The announcement came this morning to both the Miami and Washington newsrooms that Anders Gyllenhaal, 59, executive editor of The Miami Herald, will replace John Walcott as Washington Editor for McClatchy. Gyllenhaal will fill what has been the long vacant position of V.P. of News for McClatchy. Anders will be based in Washington.

Gyllenhaal, who worked as editor and senior V.P. of the Minneapolis Star Tribune prior to The Miami Herald, is the previous chairman of the Pulitzer Prize Board. He served as a Pulitzer juror from 2001 to 2010.

Read more about Anders’s move to D.C. and his replacement at The Miami Herald here.

John Walcott,  Washington bureau chief of The McClatchy Co. has been hired as chief content officer and editor in chief for SmartBrief, a DC-based news aggregator and daily e-news service.

Walcott, who says of the internet’s information explosion, ”less is more if it’s better,” was profiled by SmartBrief editor Jesse Stanchak as he was welcomed to his new position.   Check it out here.

Washington Post Publisher Katharine Weymouth participated in an Aspen Institute roundtable discussion today along with Ben Bradlee, Sally Quinn, Harry Jaffe, Doyle McManus, John Walcott, Bernard Shaw, Jonathan Rauch, Rem Rieder, Janet Terry, Beverly Kirk and Brooke Townsend.

Weymouth shared her thoughts on…

…The Huffington Post: “They are a good kick in the pants for us. We have to make our news more compelling and engaging for the reader.”

…competing in a fast-paced Internet environment: “We’re not going to prostitute ourselves — no Britney Spears stories. … But, in the context of our brand, we need to ask ourselves, what can we be doing better?”

…the state of Washington Post Radio: “The short answer is: It’s over. … It ended about six months ago. I guess you missed it a lot!”

…the Washington Post’s national and even international appeal: “The Washington Post still sees its mission as based in local reporting. … We’re a local paper that happens to sit in the nation’s capital.”

…the election of Barack Obama: “Washington itself will be a big story over the next four years.”

McClatchy Newspaper’s D.C. bureau chief John Walcott was awarded the first I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence on Tuesday. The award was given to Walcott for his Knight-Ridder bureau’s coverage of the run-up to the war in Iraq. See the text of his speech here and join us after the jumps for more photos..

Photos: Michael Temchine

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