Tag: ABC News

Hawai’i’s Future

the most expensive state in the nation

Because of the anniversary of the Lahaina, Maui wildfire, there has been a large media emphasis on Hawai’i’s future. While some were pretty straightforward – the folks are still recovering – others were more interesting,

CBS Sunday Morning showed a piece about the Hawai’ian people, as celebrated at the Merrie Monarch Festival. “Thousands of miles from Paris, on Hawaii’s Big Island, another elite competition unfolded. The world’s best hula dancers gathered to showcase their skills, competing in both traditional and modern hula categories.” The dance is far more significant than mere entertainment for tourists.

Maui Rising

ABC broadcast a few items on the topic. From the press piece by Jim Donnelly: “ABC News’ reporting initiative ‘Maui Strong 808,’ which has been dedicated to chronicling the impact of the crisis and relief efforts [highlighted] its yearlong commitment with coverage across programs and platforms.”  It began streaming on Aug. 8 at 8:30 p.m. EDT on ABC News Live.

“‘MAUI RISING: The Fight for Hawai’i’s Future,’ a one-hour primetime special marking a year since the deadliest wildfire in modern U.S. history tore through the picturesque town of Lahaina, Maui, leaving a community reeling and inspiring a new generation of organizers ready to stand up for change. Narrated by actor and Hawai’i resident Jason Scott Lee, the program highlights the strength, determination, and resilience of the people of Lahaina.” It “follows Native Hawaiian community leaders who see the tragedy as an opportunity to re-envision a new town based on ecological restoration, cultural repair, and ultimately a chance to build a stronger, more equitable and more sustainable future for all of Hawai’i.”
The latter news special, which I stumbled upon, aired on Friday, Aug. 9, at 8 p.m. EDT on ABC. It should now be streaming on Hulu and available on the ABC app from your smartphone and tablet (iOS and Android), computer on ABC.com, and connected devices (Roku, AppleTV, and Amazon Fire TV).

It becomes obvious that the disaster was not merely a happenstance but a more than century-long inequity in favor of the sugar growers, the military, and tourism to the detriment of the native Hawai’ians.

 

“‘MAUI RISING: The Fight for Hawai’i’s Future'” spotlights Lahaina leaders who see the catastrophic fire as a pivot point and opportunity to rectify long-standing issues around affordable housing, the tourism-based economy, water rights, and resource exploitation. Interviews include legendary Hawaiian surfer Archie Kalepa; Hawaiian cultural practitioner Ke’eaumoku Kapu; key organizers of the grassroots community group Lahaina Strong, Pā’ele Kiakona, Courtney Lazo, and Jordan Ruidas; ‘American Idol’ winner and Hawaiian-born singer Iam Tongi and more.”

 

Last Week Tonight

John Oliver also tackled the issue of the islands. As the article in The Guardian notes: “Hawai’i is being reshaped by wealthy outsiders.’” Last Week Tonight looked into how billionaires like Mark Zuckerberg, wealthy tourists, and the US military have altered the state at the expense of locals.

“There are currently 32,000 short-term rentals in the state, meaning one out of 18 houses is a vacation rental, and nearly a quarter of Hawaiian homes were purchased by buyers outside the state. Hawaii is now the most expensive state in the nation for housing, and because the state imports about 90% of its food, residents also pay some of the highest prices in the nation for groceries.” See the Oliver piece here. 

Also, check out the Centering Indigenous Leadership in Maui’s Fire Recovery interview. “Kaniela Ing, national director of the Green New Deal Network, co-founder of Our Hawai‘i, and a former elected official to the Hawai‘i House of Representatives, spoke with YES! Racial Justice Editor Sonali Kolhatkar on Rising Up With Sonali about the devastation on Maui and the coming recovery efforts. Ing, who is a 7th-generation Native Hawaiian, emphasizes the importance of centering Indigenous voices and leadership in rebuilding an island struggling with the ongoing impacts of tourism and colonization.”

These stories got me thinking about inequity, wealth, and the need for restitution.

Finally, 60 Minutes reran this story: “Thousands of gallons of jet fuel contaminated the Navy’s drinking water system for Pearl Harbor. Families dealing with health issues are suing, alleging they were harmed by negligence at Red Hill.” So even military families have felt neglected.

The Big Myth: climate change; djt

djt should want a speedy trial, right?

Hank Green said, I Can’t Stop Thinking that People Who Deny Climate Change are Lying.

It’s more insidious than that, I believe. Last week, I attended a book review of The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government & Love the Free Market by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway.

The description: “In the early 20th century, business elites, trade associations, wealthy powerbrokers, and media allies set out to build a new American orthodoxy: down with “big government” and up with unfettered markets. With startling archival evidence, Oreskes and Conway document campaigns to rewrite textbooks, combat unions, and defend child labor. “

On ABC News’ This Week for September 3, 2023, meteorologist Ginger Zee describes “how rhetoric around climate change science became so polarizing.” George HW Bush (41) went to Rio de Janeiro to support the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. His son, George W. Bush (43), waffled, listening to voices such as talk show giant Rush Limbaugh, who claimed he could find as many scientists on each side of the global warming “debate.”

Yes, but

While running for President in 2000, W said, “Global warming needs to be taken very seriously… But science, there’s a lot of — there’s differing opinions.” His Vice-President suggested, “there does not appear to be a consensus… as the extent to which as part of a normal cycle versus the extent to which it’s caused by man.”

Pollster Frank Luntz advised Republicans in a memo that climate change was “not a winning issue for the party in the early 2000s” and that they lean into the “lack of scientific certainty.” It’s advice he’s now backed away from.

Were W and Cheney telling the truth about their beliefs?

I think it’s weird that Vivek Ramaswamy, the youngest of the candidates at the first Republican debate of 2023, said, “The climate change is a hoax… Drill, frack, burn coal, and brace nuclear.” Most younger adults accept human-created global warming as settled science.

Was Ramaswamy telling the truth about his beliefs?

The Big Lie

Similarly, most of the sycophants running against djt for President committed to voting for him even if he is convicted in one of these felony trials. Some would even pardon him.

As a poli sci guy, I’m fascinated that “two conservative law professors [are]  suggesting that President Trump should be disqualified under Section Three of the 14th Amendment, which bars anyone from office who participated in insurrection or gave aid and comfort to enemies of the Constitution from being on the ballot.”  It’s something that will be hashed out in the courts, of course.

The Weekly Sift guy indicates What an innocent Trump should do. “Trump’s people are saying the charges against him are bogus, that it’s all politics waged by overzealous partisan prosecutors. It’s election interference whose purpose is to promote slanders against Trump during the campaign…

“But if that’s what’s going on, then Trump’s lawyers should be chomping at the bit to get into a courtroom, where they can tell the real story, introduce the “complete” and “irrefutable” evidence that clears Trump…”

Vindication?

“So if all Trump’s indictments are nothing but weaponization of the justice system, that’s what he should want: Bring in 12 ordinary Americans who are not part of the vast Biden conspiracy, let them examine all the evidence, and then see what they think. In particular, Trump should want to get as many vindicating verdicts as possible on the record before the election so that voters could put aside all doubts about his guilt…

“But if you look at what Trump, his lawyers, and his cultists are doing, they seem scared to death of him facing a jury. His legal strategy revolves around endless delay…”

So, the defense of the major player in the government for four years is leaning into the Loathe the Government sentiment. It’s brilliant, if bizarre.

Diane Sawyer is 70

After a couple years, I found the show totally unwatchable.

sawyer.nixon2When Diane Sawyer was up for a job at CBS News in the late 1970s, I was wary. She had worked for years in the press office at the Nixon White House and then helping the resigned-before-he-was-impeached former president with his memoirs in San Clemente, California. She was even suspected of being Deep Throat, the source of leaks of classified information during the Watergate scandal. A character playing Sawyer shows up in the movie Frost/Nixon, but that was a cinematic contrivance.

Diane Sawyer turned out to be not bad, first as a reporter, then fairly quickly as the first female correspondent on 60 Minutes, the long-running investigative newsmagazine.

After five years with 60 Minutes (1984-1989), she moved to ABC News to co-anchor various news magazines (Primetime Live, 20/20). “In 1999, Sawyer returned to the morning news as the co-anchor of Good Morning America with Charles Gibson. The assignment was putatively temporary, but her success in the position, measured by a close in the gap with front-runner Today, NBC News’s morning program, sustained her in the position for far longer than anticipated.”

I had been watching ABC World News, going back to the days of Peter Jennings, who I thought was a consummate newsman, until he was diagnosed with lung cancer in early 2005, and died a few months later. I stayed with the network through the brief Bob Woodruff and Elizabeth Vargas period, and the version with Charles Gibson.
Diane_Sawyer_2011_Shankbone
“Sawyer was announced as the successor to Gibson, who retired as the anchor of ABC World News, on Friday, December 18, 2009. Sawyer left GMA on December 11, 2009, and [moved] to ABC World News on December 21, 2009, three days after Gibson’s departure.”

But the show evolved into having more “news you can use” features, the type of programming appropriate for GMA but what probably would have Jennings rolling over in his grave. ABC News had a glitzy “what’s trending” on social media segment and the periodic, mildly jingoistic “Made in America” pieces; I helped find a couple of the entrepreneurs.

After a couple of years, I found the show totally unwatchable, especially after the first commercial, and started watching other programs, almost anything. Sawyer left in the anchor desk in 2014 and concentrated on specials. Her piece on Julie Andrews I found irritating, seemingly more about how strenuous the hills in The Sound of Music were for the interviewer than new information about the subject.

Still, I think that Barbara Walters-like celebrity journalism does have its place. Who else had the soft news cred to have interviewed Bruce Jenner just before the transition to Caitlyn? And I appreciated how she gave her GMA colleagues the scoop the death of her husband, Mike Nichols, in November 2014.

I recognize that media will make more of the competition between two women, no matter the field, such as Sawyer’s rivalry with Barbara Walters or Katie Couric.

So I can appreciate her accomplishments, even her style is not always my cuppa.

March on Washington, a half century later

When Jackie Robinson joined major league baseball in 1947, that did not mark the end of racism and segregation.

It’s likely you’ll see a LOT of stories about the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington. Every single one will marvel at how much progress has been made in America in the area of race, since 1963. Almost all will point to a black President, the current Attorney General, and two recent Secretaries of State as examples. The divergence in opinions come on this point: some will claim that we have “reached the promised land,” making sure to paraphrase Martin Luther King, Jr. from that day a half-century ago – as though he were the only speaker there – while others will suggest that we haven’t quite gotten there yet.

When President Obama suggested that we look at race again in light of the Trayvon Martin case, that Obama could have been Trayvon 35 years ago, some, such as Touré at TIME, thought it was a brave personal observation. He wrote: “The assertion that blacks are hallucinating or excuse-making or lying when we talk about the many very real ways white privilege and racial bias and the lingering impact of history impact our lives is painful. It adds insult to injury to attack all assertions of racism and deny its continued impact or existence.”

Others labeled Obama “racist-in-chief”, playing the “race card” and worse. When Former Florida GOP Congressman Joe Scarborough lit into Fox News talk-show host Sean Hannity last month for suggesting that Martin was a messed up teenager who “had it coming” when he was killed by George Zimmerman in their February 2012 confrontation, the bile cast on the Morning Joe host, Martin, his parents, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, among others, by a website I follow was toxic. The always dreadful Ted Nugent said that Martin had been ‘Emboldened’ By Obama, “the first black president as a ‘Black Panther’ running a ‘gangster’ government.”

Here are four charts suggesting Obama’s right about being black in America. Being profiled is, more than anything, disheartening, I can tell you. After George Zimmerman was acquitted of murdering Trayvon, Lavar Burton, the original Kunte Kinte of Roots fame, noted how he had taught his sons to keep their hands open and out of the car. Meanwhile, a white guy on the same show noted that he had once locked his keys in the car, so he tried to break in; a New Orleans police officer stopped him, saying, “No, you’re not doing it right.”

There’s this show on ABC called What Would You Do? It’s a hidden camera show that looks at human psychology. I don’t watch it, but I find it interesting that several of their experiments involve race. A most powerful one involved actors pretending to be bicycle thieves. From this story: When a white young man appeared to be taking a bike, most people didn’t question it. Yet when the African-American actor took his place, “the reactions were more pronounced. At one point, a crowd assembled around the purported thief and confronted him directly. One man pulled out a cellphone and said he was calling the police, which he was about to do until the cameramen filming the event stepped forward.”

When Jackie Robinson joined major league baseball in 1947, that did not mark the end of racism and segregation. It took over a decade before every team had at least one black player. It was 1987, when Al Campanis, general manager of the DODGERS, which was Jackie’s team, rationalized on national TV why there weren’t more blacks in baseball management; I watched it live, stunned. As a direct result, the sport was far more aggressive in making sure minority candidates at least got interviewed for a management position. They took an AFFIRMATIVE ACTION to rectify a system, not of overt racism, but merely cronyism, hiring the guys one already knows.

And speaking of which, the US Supreme Court seems destined to gut the Voting Rights Act and affirmative action, under the mistaken belief that everything is all better now. The economic inequities would otherwise. Almost 400 years have passed since blacks came to America, and that there is still work to be done does not negate the progress. Nor does the progress suggest that Martin, if he were still alive, and his colleagues, some of whom still alive, and their successors, would be resting on their laurels, satisfied that the work is done.
***
Leonard Pitts: Living in a time of moral cowardice.

If you could somehow magically bring [Martin Luther King, Jr.] here, that tomorrow would likely seem miraculous to him, faced as he was with a time when segregation, police brutality, employment discrimination, and voter suppression were widely and openly practiced.

Here is tomorrow, after all, the president is black. The business mogul is black. The movie star is black. The sports icon is black. The reporter, the scholar, the lawyer, the teacher, the doctor, all of them are black. And King might think for a moment that he was wrong about tomorrow and its troubles.

It would not take long for him to see the grimy truth beneath the shiny surface, to learn that the perpetual suspect is also black. As are the indigent woman, the dropout, the fatherless child, the suppressed voter, and the boy lying dead in the grass with candy and iced tea in his pocket.

Getting rid of ABC News’ Brian Ross, for starters

In a three-minute span last week, anchor Diane Sawyer made two errors.

I’m forever fascinated by the news media, and how often they get it wrong. Anyone who has appeared in the newspaper will tell you that; “that’s not what I meant.” Often it’s breaking news they botch, such as CNN and FOX News reporting of when it was declaring that the Supreme Court had killed “Obamacare”

But it was some hours after the Aurora, Colorado shootings when ABC News’ Brian Ross, interrupting the news anchor, speculated that the shooter may have been a member of a local tea party chapter. Ah, his investigation seems to be that he Googled James Holmes and Aurora and found A James Holmes in Aurora, who is unrelated. The network issued a public apology. This was hardly the first of Ross’ premature reporting.

Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart totally lambasted Ross (at 5:00 in), and rightly so. Regret the Error explains the network’s mealy apology, while at the same time, making me suspicious of another detail of the story. “The network had reported that Holmes’ mother said ‘you have the right person’ when it contacted her to ask if her son was the shooter. She has since said she was referring to herself to let the reporter know she was Holmes’ mother.” I tend to believe Holmes’ mother’s version.

Ross, however, is hardly the only sloppy newsperson at ABC News. In a three-minute span last week, anchor Diane Sawyer made two errors. First, she noted that the British had 9,500 soldiers in Afghanistan, but 18,200 at the Olympics, which is “MORE than twice as many;” not when I went to school. Then she referred to late actor Sherman Hemsley as “Helmsley.” Forgivable mistake, perhaps, but when the reporter on the piece REPEATEDLY announces his name correctly, you’d think she’d fix it. Or, if she didn’t notice, that SOMEONE would whisper into her headphone about her miscue.

It wasn’t that long ago that the late Peter Jennings, who died in 2005, was anchoring ABC’s evening news. Those types of errors likely wouldn’t have taken place, and if they had, heads would have rolled. I’m reminded once again why I gave up my ABC News habit.

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