All: This Is My Last Day - Chapter 14

CHAPTER 14
Some have considered the sale of the UPI Radio Department as the beginning of the end of United Press International. That is a matter of debate. Many say the end began much earlier -- closer to two decades earlier.
The sale of Radio occurred in 1999. I returned to UPI in 1996. No, that was not the beginning of the end. But, in 1996, UPI went through a major change and more changes were coming.
In January 1997, UPI announced that it was closing several foreign bureaus, including Moscow, Paris, Madrid, Rome, Brussels, Bonn or Berlin, Jerusalem, Beirut and Cairo. It was part of the philosophy that was to consume the media industry worldwide in later years -- if you can't make the profit, get rid of the expenses, i.e. those on the payroll. What they didn't consider was that the reporters in the bureaus that were being closed were the ones producing the product.
In 1997, we were working under a new management team consisting of CEO James Adams, Editor-in-Chief Susan Older, John Walston and Publisher and Vice President Grey Burkhart.
In a glossy pamphlet bearing a picture of Adams, a former editor at The Sunday Times of London, lounging in a chair, shoeless with striped socks, Adams outlined what he saw as the new UPI:
"Information, however, is fast becoming the world's cheapest commodity. Too much is as worthless as too little. We don't need to tell you what you need; you need to tell us. To make that task simpler, UPI is developing new products and services that slice through the information glut and give you only what you want."
He added, "We call it Shaping Knowledge."
In the same pamphlet, Susan Older expanded on Adams' vision. Noting Helen Thomas's long tenure with UPI and having covered every president since John F. Kennedy, Older said, "Her reporting spells trust."
Older added:
"Trust is critical in shaping information into knowledge. Today's technology produces a flood of data devoid of context. The facts engulf and complicate, rather than simplify, our lives. We don't need more information, we need more knowledge."
The team also included John Walston. He was our cheerleader. He tried to lighten the mood when things were looking increasingly grim. Walston was enthusiasm, energy, optimism and encouragement. He mostly succeeded. But the obstacles were daunting -- and growing.
On March 19, 1998, Adams angered current and past veteran Unipressers during a speech at the Seybold Seminars' "Publishing 98" conference in New York.
"I can only relate to my own experience that began at UPI around seven months ago," Adams said. "I inherited a sclerotic, corrupted organization that had repeatedly tried to recreate its history instead of trying to embrace a different future. The result was failure. It meant replacing the tired hacks with a new generation who understood not the history of the global news wire but the opportunities of the Knowledge Age."
One retired Unipresser responded to his former colleagues: "I didn't realize how unfeeling, unaware, corrupt, hackneyed, mendacious, short-sighted, misogynistic and just plain incompetent I was until Emperor Adams came along and pointed out the error of my ways."
But Ron Cohen sent his response directly to Adams. In a note to Adams, Cohen told him to stop blaming "the loyal professionals who struggled beyond comprehension for years to overcome the stupid/venal/uncaring/criminally inept/criminally mendacious band of thieves, miscreants, Philistines and Barbarian owners who in the past 15 years have looted, pillaged and cosigned our beloved and unique news company to the brink of the grave.
"Think what you will privately, but for God's sake never again publicly shift the blame from those rapacious owners to the employees who never deserved their miserable pay and despicable treatment -- all they ever asked was not love in return but merely acknowledgment of their professionalism and dedication."
Cohen said Adams' response was immediate. He said Adams told him all he was trying to do was to restore UPI to its past glory. According to Cohen, Adams said that when he took the helm at UPI "the place was such a hell-hole ... that he has had to fire every manager and start fresh with people who have new ideas and new perspectives, to try to recapture the old days."
On April 24, 1998, Adams addressed staffers and gave an update on his vision for the company in a memo. He stated that:
UPI has four major alliances and partnerships in progress:
-- A strategic alliance with Microsoft for development and beta testing of media software.
-- A partnership with Media Exchange for distribution and sales of UPI products through the Internet, which will become operational in May.
-- UPI Productions, a TV documentary company.
-- FingerLakes, which will have space on the B2 level of Washington headquarters, which is a global radio station available through the Internet.
Adams pointed out that editorially, the company has:
-- Implemented an editorial quality assurance program that has improved the quality of the editorial product, though more remains to be done;
-- Is starting a "skunk works" for development of new products (so named for the famed Lockheed development program that produced the Stealth fighter), and that the first UPI knowledge package is the World Cup Soccer package now being sold (Adams encouraged all employees to submit ideas for new products);
-- Is building up the Focus Desk to enhance editing and tracking of stories;
-- been gaining wider distribution of photos, including pictures published in Life magazine, the Quill and the St. Louis Post;
-- Had a number of good exclusive stories, including stories by Pentagon reporter Mike Billington.
Adams also said the expense report process would be streamlined, and a new expense and payment schedule would be implemented under which employee expenses would be paid every two weeks. In addition, stringer payments would be processed by the 20th of each month.
Meanwhile, those stalwart Unipressers manning the bureaus outside Washington continued to do everything they could to keep the wire service up and running. Former Unipressers, reading about the trials and changes, asked those of us still at UPI just what were we doing.
Veteran Unipresser Dave Haskell, the Boston bureau chief, gave a succinct answer:
"I'm at one of the outposts, still doing what I've always done, in one fashion or another. My job is to write up the best stories from bh (Boston) and New England. Whatever 'shaping knowledge' means, what I and Phil Reed do is cover the news. It's what we did back when UPI was fat with people; it's what we do now. How we do it is different. Rather than have staffers physically at every event, electronics allows one person to do so much more than before. Working the phones, fax, the Internet, television and radio, I sit here and gather details on a wide variety of stories each day. They aren't the 800-word thumb suckers we used to do, but I produce some 6,000 to 10,000 words a day, writing two-sentence spotlights, 200- to 300-word focus pieces, 150-word wibs (world in briefs), headline packages. I'm proud of the product we produce for our growing list of mainly broadcast clients. I still get a kick out of hearing a newscaster at a classical or rock station voice my words. I still feel I -- and the rest of us at UPI -- are still providing interesting and compelling stories to a wide audience, whether it's over the air or in cyberspace. As Rosso said, what happens upstairs is another world; we're downstairs in the trenches. Whether I write for one client or a thousand, I still must put out an accurate report. Sure, I miss the old days when we'd get tear sheets back from dozens of small-town newspapers with our bylines prominently played, but these are different times in the news biz. The one constant is that a good story is still a good story, and I'm damned glad to be in a position to contribute my share of them."
Dave was one of the best and well respected by the rest of us. But in his description of what he did, he made an observation that would be telling in another year. He said he was writing for "our growing list of mainly broadcast clients," the very clients UPI was about to dump.
Adams' tenure was relatively short. He was replaced by Arnaud de Borchgrave, the company's sixth chief executive since 1992.
In a December 1998 article by Felicity Barringer, The New York Times noted UPI was an "organization whose chief executives seem to have a shelf life only slightly longer than a piece of wire copy."
At the time that de Borchgrave became the latest president and chief executive, Barringer noted:
"Except in Washington, Chicago and a few other cities, U.P.I. correspondents work in ''virtual bureaus'' (translation: home offices, or their kitchen tables), filing dispatches daily for clients that tend to be Web sites and local radio stations."
On Sept. 16, 1999, Burkhart, stated in a staff memo:
As most of you know, our Board of Directors met yesterday in Washington and were briefed by Arnaud and me on the progress we have made this year and our plans for the next 16 months. In the wake of the restructuring of the company over the past six weeks, we viewed this meeting as especially important for the future of UPI.
Arnaud described the meeting as "highly successful." At the meeting, the Board gave us the green light to investigate exciting opportunities for strategic partnerships with major organizations interested in the "new UPI." Negotiations are currently on-going with a view to forming new media alliances that will substantially enhance UPI's global presence.
The Board also appointed a new Strategic Committee with the mandate to facilitate our transition to a brighter future. Over the next several weeks, Arnaud and I, with the assistance of many of you, will be working closely with the committee to ensure that we move forward expeditiously. Until the committee's work is completed, we will not be launching any new initiatives, but -- rumors to the contrary notwithstanding -- UPI is very much alive. Thank you for all your hard work and continued support.
My favorite is when Arnaud had an exclusive interview with Slobodan Milosevic, the president of Serbia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, during the Kosovo conflict. Since, while he was CEO of UPI he was also still affiliated with the Washington Times, the Washington Times fronted his interview story as their own, allowing the Associated Press to pick it up and credit the Washington Times.
However, the New York Times attributed the story to UPI, but said:
“Milosevic almost never speaks in public or grants interviews to foreign news media. But he gave an interview to United Press International on Thursday, and it was released Friday, coinciding with proposals that Milosevic aired privately with the Russian envoy, Viktor S. Chernomyrdin.
… The UPI interviewer, Arnaud de Borchgrave, 72, asked Milosevic few adversarial questions and allowed Milosevic to ruminate at length unchallenged. United Press International said the two-hour interview took place at a modest house outside Belgrade.
By the end of October 1999, the strain reached the snapping point and I pulled one of those "take-this-job-and-shove-it" moments, slammed a dictionary on the desk, yelled, "I quit," and stormed out. It was an argument between me and editor Tobin Beck. But the cause wasn't Tobin or the argument. It was the culmination of three years of deterioration. It was stringers not being paid, staffs cut to less than bare bones while new people were hired who proved on a daily basis that they were not up to the job.
A short time after my departure, I wrote up my recollections of my final months at UPI for my former colleagues:
After three years as senior managing editor for CongressDaily, I went off in search of new work. Having never looked for work, I got a book telling me what to do. It said to call everybody you know. I called Kathleen Silvassy, at the time UPI's Washington bureau chief. She said, "I need you."
So in 1996, I was once again in the embrace of the work I loved. But change was in the wind. It wasn't too long before there were massive layoffs. "Massive" was becoming a very relative term.
The format of UPI was about to change. Howard Dicus, of UPI radio fame, was running the show. The new dictum was short stories -- 150-300 words -- and the emphasis was on radio copy. I was eventually put in charge of the Focus Desk, responsible for all UPI print copy.
We fought to keep stories short. It was every reporter's nightmare. Some were convinced size mattered. Then, there was a change in management. In came someone named James Adams. And he brought with him Susan Older and John Walston.
Adams was fresh and alive. He met regularly with the editorial staff -- a surprising change from the past. Always a smile. Always energetic. He would put his feet up on the table without his shoes on. He wore a kilt to the White House correspondents' dinner.
But, he had an agenda. And he started to push it on the staff. One day, he attended a function and had a reporter write about a 700-worder, far over our limit. Adams was critical of a White House intelligence paper that was about to be released. The story was strong on criticism and very short on details from the report Adams said he was privvy to. And there was no response from the White House.
Diane Devore was in the slot that day. I had gone home. Diane called me and read the story to me. I talked to Tobin Beck and said the story had to be cut, it had to have White House reaction and it had to specify what it was Adams was complaining about.
I then told Diane: "I am your boss and I am telling you that that story does not move without my approval. You are only following orders. If they complain, send them to me.”
The story was rewritten. But it began a trend.
As time went on, we saw less of Adams. And then he was gone. Arnaud de Borchgrave, a Newsweek veteran and former editor of The Washington Times, was in.
Great plans were being bantered about. The Focus desk was going to expand from five to a dozen or more. Susan Older babbled incessantly that "it will be like a real newsroom."
A bank of televisions was mounted on the wall. Each desk had a headset so the desker could listen to whatever breaking news was on the television.
And then came the Pods. Everybody's first thought was, "Invasion of the Body Snatchers." Pods?! Yes, a national security pod, a science pod, an intelligence pod. The focus was now to be on cyber-terrorism, Y2K, Internet terrorism, all very spooky.
The first run-in with de Borchgrave came after he had attended a seminar that included such stellar has-beens as Al Haig. De Borchgrave took copious notes and told UPI State Department reporter Sid Balman to take his notes and write a story. Sid refused. They passed the notes on to the Focus desk. Once again, I was called at home. I told the desk we do not write stories based on somebody else's notes. There is too much chance for misinterpretation.
So UPI Publisher Grey Burkhart wrote a story.
Then de Borchgrave began calling Susan Older at 3 a.m. telling her we needed to pick up a story from The Washington Times. This was beginning to be a habit.
Sometimes the story he wanted was marginal. Sometimes it lacked substance. Sometimes it was simply something we already had. No matter, Older said, It HAD to be picked up.
Then I started losing my desk. Jennifer Brooks went to Congress and then to the White House. Joe Warminsky went to Congress to replace Jennifer. Griffin Shea went to Agence France-Presse. And I could not hire replacements. What happened to the 12 deskers I was supposed to have? Oh. That was 'someday.'
The Focus desk ran 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It was at this time, 1999, the only around-the-clock bureau existing in UPI. When I interviewed applicants, I made it clear that everybody took turns working overnights and weekends. Only one editor worked Monday through Friday -- for family reasons.
Everybody else pulled all shifts.
But when one staffer's wife called to complain about his schedule, I was called into Older's office and questioned. She accused me of destroying the morale on the Focus desk -- and that further increased tension between Older, myself and the Focus Desk.
Then, we started getting some of the Pod-generated copy. These 'thoughtful' creations turned out to be monsters that took a good hour to edit. Most of the time, I gave the copy to Lisa Van Dusen, who could tell crap from substance, and we were getting crap.
On numerous occasions, she wrote memos to Tobin Beck saying the "analysis" she was reading was not analysis but opinion and should be described as such. On other occasions, the copy was sloppy -- or took an off-the-wall approach to a subject.
We worked hard to edit the "pod" stories, but they were taking more and more time and we were again losing editors without any hope of replacing them.
Then Susan Older and Grey Burkholt started a campaign of snide, sarcastic missives to the Focus desk pointing out typos.
This copy needed to be read twice and we did not have the people to do it twice.
Then on Oct. 30, Tobin Beck insisted he had to look at a story that had been read and I was halfway through re-reading for filing.
He took it from me and filed it. He did not correct it as I was doing, and it went on the wire with a number of mistakes.
Beck and Older were constantly asking what could be done to improve editing on the Focus desk. So when that story went down the wire, I lost my composure and stormed out, with an "I quit!"
I came back calmer Monday to talk to Tobin. Another desker had been sort of 'mediating' and tension had ebbed. I met with Tobin and he told me to 'chill' and he would talk to Older and try to get me reinstated.
I waited until 3 p.m. Tuesday -- much as Patrick Grey (Watergate fans), swinging in the wind -- before Beck called and said, "It is the position of the company...."
That Friday, Lisa Van Dusen handed in her resignation.
On Dec. 18, 1999, Editor & Publisher wrote that UPI was "struggling to control its personnel turmoil as it sorts through six potential suitors for the floundering wire service."
About halfway through the article, E&P stated:
"Dave Rosso, the longtime copy editor of UPI, resigned Oct. 29, after several disagreements with editors."
The article referred to my own farewell message.
Shortly after I quit, Jennifer Brooks e-mailed me and reminded me that I had left in such a hurry that I had not filed a farewell message. I typed one up and she sent it out. She was fired.
In that message, I stated: "This group in Washington that describes itself as the new UPI is perverting journalism. You are on the front lines to stamp it out. Don't make it easy for them."
De Borchgrave told E&P that I was a "respected journalist," but that "UPI changed and David still wanted to do things the old way."
At the time of my departure, UPI Publisher Grey E. Burkhart revealed that UPI had "a number of suitors," including Canadian Conrad Black and former CNN financial anchor Lou Dobbs.
The UPI owners at the time, the Saudi Arabia ARA Group International of Riyadh, which had lost $140 million since buying UPI in 1992, pledged to keep the wire service running until they found a buyer.
In an e-mail to the Downhold wire, a collection of former Unipressers, Brooks said:
Just thought you'd like to see the farewell message I would have sent to my ex-colleagues, if I still had computer access.
All:
I’ve been fired. Quite startling. But as I sit around the house, wearing flannel, whimpering piteously and plowing through my third tub of Chubby Hubby ice cream, it occurs to me -- I'm awfully glad UPI hired me in the first place. Even if I had to get off before the ride came to a full and complete stop, I think it was worth the price of admission.
So thank you, UPI. I applied for this job, terrified that the pace and demands of wire service work would crush me to jelly. I spent my entire initial interview trying to talk John Walston out of hiring me: "But I don't KNOW anything about copy editing!" I'd lost my last reporting job and was in my fifth miserable week as a temporary secretary in USA Today's newsroom. The very next day, like a bolt from a generous God, Monica Lewinsky erupted. Day after that, I started work as UPI's lone congressional reporter.
Thank you, UPI. In my first year, I covered the presidential impeachment and trial, a near government shutdown, the rise and fall of three House speakers in as many months, stacks of legislation taller than me, and an armed assault on the Capitol. Also, Strom Thurmond patted me on the behind. I wrote half a dozen stories on an average day. If I couldn't keep pace with AP or Reuters, I took comfort in the knowledge that I BURIED Agence France-Presse.
My second year at UPI, I covered the president himself, accumulated a tidy pile of commemorative Air Force One M&Ms, traveled to nine countries (if you count a refueling stop in Ireland, which I do), honed my Clinton imitation to terrifying precision, and became quite a connoisseur of airport tarmacs and motorcade minivans. I never quite overcame my awe at strolling through the White House gates every morning (I really think if I'd stayed there just a little longer, the cute guard would have asked me out) and plopping into a chair next to Helen Thomas. I left before I quite mastered Helen's knack for yelling the right question, or Lori's (Lori Santos) finesse of the news cycle and steely control over the Viet Cong tunnels that pass for the White House bureaucracy, or Paul's (Paul Baskin) cyber-empire of computer-assisted reporting. They did their best to teach me their ways. Be nice to them. I've left them short-handed.
Thank you, UPI for introducing me to Dave Rosso, for whom I would send a thousand farewell messages; mighty Joe Warminsky, who didn't let the Hill crush him to jelly, either; Lisa Van Dusen, who made the Zen potato and me very, very happy; Karen Byrne, who carries the desk on her slender shoulders (dusted lightly in condiments and dried in a windstorm); (k)night rider John Hendel; and Anthony Louis, who was of like mind about the shocking scarcity of shredded squirrels on the A wire. Ex-unipressers, feel the love: Ken Bazinet (here, description fails me), sweet Griffin Shea, divine Diane Devore, that dude Chris Sieroty, that ol softie Sid Balman, John Walston, Chris Long (remember him?), James Gordon Meek and Mike Rosenberg, the entire radio staff ('specially Don Folsom, Pye Chamberlayne and Jim Burns. Where did you go? What did you do?) Bye Pam Hess and Mike Kirkland and Ken and Kukis and Soni (you never get your propers in these "all" messages, girlfriend).
And Rose the secretary, who always kept a stash of fax toner and reporters' notebooks for me. Bye, vanishing state bureaus. Bye, unpaid stringers. Bye, elusive UPI photographers.
I've had a splendid time. I skipped to work most mornings. I went months without turning in time sheets because I couldn't really believe I was getting paid to do this job, never mind paid overtime. Now I'm back on the market, searching for a job as much fun as this one has been. Wish me luck.
I think I'm going to be just fine, apart from missing you.
Love,
Brooks-home
Date: 99-11-05 20:41:20 EST

Dear All,
After assuming for so long it was just a figure of speech, it's hard to believe I'm actually quitting over Rosso's dead body, so to speak.
I've told this story a few times in the past week, but will tell it again. When John Walston first dragged me by the Focus desk and asked Dave Rosso if he had time to meet me, Rosso, barely looking up long enough to actually look askance, barked, "I don't have time to meet anyone right now, I've got a job to do." I knew then that I wanted to work for him because, in a business tragically overrun by ciphers, poseurs and both failed and aspiring flacks, he seemed so remarkably lifelike.
The two years I have spent working with him have both enhanced that impression immeasurably and spoiled me for any notion of doing this job in his absence. I'd like to thank him for inspiring that kind of certainty and for tirelessly running interference so the rest of us could get on with it unmolested. He is a good man, a great boss and a loyal friend.
UPI has been graced with an exceptional concentration of outstanding broads and I really cannot say how thankful I am to have had their support and friendship. Lori Santos, the departed Diane DeVore, Jennifer Brooks, Pam Hess, and Karen Byrne are all tough, loyal, talented, compassionate and very funny women. I think it must be that Helen Thomas, as the walking UPI trademark, draws the good ones and weeds out the bulk of the undesirables just by sheer force of her personality. Thank you, Helen, for that and for carrying all of us in this place longer than our mothers did.
Joe "Allentown" Warminsky, the lamented Griffin Shea, Jorge Banales, Mark Kukis and Ken Layne -- I don't have room to do it properly, but thank you for entertaining, humoring, indulging and, as often as was required, ridiculing me. It made me less homesick for my four brothers in Canada. You are darling boys.
There is a handful of real reporters left at this organization -- some mentioned above -- whose copy it was a joy to read, edit and occasionally, as one of them once said, "arbitrarily and dangerously" display an annoying but well-intentioned proprietary interest in. I'd like to thank them for their bravery in maintaining the illusion of legitimacy by continuing to commit actual journalism. Some of them are stringers, some staff, and some gone. All of them, I wish well.
Until very, very recently, I was glad to come in here every day and very grateful that I was able to work in this game again despite the demands of single motherhood. I will always be thankful to the people who allowed me to do that and especially to my colleagues on the Focus desk for not whingeing about my banker's hours even though they had absolutely every right to. You are all damn fine Americans and it was a lovely run. Thank you. Chrs. LVD (Lisa Van Dusen).

all: Little did I know, two weeks back when I gave my notice here at UPI, that my departure would be so dramatically overshadowed by other events. This place continues to be very weird. Of course I prefer to leave a job quietly, like a Thief in the Night, and that's just how I am exiting on this cool Monday evening.
It has been an education and, often, a pleasure to work on this desk. There are many of you I only know via (the message wire), and many of you already departed, and some of you still here, and I'm not sure how many of my comrades will ever see this farewell but whatever, it's an old pagan tradition.
After all this talk of newsletters in recent months, I am now off to write for a travel newsletter published by a nice stable company I needn't worry about -- hell, I don't even have to show up at the office, ever. So in the coming months I'll be relocating to the southern coast of Spain, somewhere below Granada, where I hope to spend much time studying wine, books, the piano, language and the long-term effects of sleeping on the beach after lunch.
Everybody has their own version of the ideal UPI, but I imagine most versions would require the service to be influential and fully staffed and profitable and professional and fun.
There are things I'll miss about the wire service that was still hanging on when I arrived a mere eight months ago, and I hope for the sake of American journalism that some version of the wire survives.
The United States is becoming like the old Soviet Union with the old TASS: One source of information coming from one group of editors.
And I'm not very excited about having all my news come from Disney-ABC-Viacom-ClearChannel-TimeWarner-Yahoo-Microsoft outlets running AP, with a little finance news and world headlines from Bloomberg/Reuters.
Good luck to you all. OK, shift's over.
Chrs et rgds mi amigos, Ken Layne
Date: 99-12-27 18:32:36 EST

In late December, 1999, it was Joe Warminsky's turn.
All:
Today is my last day with UPI. I have taken a job with Congressional Quarterly here in Washington, DC. If you received this message, it is my small way of thanking you for whatever part you played in making my time at UPI interesting and rewarding.
I've spent only 18 months with UPI, but it feels like a much longer stint. To sum up my experience, I'll say this: I wish UPI could hand out degrees of some sort. I feel like I've been to the strangest graduate school in journalism.
When I first got here, the Focus Desk was in the basement, squeezed into a little corner of the UPI Radio studio. I was the last person hired for a team that turned out to be the smartest and most motivated group of people I've ever worked with: Rosso, Byrne, Devore, Shea, Hendel, Van Dusen, Banales, Sieroty. (Y'all know how I feel about you.) Within six months I found myself working totally alone, still relatively green, from 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. on a Saturday when the House impeached Clinton, the president launched a new round of attacks on Iraq and Bob Livingston resigned as House Speaker-elect because of hanky-panky allegations. I think I filed about 90 items that day. Afterward, no news day seemed too ridiculous or too intense on the desk. Days like that can jade a guy, too. Byrne reminded me recently of when we were watching the Columbine situation unfold on CNN -- I was looking up at the television, dumbfounded, saying things such as: "This is fake .... This has to be a hoax." It looked so much like a movie. My six months on Capitol Hill were filled with similar head-scratching moments. How easy it is to become a cynic.
Ah, cynicism. I suppose it would be a dereliction of duty to write a completely positive farewell message -- UPI has changed too much in the past 18 months to warrant only sunshine from me. I'll put it this way: I hope UPI can succeed, but I wish some decisions in the past few months were different. Layne said it best in his recent farewell message. To paraphrase him: Now more than ever, the media industry needs as many reliable voices and as many good products as possible. Good reporting and good analysis, however, require solid resources. For the industry's sake, let's hope UPI can find or create more of them -- and keep the ones it has.
To other Washington staff members, past and present, I offer my thanks for all the support and guidance. Thomas, Santos, Basken, Bazinet, Brooks, Martin, Beck, Balman, Hess, Kirkland, Kukis, Anderson, Lawrence, Schuster, Walston, Long, Neslon, Salhani, Sieff, Meek, Rosenberg, Baker, Cook, Thompson, everybody in UPI Radio and so on -- you folks have each taught me lessons, including how to behave like a reporter (Helen, thanks for the chats) and how to play the angles (Lori, you know 'em all).
To the folks in the hinterlands: Bennett, Kreiter, Kjos, Magers, Koller, Haskell, Johnson, Ingwersen, Hawke, Butler, Cukan, Nason, Swanson, Schnaue, Reilly, Joseph, Bartholomew, Joseph and anybody and everybody I forgot -- I will miss seeing your three-letter IDs pop up on the xia printer, your vaunted message traffic and your many sardonic slugs (Kreiter, Bennett, I wish I could remember some of your zingers now. I'm sure somebody has a collection somewhere). I hope UPI will stick with the talent it still has in the field.
And last, but not least, to the international staffers and regular stringers: Thank you for working so damn hard and caring so deeply. Harbaksh, Joshua, Dalal, Sana, Saud, Rodpaul, Anthony -- I have gotten to know you better than many other people at UPI because you are all willing to talk about yourselves as well as your work. Now that there are so few UPI reporters in Washington, you and the many others in the field are the backbone of the company's news product.
And to anybody else who I didn't mention, I apologize for the oversight.
Good Luck,
Joe Warminsky"

Dear colleagues
Today is my last day at UPI. With affection, nostalgia and thanks, I salute all the reporters, stringers and deskers who keep this wire humming. It’s been an honor and a delight to work with you all.
It takes a certain kind of lunatic to do this job. The only person crazier than the witness to history is the person driven to test the veracity of the witness. It’s a divine calling: between curses, say thanks that it chose you.
The UPI wire is thinning and stretching. Stay with it if you want and while you can, but remember, you can employ your savvy elsewhere. Who knows, you might even get respected, and paid on time.
Of course, you might also be dangled about like a string puppet and made to grovel for your pennies. Gotta guard your ass in this business.
And that is my last word.
Karen Byrne
UPI-WA

Dear colleagues,
It is with regret that I write to tell you of my impending departure from UPI. In the 2.5 years that I have been editor-in-chief of this news operation, I have worked with the best, most dedicated journalists I’ve ever known. I certainly can’t deny that there have been difficult times for all of us, but your professionalism, your friendship and your generosity have made my job more rewarding and my life easier.
I have taken the position of chief content officer for an integrated health services company operating largely on the Internet. My last day at UPI will be Friday, May 5. After that time, I’ll be working in my new position from home until the end of June, when I’ll move to Manhattan.
Please keep in touch. I will miss each and every one of you — and you will be in my thoughts as you make your transition to new ownership.
Susan Older

Sunday, April 30, 2000
Well, it’s goodbye. Today is my last day at United Press International.
I would like to express my admiration and gratitude to all the stringers, writers, editors and photographers who every day keep the UPI wire an endless stream of copy and pictures despite sub-par working conditions, job uncertainty and the never-ending management changes.
It has been an honor to work with all of you.
Cheers
To those who remain: It is the beginning of the 21st century, don’t let them treat you like it’s the end of the 19th.
Jorge