Maynard Institute archives

Journal-isms Jan 20 2014

by richard0455

Black Papers, Broadcasters Petition for Share of Anti-Tobacco Ads

The National Newspaper Publishers Association and the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters on Friday asked U.S. District Court in Washington to order tobacco companies to include black-owned newspapers and broadcast properties in the outlets where it places anti-smoking ads, Target Market News reported on Monnday.

“A ruling in 2012 in the U.S. Justice Department’s 15-year-old case against the nation’s leading tobacco producers required the companies to run “corrective statements” about the harmful effects of their products. On January 10 when the U.S. Department of Justice filed an agreement on the details of those statements, Target Market News disclosed that the list (originally filed in 2006) of where those ads would appear did not include any African-American media outlets. . . .”

John Eggerton reported Jan. 13 for Broadcasting & Cable, “Each of the four tobacco companies will have to buy ads on one of the Big Three networks (Fox was not included in the mandatory TV placements) five times per week between 7 p.m. and 10 p.m., which means another 20 spots per week coming their way in prime time.

“No word on why neither Fox nor national cable networks were not included as options, though it could be that those were the networks that carried the original tobacco ads since Fox was not around and cable nets were not a force when the ads went off the air in 1971.

“No minority-targeted media are part of the TV buy either, which did not sit well with the Minority Media & Telecommunications Council. ‘It’s surprising that DOJ forgot to include minority owned media in this major advertising buy attendant to the tobacco litigation,’ said MMTC President David Honig. ‘DOJ should ask the judge to revise the order to correct this extraordinary omission.”

The omission did not sit well with the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters . . . “

Nello Ramsey of East Orange, N.J., holds a sign outside the funeral for Amiri Ba

Essayists in Newark to Record Amiri Baraka Funeral

“Newark Symphony Hall in New Jersey turned into a space of mournful celebration on Saturday for Amiri Baraka, the poet, activist and playwright,” Peniel E. Joseph, a scholar of the black power movement and history professor at Tufts University, wrote Saturday for The Root. “In many ways the event represented at once a moratorium and requiem for the Black Arts Movement.

“Actor Danny Glover and professors Cornel West and Michael Eric Dyson headlined a star-studded lineup that included poets, politicians and civil rights leaders. Their presence simultaneously acknowledged both Baraka’s individual humanity and served as a testament to a movement that culled beauty for the extraordinary pain wrought by racial slavery and oppression.

“This was, in many respects, a celebration, a brother’s homecoming and a community-wide appreciation rolled into one.”

Joseph filed his essay for The Root on Saturday. Also there to record the event were Jelani Cobb, who was writing for the New Republic, and Janell Ross, a freelance writer who filed for the Atlantic.

“As I watched artists, activists, public intellectuals, and dignitaries from around the world converge on Newark this weekend for the funeral of poet and playwright Amiri Baraka, I was reminded just how much Baraka’s other life, that of an urban activist and advocate for the not-at-all-powerful, still offers instruction and inspiration to young, frustrated urban activists engaged in their own Sisyphean fights,” Ross wrote.

Cobb told Journal-isms by email, “I wrote a piece for TNR about the funeral in the context of Newark’s racial history, the transition to black mayorships that Baraka was essential to and the current political moment in the city. Basically Newark’s past and present through the lens of the funeral.” Cobb, who writes frequently for the New Yorker, is associate professor of history and director of the Institute for African American Studies at the University of Connecticut.

Joseph added in his piece, “A jazz band provided a soundtrack to the early part of the service, a fitting accompaniment for the author of the indispensable history Blues People. Both Newark Police and the Fruit of Islam were on hand for security, a tribute to Baraka’s uncanny knack for garnering the attention of governments and grassroots representatives.

“It was a ceremony befitting familial royalty. Baraka’s life and death, in many instances, illustrated novel points of convergence from a racially divided America. Both blacks and whites agreed that Baraka was an important artist, but they remained divided over his ultimate significance and legacy. Whereas whites were often mystified by his various ideological transformations, the black community embraced him as their own irascible genius, a fearless avatar of a new and bold reimagining of blackness that sought to do nothing less than shake off slavery’s residual psychic scars. Still, despite the roiling controversy that surrounded his life, ‘the world came out to pay their respects’ to Baraka, observed former Newark Mayor Sharpe James. . . .”

President Obama checks in on first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and M

Obama Acknowledges Some Don’t Like Idea of a Black President

“President Obama sat for lengthy interviews with New Yorker magazine editor David Remnick, who has written a nearly 17,000-word profile of the president as he begins his sixth year in office,” Zachary Goldfarb wrote Sunday for the Washington Post. “Remnick interviewed Obama for hours in the Oval Office and on Air Force One late last year and earlier this month. The story is a great long-read, and you should get a cup of your favorite hot beverage and sit down with it for an hour. . . .”

On MSNBC’s “The Cycle” on Monday, on-air analyst Perry Bacon Jr. said of Obama, “He very frankly acknowledged, for the first time ever, I think, that some opposition to him is driven by race. He basically said that, ‘Some people don’t like me because I’m black, which he usually tries to avoid.

“I think that does tell you he doesn’t view — he is not going to unify the country the way he talked about in 2004. I think he knows that now.”

Remnick wrote this passage:

“Obama’s election was one of the great markers in the black freedom struggle. In the electoral realm, ironically, the country may be more racially divided than it has been in a generation. Obama lost among white voters in 2012 by a margin greater than any victor in American history. The popular opposition to the Administration comes largely from older whites who feel threatened, underemployed, overlooked, and disdained in a globalized economy and in an increasingly diverse country. Obama’s drop in the polls in 2013 was especially grave among white voters. ‘There’s no doubt that there’s some folks who just really dislike me because they don’t like the idea of a black President,’ Obama said. ‘Now, the flip side of it is there are some black folks and maybe some white folks who really like me and give me the benefit of the doubt precisely because I’m a black President.’ The latter group has been less in evidence of late.

“ ‘There is a historic connection between some of the arguments that we have politically and the history of race in our country, and sometimes it’s hard to disentangle those issues,’ he went on. ‘You can be somebody who, for very legitimate reasons, worries about the power of the federal government — that it’s distant, that it’s bureaucratic, that it’s not accountable — and as a consequence you think that more power should reside in the hands of state governments. But what’s also true, obviously, is that philosophy is wrapped up in the history of states’ rights in the context of the civil-rights movement and the Civil War and Calhoun. There’s a pretty long history there.

“And so I think it’s important for progressives not to dismiss out of hand arguments against my Presidency or the Democratic Party or Bill Clinton or anybody just because there’s some overlap between those criticisms and the criticisms that traditionally were directed against those who were trying to bring about greater equality for African-Americans. The flip side is I think it’s important for conservatives to recognize and answer some of the problems that are posed by that history, so that they understand if I am concerned about leaving it up to states to expand Medicaid that it may not simply be because I am this power-hungry guy in Washington who wants to crush states’ rights but, rather, because we are one country and I think it is going to be important for the entire country to make sure that poor folks in Mississippi and not just Massachusetts are healthy. . . .”

The New Yorker issue was timed for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.

ImpreMedia Weekly in Orlando Lays Off Editorial Staff

“The weekly La Prensa Orlando has laid off its entire editorial staff,” WVEN-TV, a Univision station in Daytona Beach, Fla., reported on Wednesday, according to an English translation of a story on its website.

“Journalist Maria Padilla, who until now served as editor in chief of the publication, confirmed the news via telephone. “Is a shame, they had all done a good job and won awards,” she said. She added that the parent company, ImpreMedia, has plans and strategies that are being launched. . . . Sources indicate that the press will continue to recruit the services of freelance journalists for future publications.

“The other two journalists who were laid off today are Migdalia Fernandez and Natalia Nevarez.”

Jacquelynn Carrera, marketing and public relations manager for ImpreMedia, the parent company, told Journal-isms by email Friday, “at this time we are not avail for comments / interviews regarding the topic.”

ImpreMedia owns La Opinión and El Diario La Prensa, based in Los Angeles and New York, respectively. They are the biggest Spanish-language dailies in the United States.

Black Students Suspended Over Gestures in Paper’s “Goofy” Photo

(Credit: Jim Romenesko)

“A Wisconsin school district said this week that it followed proper procedure when it suspended two African-American basketball players because they had made hand gestures that ‘looked like’ gang signs,” David Edwards reported Thursday for rawstory.com.

“On Jan. 1, the Sheboygan Falls News ran what they hoped would be a feel-good story about Jordan, Jamal and Juwaun Jackson moving to the district and playing basketball for Sheboygan Falls High School. The paper took several photos for the article, but decided to publish the ‘goofy’ photo of the boys joking around in Falcons’ basketball uniforms.

“But the school suspended two of the brothers after story ran in the sports section of the paper because parents suspected that the boys were making gang-related hand signs in the photo. The school even had the police department investigate. . . .

Edwards also wrote, “In a Facebook post on Thursday, Sheboygan Falls News Editor Jeff Pederson explained that the story had ‘veered wildly off the intended path.’ ”

Pederson told Jim Romenesko Monday for his media blog, “What has happened with what I still believe is a perfectly fine photo that fit well with the story is disgusting and will stay with me for the rest of my life. I am struggling to understand this entire situation, but I do know that I can’t allow the people we photograph to be put up to this very serious level of scrutiny ever again. . . .”

The ACLU of Wisconsin said in a statement on Thursday that it would also be investigating the case, rawstory.com reported.

Members of Aristide’s Party Charged in 2000 Killing of Journalist

Jean Dominique (Credit: Haitianphotos.com)

“Nine people have been charged in the 2000 killing of one of Haiti’s most renowned journalists, marking a major step forward in a high-profile case that has dragged on for years,” Trenton Daniel reported Saturday from Port-au-Prince for the Associated Press.

“A judge’s report, read aloud in the Court of Appeal, alleged that former senator Mirlande Liberus Pavert was the intellectual author of the slaying of radio journalist Jean Dominique. Liberus Pavert was a member of former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide’s Family Lavalas party while she served as senator in the early 2000s.

“Also charged was Annette Auguste, a well-known folk singer otherwise known as So Anne. She was a Lavalas activist at that time.

“Gabriel Harold Severe, a former deputy mayor of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince; Franco Camille, a onetime powerful Lavalas activist; and Dimsley Milien, the alleged hit man, were also charged.

“None of them could be reached for comment. No arrests have been made.

The appellate court must now either accept or reject the judge’s report, which was submitted on Friday.

” ‘I think it’s a positive step to the extent that we’ve been working on this for almost 14 years,’ Dominique’s widow, Michele Montas, said by telephone from her home in New York. She declined to comment further because she hadn’t seen the judge’s findings.

“Dominique, an agronomist-turned-radio commentator, and his security guard were gunned down on April 3, 2000, in the courtyard of the journalist’s radio station, Radio Haiti Inter. . . . “

Short Takes

  • Members of the Asian American Journalists Association are betting on the Super Bowl as a way to raise money for the organization. Sharon Chan, a past president wrote on Facebook, “AAJA Denver members: Chris Casquejo and I will each donate $100 to AAJA Power of One if the Broncos win the Super Bowl if your members step up with $100 wagers for a Seahawks win. Who is up for it?”
  • “Venezuela does not produce newsprint,” John Otis wrote Friday for the Committee to Protect Journalists. “Nearly all of it is purchased from Canada and the United States by Venezuelan import companies or by individual newspapers. But due to government currency controls, securing dollars to buy that paper can take months. Reserves of newsprint have fallen to an all-time low, according to news reports. Many Venezuelan journalists say they believe this is a deliberate strategy by the socialist government of President Nicolas Maduro to muzzle critical voices. . . .”
  • In Costa Rica, “Diario Extra newspaper complained Monday that it had been the victim of telephone tapping by Costa Rica’s OIJ investigative agency, calling it an abuse of authority and a violation of press freedom,” the EFE news agency reported. “The OIJ and prosecutors tapped the telephone calls of the paper’s reporters for months with the aim of identifying their sources, the daily said. . . .”
  • “CNN correspondent Zain Asher grew emotional on-air Thursday while sharing the amazing news of her brother’s Oscar nomination,” Katherine Fung reported Thursday for the Huffington Post. “Her brother Chiwetel Ejiofor has just been nominated for a Best Actor Academy Award for his role in ’12 Years A Slave.’ Asher expressed her joy at the news, telling Brooke Baldwin, ‘Everyone is so excited, so emotional, so overwhelmed at this because we have been waiting for this for a long time.’ . . .”
  • The Capital Times in Madison, Wis., is focusing on race as a project for 2014. “We pledge the focus of this project will be African-Americans, not well-intentioned whites, be they political, business, media or nonprofit leaders,” Editor Paul Fanlund told readers. “Second, we aim to host the discussion on race relations so that citizens who want to help . . . can see clear ways forward. Yes, there will be some traditional journalism, in which we write about key themes such as the achievement gap, disproportionate incarceration rates, employment challenges, and social separation between races in liberal Madison. But the Internet allows us to create what, for lack of a better term, will be a ‘citizens’ guide’ on race. . . .”
  • “I concluded after nearly eight years as an employee that building my own venture was the only way for me to maximize my potential, particularly given my entrepreneurial yen to create things,” Andaiye Taylor, founder and editor in chief of BrickCityLive.com, a hyperlocal news site covering Newark, N.J., wrote for Quartz. She added, “As a young black woman working in a the culture of a successful startup that was overwhelmingly white and male—particularly in the executive ranks—I found that no matter how well-founded my ideas, well-presented my proposals, well-executed my plans, and well-articulated my desire to build, I was often treated like a functionary, and not a visionary. . . .”

    • Betty Liu

  • “Bloomberg TV anchor Betty Liu was feted for her new book, ‘Work Smarts: What CEOs Say You Need to Get Ahead,’ this week at a party hosted by Chris Burch, the founder and CEO of Burch Creative Capital,” Merrill Knox reported Sunday for TV Newswer. “In his toast, Burch, who is featured in the book, praised Liu’s interviewing abilities, saying she asks ‘ingenious and beautiful questions’ and is an ‘amazing woman, true to the heart.’ The book also includes interviews with Warren Buffett, Jamie Dimon and Sam Zell, among many others. . . .”
  • Marcia Morgan, a native of Jamaica, opened a Jamaican restaurant in 1995 in Temple Hills, Md., but it closed for lack of capital. “She came to work at NPR that same year,” Amy Blaszyk explained Jan.10 on the WeTheEaters.com blog. “She worked her way up, beginning by answering phones in Distribution, serving as an administrative assistant for the Washington and Foreign Desks, and then becoming a long-time administrative coordinator for News. Marcia decided she wanted to advance in the news department and enrolled at University of Maryland University College, where she got her communications degree in 2004. She came to work for NPR’s Operations Desk the following year.” Then she took a buyout, and plans to launch a catering business. ““NPR is family,” Morgan said. “Change is always new, and you do get that anxiety that I hope I’m making the right decision. But nothing beats a failure but a try. And try I must. . . .”
  • “Fusion, the Univision/ABC joint venture targeting millennial viewers, has canceled one of its shows and is reorganizing its morning program, less than 3 months since the network’s launch,” Veronica Villafañe reported Friday for her Media Moves site. “No new episodes of ‘DNA,’ hosted by Derrick Ashong will be produced and ‘The Morning Show’ will be moved to primetime in the coming weeks, reairing the following morning. . . .”
  • “The Associated Press’ recently published and factually-challenged report that the Obamacare Spanish-language site is written in ‘Spanglish’ is both funny and pathetic. Years of high school Spanish seem to have been wasted upon these journalists,” Fernando Espuelas wrote Friday for Huffington Post. After another challenge to the article by Julio Ricardo Varela of Latino Rebels last week, AP spokeswoman Erin Madigan said the news service stood by the story, by Russell Contreras and Kelli Kennedy.
  • Autumn White Eyes, writing for lastrealindians.com, said she did not realize how much she was offended by Indian mascots until she went to school at Dartmouth College.”If I hadn’t gone to Dartmouth, I may have been able to focus more on the poverty and domestic violence prevalent in my community. Instead, I am in an environment where many of my peers lack the basic knowledge of who my people are. While I didn’t know how to react to their blatant racism, they didn’t know how to respond to my existence . . .”
  • Discussing the Cleveland Indians mascot, graduate student Timothy A. Model wrote Thursday for the Plain Dealer, “Chief Wahoo is indeed a perfect symbol of America and of Cleveland. He is evidence that racism is as prevalent as it always has been. We cling to caricatures of minority races, because we convince ourselves that we cannot live without that cartoon. We erupt in agony at mere speculation over the changing of a team’s logo, because it is all we have. Or is it? . . . ”
  • “Former NFL superstar Darren Sharper — a 5-time Pro Bowler and Super Bowl champ — has been arrested in L.A. on suspicion of rape … TMZ Sports has learned,” the website reported on Saturday. It said in an update, “A rep for the NFL Network just released a statement saying Darren has been ‘suspended without pay until further notice.’ ”
  • “Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid recently changed course on whether marijuana should be made legal for medicinal purposes, and a report by CNN’s Sanjay Gupta played a part,” Jordan Chariton reported Friday for TVNewser. In the Las Vegas Sun, Reid cited CNN and NPR reports about children suffering from seizures as well, to make the case that over the past several years, he’d come to think that marijuana seemed a sensible and humane treatment for people suffering from particular conditions with no other treatment or cure. , “Reid cited CNN and NPR reports about children suffering from seizures as well, to make the case that over the past several years, he’d come to think that marijuana seemed a sensible and humane treatment for people suffering from particular conditions with no other treatment or cure. . . .”
  • “BBC TV presenter Komla Dumor, one of Ghana’s best-known journalists, has died suddenly at his home in London at the age of 41, the corporation has announced,” Britain’s Press Association reported on Saturday. “Ghana-born Dumor was remembered by broadcaster and BBC Radio 4 Today presenter Mishal Husain as “one of our brightest and best”. Peter Horrocks, the BBC’s global news director described him as ‘a leading light of African journalism.’ . . .”

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