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Obama Story Line Heads South

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Journalists Follow Racial Angle to South Carolina

Journalists took with them the recently minted Barack Obama story line — “is he black enough?” “Will black voters support him?” — as they covered the Democratic presidential candidate’s venture into South Carolina over the weekend.

 

 

Michael D. Shear’s Washington Post story from Orangeburg, S.C., said in its second paragraph:

“With a Kenyan father who was not descended from African slaves, Obama is unlike Southern black candidates, steeped in the slavery and civil rights struggles that tore at the region for more than a century. Neither is he like the white politicians, whose skin color automatically disqualifies them from the black experience.”

Shear quoted Vivian A. Glover, an assistant vice president at Claflin University, a historically black school in Orangeburg: “Not only people in the black community, but people in the white community are going to be looking at this man and trying to figure out: Is he one of us? Does he understand what we’ve come through? What we’re still confronting now? He’s not bringing that with him. He’s going to need to present it in some form or fashion.”

Obama might have answered that when he joked with an Orangeburg woman, according to Gene Zaleski, who wrote in the Orangeburg Times & Democrat:

“They call me ‘Alabama’ and they call me ‘yo mama’,” he said, to laughter. “As long as you vote for me, I don’t mind what you call me.”

As the Associated Press reported:

“The first-in-the-South contest here is seen as a test of candidates’ abilities to reach black voters. Half of the state’s Democratic primary voters are black.”

The two major Chicago dailies each had an African American journalist covering their U.S senator as Obama went South.

“Black voters have found themselves in a dilemma,” Dahleen Glanton wrote in the Chicago Tribune. “Should they support Obama and possibly make history or should they support Hillary Clinton and bring her back to the White House with her husband, a team many believe was the most dedicated to black causes since President John Kennedy?”

In the Chicago Sun-Times, columnist Mary Mitchell observed, “When Sen. Barack Obama arrived here Friday night for a rally at the Metropolitan Convention Center — his first trip to South Carolina as a presidential candidate — things were in an uproar. The day before, he’d been rebuffed by state Sen. Darrell Jackson, one of the most prominent and politically influential black men in the state, in a deal that, as the late Lu Palmer used to say, ‘is enough to make a Negro turn black.'”

Before a crowd that Mitchell described as “nearly split among whites, blacks and others,” Obama noted the history his election would make, telling doubters that they would never know whether a black man could win if one didn’t try.

Still, some remained fixated on what makes a black person “black.”

“Why all the fuss about what Obama calls himself?” asked Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page. “Whether Obama had the ‘black American experience’ before, he certainly appears to be getting it now.

“Part of that experience is to hear other people argue over what you should call yourself. In fact, if you don’t have the right to call yourself what you want to call yourself, you don’t have much freedom at all.

“Besides, if you look back far enough, we’re all ‘mixed.'”

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times wrote about critics who charged that the account in Obama’s memoir of his work at a Chicago housing project leaves out others’ work on asbestos removal. Obama’s activism with the project is considered significant because he portrayed it in the memoir as “a life-altering experience, an early taste of his ability to motivate the powerless and work the levers of government,” Peter Wallsten wrote Sunday in the newspaper.

In the online publication Politico.com, Ben Smith reported Monday that “The Obama campaign sent out a fierce attack this morning” on the Times story. “It sure looks like it was written by Obama himself, if only in a degree of you-had-to-be-there hairsplitting,” Smith wrote.

“Typically, reporters take a thin-skinned reaction like this as blood in the water, a sign to dig deeper into, in this case, his memoir. Though perhaps in the new we-shall-not-be-Swiftboated conventional wisdom, this is the appropriate response.

“If nothing else, it is confirmation of how fast the relationship between the media darling and the media is going downhill.”

Not in Chicago’s Hyde Park. The Hyde Park Herald published a special section, A Tribute to Hyde Park’s Very Own.

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Obamas “Can Sell the Heck Out of a Magazine”

“The Obamas (Barack + Michelle) steamed up newsstands recently as Ebony’s ‘hottest couple’ in 2007 — gracing the cover of the magazine’s February issue,” Helena Andrews wrote Thursday for the new online and print publication Politico. “And if recent sales are any indication, Barack can do more than draft legislation and make campaign stump speeches. He (and his wife) can sell the heck out of a magazine.

 

 

“Although Ebony refused to release sales figures for the issue, company spokeswomen for two of the nation’s largest booksellers said the February issue featuring Barack and Michelle sold significantly better than recent past issues,” Andrews continued.

“. . . Bryan Monroe, Ebony’s editor-in-chief, described the impact of the Obama issue as ‘tremendous,’ saying he’s received a storm of phone calls and e-mails about ‘America’s Next First Couple.’

“. . . The real magic happens on page 53. Obama embraces his wife (who wears patriotic but va-va-voom red) from behind and nibbles on/whispers in her ear.

“Monroe said that during the photo shoot, the two jammed to Frankie Beverly and Michael Jackson.”

“. . . there is nothing boring, dull or even speechified about the Obamas. The two together are bringing sexy back to politics.”

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6th Journalist of Color Leaving Newsday

J. Jioni Palmer, a black journalist who covers Long Island’s congressional delegation for Newsday, has resigned to work as press secretary for Rep. Charles Rangel’s House Ways and Means Committee, Palmer told Journal-isms on Monday. He becomes the sixth male journalist of color to leave the paper in the last two months.

 

 

“This is a wonderful opportunity to grow and to do some fun and exciting things at a really interesting time on the Hill,” Palmer said, and it came along “after I was willing to entertain leaving journalism.”

Palmer, 31, has been at Newsday since 1999, when he started his career there as an intern.

“When I came to Newsday, it was a fun, dynamic place” that engaged its reporters and “opened up opportunities to many of us with fun, aggressive and challenging journalism that benefited the paper and allowed many of us to grow,” he said. “I don’t know that the environment that I encountered when I arrived exists today.

“There was a time when I was at Newsday when I wouldn’t have even considered this” new job with Rangel, D-N.Y., he said, echoing the concerns of some others who have left.

As reported a week ago, five male journalists of color have left Newsday in the past two months, some of them citing cutbacks, diminished opportunities at the Long Island newspaper and uncertainty over the ownership of the Tribune Co. publication as reasons for bailing out. The five are Errol Cockfield, Wil Cruz, Walter Middlebrook, Ray Sánchez and Curtis Taylor.

Tim Phelps, Newsday’s Washington bureau chief, told Journal-isms that “Jioni has been a very enthusiastic, capable reporter covering a beat that hasn’t always been so popular in the past, our local delegation — and he’s done so with a great deal of acumen and hard work and energy.”

Palmer, who starts his new job March 5, was the only journalist of color in the six-person bureau. Asked whether this still meant that a diverse Newsday staff would be covering the presidential campaign — two leading candidates, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Rudy Giuliani, are New Yorkers — Phelps said, “I’m told we’re going to be posting this position almost immediately. I’m sure the editors will do their best to get the right person in the job, and I know they’re concerned about this issue.”

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101 Died in Houston Jail’s Custody, Paper Says

“A Houston Chronicle review of state and county records reveals that from January 2001 through December 2006, at least 101 inmates — an average of about 17 a year — have died while in the custody of the Harris County Jail,” Steve McVicker reported Sunday in the Houston Chronicle. “In 2006 alone, after three consecutive years of failing to be in compliance with state standards, the jail recorded 22 in-custody deaths.

“At the time of their deaths, at least 72 of the inmates — more than 70 percent — were awaiting court hearings and had yet to be convicted of the crimes that led to their incarceration,” the story said.

“Records and interviews show that almost one-third of the deaths involve questions of inadequate responses from guards and staff, failure by jail officials to provide inmates with essential medical and psychiatric care and medications, unsanitary conditions, and two allegations of physical abuse by guards.”

McVicker told Journal-isms he did not have a racial breakdown of the inmates affected. The Harris County sheriff’s office said that as of Monday, the jail housed 4,557 whites, 4,565 blacks, 4 Indians, 55 Asians and 45 listed as “unknown.” The number of Hispanics was not immediately available.

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Parsons Says Journalists Most Resistant to Diversity

Richard Parsons, chairman and CEO of Time Warner, said on Saturday that Time Warner was “redoubling” its diversity efforts but that “the place where we have the most difficulty is among our journalists.”

On CNN’s “In the Money,” Paula Zahn asked Parsons, who is one of three African American CEOs of major corporations, “Are you satisfied when you look around at your own company? Basically our newsroom, when you look behind me?”

Parsons replied: “The answer is no, I’m not satisfied. So we’re sort of redoubling our efforts. Although we’ve done . . . probably as much as any major diversified media company in America . . . the pace of change has still been slow. Interestingly enough, the place where we have the most difficulty is among our journalists.”

“Why do you think that is?” Zahn asked.

“I think because to a real extent, journalism is like priesthood, and certain experiences and schoolings and schools that you have to go to become a member of the club. And so, again, you have that pipeline problem. We have a number of people who are sort of moving up, who went to the right schools and had the right experiences. But it is breaking down those barriers that existed that aren’t even necessarily intentionally constructed, but it is the way things were.

“When you’re looking for new journalists, people that are looking go out and find, replicate themselves. They try to find folks that went to the same schools, same orientation, the same sort of prior experiences. And if — if you don’t have enough, in this case, minorities who had those experiences, they simply come back and say, I can’t find qualified candidates. What we’ve done, we put a big focus on hiring people who can put the lie to that myth.”

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Iraq as “the Next Pine Ridge” Indian Reservation

“When President Bush says he’s prepared to stay in Iraq ‘until the job is done,’ those poor Iraqis have no idea just how long he means,” Sam Hurst wrote Sunday in the Rapid City (S.D.) Journal.

“But the Lakotas do. The United States government has been ‘stabilizing’ the Great Sioux Nation and promoting democracy for 139 years.

“Analogy is a dangerous form of argument, never precise. But sometimes analogy can give us insights into our history, and in this case, it’s worth considering: Maybe Iraq isn’t just the next Vietnam. Maybe Iraq is the next Pine Ridge.

“A good starting point is the recognition that the voice of our ‘better angels’ is forever stumbling over the more powerful impulse of greed. Oil in Iraq. Gold in the Black Hills. As a good friend likes to remind me: ‘We didn’t invade Iraq because they grow broccoli.’

“The face of American democracy first comes to nations like the Lakotas and Iraq in the form of invasion. Kill the radicals and train homegrown police to secure the countryside. Build forts along the wagon routes. (Fourteen American military bases have been built in Iraq.) Draw sharp rhetorical edges. Warriors who refuse to move to the reservations are ‘hostiles.’ Iraqis who resist the invasion are ‘terrorists.'”

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Changing Demographics Devalue Racial Descriptions

“A story last week on the latest Duke sex-crime case brought a flock of new complaints about an old issue. Why does The News & Observer not identify crime suspects by race?” Ted Vaden, public editor at the Raleigh, N.C., paper, wrote on Sunday.

“A news story Monday said that a female Duke student had reported being raped at a student party off-campus. The suspect was described as ‘being in his late teens or early 20s, about 6-foot-1 and wearing a black do-rag, a gray sweatshirt and blue jeans.’

“. . The N&O’s written policy on use of race descriptions is lengthy, but here’s a relevant portion: ‘Our aim in publishing descriptions of suspects at large is to promote community awareness and public safety. A sketchy description (white man, 5-foot-8 to 5-foot-11, medium build) fits so many people that it doesn’t suit that cause. In such cases, our report should state that police did not have a detailed description of the man or woman being sought. In the case of serious crimes where a racial identifier adds to a detailed description, we may opt to use that element.’

“The policy also says race should be identified ‘when a crime or court case involves race.’

“John Drescher, The N&O’s managing editor, says the policy means the paper will identify race when there is enough additional detail to make a description useful — eye color, length of hair, texture of hair, complexion, height, weight, age, etc.

“But Drescher also makes the case that in an increasingly multi-ethnic community, race is less useful as a description. The Triangle is suffused with populations from other parts of the country, South and Central America, the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East and other places. How do you distinguish between black, brown, white, dark complexion, light complexion and other?”

The Syracuse (N.Y.) Post-Standard and Herald-Journal all but eliminated race as an identifier about 12 years ago, in favor of skin tone.

As examples, its guidelines listed “pale, light tan, dark tan, olive, light brown, reddish brown, ruddy, fair-skinned and freckled.”

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“Sundown Towns” a Black History Month Topic

“If you were an African American in one of a number of predominantly white, Detroit-area towns in the late 1890s, you probably knew the tacit rule: Get out of town before sunset,” Desiree Cooper wrote Thursday in the Detroit Free Press.

“Today you’ll still see the legacy of these so-called sundown towns, thousands of which sprang up all over the United States after Reconstruction and flourished through the civil rights era.”

Cooper, who named Wyandotte, Mich., as an example, was only one columnist discussing “sundown towns” as the nation observed Black History Month.

Just before the month began, Erin Aubry Kaplan of the Los Angeles Times saw a parallel in the December shooting of Cheryl Green, a 14-year-old black girl. “Her death was part of a 12-year campaign by members of the Latino 204th Street gang to push blacks out of the tiny neighborhood it has long regarded as its own.

“The media immediately characterized the problem as mostly one of gang turf,” Kaplan wrote, but, “Much of the violence is reminiscent of sundown towns and their ‘just-move-along’ animus toward blacks that most of us thought were history.”

Also speaking of “sundown town” days, Lewis Diuguid wrote in the Kansas City Star, “Many towns and suburbs since then have admitted people of color. However, others resist.” Quoting James W. Loewen, whose 2005 book “Sundown Towns” tells the story, Diuguid wrote, “Just as the government sanctioned sundown towns and suburbs, government now should force them to change . . .

“He advocates a ‘Residents Rights Act’ ‘that makes it in an entire town’s interest to welcome African-Americans.’ Government improvement funds should be withheld until communities welcome blacks.”

Other Black History Month topics:

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Short Takes

“The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned about a report of deteriorating health of independent journalist Alfredo Pulido López, who has been imprisoned in Cuba for almost four years,” the organization reported on Thursday. “Pulido López, 46, is suffering from serious breathing and stomach ailments, his wife Rebeca Rodríguez Souto told CPJ.”

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