Signing off
Pat Dooris is leaving KGW News after 34 years to become a flack for the new Multnomah County district attorney, Nathan Vasquez. Dooris, who's probably in his early 60s, has been a straight shooter and a serious reporter, which you don't always get on TV. He's won Emmys, the Murrow, and other honors over the decades in Portland, and deservedly so.
Many of us have got high hopes for Vasquez, and I'm glad he's picking up an aide of Dooris's talent, but the move is a loss for Portland journalism. Along with Mike Benner's slide over to the Portland police chief's office last year, Channel 8 has lost some real fire power lately. Those are some big shoes to fill. Anyway, best wishes and thanks to Dooris.
Can't remember the last time I watched local news, or for that matter any major broadcast news. I'm more a Mencken guy:
ReplyDeleteA newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier.
Derangement is curable by acknowledging the other guy many have a point
DeleteMaggie Vespa also left, doing well nationally with NBC. Don't forget the great women reporters.
ReplyDeleteAnd, yes, will miss Pat. Will be interesting to see how Vasquez does in an incoming sea of more wokesters.
I fear that with Pat's departure that honest investigative reporting in Potland and Oregon has gone with him. Thanks Pat for all you have done.
ReplyDeleteDooris can count the numbers--on-air/cable news is tanking. If I ever watch a TV newscast, it's an excerpt on YouTube; I yanked cable long ago. It's a slowly dying media (like print in town) with a last-ditch band of survivors embedded inside their bubbles. Arrogant, incurious, incestuous to the bitter end.
ReplyDeleteKGW will be around for a while, certainly longer than the rest of Dooris's career, and he was doing well there. Maybe it's the PERS he's after?
DeleteJack, I wondered the same. I think it still takes just five years to vest in PERS, and it may be more certain than some corporate media's retirement program.
DeleteWhat, you suggest a news media staffer might have eyes on a PERS package? Wouldn't that be unethical?
ReplyDeleteI’ve known Pat for many years. Pat is not only a great journalist, but he is also very smart and wise. He has critical thinking skills that you don’t see often these days in TV news. Pat is also hard working and a really great human. I think this new role will be great for him and put a cherry on top of his amazing career.
ReplyDeleteThe thing I liked the most about Pat was that he seemed to ignore the agenda of the station’s producers and air what he thought about an issue.
ReplyDelete