Events Scheduled for D.C. on Anniversary of King Speech
Fla. Couple Chosen to “Incubate,” Own Donated TV Station
Black Enterprise Unveils Application for iPad
Al Stiney Dies, Supervised Tech Staff at “CBS Evening News”
Franz Schurmann Dies, Co-Founded Pacific News Service
U.S., Business Leaders Caution S. Africa on Media Tribunal
Columnist Milloy Calls for Spelling Out the “N-Word”
Fox News’ Glenn Beck says of his Aug. 28 rally, “Whites don’t own Abraham Lincoln. Blacks don’t own Martin Luther King. Humans, humans embrace their ideas or reject their ideas.” (Video)
Events Scheduled for D.C. on Anniversary of King Speech
It will be Fox News’ Glenn Beck and members of the Tea Party movement vs. the Rev. Al Sharpton, radio jock Tom Joyner and civil rights leaders on Saturday as each group stages a rally in Washington on the anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington that featured Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.
Speaking of Beck’s rally on the National Mall, Fox News vice president Bill Shine told Mediaite last week, “FOX News has nothing to do with the rally – we will cover it as a news event alongside other news throughout that day.”
Each side will feature public figures who double as media personalities.
Former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, now under contract to Fox News, is to be at the Beck rally.
A news release from Sharpton’s National Action Network says, “The rally will start at 11:00 a.m. at Dunbar High School, followed by a march to the King Memorial. Joining NAN will be a cross-section of organizations and principals including, but not limited to: National Action Network (NAN); United States Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, Martin Luther King, III, President, Center for Nonviolent Social Change, Inc.; Ed Schultz, Television and radio show host; Tom Joyner, The Tom Joyner Morning Show & Reach Media; Marc Morial, President of the National Urban League; Benjamin Todd Jealous, President of NAACP; Melanie L. Campbell, President of National Coalition on Black Civic Participation and Convener of the Black Women’s Roundtable; representatives from Media Matters, and many other religious groups, labor unions, and organizations.”
Sharpton has his own national radio show.
As DeNeen L. Brown reported in the Washington Post last week, “The conservative talk show host announced in November that he wanted to reveal a ‘100 year plan for America’ at the Lincoln Memorial. More recently, he said that the purpose of his Aug. 28 event is to restore the country’s ‘values’ and to pay tribute to military families.
” ‘There will be absolutely no politics involved,’ he said. ‘This rally will honor the troops, unite the American people under the principles of integrity and truth, and make a pledge to restore honor within ourselves and our country.’
“Civil rights leaders have denounced Beck’s plans, questioning his motives for choosing the date and place, which they said are historically symbolic of the country’s civil rights movement.
“Responding to the criticism on his show June 28, Beck said he believes it was ‘divine providence’ that the rally was scheduled on the anniversary of the King speech. He said he had initially planned the event for Sept. 12 and then realized it was a Sunday. ‘I’m not going to ask anyone to work on the Sabbath,’ he said. He rescheduled the rally for Aug. 28 because it was the best day for the schedules of the people involved, he said.”
Beck’s rally has a King of its own, King’s niece, Alveda King.
“‘I’m speaking at the Glenn Beck rally because Glenn and I have had many conversations about faith, hope and love,’ Alveda King said in a phone interview with TheDC,” Matthew Boyle reported for the Daily Caller. “Glenn asked me about the philosophy and the strength to love that my uncle Martin had. I’ve been sharing that with Glenn and I’m hearing and seeing Glenn embrace those principles. Where those principles are bound, and they’re not just rooted in the American Dream, but in the faith of our Father.’
Organizers of Beck’s rally say they expect to have as many as 300,000 people, according to the permits issued for the event last week, Joe Strupp reported for Media Matters for America.
- Earl Ofari Hutchinson, syndicated: Glenn Beck continues conservative crusade to co-opt Dr. King
- Denise Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com: Groups Prep for ‘Reclaim the Dream’ March in DC
Fla. Couple Chosen to “Incubate,” Own Donated TV Station
The owners of a Hispanic media company in southwest Florida have been chosen to “incubate” and eventually own the first of up to 155 television stations donated by Trinity Broadcasting Co. to an organization dedicated to increasing broadcast ownership by people of color and women
“Under its Diversity Initiative to help minority and women managers transition into entrepreneurship and then into broadcast owners, MMTC has announced plans to incubate Media Vista Group as the future owner of TBN‚Äôs W16CJ, Naples, Florida,” David Honig, president and executive director of the Minority Media Telecommunications Council, announced on Sunday.
“The principals of Media Vista, Orlando and Mayela Rosales, have many years experience in broadcasting, but are facing market conditions in which capital is difficult to access. Now they have the chance to not only own their own television station, but to be mentored and trained by leaders in the television industry.”
Trinity Broadcasting, which calls itself the world’s largest religious network, announced last month it was donating up to 155 television stations to the MMTC.
Colby M. May, counsel to the network, told Journal-isms then that when the nation last year completed a decade-long, $2 billion effort to convert its television signals to digital, Trinity found it was not cost-effective to transform all of its stations.
In accepting the donation, Honig said the stations would be used to train potential owners of color and that his group would then sell the stations to the trainees for 50 percent of fair market value.
“Media Vista group is owned by Orlando and Mayela Rosales,” Honig told Journal-isms on Sunday. “We met them through the NAB‚Äôs Broadcast Leadership Training Program, in which they were enrolled (I lecture there once in a while),” he said by e-mail, referring to the National Association of Broadcasters. “Media Vista Group owns and operates an LPTV [low power television] station in Ft. Myers ‚Äî it‚Äôs the Azteca affiliate. The station does a great deal of community service. We were very impressed with the Rosales‚Äô and their philosophy of broadcasting.”
Media Vista Group is the parent company of Azteca America SWFL, D’Latinos al Dia, D’Latinos Magazine and the D’Latinos website. In early 2006, Media Vista became a partner in the Azteca America (WTPH channel 14) TV affiliate for Southwest Florida on DirecTV channel 14 and Comcast.
Earl “Butch” Graves Jr., Black Enterprise president and CEO, touts the iPod application in this video. (Video)
Black Enterprise Unveils Application for iPad
“Today Black Enterprise unveiled its new iPad app, the BLACK ENTERPRISE magazine app for iPad. With the launch, Black Enterprise becomes the first African-American-owned and operated publication to provide content through the iPad,” Sherri L. Smith wrote Thursday for BlackWeb2.0.
“The app is running on a subscription-based model with users paying $1.99 for each issue. However, Black Enterprise is offering [its] 40th Anniversary Collectors Edition issue to users for free along with the Best Companies for Diversity issue.” In addition to the magazine content, iPad users can expect interactive content including:
- “Exclusive content not found in the printed edition with initial video offerings from trailblazers Robert Johnson, R. Donohue Peebles, Richard ‚ÄúDick‚Äù Parsons, Michael Lee-Chin, Ursula Burns, Don Barden, Russell Simmons and Tyler Perry.
- “Video clips from ‘Our World with Black Enterprise,’ ‘Black Enterprise Business Report,’ and multimedia ‘Wealth for Life’ content,” a reference to the magazine’s slogan.
- “Games, graphs and charts that bring pages to life.
- “Reader accounts that give users the ability to sign-in to custom accounts, allowing them to share, bookmark and reference personal notes.”
Al Stiney Dies, Supervised Tech Staff at “CBS Evening News”
Less than 24 hours before newly retired CBS correspondent Harold Dow died Saturday after what was believed to be an asthma attack, CBS lost another pioneering African American ‚Äî Al Stiney, who supervised the technical crew on the daily and weekend editions of the “CBS Evening News.”
Stiney died in Secaucus, N.J., Friday of heart failure after a brief illness, his wife, Rena, told Journal-isms. He was 62, born on Sept. 21, 1947, exactly a week before Dow, who was born on Sept. 28.
Stiney’s colleague Stevan Stron, who alternated in supervising the “CBS Evening News” crew, said Stiney had worked at CBS for 40 years, starting in the mailroom. He was a producer in news syndication, spent time at CBS Records, attended Baruch College and in 1980, became a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 1212.
He was likely the first African American at CBS in such a supervisory technical job, where the responsibilities are to coordinate the news feeds from around the world, graphics and the work of 15 editors, Stron said.
Stiney shared in an Emmy for “NFL Today” awarded in 1990, and a Peabody award in 1986 for “CBS Sunday Morning.”
“On a personal level I can tell you that Al was one of those guys who was clearly proud that more African Americans were working at places like CBS News compared to when he started 40-years ago,” CBS News correspondent Russ Mitchell, who also anchors the “CBS Evening News” Sunday edition, told Journal-isms by e-mail. “When you’d see him in the hall he’d always give a wink and say ‘great job’.”
Services are scheduled Friday in the family-owned Stiney Funeral Home, on Stiney Road in Hardeeville, N.C.
Franz Schurmann Dies, Co-Founded Pacific News Service
“Franz Schurmann, a sociologist and historian who was an influential scholar of modern China and a co-founder of Pacific News Service in 1970, died Friday at his San Francisco home of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases, his family said. He was 84,” Bob Egelko reported Monday in the San Francisco Chronicle.
“Mr. Schurmann taught at UC Berkeley for 38 years and headed its Center for Chinese Studies. He spoke a dozen languages and wrote more than a half dozen books on China and U.S. foreign policy. His writings early in the Cold War accurately predicted the political rift between China and the Soviet Union.
“He was an early opponent of the Vietnam War, helped to found UC Berkeley’s Faculty Peace Committee in 1964, and traveled to North Vietnam at its government’s invitation in 1968. He was the first American professor to visit Hanoi during U.S. bombing raids, said his longtime partner, Sandy Close, who ran Pacific News Service with him from 1974 on. . . .
“He founded Pacific News Service in 1970 with Orville Schell, his former student and fellow Chinese scholar, as an outlet for alternative views on Vietnam and foreign affairs, and mentored numerous young writers whom he took into his home.
“Close said Mr. Schurmann was the ‘intellectual inspiration’ for New America Media, which Pacific News Service launched in 1996 as the nation’s first association of ethnic news organizations. It now has 2,000 members.”
- Andrew Lam, New America Media: Franz Schurmann: A Curious, Restless American Soul
- Facebook: Franz Schurmann Memorial Page
U.S., Business Leaders Caution S. Africa on Media Tribunal
The U.S. ambassador to South Africa and an association of 80 heads of that nation’s largest companies separately cautioned the ruling African National Congress about its idea for a media appeals tribunal.
“In a debate with media professionals on Tuesday night, African National Congress (ANC) spokesman Jackson Mthembu defended the party’s right to raise the idea of a media appeals tribunal. Mr Mthembu said the tribunal will not serve as a punitive measure to put journalists behind bars,” Loyiso Langeni reported Thursday for South Africa’s Business Day.
But U.S. Ambassador Donald Gips, speaking at the South African Institute of International Affairs in Johannesburg, “urged the government and the media to ‘reach common ground.’ He said: ‘I believe the challenge here is to balance that right of criticism with the need for media professionalism and standards for truthful and fair reporting.’ Langeni wrote.
The business leaders were more blunt. “The idea of a statutory body, created by law, and appointed by the political executive, raises the prospect of a media answerable to political bosses,” Business Leadership SA said in a statement. It said tension between media and politics was necessary, Siseko Njobeni reported Wednesday for Business Day.
Columnist Milloy Calls for Spelling Out the “N-Word”
“Laura Schlessinger gave up her radio talk show last week after using on air what the Chicago Tribune called ‘the “n” word’ 11 times in five minutes,” Courtland Milloy wrote Monday in the Washington Post.
“And just what kind of word is this N-word ‚Äî N technically being a letter that’s often used in statistics to mean the norm, in chemistry as short for nitro and in physics for nano?
“Oh, snap, you mean the N-word ‚Äî the euphemism for that taboo sound, the racial curse: in eye, double g and . . . er, excuse me; I almost cast a spell. You can’t spell it, either.
“We can, however, play a game that linguists call circumlocution ‚Äî where we speak or write around the word so that you don’t actually see or hear it but still know what it means. That way, the idea of what’s being referred to sinks imperceptibly into the subconscious and thus keeps the taboo strong. . . .
“Some news organizations will relent and publish the actual word, but only if it is used in an innocuous quote about the word itself. On the other hand, if the quote about the word is not so innocuous ‚Äî say, a white person like Schlessinger is trying to tell a black caller not to be so sensitive about the word ‚Äî then it’s back to euphemisms.
“Or, more accurately, our superstitions about ‘the one that must not be spoken.’ If race relations in America are so bad that we can’t look at a word, then we are doomed.”
Short Takes
- “A U.S. District Court in San Juan this week ordered payment of four years of back wages to five employees fired by the San Juan Star ‚Äî nearly six years ago. Whether those former employees actually get any money, however, remains an open question, not least because the Star closed its doors two years ago,” the Guild Reporter, publication of the Newspaper Guild, reported on Friday.
- “The war of words between Comcast and its critics flared up once more as final responses during the Federal Communications Commission’s comment period for the largest U.S. cable firm’s planned acquisition of NBC Universal were due yesterday,” Georg Szalai reported Friday for the Hollywood Reporter. “Critics highlighted potential dangers of what would be the biggest media combination in recent memory. Comcast once again argued the deal is pro-consumer, in the public interest and doesn’t raise competition concerns.”
- “Should Kansas City Star publisher Mark Zieman have taken embattled editor Mike Fannin‚Äôs advice two years ago to not hire him?” Hearne Christopher, a former Star columnist, asked Monday on the website KCConfidential. “Statements about Fannin made Friday on local radio and television by recently resigned Star sports columnist Jason Whitlock raise serious questions regarding Fannin‚Äôs ability to govern as editor of the newspaper.” Christopher cited his own experiences at the paper.
- “Gwen Ifill wrote an extended apology to her viewers after what was meant to be a friendly debate over the proposed mosque and Islamic community center near Ground Zero turned heated Monday night,” Liz Goodwin wrote Friday on Yahoo News, referring to PBS’ “NewsHour.” “Ifill writes that she’s received ‘a ton’ of viewer complaints over the segment, which went well beyond the typically staid fare of ‘NewsHour.’ The Democratic mayor of Teaneck, New Jersey, Mohammed Hameeduddin, began interrupting New York Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Lazio with pointed questions while ignoring Ifill’s protestations to stop.”
- “After being headquartered in San Francisco’s Civic Center for a decade, AAJA’s National Office will be moving to the classic Hearst Building located on 3rd & Market streets near the heart of the city’s Financial District,” the Asian American Journalists Association announced on Monday.
- TV One is interrupting the summer hiatus of “Washington Watch with Roland Martin” on Sunday to explore the state of the African American community in New Orleans five years after Hurricane Katrina. Guests include: New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu; actor Wendell Pierce; Sean Payton, coach of the NFL’s New Orleans Saints; Gerod Stevens, host of “The Good Morning Show” on WBOK-AM radio; Jarvis DeBerry, editorial writer and columnist for the Times-Picayune; Kim Bondy, former producer, CNN; Sabrina Wilson, reporter, WVUE-TV; and others. The show was taped on location and is scheduled to air Sunday at 11 a.m. EDT.
- Ombudsman Edward Schumacher-Matos of the Miami Herald Sunday took on the use of anonymous sources by reporter Juan Tamayo. In two major front-page articles in the Herald and El Nuevo Herald, Tamayo “reported on the divisions between Fidel and Ra??l Castro in one and, in the other, about apparent plans in the Obama administration to lift some travel restrictions to the island.” “Cuba is one of most opaque countries in the world,” Tamayo said, but “the Straits of Florida are not an insurmountable barrier.” Schumacher-Matos backed the reporter. “Some gurus say that the future of the news business is one in which reporters, not companies, will be brands. These two stories support that possibility.”
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