Russ Mitchell Named Sunday Anchor

First African American Since Carole Simpson

Russ Mitchell has been named anchor of the Sunday edition of the “CBS Evening News” effective immediately, Sean McManus, president of CBS News and Sports, announced today.

The appointment makes Mitchell, 46, the first African American anchor of one of the broadcast networks’ prime-time news programs since ABC forced Carole Simpson out of the weekend anchor spot in 2003. Simpson has since retired.

A news release said Mitchell will retain his duties as co-anchor of the “Saturday Early Show” with Tracy Smith and as one of the rotating anchors of the Saturday edition of the “CBS Evening News,” along with Thalia Assuras and Mika Brzezinski. He also is a correspondent on “CBS News Sunday Morning,” and substitutes as anchor on the weekday “CBS Evening News With Bob Schieffer” and the weekday “Early Show.”

“Russ is one of our most versatile anchors,” said McManus in the statement. “He has more than earned this position, and I’m pleased to further raise Russ’ profile at CBS News.”

In 2003, Mitchell had finished co-anchoring the “Saturday Early Show” when he got word shortly after 9 a.m. that Mission Control had lost contact with the space shuttle Columbia, and was told to get back in the chair. He stayed until 4 p.m., joined about 10:20 a.m. by Dan Rather, Mitchell thus became the only black journalist anchoring television network coverage of the disaster, which killed all seven aboard.

He told Journal-isms then that his major influences in covering breaking news were Rather and Bryant Gumbel. He has also covered such breaking stories as the Elian Gonzalez affair, the impeachment hearings for former president Bill Clinton and the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

The St. Louis native is a a past co-host of the convention awards program of the National Association of Black Journalists and has spoken at the organization’s regional conferences.

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Editor Fired; Was It Because She Smoked Dope?

The editor of the Wotanin Wowapi, the tribally owned newspaper on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in Montana, was fired last week. The editor, Bonnie Red Elk (Dakota/Lakota), said it was because the tribal chairman, Joseph Morales, believes she “has written some articles that he doesn’t agree with.”

Morales counters that Red Elk tested positive for marijuana use and the tribal council imposed a “zero tolerance” policy. Tribal members had wrecked cars after driving them while high or intoxicated.

The Native American Journalists Association is framing the firing as a free-press issue. A statement Thursday “encourages officials on Fort Peck to resolve the issue in a way that protects the freedom of the press and preserves the integrity of the Wotanin Wowapi, which is among the most respected newspapers in Indian Country.”

“I disagree with them 100 percent,” Morales told Journal-isms today. “This is not personal against Bonnie. Indian Country needs to know.” He described his philosophy as “Tell the facts and tell the truth.” The free-press issue “has nothing to do with it,” he said.

Red Elk, 53, acknowledges testing positive for marijuana and said she “was fired for six months.” The tribal council asked her to reapply for her job and hired her back. A month later, Morales became head of the tribal board. “The drug testing statements are his smoke screen. He violated the Tribes’ Drug Testing Policies in that test results are to be confidential,” she told Journal-isms today. She pointed to her termination letter, issued Tuesday, which accused her of violation of tribal personnel policies and procedures, stating, “you have been informed numerous times that the Tribal Newspaper must be unbiased as possible, which you failed to do as of this date.”

The Fort Peck tribes have 12,500 members, Morales said. Red Elk said the paper, which has a three-person staff, has a press run of 2,500 and is circulated on the reservation. She plans to start the Fort Peck Journal, an independent reservation newspaper.

Meanwhile, Morales has named Red Elk’s sister, Lois Red Elk, co-editor along with Iris Allrunner.

[Added April 25: CORRECTION. Bonnie Red Elk writes: “Lois Red Elk is not my sister. She is a distant cousin of my husband Herman Red Elk III. Lois was named co-editor, along with her own sister Iris Red Elk Allrunner.”]

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Immigration Debate Rising to Crescendo

The immigration debate is rising to a crescendo, as the Sunday talk shows played host to members of Congress discussing measures that could come to a Senate vote this week. “The kind of comprehensive immigration reform being discussed by the Senate carries the potential of transforming the politics of the country by making citizens and therefore voters of millions of mostly Hispanic residents in relatively short order,” Time magazine says this week.

Over the weekend, the public radio show “On the Media” explored the developments from the perspective of the Spanish-language media.

Felix Gutierrez, University of Southern California journalism professor, credited the Spanish-language media for producing turnouts at pro-immigration rallies that surprised the mainstream media. “It’s produced a more balanced debate,” he said of the Latino participation. “Rather than being the targets or scapegoats of right wing people, which undocumented people have been for years, they’re speaking out in their own voice, and people are seeing another side of this community that they haven’t seen over the years.”

With Héctor Tobar of the Los Angeles Times, “On the Media” followed with a discussion of the role played by news media south of the border, where the prospect of a 700-mile wall looms large. Tobar wrote Feb. 26 from Mexico City, “already the proposed 700 miles of fencing and electric sensors loom like a new Berlin Wall in the Latin American imagination.

“El muro, as it is called in Spanish, has been in the news for weeks not only in countries such as Mexico and El Salvador that are increasingly dependent on the money migrants send back home, but also those farther away, such as Argentina and Chile. Across the region, el muro is seen as an ominous new symbol of the United States’ unchecked power.”

Spanish-language radio is a different part of the equation, Karin Brulliard reported today in the Washington Post: “For many Hispanic immigrants – especially the poor, undocumented or simply flummoxed – Spanish-language radio programs offering legal advice can be key resources for answers about labyrinthine immigration laws. And these days, with tension over illegal immigration rising – and with proposals to charge and deport such immigrants gaining traction – hosts say the tenor of questions has changed. ‘More fear,’ said Jay Marks, a Silver Spring lawyer who fields immigration questions each Wednesday on the popular morning show on El Zol (99.1 FM). ‘Lots of fear’.”

The Gannett News Service Washington bureau has started a blog on the immigration debate, and columnists of color continue to offer their perspectives:

• Desiree Cooper, Detroit Free Press: “Call it a coming-out party for the brown power movement. . . . If the recent demonstrations prove anything, it’s that American politics is poised for change. Latinos will transform the dialogue on voting rights, affirmative action and equal education. New coalitions must be built, and politicians must heed a new voice.”
• Arnold Garcia Jr., Austin American-Statesman: “Real progress toward securing the southern border is so slow that it glazes the eyes and numbs the other senses. Yet . . . President Vicente Fox of Mexico, President Bush and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas are trying. . . . Those profiles in leadership are a start – a slow one, granted, but better than no start at all.”
• Juan Gonzales, New York Daily News: “When a movie called ‘Walkout’ premiered on HBO two weeks ago, no one had any idea it would inspire hundreds of thousands of Hispanics across the country to march in the streets and end up altering a major debate in Congress over immigration reform. But that’s precisely what happened with a new movie by Edward James Olmos and Moctesuma Esparza, two of Hollywood’s biggest Latino filmmakers. . . . Like most cable films,” it “will be repeated several times over the next month. So will, I suspect, the wave of protests it has inspired.”
• Macarena Hernández, Dallas Morning News: “I’m not surprised that the sight of so many Mexican flags angers so many Americans. The flags reinforce the widely held fear that Latinos, especially the ones here illegally, reject assimilation – even though assimilation is inevitable. . . . Hyphenated Americans are squeezed between two worlds and often forced to choose. But the Mexican flag is a symbol of cultural pride, the same orgullo felt by the Irish, Polish and Germans when they were new to our shores. It doesn’t make a person less American.”
• Tannette Johnson-Elie, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Meet the Centeno family: two generations of Milwaukee entrepreneurs living under one roof, pursuing their dreams individually and pooling their knowledge and finances to help their separate enterprises grow. . . . That’s what the American Dream is all about: ensuring that each individual family member achieves his or her dreams as the whole family strives for economic independence.”
• Eugene Kane, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “As an African-American whose family has lived here for centuries, it’s difficult for me to relate to a true immigrant experience. . . . But it’s clear to me it’s incorrect to paint all illegal immigrants as ‘foreigners’ somehow living on our dime. If you’ve worked at a job and paid taxes on your income for more than 10 years . . . how can anyone not consider them a valid part of the U.S. economy?”
• Roland S. Martin, Creators Syndicate: “Mainstream journalists all across the nation were stunned when 500,000 people – mostly Latinos – took to the streets in Los Angeles to protest a proposed U.S. immigration policy. . . . I’ll be honest, I hate the fact that I can’t speak Spanish (should have paid more attention in high school!). It would be nice to watch a Hispanic newscast to get a sense what is happening in their world. It’s certainly not mine. But if I’m going to live with men and women who look, sound and act differently than me, then I need to be better informed about their issues and concerns. And the same goes for someone who is Latino, white, Asian or from another ethnic group.”
• Ruben Navarrette, San Diego Union-Tribune: “Personally, in exchange for beefing up enforcement on the border and cracking down on employers with fines and jail time, I could go along with a limited amnesty for some illegal immigrants. Preference should be given to those who have been here the longest and have immediate family members who are here legally. The others would be deported. Those allowed to stay would have to do everything that Specter mentioned, although I’d add two additional requirements: They should have to learn English and enroll in citizenship classes.” The reference is to Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
• Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune: “America’s lax immigration enforcement of recent decades would be far more tolerable if the government and the private sector did more to ‘make work pay’ for legal low-wage American workers. That’s what Clinton-era Labor Secretary Robert Reich called programs like low-income tax credits that make it easier for low-wage workers to support themselves and their families. Unfortunately, of all the people who have clout with President Bush on the volatile issue of immigration, low-income legal American workers don’t seem to rank very high.”
• Leonard Pitts Jr., Miami Herald: “It seems plain that much of what drives the nation’s unease over illegals has little to do with economics or even national security. As columnist Cal Thomas put it recently, Americans fear ‘invasion without assimilation,’ an influx of people who retain their native languages and customs and thus threaten our `unique national identity.’ . . . [But] an influx of people doesn’t threaten our national identity. It is our national identity.”
• Charles E. Richardson, Macon (Ga.) Telegraph: “Keep in mind that our lawmakers could solve the immigration problem between the U.S. and Mexico almost overnight with a couple of simple measures. First, throw the people in jail who hire workers without documentation, and second, beef up the Border Patrol and actually enforce the laws on the books. But they can’t do that, can they?”
• Gregory Rodriguez, Los Angeles Times: “Last week, immigrants and their children were telling us that they are no longer willing to be seen as homing pigeons who return to their homelands after a season of work. Now it’s time for the government of the host country to realize that the U.S. can no longer pretend that it can receive much-needed labor without embracing the accompanying laborers.”
• Albor Ruiz, New York Daily News: “Despite what the Sensenbrenners and Tancredos of this world would like everyone to believe, the fact is that there is strong backing for an intelligent and realistic approach to controlling immigration. And that it includes earned legalization for undocumented immigrants and a worker program for future immigrants. . . . Yet to hear the rabid anti-immigrant politicians talk is to think that Americans, having lost all fairness and compassion – and even their common sense – are out to ‘get’ the undocumented immigrants.” The references are to Reps. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, who has proposed a 700-mile system of walls along the border, and Tom Tancredo, R -Colo., who has proposed a moratorium on legal immigration.
• Bob Ray Sanders, Fort Worth Star-Telegram: “In observing demonstrations that broke out all over the country in recent days, including student walkouts here in North Texas, it occurred to me” that César Chávez, hero of the United Farm Workers union, “would be both proud and disappointed. He would cherish the image of a half-million people marching peacefully in Los Angeles last weekend. . . . Chavez would have been saddened, however, to hear that many of those young people were disorderly – almost riotous – and that far too many acted not out of conscience but simply for the fun of it.”
• Elmer Smith, Philadelphia Daily News: “There is no such thing as a job Americans won’t take – yet. But there will be soon, unless we enforce measures that require fair pay for people at the bottom of the wage scale. If you start there, you can enforce immigration laws with the blessings of American workers.”
• Gregory Stanford, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Immigration must not become a wedge issue between Latinos and African-Americans, natural allies. Both groups suffer racial discrimination, for instance. But rather than gloss over real issues like the impact of undocumented workers on low-level wages, the two groups must talk the issues through.”

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Chicago Readers React to Column on Black Men

Last week, “I suggested that young black males who had been involved in the drug trade and have served their time should be granted an amnesty similar to what is now being considered for illegal immigrants. You would have thought I was sanctioning drug dealing,” Mary Mitchell wrote Sunday in the Chicago Sun-Times.

“Worse yet, most of the readers who disagreed with me painted young black males with such a broad brush, it was clear that they had bought into all the negative stereotypes about impoverished blacks.”

Mitchell’s original column was prompted by a New York Times story March 20 about the plight of uneducated black men. That story, and the studies it was based on, continue to generate commentary:

• Denise Rolark Barnes, Washington Informer: The Plight of Black Men Can Be Solved
• Betty Bayé, Louisville Courier-Journal: New perspective on crisis among black men recalls an old one
• Merlene Davis, Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader: It’s past time to face crisis of black manhood
• Jerry Large, Seattle Times: We can’t afford to waste a resource: young black men
• Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune: Black males’ main threat? Not hip-hop

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Univision Sale Called Chance to Throw Out Old Ideas

“When Univision Communications said recently that it was putting itself on the auction block, the announcement was seen as a milestone,” Kyle Pope, a former editor and reporter at the Wall Street Journal, wrote yesterday in a Los Angeles Times opinion piece. “With an asking price of $11 billion, a Univision sale would almost certainly rank as the biggest deal in the history of Hispanic media in the U.S. – a testament, as if one were needed, to the economic clout of the nation’s fastest-growing ethnic group.

“But the sale of Univision needs to be viewed as much more than simply a big payday for the company and its iconoclastic chief executive, A. Jerrold Perenchio: It’s also a chance to throw out some flawed and outdated ideas about what Hispanics in this country want when it comes to entertainment.

“. . . among ad buyers and media watchers, there’s a growing sense that any deal for Univision is better than the status quo. The thinking is that the current flow of immigrants, combined with ad buyers still stuck in the old approach to Latino media, can keep the company in the black while a savvier management team retools what’s on the air.”

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Ed Bradley, N.Y. Times Columnist Tee Off

On Friday, Richard Sandomir, sports business columnist, wrote in the New York Times, “In the midst of Ed Bradley’s worshipful two-part profile of Tiger Woods on ’60 Minutes’ last Sunday, I wondered if it was an infomercial or if Woods had paid a fee for these adoring 25 minutes. With nothing new to report – and not a single tough question in his arsenal – Bradley chose to join Camp Tiger.” His piece continued in the same vein.

Today it’s Bradley’s turn. He shared with Journal-isms a letter he wrote today to the Times:

“I was surprised by the Tiger Woods story in today’s New York Times. It wasn’t tough on Tiger, and it seemed as if there was nothing new to report. It conveniently omitted the glares Woods gives fans who speak or click cameras when he swings, or the confrontations his caddie, Steve Williams, has had with those in the gallery who interrupt Woods at his work. Lest we forget – because the NY Times reporter did – the times when Woods has punctuated bad shots with expletives or whacks at the tee box.

“Those are criticisms leveled at Ed Bradley and 60 Minutes by Richard Sandomir in [Friday’s] times.

“In his column he was appalled that 60 Minutes could run such a ‘puffy profile’ of Tiger without, for example, ‘pressing Woods on what he paid’ for his house and boat.

“Can we expect a column in the New York Times critical of your Tiger Woods story which appeared in Monday’s paper? And if not, why not? Do you hold us at 60 Minutes to a different standard than you hold your own newspaper?”

• Tiger Talks: News Or Not? (CBS Public Eye blog)

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Evangelical Detroit Anchor Says Stories Miss Point

Frank Turner, who filed a complaint against WXYZ-TV in Detroit for refusing him permission to host an evangelical radio program, says some are misreporting the case.

“The two simple questions to be answered are:

“1. Is the religious accommodation I am seeking reasonable?

“2. Has the accommodation I am seeking been provided to another employee for a non-religious purpose?” Turner wrote in a letter posted on his Web site.

“Period! That’s it! The whole thing is about answering these two simple questions about my one request.”

“Contrary to the misdirected public discussion, this has nothing to do with:

“1. whether I have a contract to honor;

“2. whether channel 7 is owed gratitude for my return to television;

“3. whether anyone appreciates or approves of me being a Christian;

“4. whether it is journalistically ethical for a news anchor to be an evangelist;

“5. whether I should be able to conduct a daily broadcast ministry.”

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Pierre Thomas Breaks From Others in Lee Case

“ABC correspondent and former CNNer Pierre Thomas has filed a petition for certiorari with the Supreme Court. Thomas and several print reporters were subpoenaed in a Privacy Act lawsuit filed against the U.S. government by Wen Ho Lee. In a memo to CNN staffers on Thursday, Jim Walton explained that CNN is paying Ted Olsen to file a separate petition for Thomas,” Brian Stelter wrote in his MediaBistro blog.

Walton’s memo said: ” In contrast to the Valerie Plame case, Pierre’s case is not infected with partisan politics and it presents possibly the most favorable fact scenario for the Supreme Court to rule on whether there is a privilege that will protect not just CNN, but all journalists. That is why we felt is was both strategically necessary and financially worth it to go it alone with a separate filing on behalf of Pierre. If we succeed, the payoff will be immeasurable for everyone in the journalism community.”

A CNN spokeswoman confirmed the contents of the memo, in which Olsen, former U.S. solicitor general, was called “one of the county’s most respected Supreme Court experts.” Lee is a former nuclear weapons scientist who was the chief suspect in an espionage case. Lee sued the government to recover damages for alleged harm to his reputation caused by leaks of confidential information from the government’s espionage investigation, as R. Jeffrey Smith reported at the time in the Washington Post.

“U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson . . . ordered journalists at the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Associated Press and Cable News Network to reveal who in the government may have disclosed derogatory information to them” about Lee, Smith wrote in his 2003 story.

MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.

Short Takes

• George L. Brown, who in Colorado became the first African American lieutenant governor and a state senator, died March 31 at his home in Boca Raton, Fla. He was 79 and had cancer. “For fourteen years, he worked as a writer and editor for The Denver Post and hosted his own Denver radio talk show. He was the first African American editor to work for a major daily newspaper in the Rocky Mountains,” according to thehistorymakers.com. His death was announced by publicists for the recent National Black Peoples Unity Convention in Gary, Ind., of which Brown was co-chair.
• “The Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA) and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists (NAHJ) announce the ‘Hispanic Spotlight Initiative’ which will bring Hispanic attorneys and journalists together to further common interests between these organizations with respect to the visibility and influence of Hispanics in the media and educating Hispanic journalists of their work place rights,” the NAHJ Web site reported.
• “On the March 31 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio program, Neal Boortz said that Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) ‘looks like a ghetto slut,’ reports the Web site Media Matters. “Boortz was commenting on a March 29 incident in which McKinney allegedly struck a police officer at a Capitol Hill security checkpoint. Boortz said that McKinney’s ‘new hair-do’ makes her look ‘like a ghetto slut,’ like ‘an explosion at a Brillo pad factory,’ like ‘Tina Turner peeing on an electric fence,’ and like ‘a shih tzu.’ Both Media Matters and BET.com today provided audio. Boortz apologized later today.
• The Raleigh News & Observer “skirted the edge of fairness” in granting anonymity to the African American woman who says she was raped by white Duke University lacrosse players, public editor Ted Vaden wrote Sunday. Vaden noted that “the paper has a policy of not identifying victims of sex crimes,” but said the March 25 interview “is at odds with The N&O’s own policy on anonymous sources, which discourages their use except when the information can be obtained no other way.” Executive Editor Melanie Sill disagreed.
• Newsday columnist Sheryl McCarthy, the editorial board of the Kansas City Star and La Opinion in Los Angeles were among the winners of the Maggie Awards, named after Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger, which celebrate “noteworthy achievement in media coverage of reproductive rights.” At its Washington convention Thursday, Planned Parenthood honored McCarthy for her body of work; the Star for its editorials opposing further restrictions on abortion; and La Opinion for an editorial on Proposition 73, a campaign-reform law passed by voters in 1988 designed to limit the size of political contributions.
• Brenda Payton, columnist at the Oakland Tribune for 25 years, “was recognized Saturday as one of the 10 most Influential African Americans in the Bay Area by CityFlight Media Network, publisher of a monthly news magazine for the African-American community,” Susan McDonough reported in the Tribune Wednesday.
• Regina Holmes, who took a buyout as assistant city editor at Newsday at the end of 2004, reports she has joined the new Baltimore Examiner as an assistant managing editor. The Examiner chain of free tabloids is owned by Phillip Anschutz, with editions in San Francisco and Washington. Anschutz trademarked the Examiner name in 69 cities. The Baltimore edition debuts Wednesday. “I’m thrilled to be back in my hometown and to be part of such an exciting venture,” Holmes told Journal-isms.
• Christopher Moore, who contributed an essay to the book “Slavery in New York,” took exception to a New York Times review in a letter published Sunday. “The accomplishments of Manhattan’s slaves may seem inflated” to the reviewer, Moore wrote, but “As our book and the New-York Historical Society exhibition made abundantly clear: slavery was not a sideshow in American colonial history, it was the main event.”
• Deborah Mathis, columnist for BlackAmericaWeb.com, wrote today of the N-word, “I’ve decided I can and shall not tolerate it any longer.” She said she reached her decision after reading slave narratives in which the term was used. “The word, you see, is garbage. Was then, is now. And despite our adoption, it is not our word. It cannot be made beautiful or tender or loving or friendly. It’s like the pigs feet we pickled or the hog maws we cleaned and boiled – scraps from the master’s table. No matter how we spiced them up, they are bad for the body,” Mathis wrote.
• “The usual trend for publications is to switch from English to Spanish, usually annotated with an ‘en Español’ tagged on at the end of the name,” Nancy Ayala wrote Friday for Marketing y Medios. “But the monthly soccer magazine Fútbol Mundial will be published in English starting in June, Felix Sención, publisher and founder of Sensación Marketing Creatives, told Marketing y Medios during the National Association of Hispanic Publishers conference in Las Vegas.” The publication made a deal with USA Today Sports Weekly.
• “Philadelphia-based Al Día is in the beginning stages of putting together a Writers Group, a new service that will bring together writers from different backgrounds tackling relevant goings-on in the Hispanic market,” Nancy Ayala continued in Friday’s edition of Marketing y Medios. “The plan, says Hernán Guaracao, publisher of the weekly newspaper, is to provide publications across the country with topical, well-written pieces. Guaracao says the stories, essays or editorials, many of which will also run in Al Día will not be limited to only Spanish. The service will operate from the Philadelphia office.”
• Robert Cottrol, an African American author and law professor at George Washington University, “walks reporters through questions they need to ask in covering capital trials, and raises the issue of how juries and jurists should deal with ‘lingering doubt'” in a feature on the Nieman Watchdog Web site.
• “There are far more ads for fast food and snacks on black-oriented TV than on channels with more general programming, researchers report in a provocative study that suggests a link to high obesity rates in black children.” Lindsey Tanner reported today for the Associated Press. “The results come from a study that lasted just one week in the summer. Commercials on Black Entertainment Television, the nation’s first black-targeted cable channel, were compared with ads during afternoon and evening shows on the WB network and Disney Channel.”