Somewhere in a dingy office in Florida, the heart beat of journalism still pulses softly. A job ad for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune:
We want to add some talent to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune investigative team. Every serious candidate should have a proven track record of conceiving, reporting and writing stellar investigative pieces that provoke change. However, our ideal candidate has also cursed out an editor, had spokespeople hang up on them in anger and threatened to resign at least once because some fool wanted to screw around with their perfect lede.
We do a mix of quick hit investigative work when events call for it and mini-projects that might run for a few days. But every year we like to put together a project way too ambitious for a paper our size because we dream that one day Walt Bogdanich will have to say: “I can’t believe the Sarasota Whatever-Tribune cost me my 20th Pulitzer.” As many of you already know, those kinds of projects can be hellish, soul-sucking, doubt-inducing affairs. But if you’re the type of sicko who likes holing up in a tiny, closed office with reporters of questionable hygiene to build databases from scratch by hand-entering thousands of pages of documents to take on powerful people and institutions that wish you were dead, all for the glorious reward of having readers pick up the paper and glance at your potential prize-winning epic as they flip their way to the Jumble … well, if that sounds like journalism heaven, then you’re our kind of sicko.
For those unaware of Florida’s reputation, it’s arguably the best news state in the country and not just because of the great public records laws. We have all kinds of corruption, violence and scumbaggery. The 9/11 terrorists trained here. Bush read My Pet Goat here. Our elections are colossal clusterf-cks. Our new governor once ran a health care company that got hit with a record fine because of rampant Medicare fraud. We have hurricanes, wildfires, tar balls, bedbugs, diseased citrus trees and an entire town overrun by giant roaches (only one of those things is made up). And we have Disney World and beaches, so bring the whole family.
Matthew Doig, of Main St, Sarasota FL — we salute you. Romantics can apply to him here.
I know there are many reader’s wanting to apply for the job. So you might want to fix the URL at the end … unless that’s the first test for employment.
[For those unaware of Florida’s reputation, it’s arguably the best news state in the country and not just because of the great public records laws. We have all kinds of corruption, violence and scumbaggery. The 9/11 terrorists trained here. Bush read My Pet Goat here. Our elections are colossal clusterf-cks. Our new governor once ran a health care company that got hit with a record fine because of rampant Medicare fraud. We have hurricanes, wildfires, tar balls, bedbugs, diseased citrus trees and an entire town overrun by giant roaches (only one of those things is made up). And we have Disney World and beaches, so bring the whole family]
Hey, it’s obviously an astral twin of Brisbane/Queensland. Hurricanes and diseased citrus. Roach capital of the southern hemisphere. And I defy any other anglo constituency to have a party more disfunctional or zany than the LNP (remember Barnaby is a member too). And I will raise their new corrupt governor with the ghost of Joh Bjelke who wins in any lovable rogue leader of a semi-tropical almost-banana-republic contest. And Waterworld, and beaches up the gazoo (including of course Miami Beach).
So Sophie will you write me a reference? I am going to apply for the job, unless you triple my pay rate….hmm, triple times zero is…? (At least this qualifies me as an appropriate sicko, yes? And I even shared house once with a girl from Fort Walton Beach, next to Eglin Airbase, the largest military airbase in the world, in the panhandle.)