WALTER CRONKITE

The luncheon has been so successful over the years because of Cronkite’s personal involvement, which has helped ASU to convince the biggest names in American journalism to make the trip to Phoenix (usually from New York or Washington), accept an award and offer some inspiring thoughts. This year, the stars were Jim Lehrer and Robert MacNeil of PBS, and both men went to great lengths to emphasize what a special honor they were receiving.

“For people like us in television broadcasting, to be named among the best by Walter Cronkite is as good as it gets,” Lehrer said.

In Cronkite’s absence, ASU President Michael Crow took on a more prominent role in the proceedings. Crow staunchly defended his decision to invest heavily in upgrading the Cronkite School — highlighted by the new 250,000 sq. ft. headquarters. He repeated the statements of American founders who argued democracy can flourish only when the public has been properly informed by a free press committed to pursuit of the truth and to holding government accountable.

“We’re not crazy,” Crow said. “We’re dead serious, we’re dead serious, that the future of a free society, that the future of what we stand for, depends on the education of (journalism students) …”

Hugh Downs, an East Valley resident and former host of ABC’s 20/20, broke his final tie to journalistic independence and has decided to support Democrat Barack Obama for president. The Obama campaign has scheduled a 3 p.m. news conference today at the Tempe campus of Arizona State University, where the school of communication is named after the TV legend. The campaign already has released a comment from him:

“I am proud to announce my support for Senator Barack Obama for
President.  At a time when our economy is faltering and our health care
system remains in crisis, we cannot afford four more years of the same
failed economic policies,” said Downs, 87. “Senator Obama has solid,
realistic plans to strengthen our economy, provide health care to every
American and create jobs across this great nation. Arizonans, like all
Americans, need the change that Barack Obama will bring to Washington.”

When Downs retired in 1999, he held a world record for the longest continuous appearence on network television. He started out in entertainment but transitioned into television news and came to reflect journalistic credibility similar to that of Walter Cronkite and other anchors of the main nightly news shows.

Downs had fallen somewhat from that perch with his slate of late-night informercials. But I have heard Downs speak a couple of times, including an appearence before the Arizona Senate a few years back, and I was impressed by his continued eloquence and insight driven by his perspective as an independent observer of events.

Endorsing Obama casts a partisan shadow over Downs’ stellar career, one that’s sure to inspire those who claim all journalists are liberal and subtly support Democrats in our work, whether or not we admit to it.

ASU’S NEW WALTER CRONKITE SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM AND MASS COMMUNICATION (Tribune photo)

With a rapid decline of newspaper revenues and circulation, and broadcast media struggling as well, a lot of people predicting we are nearing the end of professional journalism as we know it today. But don’t tell that to the 1,200 students from Arizona State University who are attending journalism classes at a brand-new $71 million building in downtown Phoenix.

I participated last week in a tour of the new home for the Walter Cronkite Sschool of Journalism and Mass Communication that was sponsored by the Society of Professional Journalists. So I saw first-hand many of the issues that Tribune writer Ryan Gabrielson reported in his story today. In particular, I listened to school Dean Chris Callahan’s firm conviction that ASU journalism needed a new structure to prepare students for careers in a brave new world.

Previously, the journalism school had been spread out across a number of buildings on the main Tempe campus, and instruction took a silo approach. Students learned to be print journalists, or they learned to be TV anchors, or they learned to be photographers, or they learned to public relations experts. But rarely did they study a variety of forms and media platforms.

The new school brings everything together to emphasize digital-based curriculum that basically is supposed to prepare students to keep adapting as technology continues to change how information is gathered and is shared among people. Students can expect to be writers and videographers and sound producers and Web designers — all at the same time. Callahan also is forthright about his goal of transforming the Cronkite school into the best journalism program in the country. That means spending money on the space and equipment that will attract top faculty and students.

But I have to wonder about ASU’s timing for this venture, considering that state leaders have been told to expect the university will become a top research hub that will generate new jobs related to technology and bioscience growth sectors of the global economy. That’s supposed to be the justification for borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars for a variety of new buildings when state tax revenues are on a shaky footing. Can the state really afford to divert some of those resources to also compete with well-established institutions in the world of journalism?

Perhaps Callahan and ASU president Michael Crow have a stronger faith in the future role of journalists than I do. Or maybe I just don’t see glass-and-concrete marvels and gee-whiz gadgetry replacing proper instruction in fundamentals of good journalism — Seek the truth as independent observers and do your best to report it accurately.

LAURA KNAPEREK (left) AND HER DEMOCRATIC STALKER (Knaperek campaign photo)

   Tribune writer Gary Grado has reported this afternoon on a new low in Arizona politics – the partisan candidate stalker.
  The state Democratic Party has hired someone named David to follow and videotape every step of Laura Knaperek, a Republican candidate for the East Valley’s Congressional District 5. David showed up outside a Paradise Valley home Wednesday where Knaperek was holding a private fundraiser, apparently hoping to catch someone like Jack Abramoff or Charles Keating going inside.
   David deserves credit for being honest about who he was and what he was doing. And Knaperek has been classy in how she handled the situation, by offering David some relief from the sweltering heat and sending out a light-hearted news release about it today.
   But Knaperek told me she finds the whole situation a little creepy and I have to agree. Do Democratic Party officials really think they are going to find out something relevant by stalking Republican candidates even at private homes, do they hope to intimidate the opposition, or a little bit of both?
   I’m aware that journalists have been known to hang outside private fundraisers, but usually that’s because a very special donor is expected to drop by (like the president or Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger) or the candidate has been unavailable for comment. We don’t normally linger in private neighborhoods trying to identify every donor to walk through the door.
   One other thought, just how much money does the state Democratic Party have to spend this year that it can hire someone to stalk a congressional candidate widely considered to be an underdog in a really crowded Republican primary? The answer to that question might be just as nerve-racking for Republicans across the state.

   NBC News is reporting that “Meet the Press” host Tim Russert died today of the heart attack while at work. Russert, 58, did not just host the highest rated Sunday TV talk show. He was a full-time working journalist and Washington bureau chief for NBC.
   In an era where the American public is increasingly disillusioned with journalists of all media, Russert was widely respected for his tough but fair questions and unpartisan approach to his job. This death is a huge loss for a news empire that has added increasingly partisan talk shows to its line-up including MSNBC’s Keith Obermann and Chris Matthews.

Jerry MitchellThe Arizona Newspaper Association held its annual fall convention last week in Scottsdale. The Tribune was honored Saturday as the Newspaper of the Year for the fourth consecutive time. But another moment earlier in day was particularly inspiring to me. Investigative reporter Jerry Mitchell of the Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Miss., spoke about a nearly 20-year career devoted to revisiting unsolved murders from the civil rights era of the 1960s.Mitchell spoke at a Saturday luncheon during which he received the ANA’s Zenger Freedom of the Press award. Past notables to also receive this honor include UPI reporter/columnist Helen Thomas, CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite and investigative reporter Seymour Hersh.Mitchell is best known outside of his home state as the newspaper reporter in "Ghosts of Mississippi." This excellent movie starring Whoopi Goldberg provides a dramatic account of how the murder case against white supremacist Byron de la Beckwith was reopened more than 30 years after NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers was shot in the back outside his home.Mitchell says he was motivated to start looking into old shootings, lynchings and bombings after watching an earlier fictional movie, "Mississippi Burning." He received a tip about secret state records showing ties between police and Ku Klux Klan types that would provide a partial explanation as to why many of the murders of civil rights activists in the South never were solved.Along with de la Beckwith, Mitchell’s stories also led to the 1988 conviction of Sam Bowers for the murder of a voting rights activist and the 2002 conviction of Bobby Cherry for the bombing of a Alabama church that killed four children. In the second incident, Cherry had maintained his innocence for decades by claiming he was home watching wrestling on TV. Mitchell was able to prove no such program was broadcast in the area on the day of the bombing."In every one of these cases, the killers (had) walked free even though everyone knew they were guilty," Mitchell said Saturday.Mitchell speaks in the same lyrical and haunting tone that you can find in his most compelling stories. He talks with quiet passion about spending hours interviewing people such as de la Beckwith; racists whom Mitchell openly describes as "evil" but whose points of view were equally important to provide an objective accounting of the past and the present.As Mitchell continued to expose political and cultural corruption that had protected those who used violence and murder against the civil rights movement, he was asked to write about his newspaper’s own racist past. Mitchell said the Clarion-Ledger had been one of the South’s leading apologists for white supremacist attitudes during the 1960s. As an example, on the day after Martin Luther King gave his "I have a dream" speech, the newspaper’s headline about the civil rights march read, "Trash taken out in Washington." Death threats against Mitchell and his family have been a constant part of his life, and his newspaper has faced a lot of pressure over the years to leave the past alone. But Mitchell said no reporter worthy of the title should turn a blind eye to injustice."Good journalism doesn’t wait on public opinion to change history," he said.While Mitchell has received plenty of journalism awards, his real legacy will be the return of integrity to the Mississippi justice system and elsewhere. A total of 28 people have been arrested, and 23 convicted, because of Mitchell’s work. Six other states and the Justice Department have now reopened more than 100 other cases from that era.

I came across a story last week that demonstrates how we journalists too often expose ourselves to charges of hypocrisy and keeping double-standards.The Columbia Journalism Review reported on an event at a Washington-area conference for journalism professors that featured a panel of reporters who cover the U.S. Supreme Court. C-SPAN decided its audience of political junkies would be interested in hearing what these prominent journalists had to say about their work with one of our nation’s most powerful government institutions. So C-SPAN sent a camera crew to record the panel discussion for broadcast.But one of the panelists, Linda Greenhouse from the New York Times, objected to C-SPAN’s presence and refused to appear on the panel if the cameras rolled. Greenhouse has won the Pulitzer Prize, journalism’s top honor, and was considered the featured speaker, according to the Columbia Journalism Review. So she got her way and no video was taken.There’s some dispute about whether the panelists received enough advance notice that C-SPAN would there. But I’m baffled by Greenhouse’s justification for putting her foot down. She said she agreed to appear as part of a "private" discussion with a group of professors. She wasn’t going to speak candidly about what she does for a national audience.For all of her journalism skills and experience, Greenhouse would appear to have a poor grasp on the difference between private and public. A private conservation takes place one-on-one or in very small groups of people. Speaking to a group of 50 strangers, with other journalists present, is by definition a public setting. That implies a journalist can’t control to whom or where his or her comments might be repeated. The only thing a journalist can control is what he or she says.This issue is significant because Supreme Court justices have a rather bad habit of speaking in public settings but insisting their comments can’t be recorded. This allows the justices to later shade or even deny what they originally said, in order to deflect any negative reaction. No audio or video means taking the word of a justice over what some nobody in the audience claims to have heard.I don’t know if Greenhouse has ever been critical of the justices for this. But she should not appear to justify their behavior by repeating in her own actions.http://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/the_greenhouse_effect.php