Janet H. Cho Wins Asian Journalists Election by 1 Vote
The White House has set up a Web page to correct what it calls misinformation about President Obama’s proposals for health-care reform. (Credit: White House)
Editorial Writers Complain That Charge Is Inappropriate
The New York Times Syndication Service reversed itself Monday and decided not to charge for an op-ed written by President Obama, acknowledging that editorial writers had a point when they complained that Obama wrote the piece on the taxpayers’ dime.
Nancy Lee, editor of the syndicate, which has about 2,000 domestic and international clients, told Journal-isms that she reversed the decision after talking with Larry Reisman of the Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers in Florida, one of several editorial writers who discussed the Times’ move Monday on the e-mail list of the National Conference of Editorial Writers. Some went on to blog about it.
“I was glad that Larry brought it up,” Lee said. “As soon as I heard what he was saying, I said, ‘you guys have got a point.'”
She said some news organizations had already paid for the op-ed, though it was “not that many” and she did not have the number.
The Obama op-ed, “Why We Need Health Care Reform,” ran over the weekend in the Times, which routinely charges other news organizations to reprint its opinion pieces. Bill Burton, White House deputy press secretary, said he did not know immediately whether the White House was aware of the Times’ plans.
“Is it just me, but is anyone else incensed that a news service – to which we’re already paying an incredible sum – peddled to me today for $150 a 1,200-word oped piece from the president?” Reisman asked his editorial writing colleagues.
“Our president works for us, and the words he or his speech writers write, as far as I’m concerned, are public records – they should be available for free.”
Others soon chimed in.
“The Times is charging its subscriber papers $125 for smaller-circulation dailies (up to [50,000]) and more for higher-circulation dailies. I know times are tough in our business but this is really chintzy and high on the umbrage factor,” Doug Gibson blogged for the Standard-Examiner in Ogden, Utah.
“Is NYT going to sell it to the National Archives and the Obama Presidential Museum as well?” asked another.
A third wrote that his newspaper’s news service “is selling copies of the Gettysburg Address to member newspapers. Send checks to me, made out to ‘Cash.'”
“You’d think since we elected him the president of our country and everything, we could at least get his speeches for free,” Mark Mahoney of the Glens Falls (N.Y.) Post-Star wrote on his blog.
Lee said the Times would refund the fees to those who paid for the piece.
Readers Angered by Cartoons on Health Care Debate
“Here’s what angered many Express-News readers last week,” Bob Richter, public editor at the San Antonio Express-News, wrote on Sunday.
“Two editorial cartoons, five days apart, against a backdrop of an overheated national health-care debate, one cartoon likening President Obama’s foes to rednecks, the other depicting Obama as a thug with a bloody baseball bat in his hand, leaning over a battered man wearing an ‘I Disagree with Obama’ T-shirt.
“The former, which seemed to say if you’re against Obama, you’re a Confederate sympathizer, sparked the biggest outcry.
”I am highly offended,’ wrote Dana Rice of New Braunfels, calling the Aug. 8 David Horsey cartoon, ‘the epitome of insult to us who are not liberals.’
“Charles Slaughter spoke for many with: ‘How incendiary was that? It wasn’t funny and . . . the concept of going back to a Confederate United States was so extremely racist it just made me sick to my stomach.’
“Coincidentally, racism was a charge leveled by another reader, but at a Rick McKee cartoon published Wednesday.
”I could not believe my eyes when I saw . . . President Obama as a black street thug beating up on a white guy,’ wrote Shirley Davis. ‘What has happened to the collective common sense of the Express-News staff? Did it occur to any of you that this particular cartoon would fuel the fires of racism?”
- Associated Press: Obama denounces emphasis on health care protests
- Michael Bush, AdAge: PR Pros: Obama Has Lost Control of the Health-Care Message
- Stanley Crouch, New York Daily News: In health care debate, the GOP is pushing fiction as fact
- Wayne Dawkins, politicsincolor.com: Not so fast Glenn Beck
- Derek Donovan, Kansas City Star: Readers want watchdog coverage of the health care debate
- Melissa Harris-Lacewell and Tony Blankley with Melissa Block on “All Things Considered,” National Public Radio: What’s The Role Of Race In Health Care Fracas?
- Bob Herbert, New York Times: Hard to Believe!
- Dr. Wilmer J. Leon III, thegrio.com: With no control of message, Obama loses control of health reform
- Derrick Z. Jackson, Boston Globe: Who will stand strong in heat of healthcare fight?
- Roland S. Martin, Creators Syndicate: Hate Should Not Drive Health Care Debate
- Deborah Mathis, BlackAmericaWeb.com: Quit Playing Nice, Obama – Just Get Things Done
- Tony Norman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: A nutty way of discussing health care
- Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune: Could health care be Obama’s Iraq?
- Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune: A race card from the right wing
- Les Payne blog: The Challenges Facing Obama and Universal Health Care
- Leonard Pitts Jr., Miami Herald: Healthcare foes use fear, not reason
- Eugene Robinson, Washington Post: Behind the Rage, a Cold Reality
- Albor Ruiz, New York Daily News: GOP is killing itself with bogus talk of death panels
- Ron Walters, National Newspaper Publishers Association: Republican Rage Not Tied to Health Care
- Rod Watson, Buffalo News: Health care value, costs closely tied
- Rod Watson, Buffalo News: Health care’s true face isn’t on TV
- Tim Wise, syndicated: Racism, Right-Wing Rage and the Politics of White Nostalgia
Obama Said to Limit Cooperation on Profiles
“When Valerie Jarrett was profiled in the NY Times magazine last month, I noted that it was the third White House-related cover story of 2009, and kept with the magazine’s increased access since the Bush team left office,” Michael Calderone wrote Saturday for Politico.
“For that piece, Robert Draper spent four months reporting on ‘Obama’s BFF,’ a process that included interviewing Jarrett, [Rahm] Emanuel, [David] Axelrod, and even the president. The piece provided a window into the West Wing, but after being published, apparently caused a bit of drama there, according to a deeply-reported Times piece on Emanuel.
“In a story online Saturday, reporters Peter Baker and Jeff Zeleny spoke with ‘roughly 60 people in the White House, on Capitol Hill and around Washington’ about Emanuel – and yet, there was one integral person missing.
“But when a New York Times Magazine profile of Ms. Jarrett last month explored the old scratchiness [between her and Emanuel], White House officials said the normally calm Mr. Obama erupted with anger. An informal edict went out: no more cooperating with staff profiles. As a result, Mr. Emanuel declined a formal interview for this article.”
From left, Brian Bull of the Native American Journalists Association; Ivan Roman of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists; Michelle Johnson, who has guided the online student projects; Onica N. Makwakwa of Unity, and Doug Mitchell. (Credit: Brian Bull)
Unity Honors Doug Mitchell’s Work with Students
Unity: Journalists of Color Saturday honored Doug Mitchell, who has trained scores of young journalists of color to enter broadcasting, at the Asian American Journalists Association convention in Boston.
Mitchell, project manager for ext Generation Radio, was laid off last year after 20 years at National Public Radio, but continued working with students at each of the journalist of color conventions this summer.
- AAJA Voices: Conference interval left unaddressed
Janet H. Cho Wins Asian Journalists Election by 1 Vote
Janet H. Cho, a business reporter for the Plain Dealer in Cleveland, won re-election as vice president-print of the Asian American Journalists Association by one vote in an election that concluded Saturday at the AAJA convention in Boston.
Convention registration reached 680, Maya Blackmun, interim executive director, told Journal-isms, although she said the figure was not final.
Cho defeated Paul Cheung, deputy multimedia presentation editor at the Miami Herald, 165 to 164. Cheung is not contesting the results, Blackmun said.
“In the face of so much industry turmoil, I for one have never been more convinced of how much we need AAJA,” Cho said in a candidate’s statement. “As our economy sputters along, as corporate greed and corruption run rampant, as a strange new virus threatens global health, our roles as reporters, watchdog journalists, and trusted sources of information have never been more crucial.”
In a second contested race, incumbent Doris Truong, copy editor in the Style section of the Washington Post. won election as secretary, with 210 votes to 165 for Frank Witsil, a copy editor at the Detroit Free Press.
Teach Students How to Cover Those Not Like Them
“Maybe it‚Äôs time to acknowledge that ‘one from Column A and two from column B’ efforts to make newsrooms diverse are really just tokenism in drag and won’t inherently change how we cover minority or ethnic communities.
“Maybe it’s time to put as much effort into the latter as we do the former,” Neil Reisner, a self-described “middle-aged, middle class, white, Jewish guy who looks like a hippie” and teaches at Florida International University, wrote Saturday for the Nieman Watchdog site.
“In my course, we start by talking about stereotypes and prejudice ‚Äî the ones we all learn at the dinner table, from our grandparents, our friends and the culture around us. We work through exercises that show how we cannot avoid our learned-from-birth stereotypes even when we know we’re supposed to.
“We talk openly about subjects rarely discussed in public, much less in politically correct classrooms. An Anglo student relates how he crosses the street when he sees a black man approaching. African-Americans and Haitians examine why their communities don’t get along, how people from the islands sometimes see African Americans as lazy and unambitious and how African-Americans resent what they see as islanders’ superiority complexes. A conversation about Asian communities spurs a second-generation Chinese woman to blurt out, ‘I’m really bad in math, dammit.’ No topic is off limits. . . .
“We learn how to acknowledge our biases, set them aside and how to see the world through the eyes of people who don’t look, speak, think, eat, behave or believe as we do.
“And then we go out into the world.”
Viewers Drawn to "60 Minutes" Interview With Vick
"Michael Vick‚Äôs mea culpa on ’60 Minutes’ last night may or may not have convinced fans that the once-vilified quarterback, who served more than a year in prison stemming from a conviction on dog-fighting charges, deserves a second chance in the NFL," Toni Fitzgerald wrote Monday for Media Life Magazine.
"But many viewers turned out to watch him make his case. ’60 Minutes’ averaged a 2.6 adults 18-49 rating at 7 p.m. last night on CBS, according to Nielsen overnights, up from a 1.5 last week.
‚Äú’Minutes’ averaged 12.1 million total viewers, finishing first for the night on that measure."
- Annette John-Hall, Philadelphia Inquirer: Vick’s redemption goes deeper than football
- Jimi Izrael, theRoot.com: Mike Vick Should Man-Up
- Solomon Jones, Philadelphia Daily News: Vick had to face his kids, and that’s the hardest part of all
- Dwight Lewis, Nashville Tennessean: Need to forgive should motivate all of us
- Elmer Smith, Philadelphia Daily News: Credit the Eagles for trying
- David Zurawik, Baltimore Sun: ’60 Minutes’ on Vick: Punches pulled, truths told
Fellow Vietnam veteran sent this to Cincinnati Enquirer Editor Tom Callinan.
One More Toke for the “This Week” Panelist
The most baffling statement made on the Sunday talk shows had to be one by Ron Brownstein, the former Los Angeles Times national columnist who now writes for National Journal.
Discussing the weekend’s 40th anniversary of the Woodstock festival on ABC’s “This Week,” Brownstein called the event an “artifact of an age of affluence, when the societal worries were about self-expression and individual kind of fulfillment. We have weightier problems now; much more immediate concerns,” he said.
Shortly after Brownstein opined to the panel’s bemusement, Tom Callinan, editor of the Cincinnati Enquirer, posted on Facebook the image of a rifle sent to him by a friend who was, like him, in Vietnam at the time, “I didn’t even know Woodstock happened until I got home 6 months later,” Callinan wrote. The words surrounding the rifle say, “In 1969 . . . This is the only ‘Woodstock’ I remember.”
Brownstein must have missed that veteran when he canvassed society to determine what it was worried about at the time — not to mention the young people at Woodstock who were eluding the draft and protesting the war.
Woodstock took place a year after riots tore up cities in the aftermath of the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and in the midst of a war that claimed 58,220 American lives from 1955 to 1975.
As for an age of affluence, let’s just say it didn’t touch everybody. Census figures for 1969 show the median income to have been $8,389 overall; $5,292 for blacks.
Comic Steve Harvey Gets Reporter’s Job on “GMA”
Steve Harvey, author, comedian, actor and host of radio’s “the Steve Harvey Morning Show,” has joined ABC-TV’s “Good Morning America,” ABC announced on Monday.
“Harvey will bring ‘GMA’ viewers a series of reports on topics ranging from relationships to parenting over the next few months. He will bring his own unique perspective, style and humor to morning television while interacting with viewers around the country via ABCNEWS.com, Skype and live guests in-studio. His first report is scheduled to air Wednesday,” a news release said,
- Eric Deggans blog, St. Petersburg Times: Does it matter that Good Morning America hired comic Steve Harvey as a reporter?
