In Public Life

Could California’s vote for a ban on same-sex marriage help the gay marriage movement?

2008-12-09T11:50:00.000-08:00

Despite the passage of Proposition 8 in California on Nov. 4, or possibly because of it, gay marriage has become a hot-button issue across the nation, and the discussion seems to be gaining momentum.

Not two weeks after the vote a newly established movement called Join the Impact coordinated protests in cities across the nation. Columbia’s own protest garnered a crowd of more than 100 in freezing weather including young and old, gay and straight, some new to the movement, some veteran advocates for gay rights.

Since then the issue has received a lot of attention, much of it from the mainstream media. Newsweek’s most recent cover story, by Lisa Miller, contested conservative interpretations of scripture that condemn homosexuality, suggesting that the condemnation comes from “custom and tradition,” not directly from the Bible. Reactions to this article elicited attention from Politico and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, further spreading the discussion.

Meanwhile, the gay marriage movement continues to plug ahead. Some members have called for a ban on the Sundance Film Festival, which is held in Salt Lake City, Utah. Supporters of Proposition 8 own some of the theaters where the films are played. The Iowa Supreme Court today will hear a case brought by gay couples suing for the right to marry. Join the Impact is calling tomorrow “Day Without a Gay,” and pushing for a “nationwide strike and economic boycott.” Marc Shaiman’s mini-musical “Prop 8: the Musical,” staring well-known actors such as John C. Reilly and Jack Black, has been on the Funny or Die website for about a week and has been watched nearly 3 million times.

I don’t know whether or not the gay marriage movement has garnered more support since the vote for Proposition 8, but they have to be pleased by the attention they are receiving. The passage of Proposition 8 may have given them the publicity they needed to assert the issue on a national platform.

It's not enough to be informed...

2008-11-12T07:28:00.000-08:00

A common theme in all areas of my journalistic training is the theme of omnipresent information, thanks to the internet's buffet of websites and blogs dedicated to news. Perhaps citizens no longer require journalists to provide information, only to filter it. "Aggregate or be aggregated," as one research fellow recently put it.

Anyone seeking to be "informed" in this past election could certainly fill their treasure-chests with prolific information on the candidates, their families, their stated positions on the issues, their unstated positions, their past mistakes, acquaintances, and hypothetical cabinet picks, not to mention data on polling, projections of electoral math and statistical breakdowns of demographics and ideologies across the nation.

And voter turnout was high, thankfully. Because if you know everything there is to know about every candidate and issue, if you could wax philosophical about health care plans, tax cuts, and war strategies but you sit at home on election day, I would argue it doesn't really matter what you know. You must act.

Let's not forget that election day is not the only day to act; it is certainly not the only day where citizens of America can or should participate in their democracy (ok, republic, but you get the idea).

I was moved to write this post by reading a book called Governance in Dark Times. The author, Camilla Stivers, references philosopher Hannah Arendt. Read, digest, and be moved.

Dark times, in the end, are not the consequence of monstrous events, which are 'no rarity in history.' They emerge from the loss of the political 'world that lies between people,' the space where different people come together to speak about shared concerns and hear what each believes to be the truth. Such speech* lights up a public world, where people are joined not in agreement but in commitment to struggle with important issues. Without this light, Arendt argued, people retreat into separate, private worlds, asking no more of politics than their rights and the freedom to pursue private interests.

*don't let the word "speech" fool you. Arendt is talking about participation in a public sphere that is not limited to talking.

Do we get it?

2008-11-05T09:07:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in the last post that we at the Missourian have been constantly evaluating the nature of our election coverage and goals for that coverage.

One of the questions we addressed was, how do we cover the race aspect of this race? We certainly made an effort to represent every social group who had a particular "stake" in this election, and one of those social groups was obviously the black people of Columbia.

Let me just say that I'm not sure that I got it until last night. And it wasn't because of careful, widespread Missourian coverage that the true history of this moment hit me. It was because of a 3-minute conversation I had with a 25-year-old student right after President-elect Obama gave his acceptance speech. What she said, word for word, is below. I have nothing else to say; just think about it.

I’m speechless. It hasn’t really sunk in, but I feel like I can do anything, as an African American woman… Since growing up, everybody’s like ‘oh you can be president, you can do whatever you want to,’ but in the society we live in, we know that that’s not a hundred percent true. Well with Barack Obama becoming president, it’s true. You can do anything. You can be president. You can run the greatest country in the world and have skin like mine. It’s amazing. It’s absolutely amazing. And, I don’t know, I feel the hope that he talks about. I have hope for my future, as a college student about to graduate in six weeks, I feel like America’s moving in the right direction, that I can go out into the world and do what I want to do, change the world.

the unemotional journalist

2008-11-03T06:17:00.000-08:00

Balanced election coverage has been a major topic of discussion in our newsroom lately. We strive for "balanced", or fair and unbiased, coverage of the various races, but what does that mean? This is especially tricky in the presidential race.

Both presidential candidates have passed through Columbia in the past two weeks, so let's compare the coverage.

John McCain came through on October 20. We were notified the week before, but not given a specific date or time. The morning of the day he arrived we were still speculating about exactly when he was coming in and what he was doing. Later that morning he flew in, had lunch at a barbeque joint, and left. A handful of people went to the airport to see him land; maybe 150 stood outside the restaurant where he ate with some business owners and prominent Republicans. He's made speeches in other towns in Missouri, but they are usually outside of the area our paper normally covers.

Barack Obama held a rally at Mizzou this past Thursday, which we knew about at least four days in advance. An estimated 40,000 people attended the rally, according to the campaign.

My editor dispatched as many reporters as he could to both visits. Six or so reporters went to the airport to see McCain land and to interview the crowd. Then they followed him to the restaurant and interviewed the crowd there. When he left, they went in and interviewed the waitress who served him.

More reporters covered Obama. About 20 of us succeeded in getting media passes, some stayed in the media section, others roamed the crowd to get feedback. Several stories, including one on his speech which I co-wrote, made it online and into the paper, along with video and audio clips of the crowd.

Was our coverage fair? More reporters covered Obama's event. There were more column inches on Obama, more links on the website. On the other hand, there was more to cover. Obama appeared at a scheduled event open to the public, whereas McCain ate lunch basically unannounced in a closed venue. Some argue that that shouldn't matter.

As the discussion continues, I, for my own part, am not sure what I think.

I am squarely supportive of one candidate, I intend to vote for him, and when talking with family and friends, I'm unabashed in conveying that preference.

But I'm a journalist. I tried to sit in the media pen at Obama's rally and be unemotional. I was, at times, unsuccessful.

What is our role? We are citizens, we vote, we have opinions, often strong ones. And we try to provide fair, unbalanced, biased coverage. Is it possible? I'm certainly in favor of unbaised coverage, but I'm also wondering where our humanity is allowed to reside. If I have a political bumper-sticker on my car, will people no longer trust me to be a fair reporter? Is it that I am allowed opinions, but I just can't let people know what they are?

Again I have questions and no answers.

For those who missed the link above, here's the story on Obama's Speech

Is context what the people want?

2008-10-28T10:49:00.000-07:00

For three reasons I've been thinking about the context of news stories lately. For one, I've gotten to know a Research Fellow at the Reynolds Journalism Institute (RJI) here, and his research shtick (if I may be so bold as to sum up complicated research questions in one sentence) is figuring out how to give readers context with the stories they read, rather than just the latest.

Second, in my tentative research project (for which I am currently working on a literature review), I discuss episodic vs. thematic news stories, specifically during a crisis. The issue: when we just stick to telling people what is happening minute by minute without a longer history or explanation, are we depriving them of necessary context? Do they even want it? Do we care if they want it or not? A good example: four weeks into the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the news media captured photos and video of the statue of Saddam Hussein falling in Baghdad. It became such an iconic image suggesting victory that news coverage dropped pretty dramatically shortly thereafter. News stories in that week took one event out of the context of the whole war and many people thought we had already won.

Third, I just finished a story about the Supreme Court after attending a "debate" at MU's law school, held between two very distinguished lawyers, one of whom is arguing a case before the Supreme Court next Monday. Instead of simply covering the story as an event, I tried to package the issues they discussed in such a way as to give readers some idea of the larger context of the story: what issues the Supreme Court will likely have influence in, how the elections may influence the Court, who is on the Court, etc. I take no credit here, the speakers covered these topics in a mostly clear and accessible kind of way. It helps that I'm a bit geeky about the Supreme Court, having read a number of books about the history and the current justices in my spare time.

The thing is, I'm not sure people care. I haven't gotten any reader feedback, but while writing and editing (and editing and editing) the story, I discovered that it's very difficult to distill such complex issues into a news story that the paper wants to run. Make it too complicated, and there's concern people won't read it.

There is a tension here: I want to give people the bigger picture, more context, more information, but I'm not sure they want it, will take the time to read it, or will even understand it. It's a big question. Lately my posts have been ending in big questions, ones I don't have the answers to. Maybe no one in the field does.

Here's the story: Supreme Court, and a sidebar on the issues.

Civility: at odds with journalism?

2008-10-25T19:02:00.000-07:00

I have recently noticed a strong cognitive dissonance between some of the things I am required to do as a journalist and how, in the past 25 years, I have been brought up to act.

Let me say that I have a copy of Steven Carter's Civility on my bookshelf. I read the book in my first year of college for an introductory political science class. I couldn't tell you exactly what's in it.
But I can tell you that when I did read it, it planted a seed in my brain about civility and how often the people in our society demonstrate a mind-numbing lack of it. I worked behind the counter of a downtown coffeeshop for nearly seven years, and I could light your hair on fire with stories of how uncivil people can be, particularly in situations with strangers.

I'm afraid, and I think Stephen Carter would agree, that there is a dearth of civility in American society, despite our claims of having a civil society.

Well, I think I have been brought up to be civil, and since that class in political science I have certainly been aware of my triumphs or shortcomings in the area of civility.

These past two weeks I have been on a story where I could and probably should have been decidedly uncivil in my attempt to reach a source who refuses to talk to me, despite the fact that she is in public relations for a big company and it is her job to at least talk to reporters, even if she won't disclose any information.

My editor advised that I start calling her office every 15 minutes to let her know that I will not go away.

Let me tell you that my civility alarm certainly went off at that suggestion. For one thing, she nor her company have done anything wrong, nor are they obligated to talk to me at all. And although the story is a matter of public interest, it is not a matter of public safety, money, or anything else that the public is entitled to information about.

The situation reminded me of a pet peeve of mine: I can't stand the thought of people hounding hotel personnel in order to get a room upgrade, or a refund, when they really have nothing to complain about. I know there are people out there (some I could name) who make it a point to complain about anything to anybody in order to get free stuff.

So I'm left with this internal conflict: reporters are supposed to get stories, track down sources, convince people to talk to them. Yet I want to be civil. Where's the balance? Where do I draw the line?

If you have advice, I'd love to hear it.

[This is why I want to go into government reporting, because I'm absolutely fine with hounding public officials who aren't keeping up their end of the political bargain.]

Good Comic Fun

2008-10-24T07:02:00.001-07:00

Anyone who hasn't seen the long string of Saturday Night Live skits impersonating the presidential candidates, their running mates, and the president, I encourage you to look them up.
I've included the latest, definitely a favorite. This rather silly post will soon by followed by a much more serious one on the Supreme Court, but in the meantime....

Look at the Issues

2008-10-17T09:28:00.000-07:00

Some industrious reporters at the Columbia Missourian have put together information and translation on 11 big issues in the presidential campaign. Check out what McCain and Obama really have planned for their presidencies.
Platforms of the Candidates

Live Blogging & Fact Checking

2008-10-08T07:07:00.000-07:00

Last night, while viewing our second presidential debate between Senators John McCain and Barack Obama, I participated in live blogging on the public life blog, called the Watchword. Six reporters on the public life beat participated from various places. I sat with about eight fellow students in a living room. I tried to keep their left-leaning comments from hindering my "unbiased" reporting.

While watching the debate on TV, I was using my laptop to blog, and had several tabs open to other websites for fact-checking. I usually pay attention to post-debate analysis by reporters and panels of undecided voters, but I have never focused on how truthful candidates were about the details.

The details can be quite important. They influence our opinions the moment we hear them even if we don't remember them. And over the course of last night's debate, I realized that often, whether consciously or not, candidates are tweaking the truth. Sometimes they miss the truth by a mile.

I'll cite examples from both candidates, but I think it's fair to cite more from John McCain, since he seemed to make more blunders.

Barack Obama indicated that 95% of everyone would receive tax cuts under his plan. Unfortunately, what he meant was 95% of "working families."

John McCain claimed he wanted to give "every American" a $5,000 refundable tax credit for health care. His plan would actually only provide a tax credit for $2,500; the $5,000 is for couples or families.

John McCain, while talking about eBay's retired chief executive Meg Whitman as a possible replacement for Henry Paulson, said that 1.3 million Americans make their living off of eBay. That number is actually a little over 700,000.

There are many more, and many different websites to help you figure out what is true and what is not. Some good ones I used: FactCheck.org, and Politifact.com

Representation - Why I Can't Sleep

2008-10-01T06:50:00.000-07:00

The night before one of my stories will be published in the paper, I can't sleep. I lie there, awake, and my heart races and my mind spins its wheels. They spin in the fear that I have somehow misrepresented a person or an issue, and they can't get traction - I can't move on.

The burden of representing the truth is a burden I think many of us reporters often overlook. I suppose I'm thankful for the awareness I have about this responsibility, although I wish the weight of it wouldn't come down on me while I'm trying to sleep. I've tried to be anxious about stories earlier in the evening so I can get over it by bedtime, but so far that hasn't worked.

My latest story is a representation of an undecided voter, someone I've met with three times now for hours at a time. We discuss his political views (I keep mine to myself), we talk about what he watches and reads, and he tells me about his native country, Argentina.

One word: change. We think we need change. Let's keep in perspective that our politicians don't offer voters money for their votes, our police don't hold us up for our money, and we don't have a long history of complete corruption and international debt.

Throughout our conversations, I have come to have enormous respect for Miguel, someone who takes his responsibility, as a voter, to choose the best presidential candidate very seriously. He has no ingrained opinions about Democrats or Republicans, no family history in US politics to persuade him, no love or hatred for either party. He reads, listens, and weighs the issues according to what the candidates say about them.

In my story I am representing a complex individual with a rich history very different than my own, and I'm doing it in 6-8 inches.

So I can't sleep.

If you're reading this soon after I write it, the story will probably still be on the homepage of the Columbia Missourian. Otherwise, read here: Undecided Voters

First Presidential Debate

2008-09-27T10:51:00.001-07:00

Did you know that this is the first presidential race since 1952 that neither candidate has held the office of president or vice-president? This may be why many voters still have big questions concerning John McCain and Barack Obama, according to Dr. Benoit, a communications professor I talked with on Thursday.

If you watched the debate last night, you may agree or disagree with some of the things being said by viewers and/or analysts:
--The candidates did a poor job of answering questions about the economy. They were vague and made comments that were politically safe.
What I have to say is, what did you expect? Neither candidate is going to say something provocative about the economy when so much is still uncertain. And economic policy cannot be distilled into a 2 minute answer, no matter how pithy or witty you are.

--Both campaigns can claim their candidate won because they played to their constituents and avoided making any major gaffs.
I think this is true. Whether any undecided voters felt the lights turn on after that debate I don't know, but both candidates seemed to play their part well, especially on foreign policy. McCain insisted that Obama had to accept that he was wrong about the surge of troops in Iraq and is wrong about how to win the war. Obama insisted that McCain has to stop thinking only about Iraq.

--McCain effectively pinned the label of "inexperienced" on Obama by consistently using the phrase "he doesn't understand" or something like it, and using examples of his experience in foreign policy and his travels around the world.
Well, maybe. Some might believe that this plan of attack did answer the big question of "Is Obama too inexperienced?" with a big fat YES. But others may not be inclined to lean towards McCain on this point, given what I'm about to say next...

--McCain seemed squirrely, unable to look at Obama or talk to him directly, and he seemed irritated and uncomfortable, while Obama talked directly to McCain, and seemed composed and presidential.
I'm inclined to agree with this assesment, political partisanship aside. There were several moments when McCain clearly looked uncomfortable. I don't know for what reason, but I generally thought Obama looked more composed. And looks can go a long long way in a presidential debate.

If you want to read more about expectations of this debate and a little history on presidential debates, check out my latest story: MU Professors Weigh in on Debate.

Follow-up Reporting

2008-09-20T07:38:00.000-07:00

While it takes up the majority of my time, Reporting I is not my only class this semester. Nay, I have two more. One is a class in the Harry Truman School of Public Affairs, called Foundations of New Governance. Someday I'll get into what "new governance" is, but not now.

This morning I was reading a chapter in The Tools of Government on federal grant programs, and came across something interesting. Why are some grant programs ineffective and inefficient? Could it be because "Federal officials... know that they are much more likely to be judged by the intentions of a program than by its actual results" (Salamon 368)?

Are reporters dropping the ball by reporting heavily on the initiation of government programs, but not on the results of those programs? Do we need to do a better job of following-up?

Let me know what you think.

This has got me wondering if I am doing a good job of follow-up reporting. I think there will be some opportunities this fall for me to check up on new programs that I've reported on, especially those concerning city recycling.

What Do You Know

2008-09-17T03:44:00.000-07:00

Some people argue that journalism is not a profession for several reasons, one being that journalism has no discreet body of knowledge like law, medicine, theology, etc. I've been thinking about this, and I'm not sure I have a good counter argument, but there is something here to say about what journalists know, or have to know.

Journalists must know, or be able to find out very quickly, about pretty much everything.

A guest professor told my reporting class yesterday about how on the third day after being assigned the "energy" beat at a paper in Oregon, there was a nuclear accident at a reactor in Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania. Turns out, there was a nuclear reactor built by the same people with the same design as Three Mile nearby in Oregon. She yelled to her editors to find her a nuclear physicist, got in her car and drove to the site, stopping for 10 minutes at a cafe on the way so she could meet with the nuclear physicist. By the time she reached the press conference at the site, she knew the nuclear plant inside and out, and knew the right questions to ask.

This weekend, as many of you may have noticed, there were some big happenings on Wall Street. By Monday afternoon I hadn't seen any local coverage by our paper or the competitor, so I asked to go after the story myself.
I talked to three stockbrokers yesterday afternoon and read more than I care to admit about the stock market, about the financial crisis, and about the big firms going down, like Lehman Brothers. Which, you might be interested to know, was founded in 1850. The 158-year old giant filed for "reorganization" bankruptcy on Monday.
Unfortunately my story didn't end up being an in-depth, comprehensive explanation of how the stock market works and how it affects Columbia, but you can read about what a few stockbrokers are telling their clients around here:
What Columbia's Stockbrokers Say About the Market

Speaking of going into the unknown: I'm also attaching a story that is not mine, but is definitely worth reading. It's a tragic story, and the two reporters who wrote it traveled way out of their comfort zone to talk to grieving family members and find out the whole story of a 21-year-old girl who died in a swollen creek in Columbia this weekend.
(It's a better read than the stockbroker story, I'm very willing to admit)
Man Trapped by Floodwaters Describes Ordeal

Transparency

2008-09-10T06:24:00.000-07:00

"Transparency" and "full disclosure" are some of the first words I heard in my journalism education. Transparency is pretty obvious - be transparent about where you got your information, who you talked to (no anonymous sources or attributions to "government officials") and be balanced in your coverage: don't interview only one or even two sides of the story. Interview five different stakeholders.

Okay, I was prepared for this. But full disclosure is something entirely different. Transparency refers to your actions, and full disclosure refers to YOUR LIFE.

No bumper stickers on your car. I'm trying to get away with having a "Paddler" bumper sticker on the subaru right now... but what if I have to drive out and interview someone who is accused of polluting a local river? Even "Paddler" connotes a bias.
No membership in politically affiliated organizations. I can't stump for Obama. Or McCain.
It's not that we can't be involved in community activities, churches, or chess clubs. But we have to be upfront and honest about it.

I was thinking about transparency this morning because I was reading the blog of the National Freedom of Information Coalition, which is a coalition of state groups dedicated to open government, and headquartered here on Mizzou's campus.

Perhaps the media isn't as transparent as it ought to be, and we should work on that. But the government is definitely not as transparent as it ought to be, and we should work on that too. Check it out.

The Hard-to-Get Source

2008-09-06T11:57:00.000-07:00

This cool and cloudy Saturday morning, I got up early to go and hang around a private recycling center.

This was my last-ditch effort to find a certain group of people I had been searching for all week -- people who are going around on trash days and picking up recycling bags off the curb before the city gets there. Aluminum prices have risen dramatically, and for a pound of aluminum you get 80 cents at a local private recycler, who is in competition with the city.
During their next meeting the city council will vote whether or not to make this practice illegal, and that's the story.

After driving around Columbia neighborhoods for hours this week, peering up and down streets to try and catch people in the act, I had nearly given this quest up as a wild goose chase. My persistent editor, Scott, told me that we had to find them, however. Our competitor had already written the story, but the reporter had only interviewed the official stakeholders in the story. It was my job to find the other stakeholders - who is driving around picking up trash for a little money?

This morning I found Debra. A single mom with an 11-year-old son who just lost her job in August. Three times a week she takes her car around Columbia and fills it with bags of other people's recycling, then brings the load to the private recycler and gets some cash. Then she goes back about. On Friday she did this from 8 in the morning until 1, when she took a break to bring her son to a therapy appointment. Then at 2:30 p.m., they went back out again together.

Nothing is more rewarding for a reporter than to find this kind of source. When I first started at the Missourian, calling up city officials or council members was a bit daunting. Now I don't think twice.

An interview with someone like Debra is the true gold mine, not the perfect quote from the mayor. These are the people who get left out of news stories all too often because they are hard to find. But these are the people who need a voice. And today I'm glad I got out of bed to go hang around a recycling center.

The Recycling Story

2008-09-01T09:20:00.000-07:00

Someone is in the newsroom on labor day copyediting stories for the web. That is dedication! So here is my story, put up a couple hours ago.

Columbia Recycling

First Week of the Semester

2008-08-30T10:24:00.000-07:00

I'm currently in my "second newsroom" (Kaldi's) on a Saturday afternoon, reflecting on a week that has seemed more like the beginning of a new job than a new semester. Most of my time this week was spent either in the newsroom or going to and from the newsroom, tracking down story ideas and sources.

I went to a news conference on Friday morning to hear a preview of next week's council meeting agenda, and it was the first time my press badge got some fresh air, clipped to my shirt.

I wrote three full stories this week. My assistant city editor (ACE) Sarah advised that we shoot for at least one story a week, so I'm doing pretty good so far. She also said that a good grade usually goes hand-in-hand with spending 40 hours a week working on stories. This week I think I came close.

If you'd like to read my stories, here they are: Balloon Invitational, Tiger Security, Missouri Delegates at the DNC.

I'm still waiting for a fourth story on recycling to be published. Come back in a few days.

Overall this week has been exciting, challenging, and it feels like I've already learned enough to fill a book.
But I'm sure I still have much to learn, to experience, and to overcome.

City Council

2008-08-29T13:57:00.000-07:00

Two weeks.
One city council meeting, 5 1/2 hours long.
One news conference, 1 hour long.
Now I know all the council members and their wards by heart.