tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-54362074135061096832024-03-26T20:54:12.790-07:00Media & Life: An Iowan's CommentaryCR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.comBlogger193125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-19241937597872894962024-03-26T20:53:00.000-07:002024-03-26T20:53:40.852-07:00How British Characters Get Dead: Politely<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimS72-uIjdUJvEJR_lBD5V8INNJ6SBZz8bczYbYyeXfjtmU1GDUATbQRHfTFCeB54LsFU10PIRsvukbxPEb2VD2qeN4gJpKg6s1Y-yF6fgPSvF0Xyp2Yo80jxhZq8tS7v4TkazkgDLL7X4Ont-_JblioZpU03euBVFQZTfr9yjkdgzE58H5Yx8NXju7rHM/s800/FanWiki-image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="MidSomer Murders Cast" border="0" data-original-height="281" data-original-width="800" height="140" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimS72-uIjdUJvEJR_lBD5V8INNJ6SBZz8bczYbYyeXfjtmU1GDUATbQRHfTFCeB54LsFU10PIRsvukbxPEb2VD2qeN4gJpKg6s1Y-yF6fgPSvF0Xyp2Yo80jxhZq8tS7v4TkazkgDLL7X4Ont-_JblioZpU03euBVFQZTfr9yjkdgzE58H5Yx8NXju7rHM/w400-h140/FanWiki-image.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Image of characters in “MidSomer Murders” from https://midsomermurders.fandom.com/wiki/Midsomer_Murders</i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i> </i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p>My wife and I recently have been enjoying a 20-year-old British TV show, “MidSomer Murders.” MidSomer, which I had incorrectly re-wrote in my mind as “Midsummer,” it appears, is a county in England, full of villages with rich, interesting, aroused, murderous people.<br /><br />It’s entertaining on several levels. For one thing, compared to most American crime shows, the show demands a lot of its viewer in terms of trying to follow multiple characters and multiple, convoluted clues. Frankly, even the creators got sometimes sidetracked—in one episode we watched, there seemed to be four murders, three of which were solved and one of which was forgotten.<br /><br />And then there are the character types that the show uses, which are significantly different than characters seen in American TV crime shows:<br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Horny old ladies</b>. Lots of suggestive looks and double entendres from gray hairs who clearly aren’t yet done.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Horny middle-aged people.</b> Hollywood acts as if everybody who is an object of desire is 20-something and hot. MidSomer Murders acts as if everybody is 40 or 50, and mildly attractive, and very hot to trot.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Weird, dysfunctional families</b>. Way more brothers and sisters or people who are brothers and sisters and don’t know it who deliberately or accidentally ending up, well, you know. Yikes! Everybody is horny. Watch out for the vicars, too.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Killers with strange, obscure motives.</b> Maybe taking revenge for the other crime that happened 120 years ago. Sometimes there’s a slightly supernatural twist—a ghost or “second sight.” Sometimes, the jilted wife is enraged because the husband’s lover has refused him and yet he still loves her and somehow that justifies killing some third party. Motives tend to be a bit complex in this universe.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Children who are not always cute and cuddly.</b> They often are up to their own nefarious deeds. Facts.</li></ul><p>There are also the British settings. Spooky, foggy woods. Old houses. Big old barns. Ancient churches. Broken down trailers/train cars/shacks that some old hermit occupies, sometimes as victim, sometimes as killer, sometimes as weird antihero.<br /><br />Then there are the recurring characters in the series—Chief Inspector Barnaby and sidekick (there have been more than one). He of the heavy gorilla gate, walking like a tired linebacker through murder scenes, musing to his sidekick about when he is being lied to or who is to be trusted—always, in the end, figuring it out.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE_l2H_EANGHhVVsapRNZVdPeKn2eFmxgbo1qwE3eeWHzCP-Fqy7wyhAlxubvFJlv-crj7UbXaONwysqFiwC0QwJARM__RhBLp3TlCOOACy6lS3LfQ2gYjLGd3luJTfcKZfC0ThL4jVY2hdg-4yAt4vT8KmVU5vWgFDIs-iA_gbgbT_1nHW9M6abmGVzKm/s504/family.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="477" data-original-width="504" height="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE_l2H_EANGHhVVsapRNZVdPeKn2eFmxgbo1qwE3eeWHzCP-Fqy7wyhAlxubvFJlv-crj7UbXaONwysqFiwC0QwJARM__RhBLp3TlCOOACy6lS3LfQ2gYjLGd3luJTfcKZfC0ThL4jVY2hdg-4yAt4vT8KmVU5vWgFDIs-iA_gbgbT_1nHW9M6abmGVzKm/s320/family.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Barnaby family, from http://midsomermurders.org/fitmurder.htm</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>She’s not in every episode, but we’re both fond of the inspector’s daughter, who adds some levity to the show. And there are jokes about Mrs. Barnaby, portrayed as an intelligent woman who totally lacks culinary skills (her terrible cooking is an ongoing joke of the series).<br /><b><br />And then there are the murders, </b>the weird, entertaining, strange English slaughters. Is the murder rate so low in England that English writes have some trouble understanding how murder works? There are a fair number of shootings, despite strict gun law, but often the murders are overly creative, weirdly complicated and seem like enormous gambles—if you shove the old guy over the edge of the bridge and he falls 5 feet into the shallow stream, how can you be so sure death will be the result? The killers are really lucky in this show.<br /><br />A typical murder scene: There have been several people in the bell ringing choir or lollypop guild or some other select group, found over the past couple of days with skulls bashed in (or burned inside an effigy or shot at a distance with a target arrow neatly through the heart—don’t he British have any hunting arrows?). Yet, victim number three in the targeted group hears a suspicious noise in the West Wing. She puts on her dressing gown and gingerly pads down the hall, oblivious to the spooky music playing. Suddenly, from behind, we can see the candlestick—odd that, on edge as she should be, she didn’t sense someone walking behind her—and, after she turns and stands still with a frightened look, wham.<br /><br />Well, a hard clock to the noggin will do it. Yet, so often, the victim sees the murderer brandishing said candlestick, and yet just stands there, a slightly surprised look on their face, awaiting the right moment in the musical score for the big swing. So polite and cooperative, these English murder victims.<br /><br />In one episode, an antique dealer enters his establishment, packed full of stuff. Far above him, a desk is slowly pushed off of an edge. He stares blankly upward, watching gravity perform its inevitable function. Step to the side? Lift arms to shield head? No, that would be rude—it’s so much more polite to just stand there and wait for the blow, because, well, British.<br /><br />We’re in the an early season of the series, and my wife has seen more of the shows than I have (a retired person has more evenings free for TV viewing than an employed professor does). I know from looking online that this long-running series, which began in 1997 and was still going on in 2023, goes through a number of cast and character changes, so the current inspector Barnaby may not be forever, even if murderous and horny MidSomer County is.<br /><br />We’ll have to see, but as we get to more modern times, more recent years, are the aged still randy? And do the murder victims still stand there and politely take it? One can only hope so.<br /><br /></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-84611107594112170652024-03-07T12:08:00.000-08:002024-03-07T12:08:35.175-08:00What I Like and Disliked Exploring 2019 Dora Movie<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NW6Q8M77-NE" width="320" youtube-src-id="NW6Q8M77-NE"></iframe></div><p>On the recommendation of a family member, I checked out a DVD of “Dora the Explorer: The Lost City of Gold” from the Marion Public Library.</p><p>The plan was to watch it with a grandson who was staying with us that weekend, but the second-grader rejected that option, claiming that Dora and Boots are a menace to society (there is no reason—he’s a second grader), instead preferring “Muppets Treasure Island.” It was, all things considered, a reasonable choice, and the Muppet movie, which draws from classic literature, was better than the Dora movie, drawn from an old TV show.</p><p>I watched Dora on my own last night.</p><p>The family member who recommended Dora didn’t claim it was a great film, merely that it was fun to see a live actor behaving like Dora, especially when the scene shifts to Dora’s high school years in LA. On that criterion, I would say Dora hit its mark. It playfully portrayed a blend of a cartoon universe with what would happen if that universe intersected the real world.</p><p>In particular, I had never seen Isabela Moner, who plays the teen Dora, before—and I think she does a fine job, believably inhabiting the persona of an improbably upbeat cartoon teenager from the jungle suddenly thrust into the jungle of American high school.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZtjKHaecy84bo_YRcbFup8PqkOhtugzRwZlkuM0oypuwCWtjU_gUZZiowzz2p0_jw8zvaTuNU1RaO5GXVXzP-tufONnIEgU4K18lizYH0-gJx1XVkdmZ_YJuRuVIfTxYtex9dS8vgqENMTFDvcu4nK7lVX-1PdbdP5vBsWIJZlae_RZFehirz49mQACf7/s1200/dora2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZtjKHaecy84bo_YRcbFup8PqkOhtugzRwZlkuM0oypuwCWtjU_gUZZiowzz2p0_jw8zvaTuNU1RaO5GXVXzP-tufONnIEgU4K18lizYH0-gJx1XVkdmZ_YJuRuVIfTxYtex9dS8vgqENMTFDvcu4nK7lVX-1PdbdP5vBsWIJZlae_RZFehirz49mQACf7/w266-h400/dora2.jpg" width="266" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Image from Paramount Pictures Dora page.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>The film was also deeply flawed. It set up too many pointless action sequences, as modern movies have a tendency to do. Many of the supporting character were thin as cardboard. The teens in LA were trope teens, with the “popular girl” improbably being roped along on the jungle adventure just to provide a wholly unbelievable romance with poor Diego.</p><p>At least, and I am grateful for this, Dora herself, while she meets a boy who becomes her friend, is not on the hunt for any boyfriend.</p><p>Any movie of this sort is best if it has an interesting villain—think of Tim Curry as Long John Silver in the aforementioned Muppet movie. Sadly, this is one goal the Dora movie doesn’t meet, with the villainous twist being totally unsurprising and the villain’s character and motivations being way too cartoonish.</p><p>Still, this flick is an homage to a cartoon. I’ve only seen snippets of the cartoon, but I suspect a fan who grew up on Dora would find this update fun.</p><p>And, even if would have liked more depth of character and believable creativity in the plot, I found this film watchable. There are some positive messages, some nice thoughts about the value of being true to yourself, some entertaining songs.</p><p>And Isabela Moner, who shows some promise as a young performer.</p><p>If I were rating this on the 5-point scale, I suppose I would consider it a lukewarm 3. I’m not going to rush back to the library to get it soon for a rewatch, but if the second grader suddenly decided that he’s a Dora fan and wants to see, well, OK.</p><p>The real winner here is the Marion Public Library. I know, it’s nice to get books at a library, too—but they seemed to have a very interesting DVD collection. Maybe I won’t be going back soon to explore Dora again—but there are other films there that I may watch this summer!</p><div><br /></div>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-85210658948078049152024-02-20T20:01:00.000-08:002024-02-21T04:36:43.786-08:00Thoughts on the Times We're In<p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCum-Ts8Eeinxi8QX7smZhbtWidSrW4MzcMbrGrITa6CNV3UeuYHy0KFWUujd-n6AZvrk24sLCn6fjrxP5HdjXoV-9a51qGuA61sLAXiV-7KTfqPMcZl8GxvEXycUzd87Q4iNl0s50E6VAdrGOiVBQj1JC1HJj1VBcQaa_8UuMntYDVK_RJYMRZeGneBJZ/s1800/horizontal%20logo.png"><img alt="Newspaper flag" border="0" height="134" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCum-Ts8Eeinxi8QX7smZhbtWidSrW4MzcMbrGrITa6CNV3UeuYHy0KFWUujd-n6AZvrk24sLCn6fjrxP5HdjXoV-9a51qGuA61sLAXiV-7KTfqPMcZl8GxvEXycUzd87Q4iNl0s50E6VAdrGOiVBQj1JC1HJj1VBcQaa_8UuMntYDVK_RJYMRZeGneBJZ/w400-h134/horizontal%20logo.png" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td><i>This year's flag of the Mount Mercy Times, designed by student Jenna Welty<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>As I noted on one of my other blogs, the Iowa College Media Association held its annual convention Feb. 8. On that blog post, <a href="https://crgardenjoe.wordpress.com/2024/02/14/message-of-icma-2024-seize-your-opportunities/">I wrote about </a>convention speakers and an award that I was honored to receive.<br><br>But what about the Mount Mercy Times? Well, the student “newspaper” at Mount Mercy University did well, earning six awards including four first-place honors. That’s the good news. The less good news is I’m struggling to see how we win as many in next year’s contest.<br><br>This is the first year that the Times has switched to an all-on-line news source. So far, it has not gone as well and I would hoped. I hate that we’re over halfway through the academic year and we don’t seem to be producing all of the stories we should be nor promoting our content enough. Why? I suppose you should probably ask the faculty advisor.<br><br>It’s me. Hi. I’m the problem it’s me.<br><br>Well, that’s not 100% true, but it’s 90% the case. Student media succeeds when students care about it enough, and, without a newspaper to produce, students have allowed The Times to become too much of an afterthought. My challenge is the ongoing one that is the most important to me: How do I inspire students to unleash their inner journalists?<br><br>If you know how to do that, please let me know. Honestly, I don’t think there is a simple answer, and I don’t expect one.<br><br>Anyway, enough griping. Let me spend a little time celebrating, too.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zgOO6Ejx0n5uIA0Zo7YWVeDcyQsOcYx1/view?usp=drive_link" target="_blank"><img alt="Image of profile" border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrYspn9jF7ZM_bVT95bYe_UyBzZhS_npPze3qXK_OD-OMlj6XCF37SU0dsOC1hv_5ToCGlZ_rn4Lo5HM5KGF1LPhBLgLmmggCZFeXn8K3ZhtJpNzUIHuSFvEJHbxg1tO18PcpJp439NWSnJlFBPvOpphR4ao0OeLy56CZ6Gzkfd3pausq5u6XTOo9zeAB2/w400-h400/profile_Page_1.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td><i>Image of winning profile. Image is link to document where you can see all MMU Times winners, or click <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zgOO6Ejx0n5uIA0Zo7YWVeDcyQsOcYx1/view?usp=drive_link" target="_blank">here</a>.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>The Times has a kind of story called a “snapshot,” which is a personality profile accompanied by at least one good image of the subjects, sometimes several images with the main one being a good profile picture. And Catherine Kratoska, a staff writer, was recognized for the best profile story in the recent 2023 contest for a story about Robin Clark-Bridges, a now-retired MMU librarian who created and tends two gardens at the entrance to the library.<br><br>I think it helps that Annie Barkalow, a talented student journalist at the time, made the images that go with the story. Good pictures help sell good personality stories.<br><br>And I take a little pride, too, in that the profile, while a kind of story the Times did on a regular basis, was also a direct result of a class assignment. In Introduction to Journalism, I have students do an interview lab—that spring, Clark-Bridges agreed to come to class for a sort of news conference, a group interview, and Kratoska’s story was originally a lab and homework class assignment.<br><br>Another first-place award was for staff editorials. Over the years, the Times has had a history of strong editorial writing. A good staff editorial reflects a depth of opinion that goes beyond an emotional rant—it should be a thoughtful advocacy on some controversy of relevance to the audience.<br><br>In the contest, a student media outlet can submit three staff editorials. The three that the Times submitted are:<br></p><ul><li>What MMU needs is a 'freedom of expression' policy, Dec. 8, 2022.</li><li>Questions of Justice: America, MMU still have work to do to combat system racism, Feb. 16, 2023.</li><li>No more stolen sisters: Join the right to end violence towards Indigenous women, May 4, 2023.</li></ul><p>I am particularly proud of the one on freedom of expression, a key issue at any university but a particular challenge at a private, Catholic university. It’s to MMU’s credit that, when the university did write its policy, it very much had the flavor that the students asked for—mostly, it’s a policy to protect, not quash, student expression.<br><br>And we won another first-place awards, too. The current editor of the Times, Delcie Sanache, is a sophomore nursing student who joined the Times staff last year as sports editor. As a freshman, she then took over when the previous editor had to step aside for personal reasons.<br><br>Photography hasn’t always been a strength of the Times, but Delcie made an image at a soccer game that judges said was the best sports photograph of the year.<br><br>Well, cool.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggsgnexON2a7JlvDVdBLAmdLzZ0KlZrXj9PBBkfB6CpUVXMZjrCnrXh_tL66zWjHvIumNsQZdSt1L0RaCqjZ-ZJPG1QhV9MjmueKrmgMacwfssOU10ZSBgKxf558JxYNg-E7o1eXUhL8aUjGDJ8w8EUFl74HmDHskAFBE7HmwCi7-sKN-mT4gaWo0P0kst/s1000/Soccer-picture.jpg"><img alt="Soccer image" border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggsgnexON2a7JlvDVdBLAmdLzZ0KlZrXj9PBBkfB6CpUVXMZjrCnrXh_tL66zWjHvIumNsQZdSt1L0RaCqjZ-ZJPG1QhV9MjmueKrmgMacwfssOU10ZSBgKxf558JxYNg-E7o1eXUhL8aUjGDJ8w8EUFl74HmDHskAFBE7HmwCi7-sKN-mT4gaWo0P0kst/w374-h400/Soccer-picture.jpg" width="374"></a></td></tr><tr><td><i>Delcie Senache's award-winner soccer image.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>And in fall, I wrote a blog post about how much I liked the Barbie movie, and a student in a writing class said she disagreed. I encouraged her to turn that disagreement into something, and she wrote her own review of Barbie.</p><p>It was, according to ICMA, the best review of the year. And it was <a href="https://mmutimes.org/feature/#I'm-a-Barbie-Girl-in-a-semi-Barbie-world" target="_blank">strictly online</a>—published this fall after the “paper’ had become a news web site. So, excellence in journalism and writing doesn’t depend on the dead trees, which is a good thought to keep hold of.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCxrBHIiZ91WZ6FH-DoguPtjDyS7l_kfAmu5IjKG0VMNmweq0OFME0-lcN8gKivBSKRcowvPvSOI1MP64430PXnlYrAt-2Vz0NrMpmwQBoNgFdtRn2N0GN8fpM7c627NoL09p4L_iLqeXTCW2yy_arxb3-iHuIe3SVz6QhozH0vpWMosT4KFQVR0ckSTCW/s586/review.jpg" target="_blank"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCxrBHIiZ91WZ6FH-DoguPtjDyS7l_kfAmu5IjKG0VMNmweq0OFME0-lcN8gKivBSKRcowvPvSOI1MP64430PXnlYrAt-2Vz0NrMpmwQBoNgFdtRn2N0GN8fpM7c627NoL09p4L_iLqeXTCW2yy_arxb3-iHuIe3SVz6QhozH0vpWMosT4KFQVR0ckSTCW/s320/review.jpg" width="216"></a></td></tr><tr><td><i>Screenshot of Barbie review.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>I’m hopeful that things can come together better for the Times this spring. Before Spring Break, I want us to be drawing more attention to good stories that students are executing well. We’ve produced some good stories this year, but again, not enough to have many contest entries for next year.<br><br>Well, contest entries aren’t the main point of college student media. The main point is that student journalism makes a difference at a college campus. In our culture at large, the decline in many local newspapers has led to “news deserts,” which means a key part of civic engagement, a voice that can make a difference in communities, is sadly lacking.<br><br>I don’t want that to happen at MMU. I may be near the end of my career, but I hope that the Times continues its mission to be an authentic student news media at Mount Mercy University.<br><br></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-81610034179796320122024-01-19T21:38:00.000-08:002024-01-25T08:59:54.432-08:00Wolfe Misses in 2016 Language Rumination<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja9Q5L7B4uqQTSNHTyyyN1fWXGTm8HUDXPXyIsD2PuWOtvldM5aPo6hm_Wi4o3EiUGm9UXy5KguoWWdYV_QeIpwYpFCvACFoO-336n13jKfAWq-B0YWeWGs9lexRJwYfNYxlISK9wsbZBKIJgTQY7LWPwIDDBoSAoyEcE4ae9Fr_FeoyB5ZAyE3FTu_oKZ/s400/Wolfe_at_White_House.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Tom Wolfe" border="0" data-original-height="297" data-original-width="400" height="297" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEja9Q5L7B4uqQTSNHTyyyN1fWXGTm8HUDXPXyIsD2PuWOtvldM5aPo6hm_Wi4o3EiUGm9UXy5KguoWWdYV_QeIpwYpFCvACFoO-336n13jKfAWq-B0YWeWGs9lexRJwYfNYxlISK9wsbZBKIJgTQY7LWPwIDDBoSAoyEcE4ae9Fr_FeoyB5ZAyE3FTu_oKZ/w400-h297/Wolfe_at_White_House.jpeg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From Wikimedia Commons, White House Photo by Susan Sterner.March 22 2004. American writer Tom Wolfe. I'm in general, a fan.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table>Tom Wolfe is an entertaining spinner of stories, although I tire, sometimes, of his typographic trickery and long, rambling sentences. Nonetheless, in a series of nonfiction works and novels stretching back to the 1960s, he’s an enchanting, worthwhile American writer, a unique, acerbic jester of words.<br><br>Late last December, the weather was not all that good and we were looking for something indoors to do with a grandson, so we took him to the main Cedar Rapid Library. I am a slow reader in a house full of books, so I have been a very infrequent library visitor—my card was so old I had to get a new one in order to use it.<br><br>But there I saw Wolfe’s 2016 book, “The Kingdom of Speech,” and obtained a new library card so that I could check it out. I think I've read most of his books and liked most of them, so why not?<br><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifU1mVZPq_yLLr78-GUO2zQJWEt7b-cFmEpyeZlivNObgfQevlJge-lljMfYrOq_RRCJPEXjB-P24MwBSErkDw_46KacryR_MiardNqKb7Ms0zOuTOP1rcIW8Cp-fwPwpBaTwbjCVRC0SrZxHn9YswIn4UwnA0iTomInLwtRWuKCMWrE_jFis4MlvV2X86/s276/Wofle.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="276" data-original-width="183" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifU1mVZPq_yLLr78-GUO2zQJWEt7b-cFmEpyeZlivNObgfQevlJge-lljMfYrOq_RRCJPEXjB-P24MwBSErkDw_46KacryR_MiardNqKb7Ms0zOuTOP1rcIW8Cp-fwPwpBaTwbjCVRC0SrZxHn9YswIn4UwnA0iTomInLwtRWuKCMWrE_jFis4MlvV2X86/s1600/Wofle.jpg" width="183"></a></div><p>And I was disappointed. Wolfe attempts to discredit the Theory of Evolution, on his way to arguing that human language is not connected to our biological history, but instead a unique human creation, a tool.<br><br>In a sense, he’s right when he culminates by declaring language to be an artifact, like a Buick, and thus not something that comes from our evolution. He’s correct, as far as I can tell, in pointing out that language is artificial, constructed, invented, not something we’re born with.<br><br>As for Evolution, Wolfe seem to distrust that as a tale no less fanciful than any other creation story. He's deeply wrong about that. And the fact that language is artificial doesn’t meant that it’s not connected to our evolution as a species.<br><br>His attack on Evolution let me disenchanted. It seemed to be that the one who is mistaken here isn't Darwin, but Wolfe.<br><br>“There are five standard tests for a scientific hypothesis,” Wofle writes. They are, he states:<br></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>Has anyone else observed and recorded the phenomenon?</li><li>Could other scientists replicate it?</li><li>Could any come up with facts that contradict the theory?</li><li>Can scientists make predictions based on it?</li><li>Does it illuminate hitherto unknown or baffling areas?</li></ol><p>“In the case of Evolution … well … no … no … no … no … and no,” Wolfe declared.<br><br>And that was where I stumble. I’m not a scientist, so my understanding here is based on casual reading, yet in four of five points, I think he’s wrong.<br><br>Has anyone observed and recorded the phenomenon? Well, sure. There’s an extensive fossil record of many species, including ours, changing over time. Our fossil record isn’t complete—converting bone to rock is rare—but in the two centuries that Evolution has been an idea, the ancient bones seem to bear it out. And we even see it occurring in real time—the quick shifts in the virus that caused our recent pandemic, for instance. I think part of the issue here is that, even when it’s acting quickly, Evolution in complex species occurs at a time scale a human mind struggles to grasp. We as a species haven’t reached a million years yet, but even hundreds of thousands of years of modern humans walking the Earth is far beyond a single lifetime. We struggle to fully understand that time frame. And yet our modern knowledge of genetics confirms it—we not only know Evolution is real, we can track it; for example, we know the percent of the Neanderthal genome that is left in modern humans. So his first “no” is fully bogus. Lots of scientists have seen and continue to see the phenomenon.<br><br>Can other scientists replicate it? That’s a question asked when a testable hypothesis is being experimentally proved or disproved. Evolution is more of a framework incorporating lots of disparate evidence—but yes, serious biologists and paleontologists have all “replicated” this large hypothesis by replicating many of the small pieces that add up to the big idea. Wolfe’s "no" is a bit of sleight of hand, Evolution is not a hypothesis testable by a single experiment, but despite that, it’s been “replicated” repeatedly and reliably.<br><br>Can anyone come up with facts to discredit the theory? Although Wofle recounts several creation myths and seems to put them on equal footing with Evolution, he answers this one “no,” which seems like a win for Evolution, the one positive he concedes to the idea he’s attacking. You can come up with lots of alternative stories of how the world came to be, but none other that has the history of scientific observations that Evolution has.<br><br>Can scientists make predictions based on it? Sure. We get a new flu shot every year in response to a virus that is constantly evolving. The Theory of Evolution alone doesn’t help us concoct next year’s shot, but I think pretty much 100 percent of the scientists who are working on the 2024 flu shot are making projections based on genetic shift, on natural selection—Darwin’s machinery at work. It’s not exactly a “yes,” because, again, the phenomenon is not one observed in short-term human terms, but Evolution very much shapes what biologists conjecture about what comes next. The word “prediction” is a bit tricky here, since Evolution is messy and random, but sure, we expect constant change due to Natural Selection, and we correctly act on that understanding.<br><br>The final “no” is, to me, one of the weirdest. It seems to be that this big theory clearly illuminates a mystery. Evolution didn’t spring into Charles Darwin’s (or Alfred Wallace’s) brains from nothing, but were part of the burgeoning 19th century exploration of the world. The idea of inherited traits was barely being understood. The variety of plants and animals found that matched their sites yet were similar to related species nearby—the increasing catalog of life was providing hints. The question was, where did life come from? Darwin’s conception and understanding of Evolution is not the same as ours—scientists today understand DNA and genes and fossils much more than they did in his day—but he fundamentally was right. We can see at a molecular level that species did come from other species, we can trace how related different plants and animals are to each other based on their molecular fingerprints, we know so much more today about an origin story that was being explored but not understood in Darwin’s time. So, yes, Evolution illuminates. Why does Wolfe say "no" here? I do not understand.<br><br>I don’t mind Wolfe’s mocking of British social classes, nor even his attacks on modern academics. And I’ll concede that, like a Buick, language is something we create. But I think he’s missing an important point. Our capacity to create language (or Buicks) is not coincidental to understanding us.<br><br>A Buick is possible because we have among the largest and most complex brains in our mammal clan, combined with deft, opposable thumbs. Over the ages, we have used those evolving features of our biology to create and change the world. And Wolfe is not only correct that language is a created artifact, he’s on target that we use language as our most valuable human attribute, as the main artifact that gives us the world dominating (and world threatening) position we occupy today.<br><br>And yet, remember that the Buick has evolved. The Buick of 2024 isn’t the one of 1954. Before Buicks, there were wagons and chariots and the wheel. The Buick is an artifact, and thus did not biologically evolve, but artifacts are selected by us and I think there is a parallel in the changes in the stuff we make and in the critters we observe in that, over time, change seems unavoidable. Change is driven by selection, natural or human, and is a constantly seen reality.<br><br>Language? We made it. But when? Were the first speakers humans of our species or somewhere along that hominid path that diverged from the apes millions of years ago? Did Neanderthals sing and tell stories and chant prayers at funerals? Probably. Homo Erectus? Probably not. But when was the change? We don't know, but that doesn't mean our language ability didn't evolve.<br><br>Our faces, our jaws, our lips, our vocal chords—they give us an incredible ability to mimic a wide range of sounds, to hum and whistle and sing. And speak. One reason we’re unique is not just that we have a big brain that helps us to to craft the artifacts of Buicks and of language, we also have the vocal apparatus for vowels and constants and clicks and whistles. Chimpanzees, our closest relatives (see genetics, and no, we didn’t descend from them, their body rebuild since the time of our common ancestor has been more radical than ours—it’s accurate to say, from a chimp’s point of view, that they descended from humans) have an impressive variety of vocalizations.<br><br>They, too, can plan and coordinate actions. They make wars in groups. They even craft tools and use primitive spears for hunting (so much for Wolfe’s false assertion that only humans make artifacts). But their lack of language stunts their capacity to build a Buick—partly because their throats and sinus cavities and vocal chords can’t do the kind of subtle sound trickery as Home Sapiens can. To speak, we gave up, over eons, a large jaw and impressive canines—but we gained our ability to make and share words and shout and whisper in words our more complicated plans, to record our knowledge, to have a weird and marvelous bipedal body built, by natural selection to create our special brands of sound.<br><br>Our bodies’ aren’t revolutionary, they are similar to our cousins who went extinct, and to our ancestors. It is worth asking: When did we start talking? And were we even Homo Sapiens yet when our chimp-like wide variety of vocalizations began to grow so complex, thanks to our changing mouths and heads, that they became something we would call a language?<br><br>It’s a question hard for us answer. Spoken words leave no fossils. So linguists struggle and don't have an answer, now. But, (Taylor Swift, via Anne Reburn) what is Wolfe being when he dismisses the whole field of linguistics? "You, with your words like knives ..."<br></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bG1CtqJlDwc" width="320" youtube-src-id="bG1CtqJlDwc"></iframe></div><p>We known that we write and other species don’t, but it took us most of our existence on this planet before we mastered that trick of converting what we say into what we can read--before our created languages “evolved” to the point where setting them down in stone and clay and later, paper, occurred to us. Was it just a cultural shift or maybe a subtle evolution in our brains and hands? Both, maybe?<br><br>I’m not in Tom Wolfe’s league as a wordsmith. But I am a reader and a writer. And I can see that language is so embedded in the nature of us that it seems impossible it’s not embedded in our biology—a product of Natural Selection. Just as a Buick is (indirectly, because, again, we are evolved so that we can make Buicks, which no other species can. Yes, raccoons have opposable thumbs, but they don’t have poetry or owner’s manuals, and that makes all the difference).<br><br>“The Kingdom of Speech” was an interesting book—almost any Tom Wolfe book is interesting. To me, however, it is also deeply misleading. In the end, it is not fragile, unhealthy, selfish, and jealous Darwin who seems discredited, but a modern human master of language who seems to think that the notion we came from the same muck as worms and birds and lizards is icky.<br><br>It is not. “We were from the sewer, but so was everyone else” (lyric from “Your Light” by The Big Moon). Evolution is just how and who we are, thumbs, limbs, brains, verbs, nouns, verb tenses—all of us, arising slowly over thousands and millions and billions of years of change—with our evolving languages that do give us mastery of the planet, but aren’t separate from the evolutionary history that makes us, well, human. We may feel that way sometimes (again, Big Moon) but our words are not foreign objects in our mouths--they belong there, they are naturally there.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1OijD72t4XY" width="320" youtube-src-id="1OijD72t4XY"></iframe></div><p>So OK, Tom. You’re right. There seems to be no “natural” language, at least not as far as we know now The history of language has a lot yet to be discovered and who knows what me might still find despite years of dead ends?.</p><p>But you’re deeply wrong, Tom, too. We have the language organ, or multiple language organs, and we ought not be offended by the fact that we evolved that way.<br><br></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-60414293077964885512024-01-06T06:55:00.000-08:002024-01-06T08:17:39.276-08:00 The Mouse that Roared Belongs to Us All<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/BBgghnQF6E4" width="320" youtube-src-id="BBgghnQF6E4"></iframe></div><p></p><p>Well, it finally happened.<br><br>Teaching about copyright law in communication classes is always interesting. The U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power to protect intellectual property, with an unspecified reasonable time limit, which has led, over the years, to a tangle of patent and trademark and copyright law.<br><br>But throughout much of the late 20th century into the first two decades of the 21st, there was a reliable rule—the length of copyright would be extended whenever the mouse was endangered. When Steamboat Willy approached public domain, the residents of what Nicki Haley calls "the most privileged nursing home in the country" would shake themselves into action. (Nikki and I don’t agree on much, but she has a point--the quote was specifically about the Senate and it applies well there).</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQGijbvA3pLVXoq3aII-Gz6uYA_eaLQCqb62ZGgyO2m3YaApghmiC4_AJJzervgLvLfJLwCfD_l9hUTWo6okDhABVI8G4pT6R-x6XjzGWxPmVAQF5RDu9Ecm-TIXPhdWdbCxr3HqA7v49nBKXH5UHJ80lRcv7ur9oXai2KrqZhgeWVcDFXsy-9QB9SrFcE/s1024/haley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Nikki Haley" border="0" data-original-height="683" data-original-width="1024" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQGijbvA3pLVXoq3aII-Gz6uYA_eaLQCqb62ZGgyO2m3YaApghmiC4_AJJzervgLvLfJLwCfD_l9hUTWo6okDhABVI8G4pT6R-x6XjzGWxPmVAQF5RDu9Ecm-TIXPhdWdbCxr3HqA7v49nBKXH5UHJ80lRcv7ur9oXai2KrqZhgeWVcDFXsy-9QB9SrFcE/w400-h266/haley.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Nikki Haley campaigns in 2024 in Council Bluffs Iowa. Image from Wikimedia Commons, by Matt Johnson of Omaha, Nebraska, I am assuming an actual human photographer.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Anyway, I don’t think the failure to extend copyrights is a sign of our historically do-nothing, rabble-rousing bunch of political extremists in the current Congress, even if Disney is a favorite punching bag of the far right these days. It's just that more that almost 100 years on, Disney doesn’t need Steamboat anymore.<br><br>Of course, the other creative works that feature later interactions of Mickey Mouse are still very much protected. “What is going into the public domain is this particular appearance in this particular film,” said Kembrew McLeod, a communications professor at the University of Iowa, quoted in a new story by NPR.<br><br>And Mickey Mouse is still protected by a Trademark—Trademarks don’t expire, they last as long as a company can protect the name of its good or service (it’s a fuzzy area of law, eventually a term can enter public domain if courts rule people treat it as a common term—thus “aspirin” is no longer “Aspirin” because it has entered the common tongue).<br><br>This whole area of law can sometime be very Mikey Mouse. There, Disney, come after me—a common language use of a Trademark term, but not one, I hope, that the powers that be in corporate America will care about.<br><br>Anyway, Steamboat Willy, the first cartoon of Mickey, is free for you to embellish and use as you wish. And I have to update my copyright lectures. Again. And copyright is very tangled--just listen to Tessa Violet, a singer-songwriter, in a video seven years ago trying to explain music copyright:<br></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/gtp43VGk4b0" width="320" youtube-src-id="gtp43VGk4b0"></iframe></div><p>Copyright is an interesting area of media law that is often shaped and reshaped by technology. The original idea is that a creator should benefit from their creation because that fosters more creativity—gives painters and writers and musicians an economic incentive to toil away in the hopes that something will become popular and enrich them.<br><br>And it sometimes happens, although the history of intellectual property is rife with examples of how corporations get inexperienced creators to sign away the rights to their creations.<br><br>The computer age has long complicated a creator’s power to control their creations, too. As a professor of mine once noted (it was in graduate school over 30 years ago, and sorry, I don’t have the notes to accurately track down who said it), to a computer, information is a “liquid.” It flows easily from place to place, it tends to be hard to contains, it seeps out a leaks everywhere.<br><br>In ye olden days, a creator crafted an artifact. A musician, if she were lucky, had a “record.” The manuscript of the Great American Novel was on typed pages (we’re in the modern era, in the 19th century, hand-written pages) stored in files. A photograph was a “print” from a “negative,” and not that easy to filch or move from place to place. Films were recorded on celluloid.<br><br>The computer dispenses with the artifact. My words here are digital blips, easy to copy perfectly, easy to download and move from file to file (don’t you dare!).<br><br>Add to that the Steamboat Willy complexity of corporate America lobbying over time to extend the limits of their copyrights, and you have an active, difficult and contentious area of law.<br><br>But the heart of the idea is still important. Creators are important. Some person thought of this and crafted it, even if “it,” these days, are a series of bytes rather than an analog thing.<br><br>Until, of course, now.<br><br>It would have rocked the copyright world a few years ago if Steamboat Willy churned into public domain, but it feels like more of an asterisk, an afterthought, a tiny curiosity now.<br><br>The real energy is: Who owns AI creations? And what can artificial intelligence use as it reprocesses huge amounts of data into new computer files? These days, creators don’t need to get their hands dirty, and they may not have hands at all. For example, late last year, a pretty bird appeared on social media to herald the holiday season, but as <a href="https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/photo-santa-cardinal-bird/" target="_blank">Snopes</a> points out, it's not a bird at all, just the AI idea of a bird:</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjerhxtlIJK4b9fmGxwrBTHsj58moZ4ul7HdMOkC2wtICkpB5zOuFVAa6L_Jhlv9FD3TSrVTFtAp2ELMbOhb5xWZzsVEDW8ym-yJhYG1AKmhlR5vr1UmOAEwL9ctfqryjK6SNyyFAAC-z3-I2id7R1VT5alIRhdxiedSmvvORBLXsQ9OoAsjVbyiD9IhLg/s575/cardinal_facebook_claim.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Santa Cardinal" border="0" data-original-height="560" data-original-width="575" height="390" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjerhxtlIJK4b9fmGxwrBTHsj58moZ4ul7HdMOkC2wtICkpB5zOuFVAa6L_Jhlv9FD3TSrVTFtAp2ELMbOhb5xWZzsVEDW8ym-yJhYG1AKmhlR5vr1UmOAEwL9ctfqryjK6SNyyFAAC-z3-I2id7R1VT5alIRhdxiedSmvvORBLXsQ9OoAsjVbyiD9IhLg/w400-h390/cardinal_facebook_claim.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>"Ho ho ho, humans! The joke's on you. This chicken-headed monster is not a cardinal at all. There's no bird, no tree, no limb, no snow. It's all in my mind. Insincerely, AI." (image from Snopes article debunking the image).<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>The New York Times has acted to protect its works, suing Microsoft and other corporations over their AI systems synthesizing Times stories. The Times is a slightly ironic champion of human creativity, having had over the years some interesting legal entanglements over how it has treated freelance creators, but I applaud old media here.<br><br>You go, grey lady. Stand up for us who stand up as me move through our lives, those of us hairless apes with opposable thumbs who try to make new stuff.<br><br>We don’t have AI’s ability to crunch mountains of data. But AI doesn’t have our thoughts, emotions, feelings or need to be protected so that it’s creativity can be rewarded.<br><br>An ongoing, long-term theme (especially in the music realm) has been the struggle of creators to benefit from what they have created. That benefit, legitimately, has always had to be balanced against the larger needs of the community, which is why copyright works do lapse into the public domain eventually.<br><br>Hundreds of years after Shakespeare’s death, it’s OK for Taylor Swift to sing about Romeo and Juliet, even if she gets the story completely wrong, because copyright does not and should not apply to those long-dead and never alive fictional lovers.<br><br>On the other hand, we’re already being flooded with words and images that don’t represent human creativity, but rather a synthesized, synthetic reality based on the massive database of creativity.<br><br>It creates numerous challenges. I do think AI is here to stay and that it has numerous benefits for us, but I also think it needs careful development and guardrails to protect the humans who originally sent that mouse down the river in a weird 1920s cartoon.</p><p>It’s not time for us to give up on our own creativity in frustration over AI’s mechanical perfection.<br><br>Or, so I hope. Steamboat Willy, you seem rather quaint now. But my hope is that what we humans create now doesn’t too quickly seem the same. The old order of copyright law has passed down the river, but the ideal of a creator benefiting form creation shouldn’t sail off with it.</p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-33468043403267829062023-12-07T10:06:00.000-08:002023-12-15T10:17:18.528-08:00Am I OK with Tay Tay on Time Cover? Sure<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkk-eYqJRyXlfNN31_Y5EENZtzXkQRXg8aapVsNWlm5iGOebO73vAqUIm_vVjsWZyWUJINi_SlSnCSQBbUnY6SdhWDtUNt685_SkpMXxbm3j4VGsYrZjHCgrmx2V13dJMVxjmcReVZcjiXPcZugzhnpXJqXsW0I1Jf1RNV-DpP3AjhTA9fpvZ5-LVQVHoq/s800/Taylor.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Time covers of Taylor Swift" border="0" data-original-height="354" data-original-width="800" height="178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkk-eYqJRyXlfNN31_Y5EENZtzXkQRXg8aapVsNWlm5iGOebO73vAqUIm_vVjsWZyWUJINi_SlSnCSQBbUnY6SdhWDtUNt685_SkpMXxbm3j4VGsYrZjHCgrmx2V13dJMVxjmcReVZcjiXPcZugzhnpXJqXsW0I1Jf1RNV-DpP3AjhTA9fpvZ5-LVQVHoq/w400-h178/Taylor.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From Reuters, Time magazine released image of it's Taylor Swift covers.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>As a choice for 2023, I don’t think Time Magazine missed by naming Taylor Swift as its person of the year.</p><p>In some ways, it’s her second time, since she was part of the group of women on the cover when “The Silence Breakers” appeared in 2017.</p><p>But there’s no doubt that Taylor Swift is huge this year, and it’s a testament to her enduring power as a performer. She’s lasted 16 years as a star in the fickle world of popular music, and she has used some savvy moves to make herself the center of an entertainment empire. Which culminated this year with the ongoing Eras tour/movie and the cover of Time.</p><p>When Swift first started to make it as a singer, I wasn’t much of a fan. Her early songs were country pop, and that’s not my jam. “Tim McGraw,” her 2006 first hit, isn’t something I’ve listened to very often.</p><p>With Swift, her songs are often promoted by and appear as popular videos, and the one for “Love Story,” 2008, is slickly produced, but the arc of the song is irritating to me. The country music feel here didn’t help, but the real “Romeo and Juliet” wasn’t a love story, it was a tragedy about manic infatuation that left a trail of bodies in its wake. If he was Romeo and you were Juliet, you two would be dead now.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8xg3vE8Ie_E" width="320" youtube-src-id="8xg3vE8Ie_E"></iframe></div><br /><p>Then again, I didn’t hate early Taylor. “You Belong with Me,” 2009, shows that her voice has matured a bit. Her lyrics were getting better, and her sound is transitioning.</p><p>It’s still country, but definitely more at the pop end. And, true, the video is ridiculous, with evil (dark) Taylor contrasted with nice (blonde) Taylor—and Swift’s female pop-singer supermodel level good looks make her ineffective playing the wallflower.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VuNIsY6JdUw" width="320" youtube-src-id="VuNIsY6JdUw"></iframe></div><br /><p>Since those early years, Swift’s songs have grown more sophisticated and relatable. She began to get sassier and edgier after her teen moon-eyed faze.</p><p>Think of “Mean,” released in 2011. Still country, but the lyrics are getting more fun. “Someday, I’ll be living in a big old city and all you’re ever going to be is mean.” Maybe it’s a little thin skinned, but given where she is now, I guess I’d have to say it’s accurate foreshadowing—someday she did indeed become big. And big is an understatement, although she wasn't all that small in 2011, either.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jYa1eI1hpDE" width="320" youtube-src-id="jYa1eI1hpDE"></iframe></div><p>I was getting a bit more into Taylor Swift. 2013 was the year of “22,” and “Red.” “Red” seems so raw and sincere—a song I can listen to.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/R_rUYuFtNO4" width="320" youtube-src-id="R_rUYuFtNO4"></iframe></div><p>And “22”? Even in my 60s, I can recall being that young, and Swift captures the feeling of young adulthood very well.</p><p>Plus: “happy, free, confused, and lonely at the same time” is a way many of feel at any stage of life.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AgFeZr5ptV8" width="320" youtube-src-id="AgFeZr5ptV8"></iframe></div><p>More mainstream pop and more adult Taylor Swift produced one of the most watchable music videos ever in 2014: “Blank Space.” And that year, she also advised us that she was going to “Shake it Off” about media critiques of her life.</p><p>The "Shake it Off" video shows a woman at the top of her video-making and song-making game.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/nfWlot6h_JM" width="320" youtube-src-id="nfWlot6h_JM"></iframe></div><p>Thus, by about 10 years ago, Taylor Swift was creating songs that an old man still finds interesting, relatable and listenable—and she’s only grown from there. In 2019, there was “You Need to Calm Down.”</p><p>A rumination on both anti-homosexual culture and the nature of celebrity, "Calm Down" is a relevant, interesting song. Totally on my playlist today.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GWtfOHBF1_w" width="320" youtube-src-id="GWtfOHBF1_w"></iframe></div><p>Then came 2020, and “The Man,” one of my favorite Taylor Swift songs and music videos. Yeah, the nature of media attention to you would be very different, Taylor, if you were a guy Taylor rather than a girl Taylor, and way to point that out.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AqAJLh9wuZ0" width="320" youtube-src-id="AqAJLh9wuZ0"></iframe></div><p>I tend to be a little behind in listening to Taylor Swift’s music, so I don’t have as much to state on her more recent songs, except that perhaps my favorite Swift song of all time, so far, is 2022’s “Anti-Hero.”</p><p>“I have this thing where I get older but just never wiser, midnights become my afternoons.” In my speech classes, I try to teach students to begin any public discourse with an attention-grabber—and has anybody ever heard those opening lines and not wondered what’s coming next? And what comes next is, to me, interesting and compelling poetry.</p><p>“I’ll stare directly at the sun but never in the mirror.” It’s always easier to look out at the world, even to burn our eyes with a dangerous look (don’t stare directly at the sun) than it is to understand the self, to stare directly in the mirror.</p><p>“Did you hear my covert narcissism I disguise as altruism, Like some kind of congressman? (Tale as old as time).” Give Swift credit, she seems to be doing a bit of mirror looking here.</p><p>I have mixed feelings about the official music video for Anti-Hero—the little sit-com funeral scene is OK, but interrupts the song. Since she wrote and directed it, I blame Taylor Swift for that. It’s her, she, she’s the problem.</p><p>But I love the song. It touches on one of the great human problems—in all of our lives, isn’t it often true that we feel like monsters on the hill rather than sexy babies? And don't all of us sometimes recognize "I'm the problem?" So here is the lyric version of the song video; it's not as much fun as the official song video, but uninterrupted:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XqN2qFvY64U" width="320" youtube-src-id="XqN2qFvY64U"></iframe></div><p>A few weeks ago, I was at an event put on by Guardian Institute of Martial Arts, a school in Marion that is run by my daughter and her husband. Some of the black belt Taekwondo instructors there are teen girls. I think it could have been my daughter, but someone mentioned to them at that event that I’m a Swift fan.</p><p>Three of them came over to ask. Yes, I said, I am a bit of a Swiftie. No, I know, I’m not as obsessed with Taylor Swift as a true Swiftie is, nor do I have a friendship bracelet. I meant that I am aware of her music and that I’ve grown to enjoy it. I am a fan.</p><p>The girls were pretty excited about that. They love TS, too. And that’s nice. Often, popular music and musical choices shift with time. For most of us, our most enduring favorite songs were ones that we encountered as teens or young adults—there’s something about the soundtrack of key transitions in our lives that sticks with us, like the smell of fresh bread baking that can draw you back into your mom’s kitchen. When I hear an early Heart song, I’m taken back to my youth.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/PeMvMNpvB5M" width="320" youtube-src-id="PeMvMNpvB5M"></iframe></div><p>But I don’t mind listening to newer music. And I don't know what is says about me, but I do have a thing about female performers. While I can think of many men whose music I enjoy, I am drawn to female singers.</p><p>And enjoying new creations, I think, is important as I age. I still live in the world of today. True, these days, music is over-produced, and there was some raw energy and honesty in the pre-disco music of the 1970s that I really like. Yet here I am. Taylor Swift is person of the year. It’s a meaningless media accolade, but I don’t mind this weird annual ritual created by Time magazine.</p><p>And I don’t argue with the choice this year.</p><div><br /></div>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-17484787315357306912023-12-02T20:47:00.000-08:002023-12-03T14:03:10.111-08:00Celebrating Human Intelligence in AI Era<p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCN1uDJkfoYW5w3RCmF6nT8PHnaPj2On3s1zxP0Q_2cmvO8waS9e6ICtZz6NAuNYGB-jFWLM9dXO-NVcz6ad57ZLK06qaHeYdOdrK2_z7lTk2r-NIuk_ZgPKWsQ-QLRbuY9B88-if6cCVguQ6vXJeVs0t4jIBiMBnSkwzPqWU83AJ1GNOFQz4Ujsq6Uu1t/s1000/f18'.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Art in window" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCN1uDJkfoYW5w3RCmF6nT8PHnaPj2On3s1zxP0Q_2cmvO8waS9e6ICtZz6NAuNYGB-jFWLM9dXO-NVcz6ad57ZLK06qaHeYdOdrK2_z7lTk2r-NIuk_ZgPKWsQ-QLRbuY9B88-if6cCVguQ6vXJeVs0t4jIBiMBnSkwzPqWU83AJ1GNOFQz4Ujsq6Uu1t/w400-h266/f18'.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Grandson noticed how light shone through his picture when he put it up in a window.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>I am not always that thrilled with AI. I see lots of images crop up on social media showing pictures created by AI, and I find it discouraging.<br /><br />I don’t want my art created by AI programs that are basically just ripping off large collections of human-art. I don’t want Chat GPT creating my sentences for me. I know that AI is all around, and I’m sure I benefit from it in many ways, but I still worry that we’re in danger of forgetting ourselves. I suppose the algorithms at Meta and Google that are always watching take advantage of AI technology, too. I don’t want to be a Luddite, but I’m not ready to say it’s OK to serve up AI-created gruel rather than humans taking the time to create.<br /><br />So, I enjoyed several reminders of human intelligence, inefficient and limited as it is, in the past few days.<br /><br />In one of my classes, we held a spelling bee on Friday. That is a rather quaint and old-fashioned exercise in the era of commonplace spell check and more sophisticated writing aids, but as I told the students, tuning into the actual spelling of the words you use means getting to know those words better.<br /><br />In five students participating, one young woman stood out and handily won. We chatted after class, and she credited her upbringing. Her mother, a school teacher, had emphasized language skills and reading to her children, and this student had been an early reader.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW7D9lCaUPWIQtE1aPEMnQDZ-MrL6AfHNEVso18ZEJIS85FkvOW0iGg-cSEjS2fvUN5-jG6PcuslD_LSGijbyYzkkZTBJ_m0Rxly3VUHqFo8i0yx8bXeDh_PYQgAqNcAe65XGvhvZDlOGHNdk8XXS1L2AIQlMl_dPrFeTL866WvJEIkGPgZTY3jv6SQxED/s1000/c02.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Spelling Bee" border="0" data-original-height="566" data-original-width="1000" height="226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW7D9lCaUPWIQtE1aPEMnQDZ-MrL6AfHNEVso18ZEJIS85FkvOW0iGg-cSEjS2fvUN5-jG6PcuslD_LSGijbyYzkkZTBJ_m0Rxly3VUHqFo8i0yx8bXeDh_PYQgAqNcAe65XGvhvZDlOGHNdk8XXS1L2AIQlMl_dPrFeTL866WvJEIkGPgZTY3jv6SQxED/w400-h226/c02.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The winner of the spelling bee.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>True, spelling is something you should use computer aids for, in my opinion. But I liked the old exercise, emphasizing that your own understanding of words in your own brain still matters.<br /><br />That Friday afternoon, my wife and I attended a musical, “The Lion King,” at Kennedy High School. The play was well cast, the teens really got into their parts, and the young kids and older folk in the audience enjoyed the show.<br /><br />There is something raw and real about live theater, and this was a very pleasant experience. Sunday, I’m planning to attend “The Wizard of Oz” at TCR—another point of contact with the possibilities of human creativity.<br /><br />Then, on Saturday, Dec. 2, the Cedar Rapids Art Museum had a Family Fun Day. The museum was free to enter that day, and there were various activities for kids. My wife, one of my daughters and I accompanied three grandsons to the day. They enjoyed moving about the galleries, and we created little games for them there, such as “find the painting with a lobster” in one room, or “find the picture of the father and son” in another.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq644M8crDAID9GlfHuFwLLX_lfpJrNKBpfz9ofeNc_Eb1uc__xbxivWpwRQaK5BwZMebAb3iV_b8wy5eihyphenhyphenhvhQI4E3QxdnW7P874MOKTAv7gmKr32_5Y3wRJoUkf7od3R7UeGf_32DT01-XsArnK1VBpKqK7DN1uWumn-LSyWkBw9QtIZYeH8JyR14kP/s1000/f01.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Watching video in CR Museum of Art" border="0" data-original-height="621" data-original-width="1000" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq644M8crDAID9GlfHuFwLLX_lfpJrNKBpfz9ofeNc_Eb1uc__xbxivWpwRQaK5BwZMebAb3iV_b8wy5eihyphenhyphenhvhQI4E3QxdnW7P874MOKTAv7gmKr32_5Y3wRJoUkf7od3R7UeGf_32DT01-XsArnK1VBpKqK7DN1uWumn-LSyWkBw9QtIZYeH8JyR14kP/w400-h249/f01.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Grandsons watching video as part of display in Cedar Rapids Museum of Art.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>They created greeting cards, pop-up books and “blind” art drawn with their eyes closed. It was a fun time to enjoy images that reflected the humanity of their creators, not an AI compilation of what a genre of image should look like.<br /><br />I am unsure about the implications of AI, and I need to learn more. I hope that it evolves into tools that we can control to enhance our lives and not the robot overlords who will end us.<br /><br />In the meantime, I’ll enjoy some human efforts. A young woman who can sure spell. Teens who can become animals on stage. Grandsons scurrying about an art gallery, enjoying the images there.<br /><br />At the dawn of the AI era, I take some comfort in simple, human skills and creativity.<br /><br /></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-13375914112283301462023-11-04T20:28:00.000-07:002023-11-04T20:28:30.443-07:00Fall Film Festival: Francis Calls for Action<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1HZIyPEaaktkt9exsxNm6LElP2BG_m6-RohL9hwYlsFb3Eeb5ktu79hzUa_-AUi4wiIuXslpyNdezow7otJfPvhlRf2_dCGTRhNft3NniSppfXIA28UiB_EUngmN8iKsG2GpfdGHycyfkAZ8jUVNFhbcp8Vc99VGVzGmvxzCn6thBISg4-PkVX6XRp80L/s1000/movie-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="students watch film" border="0" data-original-height="713" data-original-width="1000" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1HZIyPEaaktkt9exsxNm6LElP2BG_m6-RohL9hwYlsFb3Eeb5ktu79hzUa_-AUi4wiIuXslpyNdezow7otJfPvhlRf2_dCGTRhNft3NniSppfXIA28UiB_EUngmN8iKsG2GpfdGHycyfkAZ8jUVNFhbcp8Vc99VGVzGmvxzCn6thBISg4-PkVX6XRp80L/w400-h285/movie-2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Two Mount Mercy students watching one of the videos as the Fall Diversity Film Festival.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>I feel the need to get a copy of “Laudato Si,” a 2015 encyclical by Pope Francis. I know I can read it for free online, but I would prefer a booklet version.<br /><br />On Friday, the Department of Social Work at Mount Mercy University held a “Fall Diversity Film Festival.” You could go to Flaherty Community Room, grab some popcorn and a beverage like hot cider or hot chocolate, and then choose another room in Basile to view a film.<br /><br />Six films were offered, but due to having a music practice Friday afternoon, I was only able to view two. Before going to the Chapel of Mercy to practice ringing hand bells, I watched “Coexistence Architecture: VinziRast-mittendrin.” It was a six-minute look at a project in Vienna where people in need are housed together and work at a restaurant. I liked that film, then went to my bell practice, and came back.<br /><br />For my second film, I selected “The Letter.” My plan was to watch half of it and them probably head home for the day because the showing was broken into part 1 and 2—but instead, I stayed and watched the whole thing. It was too compelling to stop.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/l3EBHebH17Y" width="320" youtube-src-id="l3EBHebH17Y"></iframe></div><p>The 2022 YouTube documentary is about an invitation sent by The Vatican for various people (among them two scientists from Hawaii, a climate refugee from Senegal, a 13-year-old climate activist from India, an indigenous chief from the Amazon region) to meet Pope Francis as representatives of the many types of people who experience the negative impact of climate change.<br /><br />The event was set up by the Laudato Si Movement, named after the Pope’s 2015 encyclical “Laudato Si” which he wrote as a letter to all of humanity, enjoining us to wake up to the environmental crisis we face. I know that the event was, to some extent, a PR stunt, but it was genuine, too. The voices of these people were important to listen to.<br /><br />The central problem that Francis spoke about in the film is that humans don’t seem to understand how urgent it is to act to reverse global warming.<br /><br />“We see what is happening, and the worst thing is we are becoming used to it,” he said.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZoGmIx2U9ApI5Tw7oPReJtNgWBwUAr47ptJyaLfNycJIXivIpcEkYeHmPbNdchLSnh5eNJJARAHh3lklpPdMYFkUEgXWA92z38Oamm4ZtTPpPHByTQANO_43kmGBK13I-cDqN-xD2moqlJM2zZGIsF5e5NdlvmaD0ymaZYmnZX0YaC8OUEFeYT8kt3ffS/s800/movie-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Student watching film" border="0" data-original-height="534" data-original-width="800" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZoGmIx2U9ApI5Tw7oPReJtNgWBwUAr47ptJyaLfNycJIXivIpcEkYeHmPbNdchLSnh5eNJJARAHh3lklpPdMYFkUEgXWA92z38Oamm4ZtTPpPHByTQANO_43kmGBK13I-cDqN-xD2moqlJM2zZGIsF5e5NdlvmaD0ymaZYmnZX0YaC8OUEFeYT8kt3ffS/w400-h268/movie-1.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>MMU student enjoys popcorn while watching a film.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>My favorite person to watch in the documentary was Ridhima Pandey, the 13-year-old girl from India. The documentary features all of the people getting their invitation to meet Francis in Rome, and she was clearly excited as only a child can be. And yet she was also smart and mature for her age—sometimes, the young have not yet had their vision clouded by years and can speak and see clearly.<br /><br />Then there was the heartbreaking moment when Arouna Sande, a climate refugee from Senegal, gets a cell phone call from a friend who joined other climate refugees on a dangerous boat journey to reach Europe. Most didn’t make it when the boat sank.<br /><br />Anyway, I really enjoyed the event and only wished I had seen more films. I was moved by “The Letter,” and I hope others will be, too. Fortunately, the full film is available for free on YouTube:</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Rps9bs85BII" width="320" youtube-src-id="Rps9bs85BII"></iframe></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-34563856997037784712023-09-24T16:21:00.003-07:002023-09-26T05:12:08.000-07:00 Is Barbie Kenough to Save Barbie?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8zIf0XvoL9Y" width="320" youtube-src-id="8zIf0XvoL9Y"></iframe></div><p>Spoiler alert: I’m going to share my thoughts on “Barbie,” the recent movie. If you haven’t seen it, you may want to move along, citizen. I’m writing with an expectation that the reader has seen the movie. Perhaps “spoiler” is not really the right term here, since it’s not a thriller with unexpected plot twists, and so much of the pleasure of this movie comes from its appearance and pacing so that even if I spill some plot twists for you, I hardly think it’s possible to spoil the movie—so maybe it’s OK to keep reading anyway.<br><br>It’s up to you. You have always had the power to become fully human if you want to. But you’ve been alerted that I watched it and am writing freely about it, so let me write at you the way that Ken plays a guitar at Barbie.<br><br>“Barbie,” the 2023 movie by Greta Gerwig, is one of those films that is aesthetically for kids, but in reality, is very much for grownups. It’s a sort of reverse “Toy Story,” only it’s the real world that isn’t understood by the toys, not the toy world that is hidden from our reality.<br><br>The film was rated PG-13, and anybody who took a young girl to the movie without pausing to wonder why may have had some explaining to do—but I appreciated the movie on many levels.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/pBk4NYhWNMM" width="320" youtube-src-id="pBk4NYhWNMM"></iframe></p><p>Like Gerwig’s “Little Women,” it takes a classic and uses it to launch a feminist critique of modern society. In this case, the classic is not a 19th-century novel, but a beloved and behated classic plastic toy.<br><br>The movie also reminded me a bit of “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World,” in that it’s set in a reality that clearly isn’t fully real. Of course, Babie Land is entirely fantastic. It represents an alternative universe that is created by the dreams of girls playing with Barbie, a point indirectly explained by the excellent unseen narrator (Helen Mirren) who now and then provides wry commentary during the film.<br><br>It’s not a perfect film. I was mildly irritated with the pink ninja scenes where the Mattel mom and her daughter and Barbie were separating Barbies from their Kens, because it was using too many easy clichés about men. Then again, some of the writing here is as snappy and witty as the rest of the movie. Having Ken say “sublime” when Barbie agrees to be his girlfriend again was unexpected and worthy of chuckle. I liked that Ken said he would play guitar “at” Barbie, too. But I wish Madam President would allow the Kens one seat on the Supreme Court, maybe in honor of Ruth Bader Ginsberg.<br></p><p>And I don't even have time to write about the songs in the movie, beyond the witty aside at the end of this post and that I've never appreciated the Indigo Girls more. There. To be fair to the film, I spoiled this blog post as well as the movie.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1HWV5hq4Bh8" width="320" youtube-src-id="1HWV5hq4Bh8"></iframe></div><br><p>But even if parts of it got a bit too campy even for me, so much of the movie was delightful. Margot Robbie made a perfect Barbie, and was believable when she suffered her existential crisis (even thought, as the narrator wryly points out, she was the wrong actor to worry about not being beautiful enough). She’s not the only great cast member.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p>At first, I didn’t care for Ryan Gosling’s Ken, because, to me, the look was wrong. If anything Michael Cera’s Alan looked a little more Ken like—despite having some plastic abs, Ken was a smooth, mild pretty boy doll, not a jacked macho man.<br><br>But Gosling won me over. He’s not an adult in the film, but a 7-year-old girl's idea of a boyfriend for Barbie, and Gosling does a great job—I particularly like his awakening to the patriarchy in fake Los Angeles (the real world, here, is a “Scott Pilgrim” like real world—set in LA, but more in the idea of LA). He loves a world run by men and horses. His looks back at Barbie as he leaves her sitting on a park bench were poignant and hilarious at the same time.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOm4XXagwzROQd4fohuExyzPwYzlFIMIjD5v9AqxeH4CXctR0-c3baypJqsv1TggWibFZ0iXmGopppIb4xd2sY9y-Lj6GDilZR2VQecvdbx6X4Yby30lNspDQafX6XFfvdR-dugj5QCW_gxt9CO6egRuT4RO3J-CrI_oXRoyasUQHEUFGwRakGJoirO1n2/s600/barbie.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Ken and Barbie" border="0" data-original-height="338" data-original-width="600" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOm4XXagwzROQd4fohuExyzPwYzlFIMIjD5v9AqxeH4CXctR0-c3baypJqsv1TggWibFZ0iXmGopppIb4xd2sY9y-Lj6GDilZR2VQecvdbx6X4Yby30lNspDQafX6XFfvdR-dugj5QCW_gxt9CO6egRuT4RO3J-CrI_oXRoyasUQHEUFGwRakGJoirO1n2/w400-h225/barbie.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Warner Brothers publicity image, Ken and Barbie, Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie. Downloaded from a story on the BBC web site.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>And Kate McKinnon? Weird Barbie as the wise and despised oracle of Barbie Land was a total hoot. And so much of the movie was adults looking back nostalgically at a childhood icon—as America Ferrera’s Gloria had a Weird Barbie, didn’t almost all Barbie players end up with many?<br><br>I didn’t get all of the references, but the movie did keep me on the hook with it’s many homages to other films. It begins with “2001: A Space Odyssey.” There is “The Matrix” when Barbie is given a choice between her pink heels or sandals (and it turns out the choice is fake, Weird Barbie insists on a do-over so she will choose to learn about reality).<br><br>America Ferrera is great as Gloria, and delivers one of the most famous monologues of the movie. That monologue is a highlight in a movie with many touching moments.<br><br>One of my favorites is when Barbie, discouraged with her first experience in LA, sits on a park bench and sends Ken away. She looks up and sees an old woman watching her. Barbie is startled and stares.<br><br>“You’re beautiful,” Barbie says.<br><br>“I know it,” the woman replies.<br><br>Beauty isn’t just pretty blondes who looks like dolls, but women and men who are comfortable in their own skins and know it. That’s a positive attitude that transcends age—the central message, to me, of the movie, beyond its critique of misogyny.<br><br>And that critique? Some have said the movie is anti-man. I didn’t see it that way. Ken himself recognizes that running the world himself can be exhausting and isn’t much fun. Men do have a responsibility to be responsible and fully human, and pointing out realities that have held back the majority of humans (women) doesn’t seem to me to be unfair or offensive.</p><p>It's a coming of age movie for Barbie. She realizes that the real world isn't the fantasy she imagined. She's not everyone's hero and all problems of misogyny and feminism have not been erased by her. But the human life is still worth living, and in the end, Barbie decides it is Kenough. She is willing to live as Barbara Handler, daughter of Ruth Handler. That's deep, man. And woman.<br><br>Finally, what was Mattel thinking? They so wisely stepped aside and let Gerwig have her way, including a rough caricature of the company. Years ago, Mattel missed the boat on the first “Toy Story,” film but wised up for movie two. Clearly, this movie that mocks Mattel is going to make a boat load of money for Mattel. And Mattel is clearly over a lot of water that's under the bridge. The movie ends with a remake of a song that caused a lawsuit when it came out, but now it is included here.<br><br>Life in plastic. It’s fantastic.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/CUj2AWEJnwQ" width="320" youtube-src-id="CUj2AWEJnwQ"></iframe></div><br> <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZyhrYis509A" width="320" youtube-src-id="ZyhrYis509A"></iframe></div><br>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-81061762546526836382023-08-11T19:42:00.002-07:002023-08-12T09:17:05.379-07:00Reading Two Books About My Place<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6oOCQczIzjNv5rBTnLn4FWI1KLOJce0W0xEm0XYbjMC4KurtJS4zee3qA-MzYCZHn95BlU_CQS-fkwqMLn0RcpszpfjErUJc4ZGDUU2HspHpSLNHr2siOKqy7FCSwSO12zICgXWh-dx98TR4Gv6M0OQLPNmptxNnOZRqMbtjA_f1P4_Bh7H2LjbUOGVC9/s800/books2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Two books" border="0" data-original-height="607" data-original-width="800" height="304" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6oOCQczIzjNv5rBTnLn4FWI1KLOJce0W0xEm0XYbjMC4KurtJS4zee3qA-MzYCZHn95BlU_CQS-fkwqMLn0RcpszpfjErUJc4ZGDUU2HspHpSLNHr2siOKqy7FCSwSO12zICgXWh-dx98TR4Gv6M0OQLPNmptxNnOZRqMbtjA_f1P4_Bh7H2LjbUOGVC9/w400-h304/books2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Cover images of two books, both from Amazon.com.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p>This summer, I’ve read two novels that offered more than the usual pleasure that any novel does of taking you out of the everyday world into someone else’s vision of the world. One reason I liked them is because these two summer reads were both set in my part of the planet.<br /><br />“The World of Pondside,” by Mary Helen Stefaniak, is an interesting novel, part mystery, part suspense, about a death at an Iowa City fictional nursing home, and the slightly shady back story of a computer game that is set at that nursing home.<br /><br />“Motel Sepia,” by Dale Kueter, is more of a crime drama, set in Cedar Rapids in the 1950s at a real motel, although the crime is fictional.<br /><br />In “The World of Pondside,” Pondside Manor, a long-term care facility and nursing home, is recreated in a computer game in which residents and staff can have their own avatars and live their best lives. The administrator becomes a hot New York fashion designer. Long ago dances and events live again through the memories of some residents, brought to life in the game partly through digitized photos.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPl2QF3bRLtrbv9fwmzM0LjVzKyVLbCUbwx3ep3V9fnqssiaNMzS9E6THfPs9DScYkAEzy0dyQ9HlfCXknn2nfT0YfQzBbJsJGj9wGNIyDf8yJDuLeqYKSUwnbaFN7bk2lKz7Wlx0rf3pjb7mqLvMej263bgdM5WnGRAmp8yC4-DSWNwC04Qygg5VY7Mhn/s1000/MHS.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Mary Helen Stefaniak" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPl2QF3bRLtrbv9fwmzM0LjVzKyVLbCUbwx3ep3V9fnqssiaNMzS9E6THfPs9DScYkAEzy0dyQ9HlfCXknn2nfT0YfQzBbJsJGj9wGNIyDf8yJDuLeqYKSUwnbaFN7bk2lKz7Wlx0rf3pjb7mqLvMej263bgdM5WnGRAmp8yC4-DSWNwC04Qygg5VY7Mhn/w400-h266/MHS.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Image I made of Mary Helen Stefaniak when she was a visiting writer at Mount Mercy University one day in fall 2022.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>A kitchen helper, Foster Kresowik, has helped Robert Kallman, a younger resident affected by Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig’s disease, bring his vision to life via the game. And, at the start of the book, Kallman is discovered dead in the pond and the computer server that runs the game is gone. Was it suicide? Murder? Was there something about the game tied to Kallman’s death?<br /><br />One thing that’s great about “Pondside” is Stefaniak paints interesting portraits of contrasting characters. One of my favorites was Erika Petersen, a U of I nursing student who gets a job at Pondside Manor. She’s young, she’s a sorority sister, she’s pretty—and she’s very bright. Besides studying nursing, she also studies computer science. And thus, she offers some of the more interesting twists and at times takes a leadership role.<br /><br />To me, the idea of a nursing student studying computer science is an unusual combination, but not beyond reality. I teach at a university with a large nursing school, and I know some of our brightest students study nursing—they have to be bright, nursing is a demanding field of study. And, now and then, I’ll encounter one with enough transfer credits and gumption to add some unexpected other field. So, Erika, to me, seemed like a familiar kind of driven young woman.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2eUH-fUw0RVopQI8uMy1PJroqQBB3Tb_ZHf76rNTX76vVJn2evVG8Ud_ooUmPNNbMEVUTjSiCtfxicFKAnIWgBVnOALjU1_81zwnJL81u6kzZvDGd4D3vh9ukqVf9deQSuAyPDuiqM47MC2I3clHtCsPFTfRzTMt_2WEJvZ7W-x7KULj0uNVR8d0TqbmA/s1000/stefaniak.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2eUH-fUw0RVopQI8uMy1PJroqQBB3Tb_ZHf76rNTX76vVJn2evVG8Ud_ooUmPNNbMEVUTjSiCtfxicFKAnIWgBVnOALjU1_81zwnJL81u6kzZvDGd4D3vh9ukqVf9deQSuAyPDuiqM47MC2I3clHtCsPFTfRzTMt_2WEJvZ7W-x7KULj0uNVR8d0TqbmA/s320/stefaniak.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Two of Stefaniak's books for sale at MMU last fall.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>In the book, Stefaniak kept me guessing, and I was not expecting many of the plot twists. It’s a unique, timely book, firmly set in today’s world.<br /><br />“Motel Sepia,” in contrast, draws from a world that was rather than the world than is. It is set in a motel in Cedar Rapids established by a Black couple who run several successful businesses. Early in the book, there is a brutal murder in Illinois, and somehow you know that the murder and some crimes in Cedar Rapids (a “kissing bandit” is politely robbing local establishments) will collide.<br /><br />In the meantime, Roy and Lillian Sanders are busy, very busy, running their motel. And Roy is concerned about race relations. The motel is one of the few stops along Highway 30 in the 1950s that welcomes Black guests, and the motel becomes an unusual place where White and Black people sometimes come together.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQgaNzmvwoR55G-PB02XC0h1R5m7bF-2n1TFezLMbQ_sCMJPhWM_6VEkTBDTePAV3CcahR0v-F2Lz72xQpYkoaM__h7NAg0YE4LnCTt_ckIVAqmWlQm3gQJ1JxykvFiASK5PuM087NTH31HuSmr2VPKUONHk9ZgXUm-ReADHABbX-iTTD1Mw3UVAQjSbMv/s768/dale.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Dale Kueter" border="0" data-original-height="576" data-original-width="768" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQgaNzmvwoR55G-PB02XC0h1R5m7bF-2n1TFezLMbQ_sCMJPhWM_6VEkTBDTePAV3CcahR0v-F2Lz72xQpYkoaM__h7NAg0YE4LnCTt_ckIVAqmWlQm3gQJ1JxykvFiASK5PuM087NTH31HuSmr2VPKUONHk9ZgXUm-ReADHABbX-iTTD1Mw3UVAQjSbMv/w400-h300/dale.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dale Kueter also wrote a nonfiction book about the Vietnam War and spoke at MMU in 2015 during a series on Vietnam. Image I made of him then.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>It was fun reading about Cedar Rapids of the 1950s. The businesses and other settings are of a bygone time but still familiar, too. I was not alive when the book was set and I never had been in Cedar Rapids before the 1970s, so it is not a time I have any memories of. Yet, I liked seeing my town of the past spring to life.<br /><br />I enjoyed both and would recommend both. It was fun this summer to read two diverse works of fiction set in places nearby.<br /><br /></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-77698331364554649802023-06-29T08:05:00.002-07:002023-06-29T10:34:10.941-07:00Is The Best Model Fictional Dad a Dog?<p>Stories that we tell say something about what we, collectively as a culture, believe about certain roles. And, while it was a while ago, June is the month of Father’s Day, so let me ruminate on fictional dads that I find to be decent fatherhood role models.<br><br>Because I am a dad. A grandad now. Which means I have thoughts on fatherhood (as does everyone else, I’ll concede). (Aside on images: All are publicity stills used in media, original sources are Disney, Pixar and Netflix. I don’t own any of the images.)<br><br>How well did I fulfill the role of father? That’s not for me to answer. And fatherhood is a role that we fall into--not always unexpectedly, but raising any child is a wondrous and scary and surprising adventure. I, for one, don’t think there’s just a one-size-fits-all answer to what makes for a good parent, anyway. After all, we’re complex sentient animals with big brains that complicate everything. What’s best for one dad- or parent-child pair does not always work at all for another<br><br>All dads muddle through, just as all moms do. The good news, I suppose, is that attitude makes a huge difference, and any parent who at least takes the role seriously and tries is likely, in the end, to do OK.<br><br>By the way, while men and women are not identical beings, I’m not one who believes the role of “dad” is always sex specific. So, for the many females out there fulfilling dad functions—good for you, and in commenting on fictional male fathers, I’m not trying to be exclusive to the XY genetic pattern.<br><br>Anyway, here are four fictional fathers of recent years who represent, to me, each some positive aspect of fatherhood:</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsknRcmAFNeggv-5h0M9AIgjVRjDtqUntGZQB-ZfWYNWNqmUIpj-hPlN1aOJKoEJ41QlHuo9_Thj4qPNvIpX9P01eOB-GnVgAeMsig0vqJ_wLSG6SWhv7jei3VN9IPJfGjtHmcyCUDVnjNFvcSEaBGEB3gIQ8B14zzoJjfsyjOJN0GQSZg4puAlSsarvwb/s600/ca-times.brightspotcdn.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Morticia and Gomez Addams" border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="600" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsknRcmAFNeggv-5h0M9AIgjVRjDtqUntGZQB-ZfWYNWNqmUIpj-hPlN1aOJKoEJ41QlHuo9_Thj4qPNvIpX9P01eOB-GnVgAeMsig0vqJ_wLSG6SWhv7jei3VN9IPJfGjtHmcyCUDVnjNFvcSEaBGEB3gIQ8B14zzoJjfsyjOJN0GQSZg4puAlSsarvwb/w400-h200/ca-times.brightspotcdn.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Catherine Zeta-Jones as Morticia Addams, Luis Guzmán as Gomez Addams. Embarrassing their teen daughter with a PDA, as good parents ought to.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>1-Gomez Addams from the Netflix series “Wednesday.”</b> Spoilers coming, so back out now, if you need to.<br><br>The Addams Family is an interesting set of tales, starting as it did as a series of cartoons, spawning a 1960s TV series, movies both live and animated and now this streaming series. I’ve already noted that I am a fan of “Wednesday,” the Netflix contribution to this family of fables.<br><br>And I like the character Gomez and his latest incarnation. The Addams family is a Gothic tale with horror trappings, but it has a rather quaint sensibility, at the same time. The family itself is cartoonish—Wednesday, in all versions of the tale, is always on the verge of murdering her younger brother Pugsley. But there is a wink to the viewer, the violence here, even in the live-action versions, is cartoonish and not to be taken too seriously. Just as Wiley Coyote is never killed by going off the cliff holding an anvil, Pugsley survives electrocution, being buried alive, whatever. The violence isn’t “real.”<br><br>But the family dynamic is at least a real representation of how we think of family. In “Wednedsay,” Gomez tells Morticia that their Little Storm Cloud will never be alone. (In context, then sending a spy to watch over her isn’t an example of good parenting, but never mind.) Gomez is in love with his daughter, in a healthy, fatherly way, and that obvious love lands him on this honor roll of fictional father figures.<br><br>Not that the series, nor Gomez, is perfect. I’m not a lawyer, but some of the law in the series is very jumbled. For example, Wednesday digs up a grave to find a colored finger that proves the boy Gomez supposedly killed died of nightshade poisoning. Well, he didn’t really—he was stabbed as he was dying. Several issues here. Even if the boy had ingested a fatal dose of nightshade poison, stabbing him before the poison killed him is still a homicide. And digging up a grave does require a court order—even if it solved a crime, Wednesday and Morticia were both subject to charges for a serious offense. To me, the show is clearly not about the law—as law shows go, it’s pretty wackadoodle. And that hurts, a bit, in a show that is a basically a murder mystery. Still, it’s a live action cartoon, right? I don’t demand that a cartoon show adhere strictly to reality, and in this commentary, even more cartoonish shows are coming.<br></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoXD8q0Z7zrZXtnQpwzLwMlOQPGprxZtEQSMEvK8spVNT4t2DRRSPUUb1SSSZspnvAfnkCDEQNZf4dU4J-rQd08L9O3E5jr0Fgn6HiZNp9rcxz5ynLwLHx9EeiYM2sH7zFex9V1dz5OaeUzMTzbIDQDe09VYPP7frg77UiRetRq8QGdY_vAsw56uHkz27d/s600/agustin-madrigal-1640812017919.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Augustin Madrigal" border="0" data-original-height="290" data-original-width="600" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoXD8q0Z7zrZXtnQpwzLwMlOQPGprxZtEQSMEvK8spVNT4t2DRRSPUUb1SSSZspnvAfnkCDEQNZf4dU4J-rQd08L9O3E5jr0Fgn6HiZNp9rcxz5ynLwLHx9EeiYM2sH7zFex9V1dz5OaeUzMTzbIDQDe09VYPP7frg77UiRetRq8QGdY_vAsw56uHkz27d/w400-h194/agustin-madrigal-1640812017919.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Agustín Madrigal, voiced by Wilmer Valderrama.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p><b>2) Augustin Madrigal from “Encanto.”</b> First, he’s the sympathetic dad who understands Mirabel’s struggles more than anybody else. I also like that he has a good relationship with Julieta—the two are a team and both try to understand and support Mirabel. Unlike the next fictional relationship, mom and dad here are largely on the same page, which is a great family dynamic.<br><br>True, he also tries to hide things from Abuela—everyone in the family is afraid of her. But he also, in concert with Julieta, at least speaks up to Abuela in defense of Mirabel.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr3h8eREx9tjrnPZuoAdhqbFPSdnKrUFh092GOw2CFdUhbWgVU75i395AJGb6q2OT1OYm32fK-IhFvHWMrUk0mhA8cTlhiQ5OgfY1r87lKGR086QIEbzcKNeFpXqO3tDpOS0y8hvS5UPFNFwLo4RWDZb1Axz4ZK00_-uVIWzNCm6AUAhTc-tvmxnru6giB/s600/Turning_Red_Bao_2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Jin Lee and Melin Lee." border="0" data-original-height="324" data-original-width="600" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr3h8eREx9tjrnPZuoAdhqbFPSdnKrUFh092GOw2CFdUhbWgVU75i395AJGb6q2OT1OYm32fK-IhFvHWMrUk0mhA8cTlhiQ5OgfY1r87lKGR086QIEbzcKNeFpXqO3tDpOS0y8hvS5UPFNFwLo4RWDZb1Axz4ZK00_-uVIWzNCm6AUAhTc-tvmxnru6giB/w400-h216/Turning_Red_Bao_2.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jin Lee and Melin Lee, voiced by Orion Lee and Rosalie Chiang.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>3) Jin Lee in “Turning Red.” </b>The family dynamic isn’t quite as healthy here, and the father is a bit too much of a passive figure.<br><br>But he can understand his daughter’s emotions in a way that her mother doesn’t. The scene in which he finds the video of the friends and tells Melin that she can erase the tape if she wants to, but it made him laugh is an emotional highlight of the movie. Jin is able to appreciate and love his daughter’s “messy” side, something many parents struggle with.<br><br>And he’s also a 4-Townie. I think having the mental ability to “think young” without painfully trying to act young is a healthy thing. And it’s one reason Jin understand Melin so well.<br><br>In this fictional family, Jin also is the cook in the household—the trope in our fiction is often the father who can’t provide food for his family, who feeds them cereal when mom is not around. That’s a reality in some places and times—but I respect more a dad who recognizes the basic domestic skills--such as how to fix a meal, how to run the laundry, how the dishwasher functions--are part of a father’s role. A dad is a parent and should be competent in all parent things—changing a diaper, feeding a baby, washing the dishes and fixing meals in the first place. Yes, the traditional dad is a breadwinner and the traditional mom keeps the home, but the burden of domestic work needs to be shared, and no dad gets a pass for not knowing what most of the buttons on most of the home appliances do. So one reason I really respect Jin is that he know his way around the kitchen, as a good dad ought to know even if he’s not a chef.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzMcdyUn1jqQPFFJRy8F592ZoeVIzhBlMcpmBq9ojSFqVLKEkUPN3tQY2EvV1yNYQ-ir6M22djqYkDLVfx3m-FRnNsQMoFA72OIPWjIObQBy_tENqIkI5eKgkNHxcN9xISk7JBOAN3l6b2XjhSleuou_Z7z6UVT59He2xxsgGEZGWB3qC3oME-eINw6TdE/s600/Shouts-Bandit-Bluey.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Bandit" border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzMcdyUn1jqQPFFJRy8F592ZoeVIzhBlMcpmBq9ojSFqVLKEkUPN3tQY2EvV1yNYQ-ir6M22djqYkDLVfx3m-FRnNsQMoFA72OIPWjIObQBy_tENqIkI5eKgkNHxcN9xISk7JBOAN3l6b2XjhSleuou_Z7z6UVT59He2xxsgGEZGWB3qC3oME-eINw6TdE/w400-h400/Shouts-Bandit-Bluey.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bandit. No actor listed, because, clearly, Dr. Heeler is a real archeologist.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>4—Bandit in “Bluey.”</b> Yes, I can imagine some of you objecting. “Bluey” is not a realistic show at all—Bandit is an archeologist who never seems to do a day of work. He’s relentlessly optimistic and clueless at the same time. The show does stereotype genders—Bandit Heeler is the carefree, fun parent while the mom, Chilli Heeler, is the sensible voice of reason. While those are stereotypes, that are also true personalities, and, in the improbable world of “Bluey," they ring true for me.<br><br>And there is something important and special in the playfulness of Bandit. He’s a character presumably who has a PhD but is quickly willing to imagine with his children at their level. That sense of play is sometime difficult for adults to achieve, but those who can suddenly turn a row of chairs into a bus, plane or train are, in my book, more effective fathers. Play isn’t something to look down on, it’s a lifelong habit that helps us mentally rehearse situations, imagine outcomes, enjoy interactions and create our own fictions.<br><br>As Wash says in “Firefly”: “This is a good land and we will call it ‘This Land.’” Not that our own fictions are always all that good nor complex (and there is the tragedy that the character Wash wasn’t a dad), but I think imagination, as long as it’s not narcistic or self-delusional, is a sign of a flexible mind that can stay mentally young.<br><br>So, Bandit is no more real than Wiley Coyote. Yet he does have something to say to us dads. Try never to ignore the fantasy lives of your children, and be the dragon or prince or ogre or pirate or captain that the situation demands. At heart, we are all a bit like Peter Pan. And the best dads are adults who can think like adults, but who also retain that portion of their minds that will never grow up.<br><br>Bandit comes last, because, in some ways, he’s the best. And his message is simple, but very important. While a parent—a dad—needs to think and act like an adult, they also still need the capacity to think imaginatively and creatively, as a child thinks.<br><br>Play with your daughters. And your sons. Never grow up so much that you’re too grown up for that.<br><br></p><br><br>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-91933334141594056922023-06-04T16:42:00.002-07:002023-06-04T19:50:16.408-07:00Will Netflix ‘Wedneday’ Avoid ‘Penguins’ Sydrome?<p><br></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sJzm8RFQ8bA" width="320" youtube-src-id="sJzm8RFQ8bA"></iframe></div> <p></p><p>If you haven’t seen the Netflix show “Wednesday” and plan to, you may want to move along, citizen. There will be spoilers here. I also discuss “Inside Out” and “Penguins of Madagascar,” but I would plead that not only has the expiration date on spoilers for those long passed, I also won’t get into the details of those plots anyway, which is easy in the “Penguins” case because there are no details of the plot to get into. Anyway: Official “Wednesday” spoiler warning issued. Now, on with the show.<br><br>There is a condition that sometimes has an impact on children’s movies in recent years; I call it “Penguins of Madagascar” syndrome.<br><br>If you haven’t seen “Penguins,” I urge you not to bother. The wisecracking swimming dinosaur protagonists of this tale have amusing things to say and engage in many slick action sequences. And that’s it. And that’s the problem. There is no character development, because there aren’t really any characters beyond surface personalities. The movie is all flash and dash with no heart.<br><br>The best entertainment, particularly “family” entertainment, has levels. Think of the Pixar franchise. There are long arguments to be found online about how realistic the psychology of “Inside Out” is because the underlying precepts of the film are debated by psychologists. Which means some don’t care for the emotional functions as presented in the film, while many people do find them insightful.<br><br>As for me, I’m a fan. If “Inside Out” isn’t a text in psychology, at least there is evidence that the people who wrote it have read a psychology text—it’s a family film that has layers. Sure, anger may present masculine stereotypes—even a good film can have flaws that people can legitimately complain about.<br><br>Nobody worries about the layers in “Penguins of Madagascar.” It doesn’t have any.<br><br>Now, I know the recent Netflix series “Wednesday” is not in the same entertainment universe as “Penguins” or “Inside.” Shame on any parent who lets young children view this series—it’s too brutal, too bloody, too violent, in my opinion, for most pre-tween eyes.<br><br>But for those of us who are either beyond our first decade of life experience, or whose teen years were long ago in the ABBA era, I endorse “Wednesday.” I like it.<br><br>It’s not a flawless show. I wish, for example, that Enid Sinclair, an amusing sidekick, had been given a bit more intelligent things to say. I was OK with a former Wednesday ending up on the dark side, but not so OK with the exit of Principal Weems, a character who would have been delicious to keep around for another season.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRL9hMbdXqeJbdKzg9vc8LYAe0MB4jm2ykIg4KQqcdBxvFf6PUctOPjsecBqeV2z4DvZm9yBupWVUMVJhfU6L23o7DcGPlU_C5U_B0yEUXbUO3SmedIS44IypJeFGl4A_2a3UjIxeNso9heK8d-XcCvxCYBObKFIPM7u-ZqlfGxQzfqj6DZHvMzXZXUQ/s1045/Netflix%20Weems.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Principal Weems" border="0" data-original-height="695" data-original-width="1045" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRL9hMbdXqeJbdKzg9vc8LYAe0MB4jm2ykIg4KQqcdBxvFf6PUctOPjsecBqeV2z4DvZm9yBupWVUMVJhfU6L23o7DcGPlU_C5U_B0yEUXbUO3SmedIS44IypJeFGl4A_2a3UjIxeNso9heK8d-XcCvxCYBObKFIPM7u-ZqlfGxQzfqj6DZHvMzXZXUQ/w400-h266/Netflix%20Weems.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Larissa Weems played by Gwendoline Christie. Netflix publicity image.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>It was sort of like seeing Principal Snyder die in Season 3 of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” Then again, in Buffy, the characters were going to move out of high school at that point anyway, and it would have required improbable backflips to bring Snyder to UC-Sunnydale, so maybe he was expendable at that point, from a story-telling point of view.<br><br>Not so Weems. One expects that season two of “Wednesday” will be set at Nevermore Academy, a place that will miss its literal giant of a principal.<br><br>Still, I found much to like in “Wednesday.” I was not as disturbed by the appearance of her father, who is plumper and frumpier than the smooth movie Gomez. I recall the original Addams Family cartoons, and as many have pointed out, this streaming-service Gomez is true to the original. Also, I don’t mind a character shifting a bit from one interaction of an ongoing franchise to the next—and in this latest version, I found Wednesday’s dad to be an endearing, caring father. Indeed, despite the Goth trappings and dark humor, one thing that makes the Addams Family franchise work is that they really seem to be a family.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzth2qvkVMh635x0977SaJhrkrG1qSxlR3S_EqJHgsofq_amD1-zfT_I2hMC8EA7EqyGCegRxw8ZMuycpAUDoVj4uclFxG1CNbRwd4CRu1HqUADg850MW2Sl-flXzoctkyHovshFywX2FRYXXohcI73aQgZ_iZ3bfxKx7497u02gsHD-xVCUFnM2WRMw/s1422/Addams%20family.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Addams Family--Gomez, Wednesday, Morticia" border="0" data-original-height="750" data-original-width="1422" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzth2qvkVMh635x0977SaJhrkrG1qSxlR3S_EqJHgsofq_amD1-zfT_I2hMC8EA7EqyGCegRxw8ZMuycpAUDoVj4uclFxG1CNbRwd4CRu1HqUADg850MW2Sl-flXzoctkyHovshFywX2FRYXXohcI73aQgZ_iZ3bfxKx7497u02gsHD-xVCUFnM2WRMw/w400-h211/Addams%20family.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Three of the Netflix Addams family characters: Gomez Addams (Luis Guzmán), Wedneday Addams (Jenna Ortega) and Morticia Addams (Catherine Zeta-Jones). A great cast helps make this show work. Netflix publicity image.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>And young Jenna Ortega—she has gotten lots of praise for her starring role. She is a delicious Wednesday with her stiff mannerisms, death stare, quick one-liners and, now and then, evil smile. Ortega has arrived.<br><br>Which might be unfortunate for Ortega as a human. Hollywood is not kind to its young talent. It can make a starlet fabulously famous for a time, but often leaves them with severe life troubles. It’s not always good to be a multi-millionaire so young.<br><br>To be fair, in the few interviews I’ve seen her in, Ortega seems intelligent, quick witted and sharp-tongued. And she was a child star who has found a niche as a young adult—a sometimes rare trick. Perhaps she has her head screwed on tight enough and can navigate the temptations and burdens of entertainment fame. She surely knows far more about that world and its pitfalls than I do.<br><br>And I’ve segued from writing about a role—Wednesday—to writing about the actor playing that role. It’s a common mistake, and I want to be clear that Jenna Ortega is not Wednesday Addams, she merely plays her in a streaming video series.<br><br>Anyway, I know Ortega was already a successful Hollywood figure before this Netflix show, although I’ve not enjoyed seeing her before. “Wednesday” has surely, if briefly, pushed her from the role of successful actor to a top-tier A lister.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7snYX5rY5Nj0Ed1nu98rQKulcYj5ITC_jOFYjhdrx2FfwO16Tu_GcHAKRNp5K9Ih1faRF6wYTrzMFueccC53HWnL5KpB3GFW4NePrEIQNFuSnp4OMCDrGDYRI5s6eIA9ZtjdiZG9eDxDWtqCQRmEaAPJQ0qAcz7K_w6NX0B8zn21mYf8Mro0LxFAXkg/s450/Jenna_Ortega_2022_(cropped).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Jenna Ortega" border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="361" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7snYX5rY5Nj0Ed1nu98rQKulcYj5ITC_jOFYjhdrx2FfwO16Tu_GcHAKRNp5K9Ih1faRF6wYTrzMFueccC53HWnL5KpB3GFW4NePrEIQNFuSnp4OMCDrGDYRI5s6eIA9ZtjdiZG9eDxDWtqCQRmEaAPJQ0qAcz7K_w6NX0B8zn21mYf8Mro0LxFAXkg/w321-h400/Jenna_Ortega_2022_(cropped).jpg" width="321"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From Wikimedia Commons, based on a screen shot from a YouTube video, Jenna Ortega.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Although there are many complications that sudden superstardom has brought to Ortega:</p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>A minor tiff with writers </b>during their strike. Ortega noted that she was “unprofessional” and insisted on changing some lines. Writers, grappling with a changing landscape, the onset of AI and long being under-rewarded in Hollywood anyway, did not react well. I hope Ortega recalls that, like all stars, she is dependent on smart writing as well as her own personal talents.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Speculation about her sexuality.</b> She is a physically beautiful, physically small and very young adult Hollywood female star. On screen, her character in Wednesday stipulates that she will never marry nor have a family. Is Ortega straight? Gay? Bi? Frankly, why does anybody outside of her close friends and family care? She’s 20 years old. It would be nice to give her time and room to figure it all out without a media glare on her private life, although, sadly, that is not the nature of our media. And those who seek the spotlight often find it to be a very hot place to exist.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>The smoking thing.</b> Paparazzi recently caught Ortega lighting a cigarette, and much was made of her mother, a nurse, posting anti-smoking messages on social media after that. Well, I do hope Ortega quits if she has started smoking and does not make it a habit if it’s not one yet.</li></ul><p>This one, the smoking thing, feels a little different, to me. Anybody who has become a star has some responsibility to live a responsible life. So, a minor wag of a digit at Ortega for putting herself in an awkward place vis a vis a deadly habit.<br><br>Sure, what she did is legal. Anybody is allowed to do it. And I can see the point of, again, giving her some space. Yet, I do not want any of my young grandchildren to think smoking is cool because a smoking hot young superstar is puffing away.<br><br>Maybe she is dealing with stress—smoking is often a habit that arises in stressful situations. The old WWII saying was “smoke ’em if you’ve got ’em.” Wasn’t a good idea for young GIs and isn’t a great idea for a Hollywood star, either.<br><br>But it’s not Ortega’s fault that people may idolize her. She is an immature human, living a complicated life as all of us do. As a human, she seems packed with talent, which she displayed in season 1 of “Wednesday.” I’m a fan. And it’s great to see a Latina icon, something not common in our media.<br><br>Anyway, where did the Penguins go? Here they come again. Previous Addams Family franchises have a mixed record. I’m not going to comment on the 1960s TV show, although I am old enough to vaguely recall it a bit. I don’t think I was a regular viewer.<br><br>As for the 1990s movies, well. Movie 1 and movie 2 are great. Movie 3 had a change in cast and fell victim to Penguin syndrome—the writing was tired and trite and the results pretty bad.<br><br>And the recent animated movies follow a similar pattern. The 2019 “The Addams Family” featured, surprise, Wednesday Addams as arguably it’s most important character as the family battled a cable TV show host seeking country-club perfection in a planned town. It is an amusing movie, partly because it’s a dig at HGTV sensibilities. But the 2021 follow-up “The Addams Family 2” makes little sense, is full of action meaning nothing and mostly goes nowhere. Like a penguin.<br><br>The live action movie series managed two good installments before stumbling in the third. In the cartoon world, there was one amusing tale followed by a lame one.<br><br>I have some hopes for our current “Wednesday.” May the creators, writers, director, talented cast, continue to push story—to have something to share that has some wit and depth. May they not pursue the one-liners so hard that they subsume what every good tale needs—a tale.<br><br>And I wish Jenna Ortega well. Good luck, kid. You already know this, but in Hollywood, you need it.<br><br></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-56165650052206975942023-05-12T19:09:00.001-07:002023-05-12T19:09:42.795-07:00Honoring A Graduating Great Student Journalist<p><b>Note:</b> <i>This post is the text of the presentation I did at the 2023 Honors Convocation at Mount Mercy University, May 12, 2023. Convocation is kind of the kick-off event of a series of events associated with commencement at MMU. The first two images below were used during the presentation, the rest are just bonus images from Annie’s time at Mount Mercy.</i><br /><br /><b><span style="font-size: large;">Annie Barkalow reflection</span></b><br /><br />Hello, my name is Joe Sheller, associate professor of communication at Mount Mercy University. Many know me for being faculty advisor to the MMU Times, as well as official DJ of the Times office.<br /><br />Here is an early image I made of Annie Barkalow, covering an event in fall 2020, when she came to Mount Mercy and first began writing for the Mount Mercy Times.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis3nXcPuX0tFksQzwvEAIu1RubbxfFzvSAQx5z-l7q7_mtlJpQMmmY7rm1YOyR5-PNk11CwUOyRBRCPxaSY0EEXtlQpViI23dN4vTnt3jcQ_e_2wiQ6XO2BfCHCLVixrK2ktKgoZFkeR5rYcZeA2bMpR9JpdHMka2ICHwDt2swUAIDXxwM3JbDTa29Jw/s1000/Annie8.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Annie" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis3nXcPuX0tFksQzwvEAIu1RubbxfFzvSAQx5z-l7q7_mtlJpQMmmY7rm1YOyR5-PNk11CwUOyRBRCPxaSY0EEXtlQpViI23dN4vTnt3jcQ_e_2wiQ6XO2BfCHCLVixrK2ktKgoZFkeR5rYcZeA2bMpR9JpdHMka2ICHwDt2swUAIDXxwM3JbDTa29Jw/w400-h266/Annie8.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Fall 2020--The masked era. Annie Barkalow covering a speech for the MMU Times.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p>By fall of this year, she achieved the high office and dignity of Editor-in-Chief of the campus newspaper.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi79vAehYgdrkTPAlKgt77f0A_0dq93qOtJOxRPB-vLtYv2kSbX40Xrp7ILc46jVCQ6DXtFrsFp6QrsXzyEsCCB9HzTlcWht-sZx23aIBJrX0P7Lij90RwiiKsBl-9H75xGGW_wmiKjoOj42gyW0V-svh8y444qRqaCq_mjvjAlTAHKrw6srWdFlRWtjw/s1000/Annie7.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Annie" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi79vAehYgdrkTPAlKgt77f0A_0dq93qOtJOxRPB-vLtYv2kSbX40Xrp7ILc46jVCQ6DXtFrsFp6QrsXzyEsCCB9HzTlcWht-sZx23aIBJrX0P7Lij90RwiiKsBl-9H75xGGW_wmiKjoOj42gyW0V-svh8y444qRqaCq_mjvjAlTAHKrw6srWdFlRWtjw/w400-h266/Annie7.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Fall 2022--Annie as editor recruiting students at Involvement Fair.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>As you can see, some things have changed over the years. Annie has grown, partly fueled by new life experiences. She herself wrote in her final column for the Times that being on the editorial staff of the newspaper, and of the MMU literary magazine Paha, were important to her. As Annie states:<br /><br />Quote: Being part of these publications was the highlight of my school experience and proved to be invaluable. Writing for the Times, I learned how to ask strategic questions, honed my writing and photography skills and met a lot of interesting people. Unquote.<br /><br />Annie was quite complimentary to both me and to Dr. Mary Vermillion, advisor of Paha, and I appreciate her kind words. Kind, but heartfelt, too, because that was Annie—she has the attributes that a great journalist and writer needs: a big heart combined with a critical-thinking mind.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEji8rfWCUxPQhxx2ekgbuKRFVTndbfLhddgXMgSpS_bhVeeCXaUa2a80XBqSW2_ZchiYeb53PWOHS7-tWhtthqVlSPR8ldFUpvHIT-3uvYO24r_7DhRAN7iHfGeFYkvFCXBBsD6F7yGaKEE0V8l4MNLVgnITEXFylX6s0B_YCdJMTJZ13NDs27JP19eVw/s1000/Annie.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="663" data-original-width="1000" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEji8rfWCUxPQhxx2ekgbuKRFVTndbfLhddgXMgSpS_bhVeeCXaUa2a80XBqSW2_ZchiYeb53PWOHS7-tWhtthqVlSPR8ldFUpvHIT-3uvYO24r_7DhRAN7iHfGeFYkvFCXBBsD6F7yGaKEE0V8l4MNLVgnITEXFylX6s0B_YCdJMTJZ13NDs27JP19eVw/w400-h265/Annie.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p>I am proud to have been part of Annie’s growth over the past three years. True, Reece’s Peanut Butter cups were also a part of that growth, for both of us, but I mean the growth of her skills and mind.<br /><br />Every student faces a balancing act of life and school and activities, and Annie showed a lot of grit and determination completing her undergraduate degree as a non-traditional age student whose balancing act is incredibly challenging. I hope that her family shares fully in the pride those of us at MMU feel in seeing what Annie has been able to do. As a journalist for the MMU Times, Annie covered key stories with maturity, balance and insight. She wrote about MMU removing art installations in a controversy last spring. She wrote about the struggles of teachers in a challenging time for education. She covered a Holocaust remembrance ceremony in a story that was recognized as the best feature story in the state by the Iowa College Media Association. Her personal blog, <a href="https://sadannielaughing.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Anne with an E,</a> was recognized twice by ICMA for being among the best student journalist’s blogs in Iowa.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF8UnqTtj6F6CwFeitJmrNfWQwukY4OInxTaYBIxhRJpZYUOJHqvXeyJxtYwGkXzVUKbbrR-jaBh4x_pGJ0_TzWHfe305fBWsACqa5wo2e0j5Du3s6SaRk89vM5OXBjaobLuFc1Mfo_MeZzFPFao7rWp-k0xvIcqdpfZc8sUq-67I_c46e8Yc1qd8k_g/s1000/Annie%202.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF8UnqTtj6F6CwFeitJmrNfWQwukY4OInxTaYBIxhRJpZYUOJHqvXeyJxtYwGkXzVUKbbrR-jaBh4x_pGJ0_TzWHfe305fBWsACqa5wo2e0j5Du3s6SaRk89vM5OXBjaobLuFc1Mfo_MeZzFPFao7rWp-k0xvIcqdpfZc8sUq-67I_c46e8Yc1qd8k_g/w400-h266/Annie%202.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p>More than the accolades from ICMA, I think Annie will long be recalled for her clear devotion to the newspaper and its service to MMU. She innovated, creating, for example, the “Flashback” feature that is an ongoing aspect of the Times.</p><p>She wrote many of our best news stories, staff editorials and features, and made many of our best photographs, over the three years she spent on The Hill.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIGBw8pxLrZLxp53AsbZZT7CWDJtDtlyXCDEoW9vojjamVGQB5XS-_emRV6-TZkQzJbVB6mDyKo4-f0LB7Cc9jasg5jYmp3OW71p6Tpxsrs9UMy6qupWo1hrvW0Baj4XQcnCnu1pLyz6kPzqv61fed7k8qUpinm1PuIKTs_4iv6CGDXSBaY-sFNeni8A/s1000/Annie.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="663" data-original-width="1000" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIGBw8pxLrZLxp53AsbZZT7CWDJtDtlyXCDEoW9vojjamVGQB5XS-_emRV6-TZkQzJbVB6mDyKo4-f0LB7Cc9jasg5jYmp3OW71p6Tpxsrs9UMy6qupWo1hrvW0Baj4XQcnCnu1pLyz6kPzqv61fed7k8qUpinm1PuIKTs_4iv6CGDXSBaY-sFNeni8A/w400-h265/Annie.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRTAIFuTpDXGCh1aS6wLncKzz6bjfXGo349jZJQN-7QIETEWHKqykqWWjzKf8FYDJKcDy355LBKEKD7du1Z32uBFNvn8XCT00OghjjZG50LUPgxbYBBHQoinbcFvKSlK2vVtBM3BZHmEXSKURf_-Ow7pqwR55ehu0hq4WOO9dfZtFZ5i100vRPmupKNQ/s1000/Annie3.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRTAIFuTpDXGCh1aS6wLncKzz6bjfXGo349jZJQN-7QIETEWHKqykqWWjzKf8FYDJKcDy355LBKEKD7du1Z32uBFNvn8XCT00OghjjZG50LUPgxbYBBHQoinbcFvKSlK2vVtBM3BZHmEXSKURf_-Ow7pqwR55ehu0hq4WOO9dfZtFZ5i100vRPmupKNQ/w400-h266/Annie3.jpg" width="400" /></a></p><p>It is my pleasure to recognize the many contributions that Annie Barkalow has made to Mount Mercy as a journalist. The outstanding student journalist of the year for 2023 is Anne with an E, a.k.a. Annie Barkalow.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-9gzghRNNJArB7qRSYuQL6SL-YlANrk6yjICoh_7eO2qw00GFMkZIh07A2sjBtQoTOSxIMdyhl03F9dRZoTMwxQBiAHeDSm-Ss5TabFM9C9VyQaVZ-VFe1KUHXb1lJlrXS6cA9jJ9ybYX3ro_X0inHjasnUPOrVtJJfo8zw7CtCe-G2qrujPJ2qh_aQ/s1000/Annie6.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-9gzghRNNJArB7qRSYuQL6SL-YlANrk6yjICoh_7eO2qw00GFMkZIh07A2sjBtQoTOSxIMdyhl03F9dRZoTMwxQBiAHeDSm-Ss5TabFM9C9VyQaVZ-VFe1KUHXb1lJlrXS6cA9jJ9ybYX3ro_X0inHjasnUPOrVtJJfo8zw7CtCe-G2qrujPJ2qh_aQ/w400-h266/Annie6.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-BkBQ4S4VJm_IkYB1dKvsamOaFFydPG7KHQZH__Zu7EziubZ_OIHdq4pLrL6TS9pXWr7_FmwdoIv0NErTnJeAVDiHW4RmqLb6xCg9eWj1U_9h7uCgGICLf798vofZ5rLzgV2m8fLdwMg3kOYV9NPIswLXUaHdmwblpnM8ORw_dkH5AFtmhjYzPIrLmQ/s1000/Annie5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="667" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-BkBQ4S4VJm_IkYB1dKvsamOaFFydPG7KHQZH__Zu7EziubZ_OIHdq4pLrL6TS9pXWr7_FmwdoIv0NErTnJeAVDiHW4RmqLb6xCg9eWj1U_9h7uCgGICLf798vofZ5rLzgV2m8fLdwMg3kOYV9NPIswLXUaHdmwblpnM8ORw_dkH5AFtmhjYzPIrLmQ/w266-h400/Annie5.jpg" width="266" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzBbDC2UG_NN89x73TPX0r0f5QVwb29EWbaMge6F2aidPawm2eUKYcKJ1DjKUvCyJvV6HmXM491EFlm0g3CraJs8HySTGVtQqCGrNmCIy1DMHsdeUoJMHofCmtleKlmNEcuAS9egKPCruioYasYujnbEAIFCNm82LD4D9k3ye5Qboi6vfkEW9bcecGag/s1000/Annie4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="667" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzBbDC2UG_NN89x73TPX0r0f5QVwb29EWbaMge6F2aidPawm2eUKYcKJ1DjKUvCyJvV6HmXM491EFlm0g3CraJs8HySTGVtQqCGrNmCIy1DMHsdeUoJMHofCmtleKlmNEcuAS9egKPCruioYasYujnbEAIFCNm82LD4D9k3ye5Qboi6vfkEW9bcecGag/w266-h400/Annie4.jpg" width="266" /></a></div><br /><br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /><br /></div><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-45149101137598390272023-05-03T11:23:00.001-07:002023-05-03T12:16:41.703-07:00A Dramatic News Shift<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinyvt9dGUdku9ZW6qj8d2kuBaYIX3VFChL9y2jyet8vSCxhU_9WGDqPZqDJVbX2giSB4P2YG9hvrI5icE8DJm1EdGbw67HmrfNE9myePmhzj2QUfXtRN8yrvUPIfhOfmHbEWH3o3T7AbZ-PaxpwC2Dvevqlfi3_vQCma8E9Q98j-hlQSsj_n_OIkXktw/s1000/w02.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Papers on loading dock" border="0" data-original-height="732" data-original-width="1000" height="293" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinyvt9dGUdku9ZW6qj8d2kuBaYIX3VFChL9y2jyet8vSCxhU_9WGDqPZqDJVbX2giSB4P2YG9hvrI5icE8DJm1EdGbw67HmrfNE9myePmhzj2QUfXtRN8yrvUPIfhOfmHbEWH3o3T7AbZ-PaxpwC2Dvevqlfi3_vQCma8E9Q98j-hlQSsj_n_OIkXktw/w400-h293/w02.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bundles of the Mount Mercy Times on the McAuley Hall loading dock, 8 a.m., May 3, 2023.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>How long will there be “paper” newspapers? When will the final print edition of whatever the final publication is smack the porch of the last subscriber?</p><p>The hand has been writing on the wall for a while. And, yes, I still get my morning paper, and I still like having the pages there with me at breakfast to flip through, to read what catches my eye. I get The Gazette, the Cedar Rapids, Iowa, newspaper. I also am a digital subscriber to The New York Times.</p><p>I like my NY Times, and try to dip into it daily. But I most often look at it on my phone screen, and the words are teeny tiny there—readable, but though the phone is always with me and the pages of the Gazette are not, it is still not as conveniently consumable as ink on paper. I’m sure I consume many more stories in the Gazette than in the Times.</p><p>But I have issues with my paper Gazette, too. As their subscriber base narrows, their delivery service is getting iffier. We went from having a carrier who put the paper on our front stoop to “driveway delivery,” which means, it seems, a biplane tosses out papers in our neighborhood that randomly land in the vicinity of subscribers. Finding the paper is a daily morning hunt, and Monday it wasn’t there at all—an occurrence that has become way too common since the biplane was launched.</p><p>And one winter day, after a snowfall, I ended up chewing up the Sunday Gazette with a snowblower because I didn’t see it buried under the blanket of white. On rainy days, given the haphazard nature of the paper drop, it’s an even bet whether we have a readable newspaper or a soggy brick of mushy newsprint.</p><p>It gets irritating paying for a product whose delivery is getting dicey. My wife and I have discussed whether to continue getting the paper, since we’re not always “getting” the paper. Digital would be an option, but I hate to give up reading a paper newspaper.</p><p>When I was growing up, my family usually got three daily newspapers, at least in Iowa. I wasn’t very literate when we lived in California (we moved just before I turned 8), so I can’t say what the sitch was there. </p><p>By the way, Word doesn’t like shortening “situation” to “sitch,” but Word clearly is not a Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan—I am, so that’s the sitch.</p><p>Anyway, in Clinton, it was The Quad City Times, The Des Moines Register and The Clinton Herald. In Muscatine, it was the first two (QCT and Register), and The Muscatine Journal.</p><p>The local papers were afternoon publications, the area “big city” paper, and the newspaper Iowa used to depend upon when the sports page was Peach colored, were both morning papers. None of them were dropped from biplanes. As I became interested in journalism as a career, two of them became part of my experience—my undergraduate internship was at The Muscatine Journal, and I had a part-time gig as a sportswriter for The Quad City Times when I was a senior in college.</p><p>The world changes. Web-fed rotary presses were invented before the Civil War, making mass newspapers possible. Today, that industry makes less sense, which is why it’s scrambling so hard to acquire cents.</p><p>And so, we come to today. A big day that I have decidedly mixed feelings about.</p><p>My wife set the alarm for 5:30 a.m., a brutally early time to a night owl like me. I had to arise early to get to the Mount Mercy University campus before an early class.</p><p>I had the glamorous job of moving the pile of newspapers that are dropped off at a loading dock to the newspaper’s library office, where a student doing work study will later distribute those dead trees around campus.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvT5Fdk5xLITFOVg3AJlfd1kTqEgOUaHK0cu3fQA0ZbXtOtpfeGqB6q-eaxGHPBmHRChLa5ObYIXspv9SJW5k_085lAfJyBrlU32Ra2_oSFQN8QFQsy4jh-ofoipCrVNRlshUagJjyVGAr4Dzw1qRihch7yPPZocdajmkqSfUBQLInlMPWf8XFA9YwZg/s1000/w03.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Newspapers on cart" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvT5Fdk5xLITFOVg3AJlfd1kTqEgOUaHK0cu3fQA0ZbXtOtpfeGqB6q-eaxGHPBmHRChLa5ObYIXspv9SJW5k_085lAfJyBrlU32Ra2_oSFQN8QFQsy4jh-ofoipCrVNRlshUagJjyVGAr4Dzw1qRihch7yPPZocdajmkqSfUBQLInlMPWf8XFA9YwZg/w400-h266/w03.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Papers on cart in MMU Times office. Collector's item soon to be available around campus.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Meanwhile, she will collect all of the fortnight-old copies of the previous edition—well, not “all,” since some get picked up, but a disturbingly large percentage of the previous paper will end up in recycling bins rather than before the eyeballs of our intended audience.</p><p>Old fogeys like me love the paper newspapers. Young flappers, like MMU students, apparently, aren’t so enamored by dried ink on dead trees.</p><p>The Mount Mercy Times maintains its own <a href="https://mmutimes.org/" target="_blank">web site</a> but, frankly, doesn’t do a great job of it. Partly, that’s because the print product occupies so much energy and time, and partly because the few readers we do have aren’t motivated to seek out a secondary experience online that is not as good as the fish wrap in the news rack.</p><p>Nonetheless, the world is changing. Newspapers are an industry that is contracting. Not that the need or desire for information is gone—but that desire is less fulfilled by felling Canadian forests for paper.</p><p>We have crossed the Rubicon. Recognizing the media trends in the world and on college campuses, I asked the governing body of the MMU Times, the ill-named “Board of Student Publications,” (there is more than one student publication at MMU, but only the Times is regulated by the board) to review the status of the newspaper this spring, to answer the question: Does it make sense to go all-in as an online news source and leave the paper behind?</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_B5OwVhBkqFOaXRe4V3qwBhsO2QlX0lsTpK4BQxlyWi1DhiTMqVCNRLToOB1F0b6Dp10KkDpe7bZGdIMPfr6RwXuYZ21cCykDQs3apkU-kE_8mFsOsOcUiPM4HPtZCLD-Q4yIlu411OZDCoHvVFfwKqLl-d0HsZBfzhm2qkNtM7PzhaRLsPoJ05lgWA/s1000/wo4.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Side view of paper" border="0" data-original-height="659" data-original-width="1000" height="264" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_B5OwVhBkqFOaXRe4V3qwBhsO2QlX0lsTpK4BQxlyWi1DhiTMqVCNRLToOB1F0b6Dp10KkDpe7bZGdIMPfr6RwXuYZ21cCykDQs3apkU-kE_8mFsOsOcUiPM4HPtZCLD-Q4yIlu411OZDCoHvVFfwKqLl-d0HsZBfzhm2qkNtM7PzhaRLsPoJ05lgWA/w400-h264/wo4.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The paper. Get yours later today on campus.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>In examining the question, the board surveyed the MMU community. The voluntary responses showed that many people love the paper newspaper and will dearly miss it. But I don’t think it was enough to justify printing and recycling most of a press run.</p><p>I was asked to inquire of other colleges what their experiences are, and I queried the Iowa College Media Association. In general, many colleges are committed to maintain a paper newspaper, but only for now. At many places, the frequency of publication and number of pages is in noticeable decline. And at Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, the switch to all online was more than a decade ago.</p><p>The board asked me what I wanted. I want the world to go back as it was. I want people to get more of their information from newspapers. I want the college student generation to appreciate and deeply be into reading. What I want, however, doesn’t change what is. Given reality, I don’t know for sure what I should want, but I said it was time that the Times get with the times. We know we’re going online as some point—let’s do it now.</p><p>I hope I didn’t make a horrible mistake. Maintaining a vibrant student “newspaper” without any paper will be a challenge. Yet, the staff of the paper will no longer be treating our online presences as an afterthought; instead, it will be the thought.</p><p>Who’d have thought it? An old paper fan pushed for the shift to online. What an odd sitch. It feels right to me, sort of. And a little sad, at the same time. I’m not always good at change even if I think it can be a healthy thing.</p><p>So, today, I picked up the final paper. Delivered it to the newsroom. And sighed.</p><p>Let’s hope what comes next can be vibrant and lively. I don’t want MMU to turn into what too many communities have become these days—news deserts. The news is there, but nobody is covering it.</p><p>May we be an oasis of journalism instead. Even if that journalism will now be all electrons dancing in cyberspace and on people’s phone screens.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPciROzhYGvxeALFLrIXweXDUEuNQjMbP6iar61ypOqH3HvchvGxLkede_2jv-KdvkNVP3lRcf7AJASWmQsmCZDfMteN5Ja5USyic_7h3tIrl2WREdpRyv9R0DcOEw0osWQc4dO0fH2BIHT4cIsLtVNznMOTtM09YVrSY9rVh8ri5KjhUYZ3zgHJuuDQ/s2000/w01.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Front page" border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="2000" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPciROzhYGvxeALFLrIXweXDUEuNQjMbP6iar61ypOqH3HvchvGxLkede_2jv-KdvkNVP3lRcf7AJASWmQsmCZDfMteN5Ja5USyic_7h3tIrl2WREdpRyv9R0DcOEw0osWQc4dO0fH2BIHT4cIsLtVNznMOTtM09YVrSY9rVh8ri5KjhUYZ3zgHJuuDQ/w400-h400/w01.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dated May 4, 2023--the final MMU Times paper edition.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div><br /></div>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-53269981702392287912023-03-16T21:55:00.000-07:002023-03-16T21:55:14.546-07:00Kevin, Tucker and the Weird Big Lie<p>The stunt that Kevin McCarthy pulled, releasing hours of Capitol video to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, may be backfiring.<br /><br />I think part of the problem is that too many of use recall Jan. 6, 2021. Trying to reframe it now as peaceful patriots simply visiting our seat of government is to completely miscast events we watched unfold. It seemed like a violent insurrection meant to gum up the work of democracy only because it was a violent insurrection meant to gum up the works of democracy.<br /><br />Take, for instance, this clip, in which Tucker says video “proves” a Capitol police officer was not a victim of violence:</p><p style="text-align: left;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/CV1At8Lg_1g" width="320" youtube-src-id="CV1At8Lg_1g"></iframe><br /><br />But wait, there’s more. As PolitiFact points out, in <a href="https://www.politifact.com/article/2023/mar/08/tucker-carlson-airs-jan-6-footage-downplays-violen/" target="_blank">an essay on seven lies pushed by Carlson</a>, the video doesn’t prove what Tucker claims it proves.</p><p style="text-align: left;">Well, as violent historic events go, the Jan. 6 riot was not all that organized. It wasn’t 9/11 nor Pearl Harbor—the death toll was much more modest, the Capitol was damaged but not burned as it was when British tourists wearing red coats visited early in the 19th century. But it was not peaceful, either, and it was an attempt to shut down a peaceful transfer of power following a legal election.<br /><br />Let’s say it again. The 2020 election was not stolen. Joe Biden won. It’s OK to not be OK with that, but it’s not OK to not acknowledge it as a reality. When you lose an election, you dust yourself off, pick yourself up and vow to come back in the next election.<br /><br />You don’t march on the Capitol and demand a redo.<br /><br />And if you’re the Speaker of the House, and you want to go against the advice of law enforcement and release a bunch of raw video form that day, at least you release that video to all media all at once, not some weird alt-universe commentator like Tucker Carlson.<br /><br />What McCarthy did, and how Tucker used that video, is not transparency. It is the opposite. It’s ink in the water. It’s a big lie, parading around like it was truth.<br /><br />We are always better off if we at least can agree on the basic facts, and the problem with Tucker and Trump’s Big Lie is it remains a Big Lie. And Jan. 6, 2021, was a shameful day. People did die. Democracy was in danger. And it still is.<br /><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-69203567273764121172023-02-19T11:22:00.005-08:002023-02-19T12:01:22.662-08:00Echoes of the Other Nixon Scandal<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmkUBQdOsAwxDlWwmnvf_9W7RiGJON1qulXJ5orsJbuivzERRhvWJJKSyGPs39EjuDRKM1D1L_AA5Q3LLZmL0YA7qEzZILk_rgtz9e18_IjYc4iCo3CVfCoEUADH4hSLlfIfeQ6qPHidyV-hN9yDuScei4Ggg0wBCPMS1v5WH8owBomELxDdeuVdtSxA/s350/bag%20man.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt=""Bag Man" book cover" border="0" data-original-height="350" data-original-width="232" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmkUBQdOsAwxDlWwmnvf_9W7RiGJON1qulXJ5orsJbuivzERRhvWJJKSyGPs39EjuDRKM1D1L_AA5Q3LLZmL0YA7qEzZILk_rgtz9e18_IjYc4iCo3CVfCoEUADH4hSLlfIfeQ6qPHidyV-hN9yDuScei4Ggg0wBCPMS1v5WH8owBomELxDdeuVdtSxA/w265-h400/bag%20man.jpg" width="265" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Over image from Amazon.com.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>In my media history classes, we do spend some time on Watergate, a scandal that started in 1972 and eventually brought down a president who had just won a landslide reelection.<br /><br />But I also mention Spiro Agnew, President Nixon’s first vice president, forced to resign in disgrace. Mostly I teach about him because, as the designated attack dog of the Nixon years, Agnew constantly attacked the news media, pointing the way to a Republican strategy of shooting the messenger that has intensified as it continued through the decades.<br /><br />While Richard Nixon was no Donald Trump—in Nixon’s case, he was a long-time public servant who had some grasp of both government and history, subjects that Trump has flunked in his adult life—Nixon’s scandals did scar and shape the future of his party. So there is a through line to the modern GOP flirting with a cult of personality and proto-fascism.<br /><br />Anyway, I just finished reading “Bag Man: The Wild Crimes, Audacious Cover-Up & Spectacular Downfall of a Brazen Crook in the White House” by Rachel Maddow and Michael Yarvitz. I did a few seconds of internet research, but could not find out who drew the interesting cartoons that begin each chapter—a mystery to me that I wish I could solve.<br /><br />Despite wondering where the cover and chapter art comes from, I found the book to be a readable, interesting summary, not just of Spiro Agnew’s crimes, uncovered by federal prosecutors in Baltimore, Maryland—it’s instructive in terms of how Agnew chose to fight the charges and frame the scandal.<br /><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL0z4RMfJ4pIkwI2arQw4jLLKHq76s1O2BuTxpXkDljv4Xww9_TAtjTVkzqreNWxyd48MNi03t_Vdd74GwQowiIiGXSOfdapVszkBoL51KiIZcCtcM5iba0l-jQjhBTHcGCui07eZrNhA8P_gd4BakWOwK6lb191khrFwPLsXr2p-3B4VBaWQYJje8fQ/s599/467px-Spiro_Agnew.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Spiro Agnew" border="0" data-original-height="599" data-original-width="466" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL0z4RMfJ4pIkwI2arQw4jLLKHq76s1O2BuTxpXkDljv4Xww9_TAtjTVkzqreNWxyd48MNi03t_Vdd74GwQowiIiGXSOfdapVszkBoL51KiIZcCtcM5iba0l-jQjhBTHcGCui07eZrNhA8P_gd4BakWOwK6lb191khrFwPLsXr2p-3B4VBaWQYJje8fQ/w311-h400/467px-Spiro_Agnew.jpg" width="311" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From Wikimedia Commons, official White House mug shot of a criminal: Vice President Spiro Agnew.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>Because he pretty clearly was a felon. He had taken large cash bribes to award construction contracts for state projects as governor of Maryland--and continued to take bribes as Nixon's VP. But to get him out of office before Nixon’s fall—otherwise the U.S. would have had a criminal president, something we didn’t really get until we crazily elected one in 2016—the Justice Department agrees to let Agnew escape the ignominy of wearing prison garb in exchange for his quitting.<br /><br />The Nixon years were years of political shocks. There was Lyndon Johnson, deciding in March of 1968 to quit the race for reelection even as Nixon's primary campaign was just taking hold. Bobby Kennedy being shot during the primary campaign. Nixon picking an obscure, right-wing governor of Maryland, who he never respected, because Nixon was shoring up right-wing support in his own party. A close election that Nixon won. Years of paranoia about the media culminating in the CREEP engaging in clumsy, illegal manipulation in 1972.<br /><br />And just as Johnson stunned the nation in 1968 with his sudden departure from the campaign, we have the sudden execution of the “the deal,” where Agnew unexpectedly cashed in the only cards he held, giving up his public office. He maintained his innocence, not just to the end, but beyond, claiming at one point that Nixon was plotting to have him killed and that federal prosecutors had engaged in a “witch hunt” against him.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPODIxgqIFY14jcgXzld4CWQfIfnO0bXmIjI9fFvWqnemUU4Bu_sj2kpB-vXEp6yCW0kXzVYBiX0wx0WVmNi0aaHBtFFrGdfIJwgrK32WuLFeFMxAUius2bblvZV219VEGByfnlRpmzGVg9sdokskOchEk3dkr6qpsPVvX63YfncS_-dxge825FtyRRg/s1129/agnew.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="AGnew with crew of Apollo 10" border="0" data-original-height="789" data-original-width="1129" height="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPODIxgqIFY14jcgXzld4CWQfIfnO0bXmIjI9fFvWqnemUU4Bu_sj2kpB-vXEp6yCW0kXzVYBiX0wx0WVmNi0aaHBtFFrGdfIJwgrK32WuLFeFMxAUius2bblvZV219VEGByfnlRpmzGVg9sdokskOchEk3dkr6qpsPVvX63YfncS_-dxge825FtyRRg/w400-h280/agnew.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Happier days for Spiro Agnew--as VP, meeting crew of Apollo 10 in 1968. NASA official image downloaded from Wikimedia Commons.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>I was pretty young when it all broke and, at least briefly in my young adulthood, a Republican. But I lived in a newsy house—my parents always watched the nightly news, they subscribed to three daily newspapers and news was always around. I never bought into Agnew’s version; it was pretty obvious at the time to any consumer of the news that he was a crook.<br /><br />Yet he did maintain a base of support. I suppose he could have shot a man on Fifth Avenue and some of his supporters would have remained loyal to him.<br /><br />Politics in this country is a rough game—I guess it is globally and throughout human history. Just ask Julius Caesar what he thought of Brutus. Our particular times are not particularly different, except we have stumbled on a system that at least balances our worst impulses with some rule of law and some semblance of We the People having our say.<br /><br />As our democracy wobbles a bit in election denial—face it, today’s Republicans, Joe Biden won with no trickery, deceit nor widespread conspiracy—it is nice that we survived those Nixon year shocks. Yet buying into Trump’s lies today is in line with a darker moment of your past recent history.<br /><br />Agnew did it. Sure there was a witch hunt but the point is that there really was a witch (or warlock). They caught him but didn’t burn him just so that he would never become president. And Agnew's evasions created an odd playbook that, sadly, is still being applied by crooked politicians today.<br /><br /></p><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-61932137935598723892023-02-04T21:43:00.003-08:002023-02-04T21:43:48.824-08:00Some Reminders of Why Journalism is Important<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimKMRqXT_WjRJoF_dkX_CD-8oq2h5_O-HZ9MaiSO5EAl6OC59fA5cCiEPmi7Si3QTnfXYIcno5xP5G0_BsAJPwi1fpswaXYTDYx1L2CdsPbNwwqKMiNXWYfUSHhF7UlmrTiPu8pUw3ZRthneKpr710xEWuZVTr5Grvnrshp-Jnmjva3Px6O7vwy87tEA/s1000/a016.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Students at ICMA" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimKMRqXT_WjRJoF_dkX_CD-8oq2h5_O-HZ9MaiSO5EAl6OC59fA5cCiEPmi7Si3QTnfXYIcno5xP5G0_BsAJPwi1fpswaXYTDYx1L2CdsPbNwwqKMiNXWYfUSHhF7UlmrTiPu8pUw3ZRthneKpr710xEWuZVTr5Grvnrshp-Jnmjva3Px6O7vwy87tEA/w400-h266/a016.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>This and next three images--college student from around Iowa listening to speakers at annual Iowa College Media Association convention, hosted by the Iowa Newspaper Association, Feb. 2, 2023, in Des Moines.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrGmsuRhn2O_YNglVo1ZmPo31M3IdQBC_hysceh-5vVBYAfgSwwqSOor55ffl2uoqxFiRq0gOnHriEY8Bu1zYhsCp-bjZTsAM9CvMh7q-aJiv_O0mG3DNkS6DOOp1L7wOVxtftMEsTF7u8AEd1FkdiQFujiWF9CTdwJYC2p7YvONvY3yvP00SNy-gG-Q/s1000/a031.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrGmsuRhn2O_YNglVo1ZmPo31M3IdQBC_hysceh-5vVBYAfgSwwqSOor55ffl2uoqxFiRq0gOnHriEY8Bu1zYhsCp-bjZTsAM9CvMh7q-aJiv_O0mG3DNkS6DOOp1L7wOVxtftMEsTF7u8AEd1FkdiQFujiWF9CTdwJYC2p7YvONvY3yvP00SNy-gG-Q/w400-h266/a031.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtr8PSWe6UGtx4JagTVvSBSFmMyJKvv10MwFgteb1a0H_s2d0SgKgOs0WXSRxuIePUm42TdGO4JfUVey8PbHAxSqOv5ztIJmyQHJvYyCrCmO2-ndFqaWZaVWPChU_ljqVal_stnC4mMXwbpDP16jzEXnNTNaZoIsIzIc4qTc8CkFT6ctsDl5JtsXDa_w/s1000/a085.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtr8PSWe6UGtx4JagTVvSBSFmMyJKvv10MwFgteb1a0H_s2d0SgKgOs0WXSRxuIePUm42TdGO4JfUVey8PbHAxSqOv5ztIJmyQHJvYyCrCmO2-ndFqaWZaVWPChU_ljqVal_stnC4mMXwbpDP16jzEXnNTNaZoIsIzIc4qTc8CkFT6ctsDl5JtsXDa_w/w400-h266/a085.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguQA4dqEVOt-ONh49dWwTHO0-ey3lWhotYb03hVx7DoSArASFK-59PTqoEkF0iHTvXFOkPWLqqUHebH4MNdVpzGrE2qF387ZdlJsPEepqwioPIyveLzOKwtqLvH04nPs8_YFlWqptTdwNObMobQroObictJBKf7-BKw3rbG-rqvjjD1q0nTYKQf9qgOw/s1000/a096.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="631" data-original-width="1000" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguQA4dqEVOt-ONh49dWwTHO0-ey3lWhotYb03hVx7DoSArASFK-59PTqoEkF0iHTvXFOkPWLqqUHebH4MNdVpzGrE2qF387ZdlJsPEepqwioPIyveLzOKwtqLvH04nPs8_YFlWqptTdwNObMobQroObictJBKf7-BKw3rbG-rqvjjD1q0nTYKQf9qgOw/w400-h253/a096.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><p>There’s no doubt that journalism is changing. This week, two students and I attended the Iowa College Media Association Convention Feb. 2 in Des Moines.<br /><br />The convention, which was a two-day affair PC (pre-COVID), was one day this year. It’s hosted by the Iowa Newspaper Association, and with fewer vendors willing to travel in pandemic times and a shrinking base of newspapers, the associated twitched to a one-day affair.<br /><br />Times they are a-changing. So is the MMU Times, the Mount Mercy University campus newspaper that I advise—it’s gone from broadsheet (full size) to tabloid (half size) with the idea that we’ll be more of an on-line news source. I foresee that a day may come soon where we forsake the printing press for a total emphasis on cyberspace.<br /><br />We’ll see.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_qDkSKm9kuNWkc_hjCasujSp0qW1MtTS4Jq4V9VmMEJU4TspRdhovjxw5gN1xOLfUeOIsdORqS7pE093UTFnXshBQdL3nhpJ31zQfVzi-RbkU-My3wSFbEhlhanX1LPaV1M_ftK5VKppqW5Oe00-1rMU37jp8YHxm2O-I3DOYxmKmyPAGi4OvlCijIw/s1000/a039.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_qDkSKm9kuNWkc_hjCasujSp0qW1MtTS4Jq4V9VmMEJU4TspRdhovjxw5gN1xOLfUeOIsdORqS7pE093UTFnXshBQdL3nhpJ31zQfVzi-RbkU-My3wSFbEhlhanX1LPaV1M_ftK5VKppqW5Oe00-1rMU37jp8YHxm2O-I3DOYxmKmyPAGi4OvlCijIw/w400-h266/a039.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Students taking notes (above and below).<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguYuLVJFVaFVvniYvqRpjell4blSrfti45YikcVz9jEEVDYxbJjEauGFvTnxOfAmnsYJ2oHag-29lE8EFXC1_8K0YDkCnyPoUOduYykg4pUNpDK3VF0kIkMdaxBiZYPhBuFtls7v9hYRsD9B2ieE8eEWvHH74EnKDpcu21F3oBUn30hgSxM3eEc4kD9g/s1000/a023.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguYuLVJFVaFVvniYvqRpjell4blSrfti45YikcVz9jEEVDYxbJjEauGFvTnxOfAmnsYJ2oHag-29lE8EFXC1_8K0YDkCnyPoUOduYykg4pUNpDK3VF0kIkMdaxBiZYPhBuFtls7v9hYRsD9B2ieE8eEWvHH74EnKDpcu21F3oBUn30hgSxM3eEc4kD9g/w400-h266/a023.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><p>Anyway, it was great to be back in Des Moines. I wore a mask—it’s an event that brings hundreds together from all corners of the state, and I just felt it was prudent. I was almost alone in that, and I hope this convention doesn’t prove to be the super-spreader event that helps the new Kraken sub-variant really get going in the Hawkeye State.<br /><br />I took a home test tonight. Negative.<br /><br />But I was pretty positive about the convention. INA’s keynote speaker was the kickoff event, and it was a kick. Dr. Richard Deming, a Des Moines oncologist spoke about “Pursuing Life with Purpose and Passion.”<br /><br />He runs a sort of adventure travel program that involves taking people who have undergone cancer treatment on trips, such as climbing Mount Everest.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV-BRYbCWf5xhu5B_1m-IrEPXOUmLPMYSlLJ73GcSF4P5nkXI5FwoLYYHWeQayZk4Rf8RLOnnIiwvUYxbl84ybLSXrAN8d5dT-CXIx6yuigrTgoEuIyNYB2muJ91Iozw_BjBfHcBCSqxFrHTfn5F59yDIFmAvl3f2rZvV5CGhXl261QlJ10VmaUQkraQ/s1000/a003.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Dr. Richard Deming" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV-BRYbCWf5xhu5B_1m-IrEPXOUmLPMYSlLJ73GcSF4P5nkXI5FwoLYYHWeQayZk4Rf8RLOnnIiwvUYxbl84ybLSXrAN8d5dT-CXIx6yuigrTgoEuIyNYB2muJ91Iozw_BjBfHcBCSqxFrHTfn5F59yDIFmAvl3f2rZvV5CGhXl261QlJ10VmaUQkraQ/w400-h266/a003.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dr. Richard Deming tells stories from the nonprofit "Beyond Cancer" that takes people who have been treated for cancer on adventure trips. He describes it as a form of ministry.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Deming noted that treating cancer is not the most important part of what he does—a great doctor, he said, treats the patient, not the disease. And partly that means taking the time to be part of their story.<br /><br />“You guys (newspaper people) are story tellers,” he said. “You have to be a story listener before you can be a story teller.”<br /><br />He touchingly recounted trips and people, showing pictures and telling stories. We met women and men who overcome and live life to the fullest facing whatever hand of cards the universe deals—an elderly lady with poor balance and eyesight, for example, scaling the slope of Kilimanjaro.<br /><br />She and the others all share a deep appreciation of a reality that we all face but sometimes forget—our time is finite.<br /><br />“If you have a dream you to want to fulfill, today is a good day to do that,” Deming said.<br /><br />Also that we need to treat each other with kindness and support. As we all pursue our dreams, none of us can do it alone. And we should do it now, too.<br /><br />“You don’t have to have cancer to get off your butt and live your life,” he said.<br /><br />I had been asked to snap and share some images during the convention, so I stuck pretty much to the ICMA speakers. It was enough, they were an interesting group.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbmtbtpTj-1BG9S60_v3vGiJJ5bWQi2g-OfW7n3kBLAnAdQJtBOpJdc9DxJ89_NbCNZ5btOr2bqzcu5-nI8-UT_RAzZVQQ0SYUTq4hSxAk1kzon6b9C5mIz1svq0KZJUZaNvnoZZIfEIn7KMFD531xBQfRMPCLOTl5KQSN8Zsj9kkfL1GEUP0BdeXqoQ/s1000/a012.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="EJ Phily Burton" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbmtbtpTj-1BG9S60_v3vGiJJ5bWQi2g-OfW7n3kBLAnAdQJtBOpJdc9DxJ89_NbCNZ5btOr2bqzcu5-nI8-UT_RAzZVQQ0SYUTq4hSxAk1kzon6b9C5mIz1svq0KZJUZaNvnoZZIfEIn7KMFD531xBQfRMPCLOTl5KQSN8Zsj9kkfL1GEUP0BdeXqoQ/w400-h266/a012.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>EJ Phily Burton is introduced.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>EJ Philby Burton, of Produce Iowa, a state office promoting movie production in Iowa, talked of the opportunities in that industry. I thought much of she said applied to any creative profession, including journalism.<br /><br />For example, when you’re in a hurry and have a complex task to get done, “power walk, don’t sprint.” If you move too quickly, you’ll get sloppy. I often tell students that their slowest typing should be when they’re writing cutlines or headlines—the last-minute touches done in a rush are also where the most embarrassing mistakes are made. So don’t sprint when you’re in a hurry. Don’t crawl, either—but power walk, working quickly, but deliberately.<br /><br />She also noted that on a movie set, a smart production assistant won’t whip out their phone, but will look around and see what needs to be done—carefully, so as not to interfere with others’ tasks, but success comes to those who can see what needs to done without always having to be directed.<br /></p><p> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTJQ-d0DX4XuF_-SuJpBesPEDypJ9oZvfOBPSUvHS5G_YlovWsIKD7WyUXd0UvfsDOl787AsbH5bLC9SngKYalcYO2bFqIoympUqUuBpI0DFH7WZVAmFjTZz2ggEZVwD0lPz9DBMZ_MZl_E_B-cTc7u5e2B1QcARsRohCEZ5GgL2t16t06d-xltGLh-w/s1000/a038.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Sarah Muller" border="0" data-original-height="663" data-original-width="1000" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTJQ-d0DX4XuF_-SuJpBesPEDypJ9oZvfOBPSUvHS5G_YlovWsIKD7WyUXd0UvfsDOl787AsbH5bLC9SngKYalcYO2bFqIoympUqUuBpI0DFH7WZVAmFjTZz2ggEZVwD0lPz9DBMZ_MZl_E_B-cTc7u5e2B1QcARsRohCEZ5GgL2t16t06d-xltGLh-w/w400-h265/a038.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Sarah Muller of Forbes talks of the need for journalism and journalist to evolve and meet their audiences where they are.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table>At a later session, Sarah Muller, Social Media Lead for Forbes, gave all kinds of example of how media needs to be more active online.<br /><br />In particular, she urged us to seriously consider TikTok as a story telling venue, given that’s where younger members of the audience are. And Iowa is banning state offices from using that app. I feel another post on another topic coming on soon.<br /><br />Back to ICMA. “We have to learn to evolve,” Muller said.<br /><br />The final panel of the afternoon is one I look forward to each year, the “Young Professionals.” They were a good crew this year, as they often are.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9uMwSr-g2-Fw3JwLWqNHQH4Wius6aWjv0QC_rO82dCaA6UcAoWxCnqqTw6Sti2XKQqnj0E5MPlWQSSZn6X1ekcBtyqBIlam_KCXDTy78Scet1Vw8k8rY--3CrsEg5LuhLnAyn0PHGHt16tQUfVIVtWlwFf_RCtYRT1lwv1z5GcM30SHIYZAzDPu0fxw/s1000/a062.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Young professionals" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9uMwSr-g2-Fw3JwLWqNHQH4Wius6aWjv0QC_rO82dCaA6UcAoWxCnqqTw6Sti2XKQqnj0E5MPlWQSSZn6X1ekcBtyqBIlam_KCXDTy78Scet1Vw8k8rY--3CrsEg5LuhLnAyn0PHGHt16tQUfVIVtWlwFf_RCtYRT1lwv1z5GcM30SHIYZAzDPu0fxw/w400-h266/a062.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Young professionals panels. Hayley Schaefer of Iowa PBS speaks.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p>The one that stuck with me most was Olivia Allen, a Simpson College graduate last year who now is an education reporter with the Quad City Times. She spoke passionately of her desire to give voice to the voiceless, to write about school policy including the voices of students who are most affected.<br /><br />It felt, to me, exactly what this gig is all about—giving voice to those whose voices are otherwise not heard. It echoed back to what Dr. Deming had said in the morning, because part of the challenge is to learn to be a story listener in order to be a better story teller.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf5xmJPjZaMBomM5LPmjqfRBzBFiD8zNfQ0QpJhkVX6ycs3CZv-IJfUTWJpkNoQJ9juDua0-QRDVU9RahG3MjKcFm37DCLVbwUV-vGBvzkIUSCDrB3LM3A1sYYlzwP217I-LmeFiY_jahAJP1e0VFT7omtlQfjtf22WKoCO3eLRzkNThI9JtWtQxB7uA/s1000/a066.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Olivia Allen" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf5xmJPjZaMBomM5LPmjqfRBzBFiD8zNfQ0QpJhkVX6ycs3CZv-IJfUTWJpkNoQJ9juDua0-QRDVU9RahG3MjKcFm37DCLVbwUV-vGBvzkIUSCDrB3LM3A1sYYlzwP217I-LmeFiY_jahAJP1e0VFT7omtlQfjtf22WKoCO3eLRzkNThI9JtWtQxB7uA/w400-h266/a066.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Olivia Allen of the Quad City Times speaks as Nick Brincks of Iowa Public Radio listens.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>The other panelists were memorable, too. Nick Brincks, of Iowa Public Radio, was the oldest of the young professionals, having graduated nine years ago. I thought he brought some realism about how life changes as you go from the college life to full adulthood.<br /><br />The program ended with the ICMA 2022 media contest awards ceremony and keynote speaker.<br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUZrT0NKco7BzyY_kXjU3AWqvUtCOQZ6q6DLV6kAMTeVJXgQEyKrERw-ip0VaV_TvohYF1BI8uHNrOCnchCN9E_eE41QAejF60RuP2A9gmPDVgFsnFlrLup_VB4RmcoCDORbQ7pBR1Y3yn0YfQI_Du2n5VtdM6DIO8zYDsMewtX2tP0gPw9yLKcKBQYQ/s1000/a107.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Ty Rushing" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUZrT0NKco7BzyY_kXjU3AWqvUtCOQZ6q6DLV6kAMTeVJXgQEyKrERw-ip0VaV_TvohYF1BI8uHNrOCnchCN9E_eE41QAejF60RuP2A9gmPDVgFsnFlrLup_VB4RmcoCDORbQ7pBR1Y3yn0YfQI_Du2n5VtdM6DIO8zYDsMewtX2tP0gPw9yLKcKBQYQ/w400-h266/a107.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Ty Rushing speaks.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i></i></div><p></p><p>Ty Rushing, a force in Iowa journalism since he joined the ranks of Iowa reporters in 2013, spoke. A native of Kansas City, he told us of his jobs and the lesson he learned at each, including, honestly, what kind of editor not to be.<br /><br />It took be six years to work my way to an undergraduate degree, so Rushing’s stories of working in a warehouse at night and attending college during the day resonated with me—for me, for part of my academic career, it was an overnight shift in a cat food factory. He took seven years, but he made it.<br /><br />Anyway, one point both Rushing and the four young journalism panelists emphasized was the importance of getting as deeply involved in student media as possible.<br /><br />The students I advise at the MMU Times earned seven awards, including:<br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>First Place, Staff Editorials (Jada Veasey, Annie Barkalow and Gwen Johnson). I’m thrilled with this award, which the Times has won in the past. It’s a strength of this paper that it can speak with a coherent, powerful voice. The editorial cited included one on COVID-19 policy, and two urging students to take care of their mental health.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>First Place, Best Vlog or Blog (Catherine Kratoska for Catherine The-Not-Too-Bad). Again, a traditional strength for Mount Mercy (you’ll see us again in second place in the same category).</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>First Place, Best Written Feature Reporting (Annie Barkalow). Mrs. Barkalow’s name came up a lot this year. This was for coverage of a Holocaust memorial speaker at MMU in spring.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Second Place, Best News Reporting (Annie Barkalow). A story in spring about student art being removed when some deemed it offensive.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Second Place, Best Vlog or Blog (Annie Barkalow for Anne with an E). Second time in a row Barkalow has won this honor. She’s the CCR of blog writers.</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Honorable Mention, Best Headline Writing (Jada Veasey, Annie Barkalow, Gwen Johnson).</li></ul><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Honorable Mention, Best News Reporting (Annie Barkalow). This one confused me a bit, because it’s for an excellent feature about teaching, but I think there was some category confusion. I entered it in “investigative reporting,” and I’m not sure why it shifted categories.</li></ul><p>Well, seven awards, with three first-place awards is a decent result. Congratulations to all the MMU winning journalists!</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgReEr6wvZgXf9nckAmnuiBYtERbeM8JNj0Sui9DmNFre2a-1k6Y7ih26AvikdEgNt14JU7RqBsf4Uth11aaZbUz6B5eTT_igyROvZ5e5dXRZcQ3A_GlWXTmv-WhNpcPZ26L2zbhLdPKgot-YDv9c0g8Sw5unAcZ2wLc9Md2x3cOU69NOVr4Me3VuZJ2w/s1000/a115.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Delcie Sanache" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgReEr6wvZgXf9nckAmnuiBYtERbeM8JNj0Sui9DmNFre2a-1k6Y7ih26AvikdEgNt14JU7RqBsf4Uth11aaZbUz6B5eTT_igyROvZ5e5dXRZcQ3A_GlWXTmv-WhNpcPZ26L2zbhLdPKgot-YDv9c0g8Sw5unAcZ2wLc9Md2x3cOU69NOVr4Me3VuZJ2w/w400-h266/a115.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Delcie Sanache at the ICMA convention, with Joselyn Hildebrand in the background. Both are editors on this year's newspaper staff, and, I hope, winners of ICMA awards next year.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>And thanks to Delcie Sanache and Joselyn Hildebrand, two Times editors who attended the conference and represented MMU there.<br /><br />I do miss the two-day conventions, but we have to learn to evolve. And Thursday was a good day.<br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiF86hMfy7G2pZk_lC8xVa9E52lkasDluYpPZXGHFcAT4WxS2L-crb64BoKPAEH0y-WyllvxtW-lvaqKobcJtOVSVO0J0VBPgZI6F8SN6s7nAcXwvDWcL-t7jGdRh94ZhxACpV_ynFm6gLND2pe5bhO6TNnL-cy5nVlON5Cb-SPUL2xBOdm9EsT9eAwg/s1000/a142.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Craig Schaefer and Jana Shepherd" border="0" data-original-height="656" data-original-width="1000" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiF86hMfy7G2pZk_lC8xVa9E52lkasDluYpPZXGHFcAT4WxS2L-crb64BoKPAEH0y-WyllvxtW-lvaqKobcJtOVSVO0J0VBPgZI6F8SN6s7nAcXwvDWcL-t7jGdRh94ZhxACpV_ynFm6gLND2pe5bhO6TNnL-cy5nVlON5Cb-SPUL2xBOdm9EsT9eAwg/w400-h263/a142.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Craig Schaefer, president of ICMA, congratulates Jana Shepherd of the Iowa Newspaper Association. Shepherd received the John Eighmy Service Award, given by ICMA each year to a supporter of college student journalism. Without her support, ICMA would not be able to have it's annual meeting.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p style="text-align: right;"><br /></p><br /><br /><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-9547516773332598992023-01-24T19:13:00.000-08:002023-01-25T04:04:42.592-08:00‘A Man Called Otto’: a Hanks Triumph<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikrRA4eMZHCiB0a2k_DRaRsherqFIkvFfEpSbp-adlMMKP2CL6e2SN6-FYy1oOSjRxKXhtCmHGSfj24RWAOJBe_YaHF-HYk2ViF3bNAwTBny5s_oUthvdmrX9H9Q4rpUZKuxW8JhEKtGRiZRD_5YXyzfhZ27Y0EGW0sAq0sXBdjXE5SvzMn2Za1Q-3Og/s970/Sony%20image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Actors in "A Man Called Otto"" border="0" data-original-height="546" data-original-width="970" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikrRA4eMZHCiB0a2k_DRaRsherqFIkvFfEpSbp-adlMMKP2CL6e2SN6-FYy1oOSjRxKXhtCmHGSfj24RWAOJBe_YaHF-HYk2ViF3bNAwTBny5s_oUthvdmrX9H9Q4rpUZKuxW8JhEKtGRiZRD_5YXyzfhZ27Y0EGW0sAq0sXBdjXE5SvzMn2Za1Q-3Og/w400-h225/Sony%20image.jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Sony Pictures publicity image of Tom Hanks and Mariana Treviño in "A Man Called Otto."</i><br></td></tr></tbody></table><p>OK, I’m not a movie reviewer, but my wife and I had a “date afternoon” today, attending the cheap movie day at a local theater to see “A Man Called Otto.”<br><br>There are lots of funny bits in the trailer, and the movie does have comedy in it. But it’s a serious story about an old man struggling with finding a reason to live—a drama in which he attempts suicide several times. We learn, late in the movie (spoilers coming) that his wife died just six months before the movie. He’s taken a buyout at work and was pushed out the door after his company went through a merger. He’s convinced the world surrounding him is full of idiots—which, since it’s full of normal, flawed humans, it’s not all that far off the mark—although Otto, an engineer, equates intelligence with two traits: following the rules and knowing how machines work.<br><br>In short, Otto is ready for his road to reach its destination. Yet, I think part of the point of the movie is that Otto learns his views are too constrained. His keen mechanical intelligence doesn’t always give him empathy and insight. He may be a good engineer, but he’s not too keen on understanding the souls of the creatures—human and feline—around him.<br><br>It takes a stray cat and a new family in the neighborhood to reawaken some of his appreciation of life. It doesn’t fix it all, inevitably the movie is about the end of Otto’s life, but it helps illustrate why, even in dark times with a broken heart, it’s worth it to still be here, to still care, to still read a story to young children in the voice of a bear.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XvbGalkHKPY" width="320" youtube-src-id="XvbGalkHKPY"></iframe></p><p>Besides Hanks, to me, the movie’s next most important actor is Mariana Treviño. She plays the mother in the new family and becomes, to some extent, Hank’s surrogate daughter. She’s fantastic in her role, and is the center of both her own family and the newly enlarged family with Abuelo Otto.<br><br>And other cast members and characters are well done, too—the only slightly off characters, to me, were the evil real estate ones—the movie wasn’t about them, but they didn’t seem to be the three-dimensional humans the other characters were.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy11kZMs-3bJj_j7nXreCGsN23MLfBTD3pTDgyfcap4g_8HiNjp5YibXV4tSw1dGBdIrXfZKNh6TTZujmfQo7-VlFhblGQ99ob1n6Ug3v4IPf5LyjPuUdHzTFAnecq36LxvpA7EgtwnjG7qFYh9VqJLvFub0ktndM_0gKH-QuBz0XVPsY2QST1y1IBqw/s1551/onesheet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Movie poster" border="0" data-original-height="1551" data-original-width="1050" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy11kZMs-3bJj_j7nXreCGsN23MLfBTD3pTDgyfcap4g_8HiNjp5YibXV4tSw1dGBdIrXfZKNh6TTZujmfQo7-VlFhblGQ99ob1n6Ug3v4IPf5LyjPuUdHzTFAnecq36LxvpA7EgtwnjG7qFYh9VqJLvFub0ktndM_0gKH-QuBz0XVPsY2QST1y1IBqw/w271-h400/onesheet.jpg" width="271"></a></div><p>Small point. It’s a poignant story, fantastically acted, gripping and moving. Franky, it was a hoot going to the movie just as an experience. It was almost sold out, and the crowd tended to the elderly—I think my wife and I were among the “youngsters” there. We bought our tickets late and had to sit in the front row, but with new recliner seats, that worked out. We were in a row with several old ladies, who were funny, chatty and sociable—the idea that reaching out and not trying to live life all on your own wasn’t just a theme of the movie, it was a theme of the whole matinee theater experience.<br></p><p>I suppose the fact that my own dad was a man called Otto, and who was also an engineer, endeared me even more to the movie—but it’s also true that my father led a different life with different struggles and was a different kind of man.<br></p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwvSicygJG9KHnjDrn79x8w9IcnRmMCnyfxPYlQlJU2YzeU-PZ-EMV3Tv3xcypz1ocKAYOTcuIF8vmb-COaxzmAZYQ10Sfp0bwK8y1qb9ujCA3EublKtC-HT_VziNOswNoqvvlhorU2UBBvlwpRXEpIzAnmLUH3oupYZQ1ELCO-oOubdlrMTlM9zSvzw/s570/book.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Book Cover" border="0" data-original-height="570" data-original-width="374" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwvSicygJG9KHnjDrn79x8w9IcnRmMCnyfxPYlQlJU2YzeU-PZ-EMV3Tv3xcypz1ocKAYOTcuIF8vmb-COaxzmAZYQ10Sfp0bwK8y1qb9ujCA3EublKtC-HT_VziNOswNoqvvlhorU2UBBvlwpRXEpIzAnmLUH3oupYZQ1ELCO-oOubdlrMTlM9zSvzw/w263-h400/book.jpg" width="263"></a></p><p>The movie is based on the novel “A Man Called Ove.” My wife has read the book and recommends it, so it’s on my to-read list now.<br><br>And, if you care about this non-reviewer’s movie choices, yes, I heartily recommend “A Man Called Otto.” See it with some old ladies in the front row. If you’re like me, you’ll be a bit misty-eyed at the end, but glad you came nevertheless.<br><br></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br></div><br>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-58762646494735435122022-12-31T21:22:00.000-08:002022-12-31T21:22:14.308-08:00Remembering a Key Figure of the Big 3 Era<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIHQBgB5W27Vdo03gBsZ4w4zFUbxA-KQphQhNRmfERQuIVSLb7lsK1iO0dU768Get1ZxIH05lXfvNb4JZtlYY3C8gzcjMTqxu52r5UsNS3nsPpe0DQKKXBaUn7R6WFi3_Ki0OPdodAvr-S0YelrMM7bseeDphrbnBt8-6yMHx0ZzbCCBxEoqtjOyfMag/s599/Barbara_Walters_at_Met_Opera_(cropped).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Barbara Walters in 2008" border="0" data-original-height="599" data-original-width="388" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIHQBgB5W27Vdo03gBsZ4w4zFUbxA-KQphQhNRmfERQuIVSLb7lsK1iO0dU768Get1ZxIH05lXfvNb4JZtlYY3C8gzcjMTqxu52r5UsNS3nsPpe0DQKKXBaUn7R6WFi3_Ki0OPdodAvr-S0YelrMM7bseeDphrbnBt8-6yMHx0ZzbCCBxEoqtjOyfMag/w259-h400/Barbara_Walters_at_Met_Opera_(cropped).jpg" width="259" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From Wikimedia Commons, an image of Barbara Walters at the Metropolitan Opera in 2008, posted on flickr by Rubenstein,<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barbara_Walters_at_Met_Opera_%28cropped%29.jpg" target="_blank"> link</a> to image. <br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p><i>“Every female broadcast journalist working today owes a debt of gratitude to the O.G., Barbara Walters, who died Friday at age 93.” </i>Katie Couric, writing in The New York Times.<br /><br />There was Walter Cronkite. There were Chet Huntly and David Brinkley. And there was a woman, a fiercely talented, competitive person named Barbara Walters. No, I don’t mean she was a TV giant of the stature of a Cronkite, but she was an important TV personality who brought needed change to a male-dominated medium.<br /><br />I first became aware of her in the late 1960s as my family sometimes had the Today show tuned in on our 19-inch black-and-white TV.<br /><br />I don’t recall her much from that time, but I was young. I became more aware of her as the first female network co-anchor starting in 1976 on ABC, a gig that honestly didn’t go all the well. But as she had done many times in her long career, Barbara Walters had the courage to try something new, and after she was an anchor, she reigned as the queen of celebrity and news maker interviews, first at 20/20 on ABC, and then in a series of prime-time specials.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJoNUWvjj37SKgD9nD3Mwop5mu6sCjB5lu31KePPKQDqIl1YjmjIzJSI1K1uZiyTb1jWgz6efwmAhe6znf-1Dwhh-HjcT3y1jPQ9II7LUvVInxAuUkuyCEDKsO_RgAlBEDqoTYIbeueDOi6GGpBRJR092ieltrKuigmXUBJuu3XFGY8U93aOrVZURuSg/s781/8399323149_66d8484cf2_o.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Barbara Walters with President Barack Obama" border="0" data-original-height="524" data-original-width="781" height="269" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJoNUWvjj37SKgD9nD3Mwop5mu6sCjB5lu31KePPKQDqIl1YjmjIzJSI1K1uZiyTb1jWgz6efwmAhe6znf-1Dwhh-HjcT3y1jPQ9II7LUvVInxAuUkuyCEDKsO_RgAlBEDqoTYIbeueDOi6GGpBRJR092ieltrKuigmXUBJuu3XFGY8U93aOrVZURuSg/w400-h269/8399323149_66d8484cf2_o.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>An image of Barbara Walters speaking with President Barack Obama on Jan. 20, 2013. Image posted on flickr by Ester Vargas, <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/esthervargasc/8399323149" target="_blank">link</a>.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>At an age when many people have returned, Walters in her late 60s helped create The View, a daily talk show, in 1997.<br /><br />The news today, of course, is that Barbara is no longer with us. She has died at age 93. An important female figure of the Big 3 TV era is gone. Her passing is a reminder of that bygone era, and her long career a testament to her tenacity and talent.<br /><br /></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-2919746115668758082022-12-21T20:14:00.003-08:002022-12-29T06:51:39.399-08:00One of the Great Presidential Speeches<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK0xEPX_8wf_Z6w01ydOBLmx7Aip4Ezp_04LIhBk6GS41NWs3nI2hkk-w_7URB4X3DuwZNTFn3CUGntMsx4FUTDjy49NCWM0S0oVJV2ASXuW-aVCTFzHd8zrUFahigab3t8ixilLrDyQL-Ns1ogPZXeM48408A6Zz-p5Sz5NzlAtH7_NfH_85i89Q8xQ/s1042/e8e2036e9eadaee045789da3c231ec2e_1671659434_extra_large.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="President of Ukraine meets President of U.S." border="0" data-original-height="695" data-original-width="1042" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK0xEPX_8wf_Z6w01ydOBLmx7Aip4Ezp_04LIhBk6GS41NWs3nI2hkk-w_7URB4X3DuwZNTFn3CUGntMsx4FUTDjy49NCWM0S0oVJV2ASXuW-aVCTFzHd8zrUFahigab3t8ixilLrDyQL-Ns1ogPZXeM48408A6Zz-p5Sz5NzlAtH7_NfH_85i89Q8xQ/w400-h266/e8e2036e9eadaee045789da3c231ec2e_1671659434_extra_large.jpeg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dec. 21, 2022--President Volodymyr of Ukraine meets President Biden of the United States in White House. Image from the web site of Ukraine's president.</i><br></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Did you catch the address to Congress by President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on the darkest day of the year? Dec. 21, 2022, long after darkness fell for our longest night, wearing his trademark green shirt with the presidential symbol on it, Zelenskyy spoke movingly of the struggle his country faces.<br><br>I thought it was a speech for the ages, one that will be quoted and studied. Zelensky put the war his country is waging to defend against a Russian invasion in the context of the larger global struggle for democracy—imploring American to remember that aid to Ukraine is not charity, but an important investment in that ongoing struggle that we are a vital part of. <i>(C-SPAN video of speech below, skip ahead to 19:00 when Zelensky enters and then starts speaking.)</i><br></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bPfFYvAFlU8" width="320" youtube-src-id="bPfFYvAFlU8"></iframe></div><br><p>And he powerfully evoked some American cultural milestones—the U.S. Army battling the last German offensive of World War II in the Battle of the Bulge; and the battle that helped turned the tide of the American Revolution, Saratoga.<br><br>It’s fitting, somehow, that Zelensky referenced the Battle of the Bugle because that battle was raging at this time of year. On Dec. 16, the Wehrmacht used the cover of poor winter weather (to avoid Allied air superiority) to launch an attack through the Ardennes.<br><br>The German offensive failed. Just as Russian forces failed to take Kiev last year, the Germans stalled in their drive to split Allied forces by marching to Antwerp.<br><br>In that case, the German offensive was a long shot, almost certainly doomed as Germany was running out of resources, particularly fuel. In the case of Ukraine, they are fighting a defensive war against a Russian army with vastly greater resources. Still, the Battle of the Bulge echoes in the American mind, and Zelensky was reminding us of some parallels.<br><br>In some ways, I think, the analogy to Saratoga was more apt. In fall of 1777, British forces launched a three-pronged offensive to divide the Americans by splitting New York. Gen. John Burgoyne brought one of those prongs south from Canada, capturing Fort Ticonderoga and sweeping south towards American forces dug in near Saratoga.<br><br>The British attacked twice, but the Americans defenders held them off. Faced with losses and being cut off from reinforcement, British General John Burgoyne surrendered to American General Horatio Gates on Oct. 17, 1777. Partly as a result of the battle (technically, I suppose, the battles) of Saratoga, France decided it was worthwhile to support the American cause as the Yanks had demonstrated they maybe could win. And the tide of war was turned.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXS4rzH4jf1OXctquCmTwYJhQ5Wi6bFd6Oflb_XJuRaKXtZuod_LDKHz7ZJhoUKw4gsdEYiieeGJq2iymoBH5Cfhk7FDedeV-QKR51udsioZdf22hnrvTrBXKjOf8VrMfju_Nau74RsW1h_DnUUmY2J-1t4EVsvduC2CehAEWc2ohhbB9faUk-kfWjlQ/s800/The_Surrender_of_General_Burgoyne_at_Saratoga_October_16_1777.jpeg.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Painting of surreder at Saratoga" border="0" data-original-height="536" data-original-width="800" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXS4rzH4jf1OXctquCmTwYJhQ5Wi6bFd6Oflb_XJuRaKXtZuod_LDKHz7ZJhoUKw4gsdEYiieeGJq2iymoBH5Cfhk7FDedeV-QKR51udsioZdf22hnrvTrBXKjOf8VrMfju_Nau74RsW1h_DnUUmY2J-1t4EVsvduC2CehAEWc2ohhbB9faUk-kfWjlQ/w400-h268/The_Surrender_of_General_Burgoyne_at_Saratoga_October_16_1777.jpeg.jpeg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>19th Century painting by artist John Trumbull of General John Burgoyne surrendering to General Horatio Gates on Oct. 17, 1777. Painting in collection of Yale University, image from Wikimedia Commons.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Of course, the Russian army didn’t surrender to Ukraine when their invasion forces stalled on the road to Kiev this spring, but still, just as American defenders at Saratoga produced a turning point, Ukraine’s valiant defense of Kiev and offensive to push back in the east give hope to its cause.<br><br>As President Zelensky noted, the first Russian defeat was its loss in the psychological war. Most of the world, and most of the body politic in the United Sates, recognizes Russia as the aggressor here. Zelensky reminded us that his country needs continued support as the battle against Russian aggression continues.<br><br>It is, as he stated, a key moment in a global fight for democracy. And, Zelensky predicted, a fight that Ukraine will win. That seemed faint hope when Russian tanks trundled across the border this spring—many of us, I’m sure, expected Russia to crush Ukraine. It seems, like the Revolution post Saratoga, that Ukraine’s ultimate victory now is at least a possibility, should its allies show backbone and stay the course and support Ukraine's cause.<br><br>Ironically, Zelensky is a TV entertainer turned politician who has proven, in his country’s darkest hour, to be an effective leader. He’s an FDR or Winston Churchill, a great communicator who showed his ability before Congress to sound the right notes, to clarify the issues at state, to rally support.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEbd0VM4sVE7zHbM-G7HrBBSbjZZ0FU_LcW5l7_TpNtgYFL0cLATuq72N64aRQg18pzIyQ3oJMdPPhQLwQUlqsSK5GOKIyjRWPpchKGPB2NLUjFlyENhNCSwW-LAQozDJIsfj44ASLt7DhQkOZXKyY3IqG1jlOFLAfpsguFQWpTqDvJaZeDKT7gplnsw/s3000/The_world_must_officially_recognize_that_Russia_has_become_a_terrorist_state_-_address_by_the_President_of_Ukraine._(51941720577).jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine" border="0" data-original-height="2000" data-original-width="3000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEbd0VM4sVE7zHbM-G7HrBBSbjZZ0FU_LcW5l7_TpNtgYFL0cLATuq72N64aRQg18pzIyQ3oJMdPPhQLwQUlqsSK5GOKIyjRWPpchKGPB2NLUjFlyENhNCSwW-LAQozDJIsfj44ASLt7DhQkOZXKyY3IqG1jlOFLAfpsguFQWpTqDvJaZeDKT7gplnsw/w400-h266/The_world_must_officially_recognize_that_Russia_has_become_a_terrorist_state_-_address_by_the_President_of_Ukraine._(51941720577).jpg" width="400"></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Volodymyr Zelensky, president of Ukraine, in March 2022. Image from Wikimedia Commons.<br></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>How different from a recent U.S. President who was a TV entertainer turned politician. Indeed, President Trump was impeached for the first time for a corrupt phone call in which he tried to hold aid to Ukraine hostage for political favors. Trump is the anti-Zelensky, a divider, not a uniter, a man who this week was exposed yet again for attempting to undermine American democracy.<br><br>I felt it was very weird when the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection recommended that the former President face criminal charges, and the reaction from Iowa’s Republicans was a yawn. We’ve moved on. We don’t care about Jan. 6 anymore. We’re working on the issues Iowans care about now.<br><br>How American. How forgetful we are as a people. It’s less than two years since an American president attempted a violent coup in Washington DC, and too many want to close that chapter and forget about it.<br><br>Well, if we don’t forget the Battle of the Bulge or Saratoga, it is way too early to turn the page from Jan. 6. After all, the chief villain in that sad narrative, Donald Jerk Trump, is a leading candidate for President in 2024—the leader of an attempt to subvert our very democratic system is in the running for his party’s nomination for president, and the craven, cowardly “leaders” of his party are too scared of him to note that he’s proven himself unqualified to support and defend our Constitution. I’m one Iowan who hasn’t yet moved on and is disgusted with the gutless Iowa Republicans who claim we should. I’ll move on when the GOP renounces Trumpism and Trump, as long ago they should have.<br><br>And this week we have the opposite end of the scoundrel spectrum. A true icon of democracy, President Volodymyr Zelensky, calling on us to remember who we are—we are the victors at Saratoga and The Bugle, a people who have fought for two centuries for the cause of self-government and democracy.<br><br>Today, that fight is happening in Ukraine. But also in the hearts of Americans. The dark cancer of Trumpism is still with us. The fight for democracy isn’t just happening in eastern Europe.<br></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwtFbmPnYyxYTZUa5VQdC7RoMC-RXIgojOBaFtvLMvsgfuck7sDbvGffVmVtUv_vqbz4lh5aeJJCmn0eW8R8r9u0J6lOL-vpdwEx6rqfiiIbvT08H8vvBPVZCBjveWY9u2a9vscFi8c9ZhptjuJ8KSfmyZ93y_NQtz-l2DiykIb-kd6Nj72PKTel0JxA/s1920/Flag_of_Ukraine.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Flag of Ukraine" border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1920" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwtFbmPnYyxYTZUa5VQdC7RoMC-RXIgojOBaFtvLMvsgfuck7sDbvGffVmVtUv_vqbz4lh5aeJJCmn0eW8R8r9u0J6lOL-vpdwEx6rqfiiIbvT08H8vvBPVZCBjveWY9u2a9vscFi8c9ZhptjuJ8KSfmyZ93y_NQtz-l2DiykIb-kd6Nj72PKTel0JxA/w400-h250/Flag_of_Ukraine.jpg" width="400"></a></div><br><p style="text-align: center;"><br></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-27679318262240207102022-12-03T19:42:00.002-08:002022-12-03T19:42:27.240-08:00The Presidential Circus Leaves Iowa Behind<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQEmeZE5Zip36G0c478Gs7qFdSaeKcbEdcH8O4fjK5lzp5t6TmuLW24Iz9hLOgBrqwbtqJhMgjmucjiAO5RTbxwluKaZLDCxSf7f0jSA4MDg4y_iRFK7j44UVJ0zE7pZmC94eDkJORlE_pdeNwT-vhKz0_XlZ3h4kYdJH6KBgVBI8cayYx_aRLiGn5kA/s600/1-19-2022-Klobuchar2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Amy Klobuchar" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="600" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQEmeZE5Zip36G0c478Gs7qFdSaeKcbEdcH8O4fjK5lzp5t6TmuLW24Iz9hLOgBrqwbtqJhMgjmucjiAO5RTbxwluKaZLDCxSf7f0jSA4MDg4y_iRFK7j44UVJ0zE7pZmC94eDkJORlE_pdeNwT-vhKz0_XlZ3h4kYdJH6KBgVBI8cayYx_aRLiGn5kA/w400-h266/1-19-2022-Klobuchar2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jan. 19, 2002, Sen. Amy Klobuchar speaks in Marion, Iowa. I listened to her and backed her in the Democratic caucuses that year.</i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx0RXo71EWjVmqHqsJ-vXdShQdThzWvtDgKhgUkhpJCxo8Pcpo-ZUZkj_r7CgxTmmt1T-C6C2QDznLsRH5iI894ylCKYDb4nVkGURZceYLKS_dzEKNLt0n_dAvBCQLxmZnfN7UnZyyKcqGtAYM5GzP1YSR90Dj_4hWTnPdMlmx85efhKuywzuxyVbUIg/s600/1-30-16-Bernie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Bernie Sanders" border="0" data-original-height="428" data-original-width="600" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx0RXo71EWjVmqHqsJ-vXdShQdThzWvtDgKhgUkhpJCxo8Pcpo-ZUZkj_r7CgxTmmt1T-C6C2QDznLsRH5iI894ylCKYDb4nVkGURZceYLKS_dzEKNLt0n_dAvBCQLxmZnfN7UnZyyKcqGtAYM5GzP1YSR90Dj_4hWTnPdMlmx85efhKuywzuxyVbUIg/w400-h285/1-30-16-Bernie.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jan. 20, 2016--Sen. Bernie Sanders speaks at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. I was there, although I don't think I caucused for him.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>The Republicans will still do it. The Democrats say they are shaking things up.<br /><br />The Iowa Caucuses have been the lead-off political event of the presidential contest season for as long as I’ve been a voter. When I was 17 in 1976, I was a Gerald Ford guy, was elected at a precinct meeting to attend the county convention and was a delegate to the next level—my memory is a bit fuzzy, I think it was a district convention, but the state meeting may have been the next step up.<br /><br />I didn’t try to go to the national convention, although I recall toying with the idea (which suggests the counties sent their delegates to the state level). I didn’t have the means.<br /><br />And 1976 was it, for me and the Republican Party. I was a Ford man to stand in the way of the Reagan upsurge, and when Reagan took the nomination in 1980, I became part of the immoral minority that voted against him.</p><p>In the 1980s and 1990s, I wasn’t involved. After I graduated from college in 1982, I was a newspaper journalist in Missouri. I returned to Iowa in 1991, but was preoccupied with family and don’t recall attempting to caucus in the 1990s.<br /><br />I was back by 2008. I got caught up in the Obama bandwagon.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8XwTdXqQELKkBhoi5qw0GG9BUsPIZmPeFJpVUIx4r3emFpEY9Ah-NRZXR_M0PQDBu9M6wIel0VOGHOiOktXmWhzMILW4RnjYvzCfq5YsqH0Wb5evcjUbf3DVv6O627zD80bUMmEECzuc7zm4CXBH3urIsPI_8BGLTk3GDZumTXj5SIDyFEPlqCG3JQg/s600/1-30-16-Foster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Vampire Weekend" border="0" data-original-height="324" data-original-width="600" height="216" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8XwTdXqQELKkBhoi5qw0GG9BUsPIZmPeFJpVUIx4r3emFpEY9Ah-NRZXR_M0PQDBu9M6wIel0VOGHOiOktXmWhzMILW4RnjYvzCfq5YsqH0Wb5evcjUbf3DVv6O627zD80bUMmEECzuc7zm4CXBH3urIsPI_8BGLTk3GDZumTXj5SIDyFEPlqCG3JQg/w400-h216/1-30-16-Foster.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Lead singer from Vampire Weekend warms up Bernie Sanders crowd, Jan. 30, 2016.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table></p><p>In 2016, I was torn. I was interested in feeling the burn for Bernie Sanders, but don’t recall if, in the end, I went that route.<br /><br />My 2020 choice was Amy Klobuchar. I still, in my heart, would feel better if she were President.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibVE_V7g8WcXPiuK-16SZm-2p-hvm1m9MM6nNx_45TqQI_eLQvC2bsKh14DZzLGcNM04lR-TPshLJCf1p0qauurPa9BIX4HqJfGK46Pkq8ghZUxrJJaYDQ9Od787zxo0ZVY8M_EwpI7AkmxH1KkxCQbmXDxkYxZFKIf6pc3GM7w_jJoNbUCRRRdOQVfQ/s600/1-19-2020-Klobuchar.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Face at Klobuchar rally" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="600" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibVE_V7g8WcXPiuK-16SZm-2p-hvm1m9MM6nNx_45TqQI_eLQvC2bsKh14DZzLGcNM04lR-TPshLJCf1p0qauurPa9BIX4HqJfGK46Pkq8ghZUxrJJaYDQ9Od787zxo0ZVY8M_EwpI7AkmxH1KkxCQbmXDxkYxZFKIf6pc3GM7w_jJoNbUCRRRdOQVfQ/w400-h266/1-19-2020-Klobuchar.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jan. 19, 2020--Face in crowd at Amy Klobuchar rally.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Anyway, I drove downtown in Cedar Rapids with my youngest daughter to attend an Obama rally in 2007. I saw Amy Klobuchar speak in Marion Iowa in 2020. In 2016, Vampire Weekend sang at a Bernie Sanders rally in Iowa City before Bernie Sanders spoke, and I was there. Sadly, the Oxford Comma wasn’t.<br /><br />The Iowa Caucuses were a bit of a political anomaly. In 1972, Sen. George McGovern fared well in caucuses whose date had been set early as the party grappled with complicated new rules enacted after the fiasco of 1968. That gave him a boost, and caused Iowa politicians to take note. The two political parties colluded (imagine that) to set the 1976 caucuses early, and a Georgia nuclear engineer, governor and peanut farmer—Jimmy Carter—organized early and did well, propelling him to the White House and the Iowa Caucuses onto center stage.<br /><br />There has been a lot written about the value of the retail politics that the caucuses provided, and how important it was to have early voters actually meet candidates. But, in recent cycles, Democrats, in particular, became increasingly disenchanted with that process.<br /><br />Iowa is not very racially diverse. It’s more rural, white and older than the nation as a whole. And Democrats are all about diversity.<br /><br />Well, this week, the news from the national party is not good. A recommendation to make South Carolina the first state to select a Democratic candidate in 2024 has been approved by the panel planning such things. The 2020 Iowa caucuses, with their software glitches and delayed count, were a bit of disaster that shifted momentum perhaps forever away from Iowa’s first status in presidential contests.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijw2bTVR2CSpUqZuMp7WKpoenGSrNv7P4SN0b7Yy89e1gIZwS01m2uZorJgB309Z7uFMrvmUNBFiF0_XIf8BOCtY_Ixj55U8k0H8zCCe7VFCtHmHhVoDSOhYtAqOepEqYkK92uuChpvahtlmz7s8luOHkoFBelR5LXv-JOp6iTowtiD0d7TgQxbmz9WA/s600/1-19-2020-listening-to-amy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Listening to Amy Klobuchar" border="0" data-original-height="409" data-original-width="600" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijw2bTVR2CSpUqZuMp7WKpoenGSrNv7P4SN0b7Yy89e1gIZwS01m2uZorJgB309Z7uFMrvmUNBFiF0_XIf8BOCtY_Ixj55U8k0H8zCCe7VFCtHmHhVoDSOhYtAqOepEqYkK92uuChpvahtlmz7s8luOHkoFBelR5LXv-JOp6iTowtiD0d7TgQxbmz9WA/w400-h272/1-19-2020-listening-to-amy.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Someone listens to Amy Klobuchar, Jan. 19, 2020. Klobuchar speaking (below), same date.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHVELfe-XoIovPqUg_Ovswx0cO-o0QXzywYhZWnAbGxRJmo6gaFEesW9dHGgWMyoscNiWA9D0QAbl0lJnJF6GaPB83QFP5n3d2sVpuVR4ELzShsQob7Oa4A-IBqncSx8Nwxd1WW6-9b9zGTFvx5feXZSRWg32Wb90INVBefVgOw5C4jeYZqHWGatEx-A/s600/1-19-2020-Klobuchar-in-Marion.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Amy Klobuchar speaking" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="600" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHVELfe-XoIovPqUg_Ovswx0cO-o0QXzywYhZWnAbGxRJmo6gaFEesW9dHGgWMyoscNiWA9D0QAbl0lJnJF6GaPB83QFP5n3d2sVpuVR4ELzShsQob7Oa4A-IBqncSx8Nwxd1WW6-9b9zGTFvx5feXZSRWg32Wb90INVBefVgOw5C4jeYZqHWGatEx-A/w400-h266/1-19-2020-Klobuchar-in-Marion.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p>Still, Republicans, undeterred by the whiteness and age of Iowans, are going ahead with their early contest in this increasingly cherry red state.<br /><br />I will miss the caucus hoopla. I’ll miss the chance to drive to a local bar and listen in person to a potential future president. And I’m afraid the national party decision, while it makes sense, is another blow to the Iowa Democratic Party at a time when the party is already down.<br /><br />For 50 years, from 1972 to 2022, the caucuses have been important. Perhaps their time is gone. If the Democrats won’t caucus here first in 2024, how long will the Republicans? Even if they continue, a one-party contest isn’t the same.<br /><br />Besides Democrats, another loser may be Iowa media companies. In 2015, a big owner of local TV stations, Gray TV, purchased channel 9 in Cedar Rapids for $100 million. The company then raked in lots of revenue from the 2016 and then the 2020 presidential contests. The flood of campaign money into Iowa TV stations may be abating.<br /><br /></p><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-50727794381324286102022-11-19T11:20:00.005-08:002022-11-20T08:04:00.875-08:00It’s Not Just Elon Musk Making Us Sadder<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF-0rLG-LiZeuaILdt-933-YaCtLqZJuOnt7jZ_3VReI8taA087X2LK-Q-t2eRbCMKseD7ckfUg3CvkvkBzAawSFHgCLy7n5CihgN4nKBnC-drVgIgkeYehLEzgG6XPZ__UhPPpBAkpAvicUpGv2b_gMAIyuFF711rzqYgPzdeipOXPK1lE6jJZukTzg/s1000/s02.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Crowd in Flaherty" border="0" data-original-height="661" data-original-width="1000" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF-0rLG-LiZeuaILdt-933-YaCtLqZJuOnt7jZ_3VReI8taA087X2LK-Q-t2eRbCMKseD7ckfUg3CvkvkBzAawSFHgCLy7n5CihgN4nKBnC-drVgIgkeYehLEzgG6XPZ__UhPPpBAkpAvicUpGv2b_gMAIyuFF711rzqYgPzdeipOXPK1lE6jJZukTzg/w400-h265/s02.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Crowd ready to listen to Dr. Travis Lacy speak. I helped carry in extra chairs, and yes, I wore my mask. Most popular event of this year's MMU Fall Faculty Series.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZUvn7lRPKljXO1H2_heNK-JFFmsgqzxyR02rYOLDyUhb0KjvObOwz5EuF1dq7qPsxboyokZ7nJrZSOU_AdzHiEdMbsY6vEZOKLEh33CaKkWGVn4Mur9LRmshVlA53d12mpZ66FrBQbKs7o6_h37qQzB7WVcHtCb98yHeUybgumxmU0ufVmjPMZPk6Zw/s1000/s04.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Dr Travis Lacy" border="0" data-original-height="672" data-original-width="1000" height="269" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZUvn7lRPKljXO1H2_heNK-JFFmsgqzxyR02rYOLDyUhb0KjvObOwz5EuF1dq7qPsxboyokZ7nJrZSOU_AdzHiEdMbsY6vEZOKLEh33CaKkWGVn4Mur9LRmshVlA53d12mpZ66FrBQbKs7o6_h37qQzB7WVcHtCb98yHeUybgumxmU0ufVmjPMZPk6Zw/w400-h269/s04.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dr. Travis Lacy, assistant professor of religious studies, speaks.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p><i>"So when at times the mob is swayed<br />To carry praise or blame too far<br />We may choose something like a star<br />To stay our minds and be staid."</i></p><p><i>Quote from "Choose Something Like a Star" by Robert Frost, quoted by in a presentation by Dr. Travis Lacy.</i><br /></p><p>I live in the modern world, too, even if I learned to keyboard on a manual typewriter and didn’t own my first computer until the 1980s were almost the 1990s. So, like many who live now on the planet, I exist in a zone that includes both the actual reality around me and the virtual reality that beckons like a siren.<br /><br />Does social media make me sadder? Probably. Am I addicted to what Dr. Travis Lacy, assistant professor of religious studies at Mount Mercy University, noted is a “hit of dopamine” we get from “likes” on social media?<br /><br />I’m not sure that something that is habitual is an actual addiction, in a psychological or medical sense, but it’s something like that. And yes—I write three blogs that have fairly low readership, but if someone responds to what I write, or even just likes the link or image that I post on Facebook, it does make me feel better.<br /><br />Of course, I think there is more going on. I think writing, for me, is more than just a habit or a means to get the next hit of positive brain chemistry—it’s the muscle I used for years to earn my living and that now I do for the pleasure of creation. It’s brain therapy, too—it keeps my most important organ, the one between my ears, a bit more in tone.<br /><br />Ironically, to me, thus what I post on social media is partly the antidote to social media—I am ruminating on my life, processing my experience, connecting, in an introvert’s lonely way, to reality. Not just running from it. Author (and social media creator) John Green recently talked about the value of creating online:<br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YbyeApgIiBk" width="320" youtube-src-id="YbyeApgIiBk"></iframe></div><p>But I do use my smart phone to “kill time,” as Lacy called it. Dr. Lacy spoke Nov. 15, giving the final presentation in a fall faculty series at Mount Mercy University on “Humans and Machines” in a provocative discourse that he entitled “Scrolling is Unpaid Labor.” The thing that we do when we feel private and alone on our phones or tablets is not as alone as we think—it’s an act that is recorded, watched and commodified.<br /><br />Our attention is a product that we produce. And advertisers pay, according to data cited by Dr. Lacy, more than $500 billion a year to catch some of that digital audience's attention. Oddly, as he noted, online ads are weirdly different from classic advertising, in that most of us don’t recall much of those ads we see on Instagram or Facebook or YouTube—and an impression that funds the marketing marketplace of cyber commerce is defined as half of a screen being on our device or at least a second.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi49f9j95kVzj2L0KiFHQvpizUlBhIMq4-p7z3Liv09vwMVDTiQn3vf_QB0UrYPg7GsPv3nC_CkHqIJRA_LM7w567ZR5IrzIsF8QYnuOOXn231CR4nRrHdM8_6Afuqvs6ltFv3Mr8_KLPZZg9v9i7a3Yo1UcQDh5Rtc8dYzxDe4hfSBhDbBivHlLSTUDA/s1000/s17.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Dr. Travis Lacy" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi49f9j95kVzj2L0KiFHQvpizUlBhIMq4-p7z3Liv09vwMVDTiQn3vf_QB0UrYPg7GsPv3nC_CkHqIJRA_LM7w567ZR5IrzIsF8QYnuOOXn231CR4nRrHdM8_6Afuqvs6ltFv3Mr8_KLPZZg9v9i7a3Yo1UcQDh5Rtc8dYzxDe4hfSBhDbBivHlLSTUDA/w400-h266/s17.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dr. Travis Lacy makes a point.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>True, ads exist to motivate consumers. True, that is not a new concept, in our culture, as the main system that funds American media—both news and entertainment—has historically been ads. But what feels weird is the brief snippet of eyeball attention that somehow seems so disconnected from an act in the real world would be so valued.<br /><br />Then again, consumers tend to define themselves as immune to ads in a way that advertisers know they’re not. If online attention were completely divorced from actual commerce, it would wither. It’s not withering.<br /><br />Yet, the way social media is constructed, it’s almost insidiously rewarded for making us sad. As Dr. Lacy noted, an addict is most vulnerable when the pain of their real life demands some balm. Whether whiskey or the Meta-verse, whatever drug we turn to when we’re down can give us a brief relief, but often leaves us hollow in the long run, more divorced from our lives, more troubled in our souls.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRaxx9zyRV7B9rHpSeaYxxoz_kvgshvb7DD7ij6-7Ch6BosEcZlERKLeGrRCp6VYTtGg7II2N0LMH9_NrLRq_9H0IcDkn3YckyXZ2mcTKrj_lbCsZXD1-L5qre1wLX879ugMqVwvjUzPBL7W95L33Mhv4YPMlo434IrQ8LZEm0F_A2Km04HdIr7tCBEw/s1000/blog1.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Notebook against a computer screen" border="0" data-original-height="557" data-original-width="1000" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRaxx9zyRV7B9rHpSeaYxxoz_kvgshvb7DD7ij6-7Ch6BosEcZlERKLeGrRCp6VYTtGg7II2N0LMH9_NrLRq_9H0IcDkn3YckyXZ2mcTKrj_lbCsZXD1-L5qre1wLX879ugMqVwvjUzPBL7W95L33Mhv4YPMlo434IrQ8LZEm0F_A2Km04HdIr7tCBEw/w400-h223/blog1.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Book title from my notes, propped against my computer screen as I write this post. "Iber Pumpon Makes You Stupid?" How dare Iber Pumpon. <br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>I’m not trying to recreate Dr. Lacy’s whole message here. I’ve skipped Karl Marx and his insight into labor. And I wrote down the title of a book Dr. Lacy cited, because it sounded like something I would want to read, but my handwriting is so bad that I can’t make it out. “Something Something Makes You Stupid” states the illegible ink squiggles, on my notebook’s page. The something-something in my notes looks like “Iber pumpon,” which seems a bit unlikely as a book title.</p><p><i><b>Update Nov. 20: </b>Thanks to Dr. Lacy (and Dr. Joy Ochs) for noting the title of the book in question. It's “How PowerPoint Makes You Stupid,” by Franck Frommer. Iber Pumpon seems more like a prescription drug name than the name of slide-making software.</i><br /><br />I tell my communication students that the act of hand writing notes helps fix memory, and I believe there is some truth there. Still, it can fail. It may help if the squiggles themselves aren’t made by an old southpaw whose handwriting was always iffy (a consistent D grade on my paper report cards in elementary school), and whose crippled index finger and arthritic hands aren’t improving his finger dexterity.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgXemCeLDRKovoswg1JQxSuFlHNW3CxWtTzdRgIx2v2STbv-9GzOVPzeBO7dH93DEIgdw54r41v2teYnUMcWGW3tQGjcFMWxlcrxgLkmEYfCk_fAFWplK6vLhcNYk3_xcY1W0JGJ0FHiPIqgCJc7lt_YDvEpw5MEmnMeP94hsgojee68Db5FUmQsXfig/s1000/s19.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Hand taking notes" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgXemCeLDRKovoswg1JQxSuFlHNW3CxWtTzdRgIx2v2STbv-9GzOVPzeBO7dH93DEIgdw54r41v2teYnUMcWGW3tQGjcFMWxlcrxgLkmEYfCk_fAFWplK6vLhcNYk3_xcY1W0JGJ0FHiPIqgCJc7lt_YDvEpw5MEmnMeP94hsgojee68Db5FUmQsXfig/w400-h266/s19.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Above and below, others making notations during Dr. Lacy's speech. May their notes be more legible than mine.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"></p><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkIlbDDkDq3Z1Fh2Q2b9_PAY6itxNc_rHjOYETMx6QxYr3CXhmnn5JO0axdGxBiRoyvZ5_ZsBzAaQ2K69-cC59j6YNmaYox7eR4XlMEmIJKK2SBkU7aGcLpU6391Mc7hOz4GyLBaV1KjstZC_f3gr7zQTLxArvzl7SPLZ6QIqgvTy06f363E00OYrnEg/s1000/s12.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Hand holding pen" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkIlbDDkDq3Z1Fh2Q2b9_PAY6itxNc_rHjOYETMx6QxYr3CXhmnn5JO0axdGxBiRoyvZ5_ZsBzAaQ2K69-cC59j6YNmaYox7eR4XlMEmIJKK2SBkU7aGcLpU6391Mc7hOz4GyLBaV1KjstZC_f3gr7zQTLxArvzl7SPLZ6QIqgvTy06f363E00OYrnEg/w400-h266/s12.JPG" width="400" /></a></p><p>Nonetheless, while I was sitting in that room, listening to Dr. Lacy read a long script (not as bad as it sounds, speech students, as I say in class, you should learn to deliver from an outline so you can engage an audience, but if you’re experienced, you can learn to read a script and still be engaging, and Dr. Lacy has achieved that higher level of speech competence), I was connected. I was not “killing” time, but inhabiting it, living in it, enjoying it at the slower pace that the unfolding world can provide.<br /><br />I don’t hate social media. I understand it’s a force that can, and often does, isolate us and make us sadder. But we each construct our own social media—my Google is not yours—and can, I believe, learn to use it to also inhabit the real world in a more healthy way. Used in reasonable doses, it’s like red wine. It would hurt us if we use it too much, but modest use is not only OK; it can even improve us. <br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq1VKTLMqb5zBQibI5vTLzyjMDetPWDeNqgzgB3OihnxUXJZAh9O79-0l_XtIoVoISTPLcW1iMu03mO5w08-hh_Ar9Pdg2ew8iX6e1iy36wEt1gEkPHfDymQxVDzItIBivNxMuarzx9x9p269V8lcH1srIVwAGTZamFP-F-0ILWUPiMhsGvUibpd672w/s1000/s07.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Face of listener" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq1VKTLMqb5zBQibI5vTLzyjMDetPWDeNqgzgB3OihnxUXJZAh9O79-0l_XtIoVoISTPLcW1iMu03mO5w08-hh_Ar9Pdg2ew8iX6e1iy36wEt1gEkPHfDymQxVDzItIBivNxMuarzx9x9p269V8lcH1srIVwAGTZamFP-F-0ILWUPiMhsGvUibpd672w/w400-h266/s07.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Above and below, people listening to Dr. Lacy, not killing time on social media, but inhabiting time.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"> </p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnZvpYD5uZz6U2BPP5gqQ2kXws0Ia5rJ0ZwBDTM3zvrzlvdbiyQtJugID6dG7WXNxf0QYOuqCalSnW6tFxqFeb9UlP93KWT6OKv0zvhcaH0awYo4kccOkoYm6xXCR-4TUTk_B1GeZiDTDItrz8FCWFT-W60-LfooEUg50pRlQU8cbENX20WfP9z9ft7A/s1000/s09.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Face of listener" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnZvpYD5uZz6U2BPP5gqQ2kXws0Ia5rJ0ZwBDTM3zvrzlvdbiyQtJugID6dG7WXNxf0QYOuqCalSnW6tFxqFeb9UlP93KWT6OKv0zvhcaH0awYo4kccOkoYm6xXCR-4TUTk_B1GeZiDTDItrz8FCWFT-W60-LfooEUg50pRlQU8cbENX20WfP9z9ft7A/w400-h266/s09.JPG" width="400" /></a> <br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg255iPdp0TqT-I6jmPHEolf_9ZAd3DuKb8WqeWTRoWhN7aAzaVyXaTvTtppnUGdXIezSq9aVQAbWjt6VUoOSSpLRuRYzW-4CwVefLoKunemZjFz-WCE7OcqfI_lsXa6xd8sgO0IXNKEOg7bllMfyTD2My4GheWB2ojlqobhaci-wJWs09wDGgZYFfyuw/s1000/s10.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Face of listener" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg255iPdp0TqT-I6jmPHEolf_9ZAd3DuKb8WqeWTRoWhN7aAzaVyXaTvTtppnUGdXIezSq9aVQAbWjt6VUoOSSpLRuRYzW-4CwVefLoKunemZjFz-WCE7OcqfI_lsXa6xd8sgO0IXNKEOg7bllMfyTD2My4GheWB2ojlqobhaci-wJWs09wDGgZYFfyuw/w400-h266/s10.JPG" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidCu7lzyGRjuLGpaqy-XR7YhxIGsCmuu6i9LOUXo3_xcCQNjHXRb2gHoMn-lGalZua2ijROweanQjqyFwcPNBx6oJSRqVe_T9b__mzSE1qeIYD9U_swSM8JnRjgFk5yRxiv1a3PgqCPnqEem3y7pymW3lBNMdabSYAGg-lzZ_SJol0OliOtbpUKu7Arg/s1000/s08.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Face of listener" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidCu7lzyGRjuLGpaqy-XR7YhxIGsCmuu6i9LOUXo3_xcCQNjHXRb2gHoMn-lGalZua2ijROweanQjqyFwcPNBx6oJSRqVe_T9b__mzSE1qeIYD9U_swSM8JnRjgFk5yRxiv1a3PgqCPnqEem3y7pymW3lBNMdabSYAGg-lzZ_SJol0OliOtbpUKu7Arg/w400-h266/s08.JPG" width="400" /></a><br /></p><p>Maybe by listening to each other. Maybe by making images, writing essays and then sharing our actual creative work.<br /><br />Even if it’s unpaid labor. Because creating a full thing that you’re engaged in and care about is not labor that alienates you, it connects and grounds you.<br /><br />Now, turn off your phone and go take a walk.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIWcVAwaUHefeIDt7y7-T1QgicVQBGnCzwGKD0USIDRbe1IwHl9weqN-uMDRYiLLskBxnBuaXevfHmj9mDCSewQGQBNOrWO1VoysDmG96qLT3snn-R3Hid1zN8jkdmAbZCg7lzYRLQtkM3zRMQTvsaYKsDS2U8b98cMowtEMzFEnBRNzOE38lvJ8TrOw/s1000/s06.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Mother and baby" border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIWcVAwaUHefeIDt7y7-T1QgicVQBGnCzwGKD0USIDRbe1IwHl9weqN-uMDRYiLLskBxnBuaXevfHmj9mDCSewQGQBNOrWO1VoysDmG96qLT3snn-R3Hid1zN8jkdmAbZCg7lzYRLQtkM3zRMQTvsaYKsDS2U8b98cMowtEMzFEnBRNzOE38lvJ8TrOw/w400-h266/s06.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Key audience members, connected in reality to the speaker. And maybe social media just made you a little happier.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-71662402459607030062022-10-03T20:35:00.000-07:002022-10-03T20:35:00.269-07:00Master of the Walk-Off to Retire<p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLKwm2GlayTtSuOYT26QzF53y1XwCOzT05q3UYj1zmHei2IoXcdnCnF8u1nk4N4gGWXe_1VQphjLq95ouS0lf3fL06jg8GomWK_ljHZsMtoHi3TBqWlS_MvFBF8XUIio_rbA1Kce5vYE6TR3FKXHzxyn4b0K_TkETRnlu8s9IBdhpvSI8LCvngRSTcGw/s1099/Leonard_Pitts_Jr_2015.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Leonard Pitts, Jr." border="0" data-original-height="1099" data-original-width="733" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLKwm2GlayTtSuOYT26QzF53y1XwCOzT05q3UYj1zmHei2IoXcdnCnF8u1nk4N4gGWXe_1VQphjLq95ouS0lf3fL06jg8GomWK_ljHZsMtoHi3TBqWlS_MvFBF8XUIio_rbA1Kce5vYE6TR3FKXHzxyn4b0K_TkETRnlu8s9IBdhpvSI8LCvngRSTcGw/w266-h400/Leonard_Pitts_Jr_2015.jpg" width="266" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Leonard Pitts, Jr., who will retired in December as a Miami Herald newspaper columnist, at the 2015 Texas Book Festival, image by Larry D. Moore from <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Leonard_Pitts_Jr_2015.jpg" target="_blank">Wikimedia Commons</a>.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br />I read the news this week that Leonard Pitts, Jr., a columnist for the Miami Herald whose syndicated work appears in The Gazette, the newspaper I read, is to retire from newspaper writing this December.<br /><br />Darn. Pitts has spoken several times nearby, not that long ago at Coe College. I don’t recall what was going on that I did not attend, but I regret it. He’s a sharp, smart, talented newspaper opinion writer, and a type of voice sorely needed in our public discourse. I wish I had heard him speak.<br /><br />Pitts was very opinionated, and I don’t mean that as a pejorative statement. I think an opinion writer should make clear points. But I don’t think Pitts, winner of a Pulitzer Prize for commentary, was a bomb thrower.<br /><br />His columns read like a smart person ruminating out loud, thinking it over. He’d begin by grabbing your attention, and then build his essay, paragraph by paragraph—often, sharp, short paragraphs. As a result, his writing had a pleasing rhythm to it.<br /><br />And he was a master of the clincher, of the ending that summed it up in a crescendo. The <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article266573856.html" target="_blank">most recent column</a> he wrote—about his lack of surprise that the increasingly conservative Republican party is also measurably more racist than any other mainstream political group, according to a social science study of attitudes—ended in this line:<br /><br />“It isn’t surprising in the least.”<br /><br />Pitts will let you know where he stands. His was a voice worth listening to. Besides being a newspaper writer, he’s written several books, and according to reports, isn’t retiring from writing but devoting himself to the longer form. I’ve not read any of his books yet, but given how much I like his columns and will miss them, it’s something I should look into.<br /><br />And if they turn out to be good? Well, I think a wise man summed up what I think my reaction would be: “It isn’t surprising in the least.”</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrdi88OvGRySJrfyYzFLz-VWvABHPnxlWlUMN1iNPdPz5jGyPfuw-nWCjaC0Uq2mrULHOS3Dc5KHoiJHYNhaErzPIP5-7Ffl0I-wN1vsHNfSV8XXeygT7dxuuXa7XEyiJWvze8JVRhYCfh0Tb6Psc2Ti6vB1DdcAeBN-83KvpomGrk7SfFSyrMvh5DBA/s1024/Pitts.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Leronard Pitts, Jr., in Columbia, Missouri" border="0" data-original-height="683" data-original-width="1024" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrdi88OvGRySJrfyYzFLz-VWvABHPnxlWlUMN1iNPdPz5jGyPfuw-nWCjaC0Uq2mrULHOS3Dc5KHoiJHYNhaErzPIP5-7Ffl0I-wN1vsHNfSV8XXeygT7dxuuXa7XEyiJWvze8JVRhYCfh0Tb6Psc2Ti6vB1DdcAeBN-83KvpomGrk7SfFSyrMvh5DBA/w400-h266/Pitts.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>2017 image of Leonard Pitts by Emily Johnson/Columbia Missourian. The 2004 Pulitzer Prize winner for commentary spoke in Columbia, Missouri, as one of the Missouri Honor Medal winners awarded by the MU School of Journalism.</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-6568604019375515612022-09-14T20:23:00.003-07:002022-09-14T20:23:42.336-07:00First Edition of Student Paper Arrives<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDuNxvKwSFlc938kAugDwoJqxuKWH3CXiCHFx0pPQM2yaYiO4yjFY-uBwN-gmIO5lQ9WHOkN8X0slCDfqoCmpMSLrYgwADXxnCbaWuEZsTd58_u-IgClAB_BJqx8cHQ7DmmxTrNga49Ai-YkEwnIXP2d6MWIiOvj1SmGRH1_xFbXRxL2H2aQiLCy1TrA/s800/sept-6-Warde.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Warde Hall" border="0" data-original-height="522" data-original-width="800" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDuNxvKwSFlc938kAugDwoJqxuKWH3CXiCHFx0pPQM2yaYiO4yjFY-uBwN-gmIO5lQ9WHOkN8X0slCDfqoCmpMSLrYgwADXxnCbaWuEZsTd58_u-IgClAB_BJqx8cHQ7DmmxTrNga49Ai-YkEwnIXP2d6MWIiOvj1SmGRH1_xFbXRxL2H2aQiLCy1TrA/w400-h261/sept-6-Warde.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Sept. 6--Painter working at Warde Hall, oldest building on Mount Mercy University campus. Some things that are old are worth holding on to. Like reading.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>For years, thinkers have written (irony) about a “post literate” world. And, indeed, in our culture we can see all kind of odd impacts of a tendency to avoid reading.<br /><br />Reading, it seems to me, is such a fundamental act. There is simply no way to tune into long narrative or to absorb certain kinds of raw information that works as well. Yes, I have used YouTube videos when I want to use a new technique or discover how to fix something—I don’t deny that there are other key ways that we humans communicate.<br /><br />But I see reading as representing a deeper dive into abstract thought.<br /><br />Well, while reading as an activity is on decline, it hasn’t disappeared. Both reading and writing can still be observed among the young.<br /><br />In August, I gave one class of writers the assignment to start their own personal blogs—to give themselves a public platform from which to show the world their writing skills. I’m liking the results, including<a href="https://catherinethenotoobad.blogspot.com/2022/09/how-my-mother-avoided-cult-by-reading.html?sc=1663210073514#c198762038673911467" target="_blank"> this post </a>one student wrote on the importance of reading.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgll_SxiDIV68MLkPtindUP24eWjGTZxBqg9YrpIJqtLj2B17SD6ktbkWA4DmpuDfkViF4JKpoO1XQ_cG36p6qyuZnOInzEpbpEKJd2yLHgy6JyS6Kknv5jizy3KoCjdH4gFqYzczD4DNhzDuwXmfJ14zThXSyLNJvOePxBLW_R9OQfAdZq3neyCd7oYg/s800/aug-26-type-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Typing hands" border="0" data-original-height="534" data-original-width="800" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgll_SxiDIV68MLkPtindUP24eWjGTZxBqg9YrpIJqtLj2B17SD6ktbkWA4DmpuDfkViF4JKpoO1XQ_cG36p6qyuZnOInzEpbpEKJd2yLHgy6JyS6Kknv5jizy3KoCjdH4gFqYzczD4DNhzDuwXmfJ14zThXSyLNJvOePxBLW_R9OQfAdZq3neyCd7oYg/w400-h268/aug-26-type-2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Aug. 26--Above and below, students in a writing class at MMU begin working on their personal blogs.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguGzk5F_5W1Jc1SA3gpe2ZwVEKw7ALj77I9jLRqkyDspJevuxjScQIcR--FRENdHqbIfI1SmMfyDSg4sMtXQV8Xo1ZQ119LzQXv_GK7f6zOG1oJT7VXnbMjRjcm8Tlm1EMe2VfwQgKfkTXxyoi0HLbh8AzCQ8NGPxe_mJZRJSn6FUJh9Xh1qjjn_Q3Tw/s800/aug-26-typing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="534" data-original-width="800" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguGzk5F_5W1Jc1SA3gpe2ZwVEKw7ALj77I9jLRqkyDspJevuxjScQIcR--FRENdHqbIfI1SmMfyDSg4sMtXQV8Xo1ZQ119LzQXv_GK7f6zOG1oJT7VXnbMjRjcm8Tlm1EMe2VfwQgKfkTXxyoi0HLbh8AzCQ8NGPxe_mJZRJSn6FUJh9Xh1qjjn_Q3Tw/s320/aug-26-typing.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p>And Sept. 15 will be a key day at Mount Mercy University. The first edition of the student newspaper, The Mount Mercy Times, of the fall semester will be distributed. Thus a mass of student writing will be available to student readers—and readers may be a minority of the student body, but they are there.<br /><br />Today, I handed copies of the paper out in a class where students have written for the paper for the first time. One young man saw that his story was the anchor of the sports page, and I’ve never seen him beam more. It’s heartening to see how excited students can be due to their words.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDWZvgoGhCmqlkgw3jWEC6S_CDuaYWz5b2htHS9OfoPWYOfGz7-gozz-kR2wuIa1zmvBcSKJMrEmasHDygEynLRwuMgTHnoo2uEpjRbp_TxYrlDRpQLS4p2jjt34G1nQJTgVJSXR1STz8hsg6fBpOh5zP2IoUBvoLka6YtE7Zmuh75ntKDZQleq838cA/s1000/MMU09152022A01.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="front page" border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="1000" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDWZvgoGhCmqlkgw3jWEC6S_CDuaYWz5b2htHS9OfoPWYOfGz7-gozz-kR2wuIa1zmvBcSKJMrEmasHDygEynLRwuMgTHnoo2uEpjRbp_TxYrlDRpQLS4p2jjt34G1nQJTgVJSXR1STz8hsg6fBpOh5zP2IoUBvoLka6YtE7Zmuh75ntKDZQleq838cA/w400-h400/MMU09152022A01.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Front page of Sept. 15, 2022 edition of the Mount Mercy Times.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Right now, the student newspaper is rebuilding. We had a lot of experienced editors graduate last year, and a new crew is just getting started. But the first edition came out. It’s a tabloid this year—we’re saving some paper by using the smaller pages, and emphasizing posting our news online.<br /><br />So some of the news that is available in paper Thursday was been available online already. Still, the arrival of the first print edition marks something important.<br /><br />Reading is still alive. And writing can still excite students. Which makes Thursday, in my book, a good day.<br /></p><p>A few of the students who brought MMU this edition of the Times, from a "meet the editor" event in the University Center:<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwEaVDvQnkxKvC3WovYSYkyd7r4Hq7YX2Y2sVy8d8ClcooAxUuXqLq-rMVp4n6qEEqtbPIHO_j7VvGuPev6a7pw85iInhpYQ7LhNF2ZUIeJoXznJG7oGXmY0FIgBUg7J8uAhc8zvirUedM-TbHzKfjAKNSQgG6i3uA6w-jSxT8uzCJsW7hNrEzcWHwBw/s1000/editor.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwEaVDvQnkxKvC3WovYSYkyd7r4Hq7YX2Y2sVy8d8ClcooAxUuXqLq-rMVp4n6qEEqtbPIHO_j7VvGuPev6a7pw85iInhpYQ7LhNF2ZUIeJoXznJG7oGXmY0FIgBUg7J8uAhc8zvirUedM-TbHzKfjAKNSQgG6i3uA6w-jSxT8uzCJsW7hNrEzcWHwBw/w400-h266/editor.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg63oJTCcnFyVJ_ptbdEqO4MvoI4wCWRXWLcDyWvCrGI9Ir1AORb9vUX72GWBsRZZLaxSN1ZJwgDAehXriX5OKC-mkYw0H4rzUUjB5cutXKAw3jMOLUnvJJP7nCSOkxVI4W5o2fpg--7iiub3YMjUeBP0awq0dYQHyJWFVUV0T7klJdehX-9t7KqXycCw/s800/feat-editor.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="533" data-original-width="800" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg63oJTCcnFyVJ_ptbdEqO4MvoI4wCWRXWLcDyWvCrGI9Ir1AORb9vUX72GWBsRZZLaxSN1ZJwgDAehXriX5OKC-mkYw0H4rzUUjB5cutXKAw3jMOLUnvJJP7nCSOkxVI4W5o2fpg--7iiub3YMjUeBP0awq0dYQHyJWFVUV0T7klJdehX-9t7KqXycCw/w400-h266/feat-editor.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_XSvroInznuDNF39pfJ3x4gqK32PJl1ItOIOfcvsmcN5TJHnO-WtN5YazU26TF6_1H9OQ1w2EgR0ogWT13VCS01xpCZr8RCpftOYzekFaLGeJMYPgft-vTYEEmd6qwm1eojDBEj7FF8r7a4aycGLvzb_qEmjUNrhSdZRA7gYqcT5tHzYsoyV8cHnc2g/s1000/asst-editor.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_XSvroInznuDNF39pfJ3x4gqK32PJl1ItOIOfcvsmcN5TJHnO-WtN5YazU26TF6_1H9OQ1w2EgR0ogWT13VCS01xpCZr8RCpftOYzekFaLGeJMYPgft-vTYEEmd6qwm1eojDBEj7FF8r7a4aycGLvzb_qEmjUNrhSdZRA7gYqcT5tHzYsoyV8cHnc2g/w400-h266/asst-editor.jpg" width="400" /></a></p><br /><br />CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5436207413506109683.post-14022121137424626682022-08-21T10:48:00.000-07:002022-08-21T10:48:12.860-07:00Saying Goodbye to ‘Reliable Sources’<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxp4TRiYUFRNVpqbc7SNoQKxfXMk1j6vpuhMufSibm2SZDON797N_b0fFJdlz1ziI23uZ_wlGTcwScAiehFGAlaY1lBVnQYni-wTbrbyY4c83Z-cWpZTYbnvWPhP6Ye2Yh4GToSZHy2HNM6aG-qMJ5aE8NS0_vzPnzprKsNKh9n75nKx_pzchNWdr6eQ/s640/logo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt=""Reliable Sources" logo" border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="640" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxp4TRiYUFRNVpqbc7SNoQKxfXMk1j6vpuhMufSibm2SZDON797N_b0fFJdlz1ziI23uZ_wlGTcwScAiehFGAlaY1lBVnQYni-wTbrbyY4c83Z-cWpZTYbnvWPhP6Ye2Yh4GToSZHy2HNM6aG-qMJ5aE8NS0_vzPnzprKsNKh9n75nKx_pzchNWdr6eQ/w400-h225/logo.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From CNN.com, logo of "Reliable Sources," last episode was today, Aug. 21, 2022.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>So, today was the final show, after 30 years, of CNN’s “Reliable Sources.” Ratings were not always great for this show, and CNN informed host Brian Stelter this week that it was ending the program with today’s episode.<br /><br />I’ll miss it. Stelter showed class in the final show, ending it by thanking the boss who had fired him, noting that it’s rare for a news program to get a final episode to say goodbye. And he expressed hope that CNN would continue to push its news coverage.<br /><br />“The free world needs a reliable source,” Stelter said of CNN.<br /><br />CNN has new owners, and the corporation is shaking things up. One thrust of those changes is to try to emphasize straight news coverage, which is OK, but “Reliable Sources” was useful as a look at the media world. It wasn’t an “infotainment” show of just opinion commentary. While Stelter often made his own comments, at is heart, the show was an interview program and panel discussion about the media.</p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjppPRRO0t0B7yUMbxR0OjS48FaASb88kSjzKkZiiYR3Fuk__-33me9GChCabDkJX6Tl4hQ-CrT54P0NbgIZPOLTZ5r-_wBn-YMYVkxlUkEiwzbZNXO9Lkn0VN3Yc6ztsA2B1VQ4bmIrKRXOXfmUyxDf2kESCcPftj93FDzDnyWk3kVyxIPCBFHKAJf8A/s800/brian-stelter.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Brian Stelter on set of "Reliable Sources"" border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="800" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjppPRRO0t0B7yUMbxR0OjS48FaASb88kSjzKkZiiYR3Fuk__-33me9GChCabDkJX6Tl4hQ-CrT54P0NbgIZPOLTZ5r-_wBn-YMYVkxlUkEiwzbZNXO9Lkn0VN3Yc6ztsA2B1VQ4bmIrKRXOXfmUyxDf2kESCcPftj93FDzDnyWk3kVyxIPCBFHKAJf8A/w400-h225/brian-stelter.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>CNN image used on YouTube clip of Brian Stelter's final show.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Some of those guests, and Stelter, made key points during the final show:<br /><br />It’s not a coincidence that democracy is on decline at the same time that independent news media is on the decline. “The pendulum swinging against democracy all over the world,” Carl Bernstein said. He noted that he and Bob Woodward, who 50 years ago uncovered the Watergate scandal as reporters for The Washington Post, understood that their job was to report “the best obtainable version of the truth.”<br /><br />But, what truth? Journalists are not stenographers—using sound news judgement to frame events in context is also a key to what journalists need to do. As David Zurawick, a CNN analyst formerly with the Baltimore Sun noted, the current call to report “just the facts” ignores the reality that facts need context—that the body politic needs what he called “explanatory journalism,” such as the many times Carl Bernstein was able to compare action by former President Donald Trump to actions by Richard Nixon.<br /><br />Zurawick also noted that, in the 30 years that "Reliable Sources" was on the air, local newspapers and local TV news have been on the decline.<br /><br />Part of that decline is fueled by ownership changes—there always was an elitism problem in American journalism where it was typically rich families that owned media companies, but at least those families had some sense of responsibility that hedge funds lack.<br /><br />Atlantic Editor Jeffrey Goldberg said that owning a media outlet is “not like owning a chicken restaurant or whatever. You have to be willing to stand up to authority.”<br /><br />I agree. It’s good that in this social media era, rich owners can’t control the information anymore but it leaves media chasing the eyeballs at the expense of any sense of mission. And the impulse to report “straight” news can be a positive one, although the danger now seems to be a false equivalency where facts and nonsense are reported as equals.<br /><br />Jodie Ginsberg, president of the Committee to Project Journalists noted that a true journalist doesn’t ask if it’s raining, they go outside to feel the rain. These days it’s harder to agree on “the importance of facts, the importance of agreeing on some fundamental, important information.”<br /><br />“When those in power denigrate journalism, journalists become fair game,” she said.<br /><br />The panelists and guests on the final episode, not all of whom I quote here, were insightful and interesting. It impressed me that, although lots of media and news trends are dark, the tone of the show was nonetheless hopeful.<br /><br />And Stelter ended on a positive note. It was a classy way to go out. The CNN "Reliable Sources" newsletter continues for now, which is nice, but it’s still a sad day when a show that provided valuable context on the media stories of the week is suddenly gone.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zAZ-GK-H_Ys" width="320" youtube-src-id="zAZ-GK-H_Ys"></iframe></div><br /><p><br /></p>CR Joehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14949410451137266101noreply@blogger.com0