At AP, a personnel problem and a promotion

Two bits of Associated Press news are circulating today. We'll begin with the less pleasant of the pair, in which business desk reporter of more than five years Janna Herron blasts her employer in a farewell memo obtained by Romenesko.

"I'm the 56th person to leave since the newsroom's management style turned negative and mean-spirited three years ago. And I'm sure I'm not the last. I just couldn't do it anymore," she wrote to her colleagues. "So, best wishes to everyone. You're all better editors, reporters and writers than what you've been told, and you deserve better leadership."

Last year, AP business editor Hal Ritter was accused of "installing a culture of fear" among his reporters at the newswire. "We don't as a rule comment on staffers' departures," AP spokesman Paul Colford told The Cutline.

Meanwhile, over at the politics desk, veteran AP writer Liz Sidoti has been named political editor ahead of the 2012 presidential race, an extension of the role she played in leading the organization's 2008 election coverage.

In a statement about the promotion, AP Washington bureau chief Sally Buzbee called Sidoti a "ferocious competitor," adding: "Even more remarkable is her ability to push and improve the work of those around her. She is a model for how journalists can cut through the political noise and fit the pieces together to explain what is happening in politics and why it matters to people beyond the nation's capital."