A business editor's layoff, or death by a thousands cuts

Michael Miner writes Thursday about the layoffs at the Sun-Times regional papers, including the Daily Southtown, a suburban Chicago paper, that caught business editor Bob Bong eating at his desk when his notice came.

Miner writes, “Bong said that over the past few years he’s seen business coverage diminish from a separate section to a single page. But he also wrote a couple of columns that he thought were popular, one of them on what local businesses are up to and another on video rentals. He felt he’d earned his keep.

“’It’s death of a thousand cuts,’ Bong said. ‘It used to be a really good regional newspaper. I guess you’ve got to blame Conrad Black, but at least while Conrad Black was robbing the place it was making money.’

“Bong said a ‘tiny’ security guard saw him out the door as if he were worried Bong would steal something. ‘There’s nothing left to steal,’ Bong said.”

Read more here.