoop is highly misleading.

The print media is going to face this again and again. The internet is going to beat the papers to many stories, unless the papers report everything on line first. The Newhouses obviously are sticking to their dead trees, holding stuff back for the print edition. But in this case, it caused a 36-hour delay in publishing anything about the mayor's problems. O.k., live with that. But don't run it on the front page two days later and make it sound like you're breaking something.

And to get back to my original point, the O would look a lot better if it acknowledged the local bloggers. Not me -- I've gotten enough print to last a lifetime. But the others, who are getting good stories out quickly.

The delay was simply because we were focused on other stories in the meantime.

Had to wait for the astronaut love triangle story to cool off a little...

The delay was simply because we were focused on other stories in the meantime.

Also insert your Goldschmidt and Packwood jokes here.

Sorry for the double post...

Chris,

After mentioning the love triangle, Goldschmidt and Packwood, the least you could do is refrain from using the term "insert".

Sorry

Concerning that the Oregonian was "focused on other stories in the meantime"; what other stories? All the other stories in the O were from newswires and the NY Times. Coverup?