Where have you gone J.J. Maloney?

Of course I know J.J. Maloney passed away years ago. He's gone, but certainly not forgotten. What else is gone is the kind of journalism that had you waiting for the paper to hit the driveway so you could read an exciting story about happenings in Kansas City. The Kansas City Star spends no small amount of time blaming bloggers and the internet for its declining circulation. They themselves haven't seemed to notice that the Metro section has all the pop of a phone book. Nothing interesting. Nothing exciting. Is it because Kansas City has become inactive since the days of J.J. Maloney and the River Quay? Hardly. There's plenty going on. Granted there aren't many guys with flashy nicknames ending up dead in the trunks of their cars, but there's plenty of drama going on. You just have to look a little for it. A couple of years ago I was invited to a reader's feedback forum at the Star. One of the Star's editorialists was there, supposedly to "listen" to what we had to say. When they asked me what I would like to see in the paper I said "more investigative pieces" which they immediately took to mean KCTV5 type "investigative". When I replied that no, I meant more pieces like cellphone misuse by the City Council or yes even pieces like J.J. Maloney used to do. The editorialist quickly dismissed me by saying they did not have the budget to do those kind of stories. Telling him The Pitch does those kind of stories once a week was not what he wanted to hear. I'll soon be cancelling my subscription to The Star. Why spend money on something that most mornings goes into the recycle bin unread?