St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

WTF · Nov 20, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

TomVorm;1074330 said:

Mormons slaughtered over 100 members of a wagon train in Southern Utah in September 1857 (only a few children were allowed to live) in what became known as the "Mountain Meadow Massacre".

Claims that it was a locally-initiated action were questioned, as church members were known to be subject to strict discipline (including castration, google "warren snow") should they act against directives of their patriarchy.

Many years later, church official John D. Lee was tried twice, and ultimately convicted for his part in the massacre. Lee dictated a book (titled "Confession") to explain his claim of innocence, which was widely read after his execution in March 1877 and implicitly accused Brigham Young for ordering the action.

This didn't sit well with Young, who stated in a sermon in May 1877 that it was the earlier lynching of Joseph Smith that was a motivation for the massacre. It's rumored that the church hierarchy then plotted to rid themselves of Young, and conspired to slip him a fatal dose of arsenic (Young died under suspicious circumstances in August 1877).

Was the apparent murder of Brigham Young a precusor (and "religious" excuse) for the apparent murder of L. Ron Hubbard 109 years later?

[ame="http://www.amazon.com/Paint-Your-Wagon/dp/B000NJEOY6"]Paint your wagon[/ame]

/wave Heber

fitch2000 · Nov 20, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

BTANONNYC;1074318 said:

i think this is the best course of action before anyone freaks out. but i am worried.

did you look at the government tech mag they already have thru erupublic? that is scary too. and they seem to have a big "in" there with techies at the govt level. They are promoting

Best of California 2009
Sacramento Convention Center, 3rd Floor
1400 J Street
Sacramento, CA 95814
December 3, 2009

Who Should Attend

If you influence or participate in technology decisions or implementations at any level, you will find benefit in attending. Don't miss this opportunity to see the latest in digital government solutions, keep abreast of current policy issues and network with key government executives, technologists and industry specialists.

Home Page - Best of California 2009

They seem to be getting ad monies from Sprint, Intel, Cisco and other big co.'s for this mag too. Ads are all over the site.

Is erublic a definite scilon business/front group or is it some brainwashed dudes co?

_You_ · Nov 21, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

Found some interesting links related to e.Republic

Don Pearson - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen: Scientology's Congresswoman - alt.religion.scientology | Google Groups

Interesting stuff...

_You_ · Nov 21, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

ArnieLerma;1073607 said:

I do not have a daughter...so I can not say..
If you say someone is saying they are, then either you are being trolled or you are doing the trolling.

No No No. It is you my fine bug eyed friend that has been trolled. Thank you for playing the game.

_You_ · Nov 21, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

_Bruce_;1074521 said:

No No No. It is you my fine bug eyed friend that has been trolled. Thank you for playing the game.

I think he's referring to this thread:

http://forums.whyweprotest.net/38-t...ology-22158/?highlight=arnie lerma's daughter

and this post:

http://forums.whyweprotest.net/38-t.../?highlight=arnie lerma's daughter#post420965

fitch2000 · Nov 21, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

Don Pearson - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Together with fellow Scientologist Dennis McKenna, Pearson currently operates e.Republic, a media and event management enterprise primarily serving the government information technology market, including the Government Technology and Converge magazines (GovTech.net), which McKenna founded in 1983. Another e.Republic offshoot, the Center for Digital Government, provides research and consulting to state and local governments.

http://www.newsreview.com/sacramento/content?oid=8220

But in a New York Times article that November, church spokesman Dennis McKenna intimated that Cooper was covertly working with the FBI and other federal agencies to harm the church. (McKenna was not accused of participating in Operation Freakout.)

Dennis McKenna that runs erepublic used to be a "church" spokesman? dude got promoted or what?

JohnnyRUClear · Nov 21, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

Isn't it interesting just how many tentacles of this beast there are, and how far they've gotten wrapped around how many places where they have no business being?

Kha Khan · Nov 22, 2009

SP times publisher sells Governing to Scientologists

NY Times: Concern at Governing Magazine Over Its Sale to Scientologists:

November 23, 2009

Concern at Governing Magazine Over Its Sale to Scientologists

By TIM ARANGO

Over the last several months, The St. Petersburg Times published a series of scathing articles on the Church of Scientology under the rubric “The Truth Rundown.” In 1980, the newspaper won a Pulitzer Prize for an investigation of the church’s inner workings.

Coverage of Scientology has long been an important story for The St. Petersburg Times, given that the church’s spiritual headquarters is located in nearby Clearwater, Fla.

So it came as a bit of a shock when, on Friday, the newspaper’s management announced that it would sell one of its sibling publications to a California media company whose top management are Scientologists. Governing magazine, which is based in Washington and for 23 years has covered the workings of local and state governments across the country, will be sold to e.Republic, whose founder and other top executives are Scientologists. The sale is expected to close after Thanksgiving.

The evening before the announcement, Governing’s staff gathered at the Willard InterContinental Washington hotel for its annual awards dinner, honoring its picks for the best government officials. On Friday, the staff learned of the magazine’s sale, which had long been in the works. And at a staff gathering, the question of Scientology was raised, given the paper’s aggressive coverage of the church.

“I’m aware that some of the top officials personally practice Scientology, but it never came up in the negotiations,” said Andrew Corty, a vice president of the Times Publishing Company, the holding company that runs the St. Petersburg paper and Governing. “It certainly was a question asked at our staff meeting.”

He added, “The reporting of the St. Petersburg Times has always been separate from our business functions.”

For years, e.Republic has been a respected publisher of Government Technology magazine, its flagship publication, which covers the intersection of those two subjects. E.Republic’s officials say that the personal religious affiliations of management have no bearing on the operations of the company.

The staff of Governing, nonetheless, is concerned. “There are certain tenets of the religion that affect management,” said Peter Harkness, who founded Governing in 1987 and who came out of retirement in August to serve as publisher during the sale process. “To my knowledge, they have not been proselytizing.”

Some of the anxiety among the staff stems from a 2001 article in the Sacramento News and Review, an independent weekly, about e.Republic. That article, which has been widely read by Governing’s reporters in the last few days, reported that e.Republic’s staff members are required to read a book on management called “Speaking From Experience,” written by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.

“There is concern,” Mr. Harkness said. “Unquestionably, there is concern.”

Mr. Harkness said that a recent allegation of religious bias at The Washington Times, which is owned by the Unification Church, has exacerbated anxiety among Governing’s staff. The opinion editor of The Washington Times recently filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, saying he was coerced to attend an event hosted by the Unification Church, according to The Associated Press. The founder of The Washington Times is the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, also the founder of the church.

A message left at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, where Dennis McKenna, the founder of e.Republic, was staying the weekend to meet with Governing employees, was returned by Paul Harney, the company’s chief operating officer. (Mr. McKenna has been a Scientologist for more than 30 years, and in a New York Times article in 1979 was identified as a church spokesman.)

Mr. Harney, who is not a Scientologist, said that he had been with the company for 13 years, and that he had never read Mr. Hubbard’s book, nor, he said, read the article in the Sacramento newspaper. “I’m sure if a management book is requested and we’ve got it, we would hand it out,” he said.

He said, “We’re a business like everyone else, trying to meet a quarterly number.”

He said Scientology had been raised in meetings with Governing staff members over the weekend. “Some people have asked about it. If they’ve brought it up, we’ve addressed it on an individual basis.”

Scientology “doesn’t guide how the company is run,” he added.

Staff members of Governing were reluctant to speak on the record because they did not want to antagonize their new employers. One person who spoke on the condition of anonymity said, “There have been some eyebrows raised based on the fact that the St. Pete Times has been doing these stories, while simultaneously they have been selling this to a company run by Scientologists.”

The newspaper’s series, which ran in three installments, in June, August and November, detailed what it described on its Web site as a “culture of intimidation and violence” under the church’s leader, David Miscavige. (The articles were based in part on interviews with church defectors, tales which the church has called “total lies.”)

The St. Petersburg Times, which is owned by the Poynter Institute, a nonprofit group focused on journalism education, has faced financial challenges lately, like most print publications. To raise cash to shore up the newspaper, the group’s flagship, it has been selling subsidiaries. This year, it sold Congressional Quarterly, which tracks legislative activity, to Roll Call.

A more pressing concern for workers was whether or not they would keep their jobs. Many did not.

Of the publication’s 27 employees, 12 were kept on, nine were let go immediately and six others were asked to stay on in transitional roles.

Mr. Corty, the St. Petersburg executive who led the sale, said he was in a no-win situation: if he didn’t sell to e.Republic, which offered the highest bid out of six contenders, he would have been accused of discrimination.

“I felt I would have been criticized either way,” he said.

*****

Catholic Online: Times Publishing sells D.C. magazine to Scientology?

Times Publishing sells D.C. magazine to Scientology?
By Randy Sly
11/23/2009

Catholic Online

The parent company of the newspaper who published a major expose on Scientology sells magazine to West Coast Publisher tied to Scientology.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (Catholic Online) – In June 2009 the St. Petersburg Times ran an in-depth three-part series documenting the problems and practices of Scientology that caused a renewed caution on the group established by L. Ron Hubbard at the mid-point of the twentieth century.

This month, the Times Publishing Company announced it was selling its Washington DC publication “Governing” to e.Republic a publishing and new media company with ties to Scientology.

In a public statement, Times Vice President Andrew Corty stated, "The Times Publishing Company takes great pride in ‘Governing,’ which we nurtured from its inception 22 years ago into the powerful brand it is today. As part of this combination, ‘Governing’ has a bright future educating and informing its senior-level readership across the nation."

The Times reports that the decision was a means of divesting in certain media holdings in order to strengthen other portions of the company located in Florida.

e.Republic Chief Operating Officer told the St. Petersburg Times "Our flagship ‘Government Technology’ magazine has published alongside ‘Governing’ for over 20 years. Combined, the two organizations create the largest media firm providing news, research and analysis of the $2.9 trillion state and local government market."

Don Pearson and fellow Scientologist, Dennis McKenna, currently operate e.Republic, which describes itself as the nation’s leading publishing, research, event and new media company focused on the state and local government and education markets.

The Sacramento News & Review described e.Republic as Scientology, Inc. in an August 2001 article. According to the article, “On your very first day as a new hire at e.Republic, you’re given a copy of ‘Speaking From Experience,’ a management training book written by the late L. Ron Hubbard.

“All new hires at e.Republic, a publishing company based in Folsom, California, are required to not only read the book, but also take a course based on its contents, which—notwithstanding the grandiose description above—reads much like the same kind of hokey training materials that millions of workers try to avoid daily, except Hubbard’s methods have the higher goal of ‘improving conditions in your business, your life and on Earth in general.’”

For the past quarter century, e.Republic has become a major publishing and media force in the area of government technology.

The Times assured inquirers that the decision is sell was purely a business decision.

"We went through a full auction, with two dozen bidders on the initial list, then half a dozen final companies participating,” Corty said. “We really never let religion enter the issue at all. We operated this separately from the newsroom."

The magazine will continue to operate from its offices on Connecticut Avenue in Washington with publisher Fred Kuhn. However, smaller operational functions will be combined with other e.Republic holdings.

*****

ESMB: Concern at Governing Magazine Over Its Sale to Scientologists

/

Bob Loblaw · Nov 22, 2009

re: SP times publisher sells Governing to Scientologists

Considering the fact that Scientology has a long and storied history of infiltrating government, yes, I'd be sweating this.

The Poynter Institute should have taken a lower bid - and let their lawyers worry about discrimination. For chrissakes, the Poynter Institute is a non-profit--not a publicly traded company.

JohnnyRUClear · Nov 22, 2009

re: SP times publisher sells Governing to Scientologists

Staff members of Governing were reluctant to speak on the record because they did not want to antagonize their new employers. One person who spoke on the condition of anonymity said, “There have been some eyebrows raised based on the fact that the St. Pete Times has been doing these stories, while simultaneously they have been selling this to a company run by Scientologists.”

Heh. Enjoy your breakfast, kids.

Ann O'Nymous · Nov 22, 2009

re: SP times publisher sells Governing to Scientologists

As a private entity, they were not obliged to sell to the scientologists, even if they made the best offer. It is quite disappointing. We will have to keep an eye on this one.

_You_ · Nov 22, 2009

re: SP times publisher sells Governing to Scientologists

Water over the dam.

Questions on my mind:

Are employees going to be subjected to Scientology training and tech as at Diskeeper and the Grands Fores golf course in Trois-Rivieres and fired if they don't comply?

What are the connections between e.Republic and other WISE companies?

What are the relationships with the NFWL and Narconon?

How is Governing going to promote the anti-psychiatry hate groups Global Obliteration of Psychiatry agenda?

How susceptible are Governing subscribers, advertisers, and vendors to OSA intelligence gathering and infiltration?

Will Governing become a platform for promoting a campaign against anti-religious hate group cyber-terrorists?

_You_ · Nov 23, 2009

re: SP times publisher sells Governing to Scientologists

if you can't beat them; buy them ?

Anonynamefag · Nov 24, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/23/business/media/23govern.html

The staff at Governing are not happy about this.

The staff of Governing, nonetheless, is concerned. “There are certain tenets of the religion that affect management,” said Peter Harkness, who founded Governing in 1987 and who came out of retirement in August to serve as publisher during the sale process. “To my knowledge, they have not been proselytizing.”

Some of the anxiety among the staff stems from a 2001 article in the Sacramento News and Review, an independent weekly, about e.Republic. That article, which has been widely read by Governing’s reporters in the last few days, reported that e.Republic’s staff members are required to read a book on management called “Speaking From Experience,” written by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.

“There is concern,” Mr. Harkness said. “Unquestionably, there is concern.”

_You_ · Dec 6, 2009

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

well thats sucks

Anonymous · Jan 25, 2010

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

National League of Cities

States’ Fiscal Agony: No End In Sight?

by Neal Peirce

“This may be the most calamitous fiscal year states have known in decades,” reports Rob Gurwitt in Governing magazine, the 23-year-old bible on state and local governance across the continent.

<snip>

Ironically, if crisis has hit the states, it’s also hit Governing magazine itself. Its former parent corporation, the St. Petersburg Times, late last year insisted on unloading it for cash. And there’s fear the magazine itself may never again be what it was in its heyday under founder Peter Harkness. The top bidder and buyer, e.Republic, does publish credible trade magazines such as Government Technology. But, as The New York Times reported, the fact that e.Republic’s top managers are members of the Church of Scientology has caused some uneasiness.

The first move by e.Republic was to slash Governing’s staff, including more than half the magazine’s top brain trust of such editor/writers as Alan Ehrenhalt, Christopher Swope, Penny Lemov, Ellen Perlman and Alan Greenblatt, plus deputy publisher Elder Witt — almost anyone earning a high salary.

<snip>

Anonymous · Jan 25, 2010

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

But, as The New York Times reported, the fact that e.Republic’s top managers are members of the Church of Scientology has caused some uneasiness.

The first move by e.Republic was to slash Governing’s staff, including more than half the magazine’s top brain trust of such editor/writers as Alan Ehrenhalt, Christopher Swope, Penny Lemov, Ellen Perlman and Alan Greenblatt, plus deputy publisher Elder Witt — almost anyone earning a high salary.

After all, we can't have any sp's on the staff. Besides, the Cult's labor costs are so much lower. This is sounding a bit like CAN takeover, redux.

Anonymous · Jan 25, 2010

Re: St. Petersburg Times Sells Magazine to Scientology Publisher

Anonymous;1137019 said:

This is sounding a bit like CAN takeover, redux.

QFT.

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