September 6, 2007
Paper Loses 6 Prominent Blacks Since Last Fall
Janet Clayton, who for nine years was editor of the Los Angeles Times editorial page and for the last three assistant managing editor for state and local news, is leaving the paper, she told colleagues on Thursday.
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| Janet Clayton |
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| J.A. Adande |
"Jim and I are announcing today that I am leaving the Times soon," Clayton wrote to the staff," referring to Executive Editor James E. O'Shea. "I
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| Gayle Pollard-Terry |
"I am both excited and nervous about not knowing exactly what comes next. I appreciate that both Jim and John have tried hard to change my mind," an apparent reference to O'Shea and Managing Editor for News John Arthur. "I'm just feeling deeply that it's time for me to explore the world beyond the Los Angeles Times, where I have spent my entire adult life. I have been privileged to work with scores of you over the
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| Jason Reid |
When she left the editorial pages in 2004, the Times wrote:
"Clayton, 48, began her career with The Times in 1977 in the Washington, D.C., bureau and was a reporter and deputy city-county bureau chief in Los Angeles before moving to the Op-Ed pages as an articles editor. She became an editorial writer and later was named assistant editorial page editor before her appointment as editor of the editorial pages in 1995," the story said.
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Exit Leaves N.Y. Times With One Black Sportswriter
Clifton Brown, who has covered pro sports for the New York Times for 19 years, is leaving for the weekly Sporting News, Mike Nahrstedt, the publication's managing editor, told Journal-isms on Thursday.
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| Clifton Brown |
Times Sports Editor Tom Jolly said of the dwindling numbers, "obviously it's a huge concern" and added, "I should credit ESPN and Sports Illustrated for doing a great job with diversity." The two organizations, who have hired reporters from his department, "have an ability to pay a lot more than we do," Jolly told Journal-isms.
"It's becoming all the more difficult . . . the pool is becoming a little more shallow," Jolly said of recruiting journalists of color. Yet he added, "we are making every effort to increase the numbers" and said interested candidates could e-mail him at the Times.
At Sporting News, Brown will cover the NFL, writing the "NFL Insider" column for the magazine, reporting for the Web site, and "whatever we need" to get the job done, Nahrstedt, the managing editor, said.
Brown has covered golf, the NFL and the NBA for the Times since arriving there in 1988 from the Detroit Free Press, where he had worked since 1983. Before that, he was at the Boca Raton (Fla.) News.
"Sporting News presented me with a chance to write columns. I've wanted to do that for a long time," Brown told Journal-isms. "I didn't really think that opportunity was going to present itself at the Times."
Nahrstedt said Brown's application for the job "jumped out at me" after the St. Louis-based weekly advertised the job. What was it that leaped out? "Covering the NFL for the New York Times," he said. "He's a strong writer and reporter. We're looking for someone who can cover the NFL very thoroughly."
The Sporting News circulation exceeds 700,000, Nahrstedt said. Brown starts in two weeks and will continue to work from the New York area, he said.
Brown will be the second African American leaving the Times sports department. As reported a week ago, Sports Illustrated has hired golf writer Damon Hack to cover the NFL and golf. Terry McDonell, editor of the Sports Illustrated Group, went to the National Association of Black Journalists convention in Las Vegas last month to recruit after meeting with journalists of color on his staff. "Tiffany Black was especially strong in helping me meet people and get the most out of it," he told Journal-isms, speaking of the producer at sportsillustrated.com who is an NABJ member.
While the Times has made strides in hiring women in the sports department, Brown said, not long ago — he thought it was four years ago —it had seven sportswriters of color, all African American: Rhoden, Hack, Tim Smith, Thomas George, Mike Freeman, Chris Broussard and himself. However, Jolly said Smith and Hack were not there at the same time.
Smith is at the New York Daily News; Broussard at ESPN: The Magazine; George went to the Denver Post and then to the NFL Network as managing editor; and Freeman went to the Florida Times-Union and then CBS Sportsline.com after an aborted attempt to join the Indianapolis Star.
Another young black journalist, John Eligon, was in the Sports Department for two years as part of Times program for young journalists.
Jolly sat on the paper's Diversity Council that reviewed diversity at the paper and is a participant in the summer journalism program at Princeton University, which is designed to improve newsroom diversity. He said the other people of color in his department of about 60 were Asian Americans Jade-Snow Moy, the photo editor, Wayne Kamidoi, the art director, Bedel Saget, graphics editor and Carlos Ygartua, copy editor.MESSAGE BOARDS: Feel free to post a comment on this subject and view those from others.
Jackson to Head Inquirer Opinion Pages
September 5, 2007
Pulitzer Winner Was an NABJ Journalist of Year
Harold Jackson, deputy editorial page editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer, will become editorial page editor, overseeing the opinion pages, the newspaper announced on Wednesday.
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| Harold Jackson |
Jackson, 54, who succeeds Chris Satullo, became deputy editor of the editorial page in 2004, after coordinating the newspaper's zoned daily commentary and Sunday Voices pages.
He has been with the Inquirer since 1999, and served a previous stint in the mid-1980s.
"Jackson has also been an editorial writer at the Baltimore Sun and the Birmingham (Ala.) News. There, in 1991, he and two colleagues won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing for a series on changing Alabama's tax system. He also worked for United Press International and the Birmingham Post-Herald in Alabama," the Inquirer noted in 2004.
Jackson told Journal-isms, "the newspaper has to be described as liberal in its philosophy and the readers should not be expecting that to change."
The Inquirer was generally supportive of Mayor John Street and endorsed former councilman Michael Nutter in the Democratic primary as Street's successor. Both are black, as were Nutter's opponents. "As an African American, I'm supportive of all African American politicians, as long as they are doing the right thing," Jackson said. The paper was critical of a so-called "pay-to-play" culture during Street's administration.
Philadelphia has attracted attention for a burgeoning homicide rate that on Sunday reached a total of 288 for the year. Jackson said the editorial page had responded with a long-running anti-violence series and called for reduced access to guns.
"What I've been pushing for is prison reform," Jackson said. "Nearly 80 percent of the homicide victims and 80 percent of the assailants have prison records." In prison, he said, he favors drug treatment and education, and outside, making it easier for ex-offenders to be hired, though the paper has not yet taken a position on the best method to accomplish that.
In his latest column, published Tuesday, Jackson found himself reflecting on Alabama Gov. George Wallace, whom he had to greet as part of his job in 1972.
"By the summer of 1972, I was totally into black power," Jackson wrote. "My mind had been Afrocentrically shaped while in the Upward Bound program for high school students at black Miles College. Later, I became a leader in the black student union at mostly white Baker University in Kansas."
Remembering Wallace led him to reflect on the Jena Six case in Louisiana, where in December six black teenagers were charged with attempted murder "for allegedly beating up a white student who suffered only minor injuries in a fight." Charges for two have been reduced to aggravated-second degree battery and a third has been convicted of aggravated second degree battery.
"It's hard to believe that 30 years after I couldn't make myself shake George Wallace's hand, there are still places in America where people can't even stand under a tree without being threatened because of their skin color," Jackson wrote.
"My children are grown. When they were little, I prayed the world would be much changed by the time they became adults. It has changed, but not enough. Discrimination lives. There are hearts and minds yet to be conquered."
Other African Americans heading editorial boards include Otis Sanford at the Memphis Commercial Appeal, Joe Oglesby at the Miami Herald, Cynthia Tucker at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Robin Washington at the Duluth (Minn.) News Tribune, Vanessa Gallman at the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader, James F. Lawrence at the Democrat and Chronicle in Rochester, N.Y., Lovell Beaulieu of the Hattiesburg (Miss.) American and Allen Johnson of the Greensboro (N.C) News & Record.
The Inquirer becomes the second-largest U.S. newspaper with an African American editorial page editor. It ranked 20th in circulation in 2006. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ranked 18th and the Miami Herald, 27th, though the Inquirer's Sunday circulation tops that of both those papers.
"This is a wonderful and deeply gratifying example of virtue rewarded," Satullo said in the Inquirer story, speaking of Jackson's appointment. "Harold's an excellent journalist, but he's an even better person."
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Michel Martin's "Tell Me More" Adds D.C., Detroit
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| Michel Martin |
But come Sept. 17, the show, produced in association with the African American Public Radio Consortium, adds Washington and Detroit, bringing the total to 31, according to Anna Christopher of NPR.
It will air Monday through Thursday at 2 p.m. on WAMU in Washington and 1 p.m. Monday through Friday on WDET in Detroit, in both cases bumping BBC programming.
"WAMU Program Director Mark McDonald and I were asked very early on (about 2 years ago), to be 'mentors' (among other stations) to the development of a vehicle for Michel Martin at NPR," Caryn Mathes, general manager of Washington's WAMU-FM, told Journal-isms. "We've paid attention to how the program pilot developed and to the show, now that it has launched nationally.
"We very much like how it is developing and believe it will add much-needed fresh and broadened perspective to our service.
"As a major station and being in the highly-visible nation's capital, we feel an obligation to aid development of new program content for the public radio system."
In Detroit, "Tell Me More" was "a program they had been considering since its inception," spokesman Kevin Piotrowski said of executives there.
Martin was mentored by two other successful women public-radio hosts as she launched "Tell Me More," Diane Rehm of the long-running "Diane Rehm Show," based at WAMU, and Terri Gross, of the popular "Fresh Air," based at WXYY in Philadelphia. "I reached out to her and she reached back," Martin said of Gross. She "let me shadow her and the show and has listened and given feedback."
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Michael David Murphy/www.whileseated.org
Melissa Bell, mother of Mychal Bell, who was convicted of 2nd degree aggravated battery and conspiracy as a defendant in the "Jena Six" case, is interviewed June 25 outside the LaSalle Parish Courthouse. |
Coverage of Louisiana's "Jena Six" Case Increases
Coverage of the so-called "Jena Six" case in Louisiana has increased since Barbara Ciara, new president of the National Association of Black Journalists, last week urged the news media to pay more attention.As NABJ explained then, "In December 2006, six black students at Jena High School were charged with attempted second-degree murder for allegedly assaulting a white student who taunted them with racial slurs. In a previous incident, three nooses were found hung on school property. On June 28, one of the black students was convicted of aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated second-degree battery. He now faces a maximum sentence of 22 years in prison. Five other defendants were indicted in the case and will go to trial later this month."
On Tuesday night, CNN Correspondent Susan Roesgen filed a report on the "Jena Six" case starting with the story of Mychal Bell, the 16-year-old star running back who was arrested along with five other teens. Appearing on CNN earlier in the day were Tina Jones, mother of Bryant Purvis; Jordan Flaherty, editor, of Left Turn Magazine; George Tucker, attorney for Theo Shaw as well as Shaw himself. Purvis and Shaw are Bell's co-defendants.
At least two national radio talk show hosts, Michael Baisden and Reuben Armstrong, plan to be in Jena on Sept. 20, when Bell is to be sentenced. The Rev. Al Sharpton, who has a syndicated radio show and has already spoken in Jena, has said he would return. A march is planned.
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Fatima Ali, Philadelphia Daily News:
Necessary for the triumph of evil?
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Eugene Kane, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
Tales of injustice find audiences via Internet
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Mary Mitchell, Chicago Sun-Times:
Moral support OK, but Jena 6 need money
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Mary Mitchell, Chicago Sun-Times:
Did Civil Rights movement pass Louisiana by?
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Pierre Tristam, Daytona Beach (Fla.) News-Journal:
Louisiana Lynching
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Obama Platform Said to Home In on Black Concerns
The editor and publisher of the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, a 10-year-old periodical that frequently analyzes educational statistics about African Americans, has compared the platforms of the two leading Democratic presidential contenders and concluded that Barack "Obama offers a concrete program for black America. Hillary Clinton offers none."Theodore Cross writes, "It is true that Senator Clinton's campaign speeches include expressions of support for the plight of poor blacks. But it is her formal political platform that tells the story. The words 'black' or 'minority' never enter the text of her official program for America. Given Hillary Clinton's well-known progressive views on social and racial issues, one would have expected to find key words in her platform such as 'inner-city schools,' 'reduction of poverty,' 'revitalizing America's cities,' 'increased access to job training,' and 'support of Head Start programs for youngsters from low-income families.'
"One would have expected too that Senator Clinton's platform would address such issues as community development programs for inner cities, increased support for minority college students, support for black farmers, programs to create capital and encourage entrepreneurship in black communities, and tougher penalties for hate crimes. Yet all of the standard campaign promises that a liberal Democrat typically offers to blacks are completely absent from her announced program.
"Now let's turn to the platform of Senator Obama," Cross writes. "His campaign Web site, published on the Internet for all to see, bears down hard on all of the major issues of concern to blacks. These include fighting poverty, improving our schools, voting rights and election reform. Unlike Clinton, he outlines a comprehensive program to reduce poverty, revitalize America's urban areas, and empower black Americans.
"Obama has put a lot on the table, maybe too much. Nevertheless, announced here on the Obama Web site is an elaborate and unqualified proposal to use presidential power to deal with some of the most severe problems of African Americans and other minorities. There are no politically expedient bows to the hardships of America's white middle class. In his declaration of a concrete program for blacks and others who have had a difficult time, there is no doublespeak or ambiguous language. Senator Obama deals with racial issues head on. He enters the arena of race with his six-shooters blazing."
Meanwhile, Matthew Mosk reported in the Washington Post that Oprah Winfrey is in discussions with Obama's advisers "about playing a broader role in the campaign — possibly as a surrogate on the stump or an outspoken advocate — or simply bringing her branding magic to benefit his White House bid."
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Jeff Chang, Vibe magazine:
Barack Obama Q&A (Part One)
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Merlene Davis, Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader:
Drawing hope from the idea of Obama
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Nikole Hannah-Jones, Portland Oregonian:
Is Obama Black Enough?
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Derrick Z. Jackson, Boston Globe:
Kucinich is right on healthcare
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Steve Penn, Kansas City Star:
Cleaver discusses his support for Sen. Clinton
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Albor Ruiz, New York Daily News:
Hillary and Rudy share tired view on Cuba policy
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DeWayne Wickham, Gannett News Service:
Dodd's Cuba policy edges other Dems'
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U.S. Plans in Africa Called One of "Censored Stories"
"President Jimmy Carter was the first to draw a clear line between America's foreign policy and its concurrent 'vital interest' in oil, Amanda Witherell wrote Wednesday in the San Francisco Bay Guardian."During his 1980 State of the Union address, he said, 'An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.'
"Under what became the Carter Doctrine, an outpost of the Pentagon, called the United States Central Command, or CENTCOM, was established to ensure the uninterrupted flow of that slick 'vital interest.'
"The United States is now constructing a similar permanent base in Africa, an area traditionally patrolled by more remote commands in Europe and the Pacific. No details have been released about exactly what AFRICOM's operations and responsibilities will be or where troops will be located, though government spokespeople have vaguely stated that the mission is to establish order and keep peace for volatile governments — that just happen to be in oil-rich areas."
The AFRICOM story ranked third on Project Censored's list of the "Top 25 Censored Stories of 2008." Project Censored is a media research group at Sonoma State University in California.
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What About White Collar "No-Snitching" Codes?
Commenting on the "no-snitching" cartoon in the Florida Times-Union last month that created controversy in its representation of the "no-snitching" culture in the 'hood, David Honig, executive director of the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council, which advocates for minority broadcast ownership, makes this observation:
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Ed Gamble/Florida Times-Union
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"One of the most prominent categories of Title VII violations every year is retaliation against those alleging discrimination or coming forward with evidence of discrimination. Congress included an anti-retaliation provision in Title VII because Congress understood the problem to be analogous to witness intimidation.
"A victim of discrimination may know of or be complaining of misconduct that also affects other employees, so he or she is a witness as to those employees. Further, Congress recognized that retaliation implicates the petition clause of the First Amendment. This kind of practice is at least as common and no less harmful to society than the habit of some street criminals of intimidating witnesses to their crimes. Yet it's easier for columnists and cartoonists to focus on 'stop snitching' when it involves street crime rather than when it involves white collar crime and, especially, civil rights violations visited on the striving, achieving, and law-abiding family members of those depicted in these cartoons."
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Mary Mitchell, Chicago Sun-Times:
Witnesses need to step up and do their part
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Lynne Varner, Seattle Times:
The walls around us are crumbling
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Bay Area Journalists to Honor Leslie Guevarra
"Top Bay Area journalists and Filipino community members are gathering Sept. 14 in San Francisco to fete Leslie Guevarra, a veteran newswoman who was among the nearly 100 people who left the San Francisco Chronicle in recent months as the paper cut almost a quarter of its newsroom staff," L.A. Chung, a columnist at the San Jose Mercury News and a 1980 graduate of the Summer Program for Minority Journalists, told Journal-isms.
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| Leslie Guevarra |
"The host committee includes many of the Bay Area's prominent journalists and diversity advocates in the industry. Among them are broadcast journalists Jan Yanehiro, David Louie of ABC7 KGO-TV, Lloyd LaCuesta of KTVU, Odette Alcazaren-Keeley of New America Media, News Director Rose Shirinian of KTSF-TV, columnist L.A. Chung of the Mercury News, Filipinas magazine publisher Greg Macabenta, the magazine's founder Mona Lisa Yuchengco and Benny Evangelista of the Chronicle."
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Short Takes
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The Howard University newspaper, the Hilltop, has created an ombudsman
position, most likely
the first newspaper at a historically black university — and one of
the few at any college — to do so. "The past few years we have gotten a lot of criticism for our lack of community/personal coverage, so we want to get our community involved more in how we produce the newspaper," Editor-in-Chief Drew Costley told Journal-isms. "An ombudsman was a simple way to bring professionalism and legitimacy (by mimicking professional newspapers) to our newspaper while attaining this goal." Janelle Jolley, who will hold the position, made the
announcement in an Aug. 27 column
outlining plans for the semester.
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W. Curtis Riddle, president and publisher of the News Journal in
Wilmington, Del., will assume responsibility for the Gannett Co.'s
Atlantic Group,
which includes the Gannett community newspapers in New Jersey and New
England, Gannett
announced
on Aug. 29. Riddle is senior group president of Gannett's East Newspaper
Group, which includes community newspaper operations in Delaware,
Maryland, New York and Ohio.
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Tiki Barber's twin brother, Tampa Bay Buccaneers cornerback Ronde Barber, said of the former
NFL running back's new career as a journalist for NBC's "Today" show:
"To this day — and
he's only been (on "Today") since April — I have not seen him nail
anything yet that I would
give him credit for. Even if he did, I probably wouldn't tell him. I
don't want to
be the guy that's tellin' him that he's made it, 'cause then you lose
interest and I don't want him to do that." Ronde Barber was quoted
Wednesday in a
story
on his brother's new life by Janice Rhosalle Littlejohn for the
Associated Press.
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Geraldo Rivera, "who as a fledgling lawyer in the '70s counseled the Puerto
Rican nationalist group the Young Lords, says he can't stomach the
politicians and pundits who are stoking 'anti-immigrant hysteria,' and
his antipathy extends to some of his colleagues at Fox," Mark Shanahan
wrote
Saturday in the Boston Globe. "'Michelle Malkin is the most vile,
hateful commentator I've
ever met
in my life,' he says. 'She actually believes that neighbors should
start snitching out neighbors, and we should be deporting people. It's
good she's in D.C.
and I'm in New York,' Rivera sneers. 'I'd
spit on her if I saw her.'"
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Michael Lewellen, former head of corporate communications for Black
Entertainment Television, has been appointed vice president, public relations, for
Universal Orlando Resort
and will
join the company Sept. 17, the resort announced on Wednesday.
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Kevin Blackistone, formerly of the Dallas Morning News, where he was a reporter and sports columnist from 1986 to 2006, is doing a Saturday morning show on XM satellite radio with Scott Jackson. "Morning Tailgate" airs from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. Blackistone is also a regular panelist on ESPN's "Around the Horn."
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"Rapidly emerging as the professional face of hip hop journalism, Hip
Hop Journalism Association has announced the 2007 HHJA Conference and
Convention in Miami, Fl; October 19-20," the ThugLifeArmy.com Web site
reported
on Tuesday.
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Roger Witherspoon, contributing editor of U.S. Black Engineer and
Information Technology, is one of the few journalists of color on the
program at the Society
of Environmental Journalists
conference
at Stanford University. It began Wednesday and continues through Sunday.
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"Journalists in trouble for allegedly 'insulting' their heads of state
are getting help from all corners of the world," according to Eric Green,
writing
Friday for the State Department. "Many countries still use 'insult
laws,' even though
international judicial bodies such as the European Court of Human Rights and the
Inter-American Court of Human Rights have ruled that these laws are in
direct violation of the fundamental right to free speech and a free
press."
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"The criminal slander conviction of an
Argentine radio journalist is alarming and should be overturned on
appeal, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Monday's
ruling, by a judge in northwestern Salta province, also bars
commentator Sergio Poma from working for one year," the Committee
said
on Tuesday. Poma received a
one-year suspended prison sentence on a criminal slander complaint
brought by the local governor, according to local
news reports and CPJ interviews.
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"Sweden's prime minister said Tuesday he was sorry if Muslims were
offended by a cartoon depicting Prophet Muhammad as a dog but stressed
that freedom of expression was an 'inalienable' right in Sweden,"
Agence France-Presse
reported
on Tuesday.
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"The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today wrote to
President Joao Bernardo Vieira of Guinea Bissau urging him to put an
end to the harassment of journalists reporting on drug trafficking,"
the Brussels-based federation
said
on Wednesday. "We are dismayed that one reporter who interpreted for ITN News, a
British television station investigating drug trafficking, has been
charged with libel after the head of the navy filed a complaint
against him," wrote Gabriel Baglo, director of the federation's Africa office.
"Threats against another reporter who has written about the drug trade
have pushed him into hiding."
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In Somalia, "a prominent press freedom activist and
freelance journalist was forced into hiding on Monday after gunmen
went looking for him at his office in the war-torn capital Mogadishu,
according to the National Union of Somali Journalists," the Committee
to Protect Journalists
said
on Tuesday. "Ali Moallim Isak, Organizing Secretary of the union and a
correspondent of Baidoa-based private Radio Warsan, received several
threatening phone calls that day ordering him to stop speaking out
against attacks on journalists or be killed."
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