The Few Commentators of Color Give It to Kerry
The handful of commentators of color who appeared in the news media after Thursday night’s presidential debate generally echoed the prevailing media sentiment that Democrat John Kerry edged Republican President Bush. Joe Davidson of BET.com even weighed in from Barcelona, Spain.
Carlos Watson, a “political analyst” who joined CNN in December, appeared to be the only black journalist commenting for the major networks during or after the debate.
Two newspapers — the Boston Globe and the Daily Press of Newport News, Va. — included black columnists in their debate coverage.
On Pacifica Radio’s “Democracy, Now!” this morning, Bill Fletcher of TransAfrica Forum, the lobbying organization for Africa and the Caribbean, was asked about the candidates’ stances on the genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. He said he was “surprised that they would even discuss the issue of and conflict in Darfur,” but that the two had essentially taken the same position — supporting the African Union’s efforts to settle the conflict.
But Fletcher noted there was no discussion of Haiti, where he said more than 3,000 people had been murdered in political killings “since the coup,” a reference to the Feb. 29 resignation of President Jean-Bertrand Aristede, after which he left the country. “The only thing we get is the photos of the victims killed in Hurricane Jeanne, but there’s no context,” he said.
[Added Oct. 2: On the syndicated Tom Joyner radio show Friday, columnist DeWayne Wickham said that Kerry looked “presidential,” while Bush looked like Richard M. Nixon in the 1960 Nixon-Kennedy debates.
[On NPR’s “The Tavis Smiley Show,” host Tony Cox discussed the debate with Rochelle Riley of the Detroit Free Press and Terry Neal of washingtonpost.com.
[“This was Kerry by a decision, so I would have to have them box again,” said Riley. “Kerry, for the first time, actually was able to speak definitively and concisely about what his positions were.” Neal said, “I gave Kerry a slight advantage. I wasn’t quite as breathless as some people. I don’t think he crushed the president, by any stretch of the imagination, but I thought he was more concise, more clear, and he controlled the tempo of the debate.”
[When Cox asked whether “there was something, some kernel, that the African-American voting community will glob onto,” Neal replied that:
[“. . . sometimes candidates can speak to issues of concern of race without explicitly talking about race. The bottom line is African-Americans and Hispanics are far more likely to be opposed to this war in Iraq, and have been searching, waiting for this candidate, John Kerry, to sort of express that, to talk about it and articulate it. And while he didn’t talk about it, certainly, in terms of race, I think the fact that he finally sort of stood up and articulated a fairly clear vision will help him with many minority voters. But I think it’s going to be this third debate, in particular, where they talk about domestic issues, where he has a real opportunity to do that.”]
Latino, Asian American or Native commentary in English-language media was difficult to come by. But Rachel La Corte of the Associated Press reported that in a turnabout, about 100 Cuban-Americans were among the protesters outside the University of Miami campus, site of the debate. They were protesting against Bush because of strict restrictions his administration has imposed on travel to Cuba, her story said.
“All these people never voted against Republicans before, but this particular issue is of such concern that even the ones who never voted at all want to vote against Bush,” Rosa Garmendia said in the piece.
The commentary:
- Ta-Nehisi Coates, “Press Clips” columnist for the Village Voice, in a piece posted late today on the Voice Web site: “Bush seemed virtually unaware of the camera. He contorted his face while Kerry replied to some of his points. Even when the camera was actually on Bush, at times he seemed to hunch over the lectern as if hectoring the audience. . . . factors that were predicted to be advantages for Bush seemed instead to work against him.”
- Joe Davidson, BET.com, writing from Barcelona, Spain: “Foreign affairs was the sole topic of the debate, but Kerry brought the war home to the retired Aunt Thelmas in Detroit, the cousin Davettes teaching in Florida, and to the young sisters and brothers hip-hoppin? in Watts. . . . Bush places great value on consistency. The problem is, he has consistently made fundamentally wrong decisions. That?s why people here in Europe, in Africa and around the globe are in concert with African Americans who have been long and strong opponents of Bush?s war of choice and aggression in Iraq.”
- Derrick Z. Jackson, Boston Globe: “America may not be ready to follow Kerry just yet, but with two more debates, foreign policy out of the way, and the shaky economy looming as the next topic, Bush will need more than a fly swatter.”
- Wil LaVeist, Daily Press, Newport News, Va.: “There was no clear winner in this debate. They will both claim victory. However, Kerry may have succeeded in making Americans more comfortable with him. This may be just what he needs. His line suggesting that Bush’s plan to get us out of Iraq will be ‘four words: more of the same,’ is the button line we will all decide on.”
- Carlos Watson, CNN’s post-debate analysis: “It was a solid debate. It wasn’t as spectacular or as engaged a debate as I thought we might see. I thought it might get more aggressive. I think ultimately the president did not do what Bill Clinton did in 1996 as an incumbent, which was to put away his challenger. But nor, by the way, did John Kerry do what Ronald Reagan did in 1988 as the challenger and dramatically change the race.
“I think the Kerry people are going to come out of this very happy feeling like he met expectations, even exceeded them. I think the Bush people, particularly voters out there, continue to feel good about him. But I think undecideds are going to take another look at John Kerry and more people will tune in to the second debate a week from now, which is reminiscent of 1992. Instead of the audience going down, as it did in ’96 and 2000, first debate to second debate, I expect it to go up.”
On the Morning After, Most Big-City Editorials Give Nod to Kerry (Editor and Publisher)
Keith Woods Named Dean at Poynter Institute
Keith M. Woods, a former city editor, editorial writer and columnist at the New Orleans Times-Picayune who is reporting, writing and editing group leader at the Poynter Institute, has been named Poynter’s dean, its No. 2 position, the faculty was told this week.
An announcement from Dr. Karen Brown Dunlap, Poynter’s president, is expected next week. Neither she nor Woods could be reached for comment.
The appointment of Woods puts African Americans in the top two posts at the well-regarded St. Petersburg, Fla., school for professional journalists, which also owns the St. Petersburg Times.
“It’s a wonderful choice,” said Jill Geisler, leadership and management group leader. “Keith is thoughtful about the journalism and the journalists, about the craft and the human element.” He cares about “the people, the process and the product,” she told Journal-isms.
The dean leads the faculty in curriculum planning and implementation, another faculty member explained, saying that the division of roles between the president and the dean is up to the president.
Dunlap had been dean before assuming the presidency in August 2003. Janet Weaver, who next held the job, was named managing editor of The Tampa Tribune in June.
In his latest “Race Matters” column on the Poynter Web site, “Remembering What We’d Rather Forget,” Woods discusses racially charged words and phrases, and concludes that when they are used, “journalists need to include in such stories the kind of contextual information that helps the public understand the nature of the problem and the history that gives it its power.
“Without that context, it’s easy to leave the public confused over how seemingly small things can escalate into scandal, protests, and court cases. And it’s easy to dismiss those who complain as reactionary, unreasonably sensitive, or as political opportunists just ‘playing the race card.'”
Ed Gordon to Interview Kerry for Half-Hour on BET
Ed Gordon, formerly of Black Entertainment Television, returns to the cable network to interview Sen. John Kerry for half an hour next Thursday at 8 p.m. Eastern time, BET announces.
BET Founder and CEO Robert Johnson had invited both Kerry and Bush “to each have their own prime time opportunity on BET to discuss issues of relevance to African-American viewers as the November election draws nearer. To date, only Senator Kerry has accepted the invitation. The Bush Administration has offered only a response that they are considering BET?s invitation,” a news release said.
The show is to be repeated on Friday, Oct. 8, at 11:30 p.m.
Gordon left BET at the end of 2002 after the network canceled most of its regular news and public affairs programming.
He was spotted again in September 2003, when he co-moderated a Democratic presidential candidates debate in Baltimore. He was introduced as a contributing editor of Savoy magazine, the publisher of which later announced it was going out of business.
Kerry sat down recently with the National Newspaper Publishers Association, which represents black newspapers, for an interview with Hazel Trice Edney.
Hampton U. Paper Ends the Week Unpublished
The Hampton University student newspaper remained unpublished as the week ended, ordered by the university administration not to print or go online until it had an editorial adviser. “Right now, we’re still waiting to get our notification from the administration that we have an adviser or are allowed to print,” editor Talia Buford told Journal-isms today.
The previous adviser resigned after the journalism school would no longer allow her to receive credit for the hours spent on the student newspaper, The Script, a concept known as “release time.”
The new dean of the Scripps Howard School of Journalism and Communications, television host Tony Brown, has made it clear he wants to separate the school from the student paper as much as possible.
The current problems between the administration and its student journalism go back to 2002, when the Scripps Howard Foundation and Hampton opened the Scripps Howard School of Journalism and Communications, part of a multi-million investment by Scripps in the university.
Charlotte Grimes, a former national correspondent for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch who had been brought in two years before to head the university’s Department of Media Arts, was not chosen to head the new school. She told interested parties in a memo that she “respectfully declined the conditions under which Dr. Harvey invited me to take on the leadership . . . As I wrote to him, I’m concerned about his proposal to appoint a committee to craft a mission statement for the new school,” referring to University President William R. Harvey. “This mission statement, he advised me, should reflect his view that journalism is ‘to do good, not muckraking.'” (Harvey denied saying that.)
Under the next school leader, Dr. Christopher Campbell, acting president JoAnn Haysbert confiscated copies of the newspaper after the Script ran a story about health violations in the cafeteria and did not place a note from her on the situation on the front page as she requested. Instead, it ran on page 3.
A task force was created to make sure such confiscations did not happen again. The task force recommendations accepted by Haysbert last December declared that, “Oversight and guidance from a faculty advisor (or advisors) with adequate journalistic knowledge and an appreciation and commitment to the Hampton model are necessary.”
The students wanted an adviser who knew about journalism. But the students did not intend for the provision to be used as a weapon to shut down the paper. “I don’t think we would intentionally do this to ourselves,” Buford said today.
“Right now the Script is the illegitimate child that no one wants to claim,” Alexander R. LeMaine, a Script staffer and print journalism major, wrote in a letter to Journal-isms. “We put in all of the time and effort it took to get the paper out on time, but as of now it is all for naught. . . . I see this as a proverbial slap in the face, possible retribution for last year’s altercations.”
Schwarzenegger Vetoes Media Access to Inmates
“Expressing fears that increased media access to state prisons would make inmates into celebrities, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill Thursday aiming to give new rights to reporters and inmates behind prison walls,” the Associated Press reports.
“The governor’s action preserves restrictions established during Gov. Pete Wilson’s administration to limit one-on-one interviews between reporters and inmates.
“In a veto message, Schwarzenegger called the legislation by Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, ‘unnecessary.’ He said the media can already interview random inmates during tours and can arrange one-on-one interviews through prison visitation programs.
“But backers note that those interviews can take up to 30 days to arrange and are recorded, watched and often conducted without a reporter being able to write notes or take photographs or videos,” the story continued.
“Supporters of the bill included the California Newspaper Publishers Association, American Civil Liberties Union, California Broadcasters Association and the Catholic Conference of Bishops.”
The population in California state prisons is 29 percent white, 29 percent black, 36 percent Hispanic and 6 percent other, according to a report for the third quarter of 2004 from the California Department of Corrections.
Ed Bradley Keeping Head Down on Held Story
“Moveon.org, the influential Web-based group in support of John Kerry’s presidential bid, Wednesday petitioned its members to contact CBS in an effort to get the network to air an investigative ’60 Minutes II’ piece that was shelved in the wake of the now-debunked story on President George W. Bush’s National Guard service,” Verne Gay reported in Newsday.
Separately, Mary Jacoby of Salon.com reported that the front man on the story, correspondent Ed Bradley, was trying to keep his head down amid the controversy.
“It’s not my decision about why it’s not running. You should talk to the people who made that decision,” Bradley said in Jacoby’s piece, explaining that he was referring to CBS News President Andrew Heywood. “I reported the story. I certainly understand their decision not to air it,” Bradley added.
“Like I say, I’m not going to be pulled into this,” he said at another point. “I’ve said all I’m going to say.”
The Newsday story reported that Moveon.org representatives said 5,000 members had called or e-mailed CBS, although that number could not be independently verified. “A network spokeswoman said yesterday that she was unaware of the Moveon.org campaign, and referred a reporter to a weekend statement that said, in part, that ‘it would be inappropriate to air the report so close to the presidential election,'” Gay wrote.
“The shelved story, by veteran investigative producer David Gelber and correspondent Ed Bradley, reported how the Bush administration and intelligence agencies had used forged documents to prove Iraq had received a shipment of uranium from Niger; Bush had made reference to the shipment in his State of the Union address before the war.
“The piece was originally scheduled to air Sept. 8, but was pre-empted at the last minute when the broadcast got documents that were alleged to have been written by Bush’s former National Guard commander. CBS later admitted it could not ascertain whether the documents were authentic.
“Then, the Niger piece was pushed to the Sept. 29 broadcast. CBS pulled the segment again, and it is now expected to air sometime after the election.”
Juan Gonzalez Pursues Depleted-Uranium Story
“Sen. Hillary Clinton called on the military yesterday to institute a ‘comprehensive approach’ to tracking soldiers’ health before and after overseas duty,” the New York Daily News reported Thursday.
“The New York Democrat was responding to a disturbing account by Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez yesterday of an Iraqi veteran’s exposure to depleted uranium — and the birth of the soldier’s child with a deformed hand.
“Gonzalez wrote that Army National Guard Spec. Gerard Darren Matthew was sent home from Iraq with a sudden illness. Military doctors have been unable to explain what ails the Bronx soldier. Then, Matthew and his wife, Janice, had a baby girl who was born missing three fingers and most of her right hand.
“In an independent analysis for The News, Matthew tested positive for depleted uranium. ‘My husband went to Iraq to fight for his country,” Janice Matthew told Gonzalez. ‘I feel the Army should take responsibility for what’s happened.’
“Clinton agreed, saying, ‘When they are called on to sacrifice so much overseas, the least we can do is to ensure the health of our men and women in uniform when they return home.’
Gonzalez, president of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists in 2002-2004, interviewed Matthew and Staff Sgt. Ray Ramos, who is among the first confirmed cases of inhaled depleted uranium exposure from the current Iraq conflict, Thursday on Pacifica Radio’s “Democracy, Now!” Gonzalez is co-host.
Jeff Chu of Time Honored for Europe Coverage
Jeff Chu of Time magazine has won one of two $5,000 Junior Peter R. Weitz Prizes for excellence in reporting on European affairs by a journalist under 35, the German Marshall Fund announces.
Chu won for ?Faith, Hope and Trust in Europe.? Matthew Kaminski from The Wall Street Journal Europe for his series ?Wider Europe ? What Sort of Europe?? “Two prizes were awarded this year as both journalists demonstrated extraordinary talent in covering the complexities of a unifying Europe in search of an identity,” the organization said.
Chu’s winning entries:
Winning The Battle, Losing The War
Vibe Plans Twice-Yearly Shopping Magazine
“Urban music mag Vibe will debut Vibe Vixen in February, aiming the twice-yearly spinoff at young women with an eye for fashion and beauty products,” Paul D. Colford reports in the New York Daily News .
“Vibe editor in chief Mimi Valdés will also edit Vixen.”
