NewspaperAlum

Murphy's Law: ``Change is a Great Catalyst for New Opportunities.’’

Caryle Murphy with her nephews at Yellowstone National Park

Murphy interviewing Islamic scholar Ahmed Bin Baz in Jeddah

***

Though no longer reporting for a major daily newspaper, Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Caryle Murphy [See her personal website ]is still plying her trade both in the U.S. and abroad.

Skeptical about the durability of the newspaper industry, Murphy accepted a company buyout from the Washington Post in 2006 to begin freelancing and pursue stories near and dear to her heart, especially in the Middle East, a troubled region raging with complexity and conflict, conditions, in other words, always appealing to an inquisitive journalist like herself.

Besides, as Murphy told me, ``I believe that change is a great catalyst for new opportunities.’’

So soon after taking her four nephews on the mother of all camping trips, which included a spectacular trip down the Green River in Utah and then to Yellowstone, she requested a visa from the Saudi government to work in the kingdom as a free-lance journalist.

She was pleasantly stunned to learn she had been approved by the government. But then again, timing is everything. ``Fortunately’’ Murphy said, ``I asked for a visa at a time when the Saudi government was trying to attract foreign correspondents to reside in the kingdom.''

Beginning in 2008, then, Murphy took up residence at a compound in Riyadh for foreign residents of the kingdom, where she remained for the next three years, mingling and blending with families from around the world, including ones from Egypt, Lebanon, South Africa, Spain, and India. Her yoga instructor was from Iran.

Murphy made it clear to me the foreign families weren’t forced to live in the compound; it was their choice largely because it provided more of a secular environment and came equipped with a number of amenities, including restaurants, a swimming pool and a gym without the strict gender segregation that is the custom in Saudi Arabia. And neither was Murphy required to wear a black robe over her clothes (like she did) when she left the compound during the day.

While in Riyadh, she reported for a number of news organizations, principally the Globalpost, the Christian Science Monitor and the National in Abu Dhabi.

Did she encounter any government-imposed restrictions interviewing local residents? `` For the most part, I was able to move around freely, meet Saudis with relative ease and report without interference’’ Murphy told me.  Approaching government officials, however, remains a huge problem for most foreign journalists. The Saudi government, Murphy said, remains excessively secretive, making interviews difficult to land.

Fortunately, she found an abundance of gripping and newsworthy stories to report on without having to rely on government officials. She did this mainly by keeping her ear to the ground, listening closely to the concerns and pent-up anxieties of the residents, especially as violent protests erupted in countries all around them.

Back on American soil in 2011, Murphy became a public scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington D.C.; a place that has long been considered a journalists best friend, especially for those who want to write books. It was at the Center where she researched and wrote her latest book, ``A Kingdom's Future: Saudi Arabia through the Eyes of its Twentysomethings.'' . Her residence at the Wilson Center ended in 2012.

Murphy tells me she’s not sure what’s she’ll do next, though it will almost certainly involve writing, hopefully in the journalism field, though she remains cynical about the industry’s future especially when she reads dim-witted headlines like  the one she noticed the other day on Yahoo News, speculating as to who the next Bachelorette will be. ``Part of me’’ Murphy says,`` thinks that our civilization is passing through a technological-robotic-digital transformation whose destination we don’t yet see and that will change us in fundamental ways.’’

Before reporting full-time for the Post, Murphy was a free-lancer in the West African country of Angola, where she worked for Newsweek, the Sunday Times of London, and the Washington Post. After being hired by the Post full-time, she served as foreign correspondent during the tumultuous 1970's amid the Soweto student uprising and police murder of black leader Steve Biko, an anti-apartheid activist in South Africa. During the 1990’s she had a tour of duty as the Post’s Cairo Bureau Chief, responsible for covering the Arab world.

And as a crowning achievement to her courageous reporting, she was awarded a Pulitzer-Prize in 1991 in the category of International Reporting for her dispatches from occupied Kuwait, some of which she filed while in hiding from Iraqi authorities. She was also a recipient of the George Polk Award for Foreign Reporting for her coverage of Iraqi-occupied Kuwait and subsequent 1990-91 Gulf War.

In addition to her book she wrote on Saudi Arabia during her residence at the Wilson Center, she also authored ``Passion for Islam’’  , which explores Islam's contemporary revival and the roots of religious extremism in the Middle East.

When not covering hot spot overseas, Murphy’s domestic assignments for the Post included U.S. immigration policy, U.S. federal court in Alexandria, Va. and religion. A year before accepting a company buyout (2006) she reported from Baghdad for three months. Outside of the newsroom, Murphy was the 1994-1995 Edward R. Murrow Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

Raised in Massachusetts, she is a graduate of Trinity University in Washington, D.C., and Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies.

Murphy is single and lives in Washington D.C.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
March 11, 2013

Finally, A Dictionary for Deciphering the News

We have another first.

Just think of the hundreds and hundreds of specialized dictionaries there are on the market.

We have a ``Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English’’, a ``Dictionary of Obsolete English’’, a ``Dictionary of Catch Phrases’’, a ``Dictionary of Confusable Words’’, a ``Dictionary of Epithets and Terms of Address’’, a ``Dictionary of Euphemisms’’, and a ``Dictionary of Sports Idioms’’, but not one on Journalese; that is, until now.

Thanks to authors Paul Dickson and Robert Skole and the recent publication of ``Journalese: A Dictionary for Deciphering the  [Marion Street Press] this is the first dictionary devoted specifically to  ``Journalese.''

Dickson, by the way, is author of another recently released book: ``Words from the White House: Words and Phrases Coined or Popularized by America’s Presidents’’ .

 Journalese, for those not familiar with the term, is a code word for journalist jargon, distinguished by clichés, sensationalism, and triteness of thought, which usually appear in your local newspaper but is rarely spoken at the office water cooler.

The authors in their introduction make it clear, however, this dictionary isn’t intended to pass judgment, and neither is it meant to be a celebration of journalese. Rather, their objective is to ``describe and define it and, in the process, perhaps spike –or at least skewer-some of its more overwrought examples.’’

Any lover of words and newspapers will get a tremendous kick out of this A-to-Z dictionary. It’s a highly entertaining, light and breezy, and witty look at the good, the bad, and the ugly of newspaper buzzwords and phrases. Aside from its pure entertainment value, this is practically a mandatory book for any writer to have parked next to their computer or laptop-since it will undoubtedly serve as a handy and useful reference guide to prevent falling victim to some of the most worn-out and overused phrases in American journalism.

So how exactly did this book come about?

Paul Dickson, the co-author of this book and author of more than 60 books, including ``The Dickson Baseball Dictionary’’, ``The Congress Dictionary ‘’ (with Paul Clancy), and a ``Dictionary of the Space Age and Slang ’’, has been collecting journalese terms for years. Some of the terms, in fact, were so outdated they couldn’t be used in this book. So Dickson decided to team with Robert Skole, a Boston resident, who has worked as a reporter, editor and foreign correspondent. 

They previously collaborated on another book, ``The Volvo Guide to Halls of Fame: The Traveler's Handbook of North America's Most Inspiring and Entertaining Attractions.’’  The dictionary took about a year to compile as they scoured Google, Nexis, and a number of other databases that could search newspapers' use of specific words. Skole told me they found WoPular  , an aggregator of news, especially helpful. The New York Times’ historical archives was another helpful site in finding specific journalese words, such as with hackneyed examples of the word ``Many.’’ For their sidebar devoted to Bible phrases titled ``Gospel Journalese’’, the websiteThe Blue Letter Bible , an online resource packed with useful information and data of words used in the Bible was another gold mine.

As newspapers continue to plow forward with buyouts and the slashing of staff, with copy editors usually absorbing the brunt of these cuts-are journalese terms running amok in newsrooms today or slipping through the cracks (more often than they should) without the eagle eyes of experienced copy editors?

``Newspapers' cutting down copy desks has created a tsunami of journalese’’ Skole concedes.  ``Back when I went to the University Of Missouri School Of Journalism, any reporter using "many" in a story on the Daily Missourian would get it tossed back to him or her. ``Today’’, Skole points out, ``nobody cares. It's all the Journalese that fits in print.’’

For anyone fascinated by newspaper style and usage, the authors have created a Facebook page on Journalese,  which is most definitely worth a visit.

So to give readers a sense of (journalese, refer to page 81), an idea of some of the journalese terms defined in their book, the authors have given me permission to list some of my favorites.

Enjoy!

Arguably: Arguably gives reporters the freedom to draw conclusions they wouldn’t dare on their own. No one wants to say ``certainly’’ when such a useful fudge factor is available.

Claim:  We don’t believe what the person says, but here it is. A person who likes a source, never says he or she ``claims’’ something.  Instead, it is ``firmly stated.’’

Compelling: Book reviewer already used riveting.

Cycles of Violence: At least two crimes in two days.

Firestorm: At least two people protest or complain.

Fledgling:  A young and inexperienced person, but often used by fledgling reporters to mean faltering.

Frantic Search: The kind of search that people conduct when children are missing.  A level-headed search won’t do.

Frenzy: At least three guys arguing.

Hero: Just about anyone in uniform or someone who gets a cat down from a tree.

High-speed chase:  All police chases are at high-speed. It would be big news, such as O.J. Simpson, if the chase stayed within speed limits.

Highly respected:  One degree above highly regarded. His mother and father both boast about him.

Machiavellian:  Any actions by politicians the paper does not support. Politicians the paper does support are wise, savvy, strategic, shrewd or astute players of the political game.

Motion Picture: A very serious film the reviewer likes, and is often described as a ``major motion picture.’’  Otherwise, it’s a movie or film or flick.

Noted Authority:  Said of anyone on a reporter’s speed-dial or Twitter feed.

Presumably:  Codeword that the writer is about to take a wild-assed guess.

Punishing: Any storm, hurricane, tornado, flood, or other natural disaster. Also a military operation that the reporter doesn’t approve of.

Raw Data: Data that has not yet been cooked.

Sketchy: Reporter doesn’t know what the heck is going on.

Unconfirmed: It may not be true, but we want to print this before the opposition did.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
March 4, 2013

 

They Just Called Him ``Scoop'': Jack Nelson's Revealing Posthumous Memoir

Jack Nelson descending the steps of the Georgia Capitol circa 1960, the same year he won a Pulitzer.

Nelson with Paul Duke (center), of Washington Week in Review, and Charlie McDowell, like Jack, a regular on the show.

Nelson in China, on a trip with Ronald Reagan in 1984. 

*Photos courtesy of  Barbara Matusow

***

Do I have a scoop for you.

The memoirs of tenacious investigative reporter and Washington correspondent, Jack Nelson, who died in 2009 from pancreatic cancer are recounted in an enlightening book released in December , 2012: ``Scoop: The Evolution of a Southern Reporter,’’  published by University Press of Mississippi.

Mr. Nelson’s memoirs, which chronicles his reporting, beginning as a cub reporter in Biloxi, Mississippi, to earning a Pulitzer Prize at the Atlanta Constitution, to his aggressive and insightful reporting for The Los Angeles Times, covering civil rights to butting heads with the corrupt FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover- has met with a number of flattering reviews, including from investigative journalist and best-selling author Bob Woodward, describing it as ``a terrific memoir by one of American's toughest and greatest reporters."

Nelson died two years before his memoirs were completed; so his wife, Barbara Matusow, a veteran writer and television producer, and a contributing editor with Washingtonian magazine decided to conduct some of her own research to fill in the missing  pieces and publish the book posthumously.

Nelson was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1960 for a series of articles which exposed the unspeakable practices at a mental hospital in Milledgeville, Ga., which, among other shocking revelations, documented the use of experimental drugs on patients without their permission and surgeries performed by nurses when doctors were absent.

Two notable civil rights stories covered by Nelson included reporting on civil rights worker Viola Liuzzo, a 39-year-old white woman from Detroit who was shot and killed by Klan members after the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches in Alabama; as well as chronicling three South Carolina State College students (all black) who were killed on Feb. 8, 1968, after state troopers opened fire on protesters upset about a segregated local bowling alley in what became infamously known as the Orangeburg Massacre.

Though Woodward and Carl Bernstein were largely responsible for uncovering the Watergate scandal, Nelson landed a scoop of his own in the midst of the highly publicized affair.

In his exclusive interview on June 17, 1972 with an F.B.I. agent who had been working for President Richard M. Nixon’s re-election campaign, Alfred Baldwin admitted to Nelson he had installed listening devices at a Howard Johnson hotel across from the Watergate weeks before the celebrated break-in.

 Nelson skillfully elicited specific names from Baldwin and it soon became a crucial first-person account of the operation in helping authorities unravel the scandal.

One of the more spicier slices of Nelson’s memoir is arguably his ongoing war with the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.  As reported by The Los Angeles Times,  Hoover was convinced that Nelson was preparing to report that the FBI director was a homosexual.  Hoover labeled the Times’ star reporter a drunk, tried to get him fired, another time attempted unsuccessfully to kill a page one story of Nelson’s and even went so far as to put him on the bureau's list of "untouchables," , that is, reporters who were to receive no cooperation.

The Talladega, Alabama native who began reporting for the L. A. Times in 1964, was named its Washington Bureau Chief in 1975, and remained in that position through 1995. He continued at the bureau as its chief Washington correspondent until his retirement in 2001. As a ringing endorsement of his brilliant journalism career, many credit Nelson with having catapulted the Times into national prominence as one of the most influential dailies in the country.

Away from the newsroom, he was for many years a fixture on the ``Washington Week in Review” on PBS.

In addition to being awarded a Pulitzer, Nelson was the recipient of the Drew Pearson Award for Investigative Reporting in 1975 and the Robert F. Kennedy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1999.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
February 10, 2013

 

With Few Job Prospects, John Woestendiek Still Has an Ace in the Hole.

When the world turned upside down, like it did for so many journalists during the Great Recession, it’s nice to know that a dog is still man’s best friend.

That certainly is the case for Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist John Woestendiek, who after 33 years in the newspaper industry, the last seven years with the Baltimore Sun, accepted a buyout in 2008 to write a book, ``Dog, Inc.: The Uncanny Inside Story of Cloning Man's Best Friend’’ , a smartly written book, which met with strong reviews, and explores the curious history of pet cloning, from its roots in a 1928 experiment.

Disheartened by the diminished quality of newspapering, the book was really only a pretext by Woestendiek to mount his exit strategy.

``Like a lot of reporters,’’ Woestendiek tells me, ``  I bounced around in hopes of landing in places that were still doing things right, only to see those places cut back to the point of losing important things, like ethics, principles, depth, morale, fun, and the opportunity to write good stories.’’

Between his buyout allotment and the advance he received from the publishing company, Woestendiek was able to write his book, including spending time in South Korea to conduct additional research for the book.

In addition to his book project, soon after leaving the Baltimore Sun, Woestendiek launched his own blog, ohmidog! , essentially an extension of the blog he authored while working at the Sun.  Ohmidog is a collection of dog news from around the world, which features original reporting as well. `` Its focus is on the science and wonder of dogs, and the bond we share with them. It tries to be a non-cutesy, non-fluffy website, somewhat hard hitting, and with a distinct animal welfare slant’’ Woestendiek says.

Finding it difficult to immerse himself fulltime in the mundane business side of running a blog, Woestendiek says, at present, he hasn’t been able to monetize the site, though the blog does generate approximately 50,000 visitors a month.  While admitting he still hopes to make the blog financially successful without compromising his journalist principles, ``It is more of an obsession and hobby than anything else’’ he tells me.

Like many former print reporters flying solo, the North Carolina native has run into his share of air pockets along the way.

With no newspaper jobs popping up, without health insurance, and with his unemployment checks having run dry, he threw his belonging into storage, moved out of his rental and began traveling with his shelter dog, Ace. Part of his travels through the U.S., included duplicating the route John Steinbeck took 50 years earlier in "Travels with Charley." His journey was chronicled in another website Woestendiek created, ``Travels with Ace’’  . The trip essentially focused on dog-related stops, spanning a year and covered 25,000 miles.  `` It was a total blast’’ Woestendiek says.

``All in all’’, Woestendiek explains, ``I found, I could live as cheaply on the go as I did in still life, thanks to mooching off a lot of friends and a few strangers, and thanks to the doors my dog opened for me.’’

From the outset, Woestendiek realized the trip, conducted on a shoestring with Ace, had the makings of another book. Despite not having landed a publisher yet, he continued to pound out the book and is in the process of putting the final touches on it.

After leaving Baltimore and darting off to his native North Carolina, he discovered the apartment that his parents lived in when he was born in Winston-Salem had a ``For Rent’’ sign on it. The apartment was immediately gobbled up by Woestendiek and it’s where he hangs his hat today.

At present, Woestendiek is job-hunting, publisher-hunting, still updating ohmidog! , while periodically engaging in some freelance writing, usually dog related.

Woestendiek tells me he still misses newspapers, or at least the industry that existed before the appalling downsizing took root. `` I miss the camaraderie, the health insurance, the being part of a team. I miss uncovering stuff that needs to be uncovered and telling stories that need to be told.’’

Despite not drawing a handsome salary like he used to, Woestendiek insists he’s doing the same thing: traveling, seeking out stories and telling them -- only without getting paid for it.

Assessing how the newspaper industry lost its way, Woestendiek maintains ``the American attention span has shrunk, and newspapers, while a victim of that, were probably also perpetrators.’’

 Though frustrated by the bleak prospects on the job market, Woestendiek has no regrets about taking the buyout when he did.

``I'm glad I made the leap’’ he assured me. ``It made things uncertain, but both despite and because of that, it opened up new avenues, and, in the case of my dog and me, an entire country to explore. Even if my first book sets no sales records, even if my new book doesn't become a book, it was worth it.’’ ``Scary!’’ Woestendiek admits, ``but worth it.’’

In addition to the Baltimore Sun, Woestendiek reported for the Arizona Daily Star, Lexington Herald-Leader, the Charlotte Observer, and Philadelphia Inquirer. It was at the Inquirer where he earned a Pulitzer in 1987 for a series of articles that helped overturn the murder conviction of an innocent 18-year-old man sentenced to life in prison.

A graduate of the University of North Carolina, Woestendiek was inducted into the North Carolina Journalism Hall of Fame in 2003. He is a former Knight Fellow at Stanford University, and served as the T. Anthony Pollner Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Montana School of Journalism in 2007.

Woestendiek, 58, and his shelter dog, Ace, currently live and blog in Winston Salem, North Carolina.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
February 5, 2013

New York Times Jacques Steinberg Joining ``Say Yes to Education’’

Jacques Steinberg, The New York Times education reporter and editor who recently accepted a company buyout has announced he will begin a new chapter of his life at ``Say Yes to Education’’, a national, non-profit education foundation committed to dramatically increasing high school and college graduation rates for our nation's urban youth.

He will begin his new assignment on February 4th.

Since its founding 25 years ago, Say Yes has raised or leveraged more than $11 million in Say Yes scholarships and sent nearly 2,000 students to college.

“After more than a decade writing, reporting and lecturing about college admissions, I have lately found myself wanting to put down my reporter's notebook to work more directly with public-school students, families and their counselors, whose caseloads have often ballooned to 500 or more in the midst of budget cuts,” Steinberg wrote in a press release.

Steinberg first joined the Times in 1988 as a researcher for James "Scotty" Reston, assisting him in the compilation of his memoirs. For nearly 25 years, most recently as its senior editor for education initiatives.  Steinberg edited The Choice, the Times’ college admissions and financial aid blog, which he created for the paper in spring 2009, as well as The New York Times Learning Network.

He also covered the media, primarily television, for the Times’ cultural news desk.

In addition to his extensive reporting, Steinberg is the author of  The Gatekeepers: Inside the Admissions Process of a Premier College, a New York Times-best seller and Times Notable Book that was first published by Viking-Penguin in September 2002.  The book was reissued by Penguin, with a new Afterword written in conjunction with its 10th anniversary, in September 2012.

A 1984 graduate of Dartmouth College, with a major in history, Steinberg grew up in southeastern Massachusetts, where he graduated from Somerset High School

Bill Lucey
[email protected]
January 30, 2012

Mr. Smith goes to Washington, Saigon, Cairo, and Moscow

Is there life after newspapers?

Of course there is; especially if you talk to Hedrick Smith [See his personal website ], Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and former correspondent for The New York Times who left the paper in 1988 after 26 years, having covered Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights struggle, serving a tour of duty in Saigon covering the Vietnam War, immersing himself in the Middle East conflicts from Cairo, the Cold War from both Moscow and Washington as well as reporting on six American presidents and their administrations.

In 1971 as the Times chief diplomatic correspondent , Smith was a member of the team which produced the Pentagon Papers series; and in 1974, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for his coverage of the Soviet Union and its allies in Eastern Europe.

Since leaving the Times over two decades ago, Smith decided to get serious about his contribution to American journalism.

The former Times Washington Bureau Chief has gone on to publish five books and produced more than 50 hours of long-form documentary television. His most recent book, ``Who Stole the American Dream?'' , which came out in September 2012, landed on The New York Times national bestseller’s list, while remaining a best seller in a number of cities.

Smith considers his latest effort, ``Who Stole the American Dream’’ his best effort so far. `` It is sharp on the central issues of our society, economy and politics today and probably for years to come.’’  ``Working on it’’ Smith said, `` certainly changed my own thinking and writing.’’

Another highly successful book of his was ``The Russians’’ , based on his years as New York Times’ Moscow Bureau Chief from 1971-74, which smashed the charts as a No. 1 American best-seller. It has since been translated into 16 languages and has been widely used in university and college courses.  That book was followed by yet another national best-seller, ``The Power Game: How Washington Works’’ , an influential political masterpiece considered a bible for newly elected members of Congress and their staffs, and became bedside reading for President Clinton, a master politician in his own right.

For PBS since 1989, Smith has created 26 prime-time specials and mini-series on such hotly debated and much discussed topics as terrorism, Wall Street, Soviet perestroika, Wal-Mart, Enron, tax evasion, educational reform, health care and Washington’s power game. Two of his Frontline programs, `` The Wall Street Fix’’ and ``Can You Afford to Retire?’’ won Emmys, while two others, ``Critical Condition’’ and ``Tax Me If You Can’’ were nominated.

On two different occasions, Smith either won or shared the Columbia-Dupont Gold Baton, or grand prize, for best public affairs program on U.S. television for Inside Gorbachev’s USSR in 1990, and for Inside the Terror Network in 2002, an investigation of the Al Qaeda pilots who carried out the 9/11 attack and how the U.S. failed to stop them. In addition to the George Polk, George Peabody and Sidney Hillman awards for reporting excellence, his programs have won two national public service awards.

Asked about the calamitous state of the newspaper industry with more downsizing, buyouts, or layoffs being announced seemingly every other week, Smith said, ``The print newspaper business obviously faces enormous challenges and probably another decade of sorting out and finding a way into the future, but I believe that news organizations of some kind will continue to exist because there is a fairly large elite that wants and demands quality news that can only be produced by established news organizations such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, NPR, PBS, and others.’’

Does he have any practical remedies to revive the newspaper industry?

``My hunch'' Smith tells me, `` is that some news organizations over time will find ways to form collaboratives with elements of the non-profit world such as libraries, universities and all kinds of charitable organizations. All those institutions have a strong self-interest in preserving and fueling the flow of quality information being produced and circulated among civil leaders and decision-makers.''

The most important change, as Smith sees it, is that the news industry is going to have to drastically change how it markets and disseminates news. What Smith finds most irksome is the way college-educated younger generation having been getting news for free, which Google encourages by cannibalizing news gathered by news organizations at terribly high cost and distributes free of charge.

Smith strongly believes that ``quality news costs a lot of money to produce, a lot of trained, educated, dedicated, very hard working people to produce and so you cannot just expect to pluck it off the Internet tree like so much ripe fruit.''

According to Smith, it will be the responsibility of media managers and owners to impress upon the current generation of college students that quality news coverage is worth paying for if they expect to have successful careers, understand the complexities of the world, make political and personal decisions, and lead interesting lives.

The Emmy Award producer, Pulitzer Prize recipient and bestselling author is confident that the news world of 2025 may look quite different from the news world of 2000, ``but there will be a news world with perhaps more secure footing than today's.’’

Born in Kilmacolm, Scotland and educated at The Choate School in Wallingford, Connecticut, Smith’s first newspaper reporting job was with The Greenville (S.C.) News during the 1950′s. After graduating from Williams College (where he earned a B.A. in American history and literature)  he did graduate work as a Fulbright Scholar at Oxford University. After serving three years in the U.S. Air Force, he landed at United Press International in Memphis, Nashville and Atlanta from 1959 through 1962.  He was hired by The New York Times in 1962 where he remained until 1988. While working for the Times, he was chosen for a prestigious Nieman Fellowship at Harvard in 1969-70.

Smith informs me he is married to Susan Zox, an artist, a supremely good chef and wonderfully entertaining and bright life companion. They have four children, two step daughters, and eight grandchildren.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
January 14, 2013

 

 

Former N.Y. Times War Correspondent Stephen Kinzer Still Hiding Behind Bushes

When I spoke over the phone recently with former New York Times reporter Stephen Kinzer [See his home page ], it became immediately clear to me this award winning war correspondent doesn’t cover Washington, or go on power runs with four star generals or hobnob with Tampa socialites; he’s more interested in journalism. Kinzer has spent the bulk of his reporting career, after all, hiding in bushes while being shot at, beaten by police, tear-gassed, bombed from the air, and even jailed while covering over 50 countries in five continents.

After spending over 20 years with The New York Times, mostly as a foreign correspondent, which included tours of duty in Nicaragua as bureau chief (1983-1989), chief of Times’ bureau in Germany (1990-1996; Berlin is where he met his wife), and chief of the newly opened bureau in Istanbul, Turkey (1996-2000), he decided to leave the newspaper business in 2006 to teach and devote more time to his real interests in hot spots spanning the globe.

Asked the biggest reason for leaving the Times, Kinzer said that he was unhappy and uncomfortable with the way the American press during the Iraq war was ``cheering up’’ the war effort.  At least in the early stages of the conflict, Kinzer thought the media coverage was ``one of the most shameful episodes in the history of the American press. We became handmaidens of power. We let Washington set our agenda for us, which I hate.’’

The other reason Kinzer left was that he was at the point in his career that he didn’t like getting bogged down in having to report on the flavor of the day; he was more interested in writing about what most interested him, which is incompatible with today’s journalism.  So when he was offered a teaching position at Northwestern University, he thought the stars were perfectly aligned for him to begin a new chapter in his career.

And that he did.

In 2006, Kinzer published ``Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq’’ , which recounts the 14 times the U.S. has tried to overthrow governments.  He's also written, ``All the Shah’s Men:  An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror’’ ; and most recently, ``Reset: Iran, Turkey, and America’s Future’’ , which sketches his vision for rebuilding America's strategic partnerships in the Middle East.

What Kinzer finds most troubling with so many news organizations shutting down foreign bureaus is that we seem to be only reporting on American foreign policy. ``Covering what’s going between the Pentagon and the State Department and the White House is one thing’’ Kinzer points out, ``but that’s not covering the world.’’

And speaking of covering the world, what does he think is the United State’s biggest foreign policy challenge as President Obama prepares to begin his second term in office?

Kinzer contends East Asia is where we ought to be focusing our attention. ``It’s going to be very difficult for us to deal with the rise of China,’’ Kinzer warns.  ``China is not our enemy, God forbid that it would ever become our enemy’’ he explains, `` it’s not really an ally. This might the biggest foreign policy challenge the U.S. has ever faced. We are not able to focus on it to the extent that we should because so much of our diplomatic and political focus is on the Middle East.’’ He believes strongly that the U.S. needs to lighten its footprint in the Middle East. 

In the Greater Middle East or Central Asia in particular, Kinzer, like many other harsh critics of U.S. foreign policy, argues that not only was little accomplished by the U.S’s efforts in Afghanistan, but we ended up with a situation which is far worse than when it started.   Kinzer has vehemently argued in the past that our biggest mistake or ``original sin’’ in Afghanistan was in arming and training jihadis to fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s, which ultimately created the Taliban as we know them today.  `` We effectively created the momentum that produced September 11th  and Al Qaeda.’’ ``Afghanistan’’, Kinzer argues, ``is a great example of how we [U.S. government] do things that might feel good in the short run, but actually undermines our national security in the long run.’’

So if he had President Obama’s ear, what diplomatic efforts should take priority in the international arena?

``It would be great if there could be another effort in the Middle East’’ Kinzer told me. `` We have to resist temptations to go back into Iraq and Afghanistan, those are bad temptations. I would like to see some new effort made on the Israel Palestine issue. There’s even been talk that Bill Clinton would be a good negotiator for that, which I think is probably true. ‘’ Most important, Kinzer maintains, it’s incumbent upon the U.S. to exhibit some prudence and lower the heat level in our rhetoric about Iran and not follow the war path like so many people in Washington. 

With Susan Rice facing blistering attacks about her initial assessment of the deadly attack on a diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, I asked Kinzer about the U.N. ambassador’s diplomatic skills. When asked if Rice would eventually be confirmed as the next secretary of state, Kinzer said simply, ``I hope not.’’

``She [Rice] is the hectorer in chief’’ Kinzer says. `` There isn’t a day that goes by that she doesn’t have some other country to criticize.  One doesn’t do enough for human rights, one is involved in sexual trafficking, another one is not doing enough to combat the drug trade, another doesn’t have enough religious freedom.’’ Rice’s diplomacy, according to Kinzer, is a classic example of someone exhibiting an American-centric view of the world.

Our conversation briefly turned toward the U.S. budget deficit.

With exploding debt to contend with, the White House and Congress are on the verge of approaching the dreaded ``fiscal cliff’’ unless a compromise is reached. The tone of the debate, as widely reported, has reached fever pitch over which programs will absorb the brunt of the budget cuts. In 2011, 20 percent of the U.S. budget, or $718 billion, paid for defense and security-related international activities. Interestingly, according the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the same percentage, another 20 percent of the budget, or $731 billion, paid for Social Security, which provided retirement benefits averaging $1,229 per month to 35.6 million retired workers in December 2011.

Asked whether he thought the U.S. was overextended militarily, Kinzer answered with a resounding yes.  ``We have over 700 military bases around the world. We have way too many troops. We have way too many troops abroad. We have 60,000 troops in Germany; for what? What are we protecting them against?’’ `` We have 11 aircraft carriers’’, Kinzer calls attention to, `` no other country has more than one--and the personnel to run a single carrier group is larger than the total number of diplomats at the State Department.’’  According to Kinzer, we [the U.S.]  need to make significant reductions abroad, which would probably increase our security rather than harm it.

What grade, then, would he assign President Obama on his foreign policy initiatives up to this point? ``An incomplete,’’ Kinzer says.

As we wrapped our conversation, I asked this former newspaper veteran who spent over 20 years at a daily newspaper how disheartened he’s become witnessing so many print newspapers struggling to survive as the migration to the Internet picks up steam? ``There’s no reason to become emotional about it’’, Kinzer told me, ``because it’s a reality.’’

`` My general view’’ Kinzer explained further, `` is the delivery of news is changing in dramatic ways, and will continue to change into ways we can’t even predict.’’ ``At the end of the day’’, Kinzer stressed, ``there is still one function of journalism that cannot be computerized and that is reporters. You’re always going to need reporters. Reporters are going to have to maintain the same kind of standards and the same kind of interests, the same kind of work ethic. The fundamentals of what journalism is about don’t necessarily change. What will change is the delivery of news.’’

Before joining the Times as bureau chief in Nicaragua in 1983, Kinzer was a Latin America correspondent for the Boston Globe. He ended up writing two books about the region, ``Blood-Brothers: Life and War in Nicaragua and co-authored ``Bitter Fruit: The Story of the American Coup in Guatemala''

In 1988, Columbia University awarded Kinzer its Maria Moors Cabot prize for outstanding coverage of Latin America; and in 2009, Dominican University in River Forest, Illinois, awarded him an honorary doctorate. The University of Scranton additionally awarded Kinzer an honorary doctorate in 2010.

Kinzer and his wife Marianne, who have a grown daughter, live in Boston, where he now teaches in the Department of International Relations as a visiting professor at Boston University with a specialization in International Journalism, Intercultural Communication, U. S. Foreign Policy, and the politics of Turkey, Iran, Rwanda, and Central America.

In addition to writing books and teaching,  Kinzer contributes articles to the New York Review of Books, The Daily Beast, and writes a world affairs column for The Guardian.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
December 3, 2012

 

Deborah Blum, Master of Reinvention!

Believe it or not, journalists, yes even print journalists, can reinvent themselves.

Deborah Blum [See her home page ], never shy about reinventing herself, entered college to become a scientist before switching majors and colleges to pursue a journalism degree, later quit her journalism job to study science writing, came back to newspaper reporting as a science writer, then left journalism again to devote herself full-time to book writing and teaching journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Along the way, she earned a Pulitzer Prize in the category of beat reporting in 1992.

For those troubled about the rapid crumbling of the daily newspaper and the end of serious journalism, Blum points out that the industry is actually in a state of evolution, not decline.

At the journalism classes she teaches, for example, Blum regularly bears witness to students landing jobs across a range of platforms, including as data-visualization journalists, others as multi-media and social media specialists.  ``The trick,’’ Blum says, `` is to be aware of this, to be smart about the new skills we [journalists] want to acquire, and to believe that we are capable of reinventing ourselves. It's never going to look like the journalism that I grew up with. But it's got all the promise and risks of reinvention, both individually and across the profession.’’

Despite the new opportunities available in journalism, particularly online journalism, the Urbana, Illinois native still mourns parts of her profession, especially the more specialized forms of journalism that have been pushed off the pages of many daily newspapers due to plummeting advertising revenue and drastically reduced news space. In particular, Blum feels the areas where newspapers have been most significantly damaged, have been in investigative reporting (that is now often replaced by non-profit investigative centers), the lack of staff and shoe leather reporting necessary to adequately cover a city, and the woeful lack of coverage devoted to specialty beats like science. ``We don't do great print journalism today if we measure ourselves against that standard’’ Blum says.

Though no longer working for a newspaper, Blum continues to freelance for a number of publications, including Scientific American, Slate, The Los Angeles Times, and The Wall Street Journal. In addition to teaching journalism and writing books, she blogs as a science writer for WIRED and is actually getting paid for her efforts, something not many online sites are willing to do these days.  Blum strongly believes a key component of the evolution of journalism from print to online is the need to bring online pay up to living pay for a lot more writers and journalists. ``That's starting to happen’’ Blum tells me, `` but like everyone else; I'd love to see it happen faster.’’

After graduating from the University of Georgia with a degree in journalism (including a double-minor in anthropology and political science) Blum reported for The Times, in Gainesville, Ga., The Macon (Ga.) Telegraph, and the St. Petersburg Times in Florida, covering police and fires, courts, city government, and education.  Motivated to cultivate more of an area of expertise, she then enrolled at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to study science writing in the journalism school’s specialized reporting program.

Armed with a master’s degree in environmental journalism, Blum resumed her reporting career as science writer for McClatchy Newspapers in California, starting with The Fresno Bee and moving to The Sacramento Bee in 1984.  She worked in Sacramento for 13 years, covering everything from glaciers in Alaska, witnessing the volcanoes in Hawaii, writing about the triumphant arrival of Voyager 2 to the tragedy of the space shuttle Challenger.

In 1992, at The Sacramento Bee, Blum won a Pulitzer for her series, "The Monkey Wars," which explored the complex ethical and moral questions surrounding primate research. The series led to a book, ``The Monkey Wars’’ , published by Oxford University Press in 1994.

Blum left newspapering in 1997 to take a position as professor of journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; where she currently holds the endowed chair as the Helen Firstbrook Franklin Professor of Journalism. 

Away from the classroom, Blum continues to write books; most recently, she wrote an e-single for The Atavist called ``Angel Killer: A True Story of Cannibalism, Crime Fighting, and Insanity in New York City’’  which tells the story of a savage cannibal killer and the detective who brought him to justice. She’s also written ``The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York’’ , which made its way on The New York Times paperback best seller list. She is now under contract with Penguin Group for a book about poisonous food.

Though born in Urbana, Illinois, Blum and her family, including her sisters Darcy, Dawn and Dana moved to Baton Rouge, Louisiana when she was only two, where the Blum girls or the ``four D’s’’ as they were affectionately known, kept snakes as pets, grew tadpoles into frogs, collected butterflies, and waded in neighborhood swamps where they lived in fear of crayfish climbing into their boots. One of her fondest childhood memories is of her and her sisters following her father Murray S. Blum (an entomologist) and her mother Nancy Ann Blum, (an educator and writer) around the world on bug hunting adventures from Costa Rica and Puerto Rico to the England and Canada.

Her third book, ``Love at Goon Park; Harry Harlow and the Science of Affection’’  was published by Perseus Books in 2002 and was a finalist for The Los Angeles Times Book Prize; that was followed with ``Ghost Hunters: William James and the Search for Scientific Proof of Life After Death'', (published in 2006) a compelling tale involving a group of brilliant 19th century scientists who were willing to risk their careers to investigate the idea that the dead can communicate with the living.

Blum is married to Peter Haugen, a writer himself, who is the author of ``World History for Dummies’’  .  They have two sons, Marcus, currently studying archeology at the University of Wisconsin, and Lucas, a sophomore in high school.

So for those discouraged and pessimistic over the calamitous state of affairs within the newspaper industry, you can take heart in knowing Blum is a middle-aged journalist whose first job involved a typewriter. But as Blum herself tells me, ``I'm working harder and doing more interesting journalism than I ever did. So that's a good sign!’’

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
November 25, 2012

Former Washington Reporter Jim Mann Blazed a New Career as Award-Winning Author on Foreign Policy

It was certainly nice catching up with Jim Mann [See Biography ], a Washington-based author who spent 33 years reporting for a number of daily newspapers, the last 23 of those years with The Los Angeles Times before accepting a buyout in 2001.

Since leaving the newspaper industry, Mann has written a number of books, including a national best-seller and is now an author-in-residence at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.

Soon after graduating from Harvard University, the Albany native began reporting for the New Haven Journal in 1968 before landing at The Washington Post, where he worked in the Metro Department from 1969 through 1972, covering everything from the federal courthouse to Watergate.

Mann was not only assigned to do some early reporting in the Watergate scandal, including covering the burglars’ trial during the long blistering summer of 1972, but was instrumental in getting future Pulitzer-Prize winner Bob Woodward hired at the Post.

Asked about his recollections of Mann, Bob Woodward, responding through an email, wrote: `` Jim [Mann] is one of the most aggressive, thoughtful reporters of his generation.’’  `` Yes’’, Mr. Woodward recalled, ``he was more than instrumental in pushing the Post Metropolitan Editor Harry Rosenfeld to hire me in 1971.  I was then working for the Montgomery County Sentinel, a weekly in the suburban Maryland County which Jim was covering for the Post.’’ And as a ringing endorsement to the superior quality of Mann’s brand of journalism, Woodward went on to write: `` If the average newspaper reporter had one half his brainpower, we would be a much more respected profession.’’

According to David Halberstam’s ``The Powers That Be’’ Woodward wasn’t interested in the Watergate story at first or at least not interested in devoting 100 percent of his energy to , since he was pursuing other stories, including a local drug dealer who was selling millions of dollars’ worth of heroin in the Washington area.  What Woodward really wanted was the prestigious federal court beat which had opened up when Mann decided to take a year-long sabbatical to accompany his wife, Caroline, a student in classical archaeology to the renowned American Academy in Rome so that she could finish her dissertation. In his book, Halberstam erroneously reported Mann’s wife was an architectural student.

In any event, the Post didn’t take kindly to one of their ``brightest young reporters’’ darting off to a foreign country in the midst of such an explosive story. According to Halberstam, the Post’s metro editor Harry Rosenfeld would later refer to Mann as ``the reporter who walked away from Watergate.’’

When asked if he had any regrets about taking a sabbatical at such an inopportune time, Mann said,  ``To put it less negatively than Harry's one-liner from long ago,  I went off for a year to support the fledgling career  of the woman whom I had just married, and who, now four decades later, I love more than ever. Back in the early 1970s, some of the Post's editors thought that while a woman should follow her husband's career all over the globe, a man should not follow his wife's career beyond the first taxi zone. I went off, Watergate certainly got covered just fine without me, and I certainly did just fine without Watergate."

After leaving the Post, Mann spent a couple of years with the Philadelphia Inquirer, then returned to Washington to cover the Supreme Court for the Baltimore Sun. Beginning in 1978, he started reporting for the Los Angeles Times, first covering the Supreme Court then as Beijing bureau chief in China from 1984 through 1987.  Back on American soil, Mann later became a correspondent and columnist on foreign affairs based in the Times’ Washington Bureau.

During his reporting career at the Times, Mann had written two books, ``Beijing Jeep: The Short, Unhappy Romance of American Business in China’’ (1989) and ``About Face: A History of America's Curious Relationship with China, from Nixon to Clinton’’ (1999).

As the new millennium was drawing near, Mann gave serious thought to hanging up his reporter’s notebook to devote himself full-time to writing books. Unlike others who found the routine of writing books onerous and miserable until their book was finally completed, Mann actually enjoyed the process, more than he enjoyed the daily grind of newspaper deadlines.  And with having one of his two children having already graduated from college, he thought the initial loss of income if he left the paper would still be financial feasible. So when the Times (who had just being taken over by the Tribune Company) offered an attractive buyout package in 2001 to its employees, Mann figured this was an exit strategy made to order. At the time, he didn’t have a clear blue print of what he wanted to do, but with his wife supporting whatever decision he made, Mann took the money and ran.

He tells me he ventured into the publishing field at just the right time.  In 2001, the publishing industry was much healthier than it is today, and you didn’t have to be Stephen King to get published, making it much easier for new authors like Mann to break in.

With barely one foot out the door at the Times, Mann was offered a position as a writer-in-residence at one of the leading foreign-policy think tanks, the Center for Strategic and International Studies where he would begin writing a book that would carefully scrutinize and examine the ideas embraced by George W. Bush’s foreign policy team. Since he had interviewed these officials and followed their careers over many years, dating back to the Ford and Reagan administrations, Mann figured he was well armed with background material on these cabinet members. He began the book soon after 9/11.

In writing a previous book about China, Mann came across declassified documents in the Ford Library involving Cheney and Rumsfeld several years earlier, information which prompted him to write the book. According to Mann, ``I had no idea when I started interviews in 2001 that, less than 18 months later, the people I was covering would be leading America into war with Iraq.’’

His finished product was ``Rise of the Vulcans: The History of Bush's War Cabinet''   , published in 2004, which became an instant best-seller and still stands as one of the primary source materials on the Bush team.

Reviewing the book for the journal Foreign Affairs, Lawrence D. Freedman wrote: `` Journalists, rather than academics, are providing the essential reading on the origins and course of President George W. Bush's "war on terror." Fortunately, their skill at getting original material and then telling a good story…. is matched by a keen sense of historical context.’’

Soon after the release of ``Vulcans'' in 2004, Mann left the Center for Strategic and International Studies and took up residence at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington, where he continues to write books at the Foreign Policy Institute, the school's internal think tank. Over the past eight years, Mann has written three books at SAIS and is preparing to begin his fourth. On occasion, he also teaches mini-courses or seminars on history and biography.

Never afraid to lunge into a contentious issue, especially one that he believes strongly in, after the publication of ``Vulcans'', Mann’s next book would be his most controversial when he returned to the subject he knows best: China. In 2007, Mann came out with ``The China Fantasy: How Our Leaders Explain Away Chinese Repression’’ , a slim pithy book which casts a suspicious eye over ``Washington think tanks’’ that advance certain theories about China and ignore others when it doesn’t fit into their financial or other self-interest paradigms. Mann, for instance, outlined two prevailing schools of thought erroneously advocated by American scholars and politicians: one that capitalist reforms in China will inevitably lead to democratic reforms; the other theory holds that China is headed for political and social collapse. In fact, Mann argues, both of these assumptions ignore the cold hard alternative reality, which is China may very well continue its rise as a formidable economic competitor and remain in good standing within the "international community’’ while continuing to be a repressive, one-party state.

``I think it's fair to say’’, Mann said, ``that mainstream China scholars hated the book, but I had the satisfaction of writing something I deeply believe, and to challenge the prevailing notion that American political leaders, up to and including Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, had been regularly putting forward.’’

Beginning in 2005, Mann examined Ronald Reagan’s role in the end of the Cold War. He spent an academic semester in Germany as a fellow of the American Academy in Berlin, where he was able to interview Helmut Kohl and a host of other people in the former West and East Germany about American policy in the late 1980s; this in addition to conducting a number of interviews with officials in Washington. The result was "The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan: A History of the End of the Cold War’’ , published in 2009. In the book, Mann argued, to the anger of many conservatives, that Reagan didn’t ``win’’ the Cold War by military strength; rather it came about largely through his skillful diplomacy with Mikhail Gorbachev, something liberals never gave the ``Great Communicator’’ enough credit for.

Much like his examination of George W. Bush’s foreign policy, Mann began writing a book soon after Barack Obama took office, evaluating his foreign policy actions, resulting in ``The Obamians: The Struggle Inside the White House to Redefine American Power’’  , which was published last June.  After traveling the country promoting the book, Mann can say without hesitation that unlike during the Bush years, the country is more preoccupied with Mr. Obama’s domestic agenda than is with his foreign policy.

As for other projects in the works? Mann says, `` I'll keep on writing as long as it works.’’ He was asked to do a volume for the American Presidents Series , started by Arthur Schlesinger- which will be a collection of short biographies of American presidents, written mostly by historians, with a few written by other prominent authors or journalists like Mann. He was assigned a volume on George W. Bush.  So any readers out there who might have some keen insight into Mr. Bush’s life or would care to share their childhood memories of the 43rd president, Mann would love to hear from you.

Aside from his professional projects, Mann informs me his wife is preparing to wind down her teaching duties at Howard University over the next couple of years (where she teaches classics) and both look forward to doing a great deal of traveling. Mann is even hoping to write "a book or two" during or about his travels.

He tells me his two kids are both grown, employed and married; and his first two grandchildren were born over the past two years, and a third is coming in December. ``Grandchildren are more fun than anything else’’ he says.

For a person who supposedly walked away from the Watergate story, Jim Mann, I’d say, has lived a productive, well-traveled life, one that most of us can only dream about.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
September 5, 2012

Jim Marrs Uncovering Conspiracies Deep in the Heart of Texas

Always on the move and having yet met a conspiracy he didn’t like, former Fort Worth Star-Telegram staffer Jim Marrs [See Biography  ] stopped by to say a quick hello and inform me that after witnessing the loss of conventional journalism, he left the newspaper business some time ago to devote himself full-time to writing books.

Though he has traveled down a different path, the Texan says he’s continued his ``role as a professional journalist’’, only today, Marrs said, `` I try to tell truth through book publishing rather than newspapers. ’'

Since he interviewed so many of the characters involved in the John F. Kennedy assassination over the years, including  Marguerite and Marina Oswald and having taught a course on the assassination at the University of Texas at Arlington for 30 years, Marrs decided to write about the subject he knew best, which resulted in ``Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy’’ .

To his surprise and good fortune, the book became the basis for the Oliver Stone’s 1991 film "JFK’’ starring Kevin Costner and Tommy Lee Jones.  Marrs tells me ``Crossfire’’ has been updated, which will be published in time for the 50th anniversary of the JFK assassination.

Marrs has now authored a total of 11 books , four of which have become New York Times Best Sellers and another one will be published in 2013.

A familiar theme running through his books has been developing in great detail conspiracy theories and the hidden truths largely ignored by mainstream news organizations.  In addition to his conspiracy theory with the Kennedy assassination, Marrs has written about UFOs and Extraterrestrial Aliens, suggesting UFOs are real, while offering evidence of government cover-ups, and proof that Earth has been visited by alien life forms.

Similarly, in ``Rule by Secrecy: The Hidden History that Connects the Trilateral Commission, the Freemasons, and the Great Pyramids’’, Marrs traces the history of secret societies, connecting them to events ranging from wars, stock markets, class distinctions and censoring news by advancing theories that key world calamities were manipulated by the financial dynasties, such as the Rockefellers, Morgans, and Rothschilds.

More recently, in ``Inside Job: Unmasking the 9-11 Conspiracies’’ Marrs describes the hidden role of the George Bush White House in perpetrating the 9/11 attacks and in government agencies destroying key evidence after the attacks.

A native of Fort Worth Texas,  Marrs graduated with a degree in journalism from the University of  North Texas located in Denton, a city located on the northern edge of the Dallas–Fort Worth metropolitan area. He soon landed a job at the Denton Record Chronicle where he worked as a reporter and editor. 

By the late 1960’s, Marrs moved to Lubbock, Texas and began working as a reporter, editor and photographer for the Lubbock Avalanche Journal; and soon after that he became editor of a weekly publication, the Lubbock Sentinel.

Marrs eventually returned to his native soil in Fort Worth and started working for the Fort Worth Star- Telegram in 1968, where he stayed for a dozen years as a police, general assignment reporter and feature writer covering everything from Europe to the unrest in the Middle East.

After taking a leave of absence to serve with a Fourth Army intelligence unit during the Vietnam War, Marrs became military and aerospace writer for the newspaper as well as an investigative reporter.

 While at the Star- Telegram, he received a number of writing awards from the Associated Press. He’s also been the recipient of the Aviation/Aerospace Writer’s Association’s National Writing Award and Newsmaker of the Year Award from the Fort Worth Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.  In 1993, Marrs was presented with Freedom Magazine’s Human Rights Leadership Award.

In the early 1980's, he published a rural weekly newspaper entitled, "The Springtown Current" as well as a monthly tourist tabloid for the North Side of Fort Worth entitled, "Cowtown Trails."

 Like so many other newspaper alums disheartened by the state of the newspaper industry,  Marrs said ``with blogs and social networking taking the place of ever-diminishing newspaper sales, the print media still haven't figured out what is wrong nor what to do about it. Sad.’’

Married for 44 years, he lives in North Texas with his wife. They have two grown daughters and a grandchild.

-Bill Lucey
[email protected]
August 22, 2012