Alt Together Now

In another sign that the "alternative weekly" newspaper format is about as fresh as Grandpa's cologne, the longtime hated rivals at the New Times chain and Village Voice Media have merged, regulators willing, with the NT cookie-cutters seizing control of Norman Mailer's creaky ship.

This will trigger some amusing political gymnastics, as union shops merge with Labor-free zones, and smart-ass "radical centrists" make nice with the earnest lefty graybeards they've been mocking all these years, but you can expect the most entertaining reactions to come from cranktastic San Francisco Bay Guardian poobah Bruce Brugmann, who is quoted by Howard Kurtz as saying the New Times will export its "desert libertarianism on the rocks, with sprigs of neocon politics."

More links over at L.A. Observed.