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Anna Nicole Takes Up the Bandwidth

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Little Room for Tragedy of U.S. Soldiers in Iraq

The news about Navy Corpsman Manuel Ruiz didn’t stand a chance.

 

 

Ruiz, a 21-year-old from Maryland’s Eastern Shore who could dance like Michael Jackson, was one of seven killed in Iraq on Wednesday when a Marine transport helicopter crashed in al-Anbar province, northwest of Baghdad.

But who had time to notice? The next media cycle was overwhelmed by the death of the “famous for being famous” former centerfold Anna Nicole Smith.

“With the death of reality TV star Anna Nicole Smith yesterday, a ferocious barrage of Marilyn Monroe-like images and scattershot speculation was instantly loosed across the on-air and online landscape of 24-hour news,” David Zurawik and Nick Madigan wrote Friday in the Baltimore Sun.

“From a former flame describing on MSNBC how she kissed, to Fox and CNN hosts stressing the ‘mysterious’ circumstances of her death as they queried medical experts, the story lines driving the wall-to-wall coverage yesterday careened from tragic-death-of-sex-goddess to ‘CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.'”

On CNN, correspondent Jack Cafferty told Wolf Blitzer on Friday, “if you tuned into ‘The Situation Room’ at 4:00 yesterday afternoon, you were informed that Anna Nicole Smith had died. And that’s all. That’s the only story we reported for two solid hours. And we weren’t the only ones.

“You wanted to know why there was no coverage of the war in Iraq and the deaths of seven or our troops there the day before? Or the Libby trial? Or the threat from Iran to strike American interests around the world if it was attacked?

“Those are all valid questions.

“Because of the eccentric and troubled and highly public life she led, as well as her overt sexuality, her death was tabloid gold and apparently we just couldn’t help ourselves.”

Cafferty went on to ask viewers for their comments, and they were uniform in denouncing the excess.

Yet the coverage drew ratings — and journalists of color played their parts.

A report on BET.com found its angle: “Anna Nicole Smith, who appeared in the Kanye West video for ‘The New Workout Plan’ in 2004 dies at age 39,” it began.

On his TV Newser blog, Brian Stelter reported, “Around 3:30 p.m. on CNN, anchor Don Lemon felt the need to defend his network’s extensive coverage of Anna Nicole Smith’s collapse and passing. After Showbiz Tonight’s A.J. Hammer mentioned her legal problems, Lemon replied:

“‘With everything that’s going on with Anna Nicole Smith, that’s the reason we’ve covering it, because it sort of supersedes entertainment. There are a couple of lawsuits at stake here, and it’s just been a very tumultuous time for her.'”

NBC News announced that Natalie Morales would report on “the life and times of [the] supermodel and nonstop headline-maker” Saturday on “Dateline.”

ABC’s “20/20” was to air “an hour-long look” at Smith’s life and death” on Friday, anchored by Elizabeth Vargas and featuring reports by correspondents Jim Avila, Juju Chang, Deborah Roberts, Don Dahler and Bob Brown. Fox News scheduled “Anna Nicole: Tragic Beauty,” an hour-long special hosted by Geraldo Rivera and Greta Van Susteren.

The Web site Think Progress.com had a stopwatch handy: “NBC’s Nightly News devoted 14 seconds to Iraq compared to 3 minutes and 13 seconds to Anna Nicole. CNN referenced Anna Nicole 522% more frequently than it did Iraq. MSNBC was even worse — 708% more references to Anna Nicole than Iraq.”

The coverage paid off: “Thanks to Anna Nicole Smith, CNN beat FNC in the 25-54 demo on Thursday night,” Stelter reported. “Overnight ratings for the syndicated magazines — ET, Extra, Inside Edition, and the like— all saw a significant spike in ratings because of the coverage of the death of Anna Nicole Smith,” John Eggerton reported Friday for Broadcasting and Cable. “Entertainment Tonight had the largest jump, shooting up 40% from the night before.”

In Editor & Publisher, editor Greg Mitchell told readers that by noon Friday, there had been only seven press mentions of Jennifer Parcell, who was killed with Ruiz in Iraq.

“In contrast to, say, Anna Nicole Smith, Parcell seemed to have a serious side. Even in Iraq, she was managing to take a course at the University of Maryland, the Baltimore Sun relates, adding: ‘Helping others was routine for the Marine corporal. She sponsored an African child through a mission charity. And when Pakistan was devastated by an earthquake last year, she and others in her unit were dispatched to the scene. She earned the Humanitarian Service Medal for her efforts.'”

On his Daily Nightly blog, “NBC Nightly News” anchor Brian Williams explained that he opposed leading his broadcast with the Smith story. “We are not cable,” he said. As managing editor, his decision stood.

Williams added, “We’re not cultural arbiters or enforcers — we are a network of journalists who put together a half- hour long newscast each evening. Tonight our broadcast will concentrate on the underpinnings of the war in Iraq and the first-hand account of one of our correspondents who is embedded with an American combat team — and who earlier today came way too close to an IED explosion while on patrol. We’ll end the broadcast as we always do on Friday nights, with a segment profiling someone who is truly making a difference in society.”

That likely meets the approval of the family of Manuel Ruiz. His was the fifth American helicopter to crash in Iraq in less than three weeks, as Scott Shewfelt reported for the Capital News Service. The Defense Department now confirms 3,105 U.S. deaths in Iraq.

On his attytood blog, Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Daily News said he wished he had the resources of CNN, MSNBC or Fox News. He spoke about Ruiz’s colleague, Parcell.

“We could call in our medical expert, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, to talk about the type of combat injuries that Americaâ??s fighting men and women are suffering in Iraq, and whether the troops have adequate protection. Then we would dial up our legal affairs correspondent, Jeffrey Toobin, and discuss whether or not Congress has the legal authority to defy the White House and bring at least some of our soldiers home. Weâ??d send all our spare reporters out into the field, maybe to track down the last person who saw Jennifer Parcell alive, or find that friend who could tell us about her life, and our loss. We would make sure that our news coverage gave you a name and a face to go with that number, 3,105.”

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Obama’s Official, and Ravenous Media Are Ready

Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., received live coverage from at least four cable networks Saturday when he declared for president in Springfield, Ill., and he can be assured that, “Reporters, perpetuating the boom and bust cycle of a ravenous media culture, will try to make up for fawning coverage of the past,” according to political writer Mike Allen, reporting on Politico.com.

Allen appeared on C-SPAN after the network broadcast Obama’s announcement. MSNBC, CNN and Fox also broadcast the event live.

Obama and his wife, Michelle, are scheduled to address racial issues on Sunday in an interview with CBS-TV’s “60 Minutes” correspondent Steve Kroft.

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Tavis Smiley to Host Two Presidential Forums

Tavis Smiley will host two presidential forums to be broadcast live in prime time on PBS, the public television network announced on Thursday.

“The Democratic presidential forum will be held Thursday, June 28, at 9 p.m. [Eastern time], at Howard University in Washington, DC. The Republican presidential forum will be held Thursday, Sept. 27, at 9 p.m. [Eastern time], at Morgan State University in Baltimore,” a PBS news release said. Smiley hosts a late-night talk show on the network.

“The forums will include three journalists of color who will pose questions to the candidates. Additional details regarding the selection of the journalists and forums will be released at a later date.

“Smiley, who conceived of the forums, said they are an outgrowth of last year’s New York Times best-seller, the Covenant with Black America. When the book was released in 2006, both the Democratic National Committee and the Republican National Committee pledged that their respective presidential candidates would address the issues outlined in the book. Edited by Smiley, the book outlines 10 of the most pressing issues facing African Americans,” the release said.

Smiley mentioned his accomplishment Saturday as he hosted “Jamestown America’s 400th Anniversary: The African American Imprint on America,” this year’s installment of his annual symposium on black America televised on C-SPAN.

“Tavis Smiley asks the questions that other interviewers won’t,” Al Jerome, president and chief executive officer of KCET, the presenting station for the forums, said in the news release. “These conversations are sure to be lively as well as informative.”

Smiley and CNN’s Soledad O’Brien hosted the “Black and Brown Forum” during the Iowa primary season in 2000.

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Victor Vaughan, Once Laid Off, Now AP Photo Editor

In the mid-1990s, Victor Vaughan was laid off from the Daily Press in Newport News, Va., a victim of what was then called “corporate downsizing.” On Friday, he was named national photo editor of the Associated Press, leading AP’s 200 photo staff members throughout the United States from AP’s

 

 

headquarters in New York.

The announcement was made by AP’s director of photography, Santiago Lyon, who said Vaughan “has the focus, the talent and the desire to take on this crucial job in the AP’s photo department. He will bring energy, vision and imagination to his new challenge of overseeing AP’s extensive photo operations in the U.S.”

Vaughan, 43, is leaving the Arizona Daily Star in Tucson, where he is assistant managing editor/presentation. He is also a board member of the National Association of Black Journalists and the Associated Press Photo Managers.

The mid-’90s layoff was “a very tough chapter in my career,” he told Journal-isms. “It really tested my faith but through perseverance, patience and support I was able to rebound. I did not wallow in the past” or in things over which he had no control, he said; he reveled in “the possibilities for a brighter future.”

A graduate of Norfolk State University, Vaughan has worked at the Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch, Roanoke (Va.) Times, Detroit Free Press and the Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk. He joined the Daily Star in 2002 as director of photography and in 2004 was named assistant managing editor/presentation.

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Bob Herbert Writes of Louisiana “Travesty”

In 1974, when Gary Tyler was 16, he was accused of murdering a 13-year-old white boy outside the high school that they attended in Destrehan, La. “The boy was shot to death in the midst of turmoil over school integration, which the local whites were resisting violently,” New York Times columnist Bob Herbert wrote Thursday in his third column in eight days on the case.

“There is no longer any doubt that the case against the teenager . . . was a travesty. A federal appeals court ruled unequivocally that he did not receive a fair trial. The Louisiana Board of Pardons issued rulings on three occasions that would have allowed Mr. Tyler to be freed,” Herbert wrote on Monday.

“But this is the South and Mr. Tyler was a black person convicted of killing a white. It didn’t matter that the case was built on bogus evidence and coerced witnesses, or that the trial was, in the words of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, ‘fundamentally unfair.’ Mr. Tyler was never given a new trial and the pardon board recommendations were rejected by two governors.

Herbert’s Thursday column quotes Tyler’s mother, Juanita Tyler. “They beat Gary so bad,” she said. “My poor child. I couldn’t do nothing. They wouldn’t let me in there. I saw who went in there. They were like older men. They didn’t care that I was there. They didn’t care who was there. They beat Gary something awful, and I could hear him hollering and moaning. All I could say was, ‘Oh Jesus, have mercy.’

“One of the deputies had a strap and they whipped him with that. It was terrible. Finally, when they let me go in there, Gary was just trembling. He was frightened to death. He was trembling and rocking back and forth. They had kicked him all in his privates. He said, ‘Mama, they kicked me. One kicked me in the front and one kicked in the back.’ He said that over and over.

“I couldn’t believe what they had done to my baby.

“The deputies had tried to get Gary to confess, but he wouldn’t.”

On Feb. 1, Herbert explained, “Mr. Tyler was spared electrocution when the Supreme Court declared Louisiana’s death penalty unconstitutional. But in many ways he has in fact paid with his life. He’ll turn 50 this year in the state penitentiary at Angola, where he is serving out his sentence of life without parole for the murder of Timothy Weber.”

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AIDS Author Succeeds With Black Columnists

In conjunction with National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, which was observed Wednesday, at least five more black columnists have addressed the subject. All but one mention an anthology edited by Gil Robertson IV, “Not in My Family: AIDS in the African-American Community.” Other columns were noted in Wednesday’s Journal-isms.

“My outreach efforts worked out splendidly,” Robertson told Journal-isms, “delivering coverage on this issue to daily newspaper audiences coast to coast. These journalists should be applauded for using their talents and muscle to shine light on an issue that has serious implications for our community.”

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