Tag: obit

Gotcha journalism

What occurred to me is that the notion of “gotcha journalism” has been turned on its head.

The first big story I noticed when I was out of town last week was the death of CBS News’ 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace at the age of 93. He was one of those old-fashioned hard-nosed reporters who irked politicians, the powerful, and occasionally his own network with his investigative television journalism from the show’s debut in 1968 until his retirement in 2006, and even to his 2008 piece on Roger Clemens. Here is the New York Times obit, and his story in The National Memo. His interviews with Ayatollah Khomeini, Dr. Jack Kevorkian, and cigarette company insider Jeffrey Wigand, among many others, were legendary.

One of the trademarks in 60 Minutes reporting, used by him, but not exclusively, was the use of the hidden camera to ambush some person changing the odometer on an automobile or making some unsubstantiated medical claim. One of my favorites and I don’t recall the reporter, involved a black couple in Illinois going to see if a property was available for purchase, and told it was not. Then, a shot later, a white couple would show up, and the property would suddenly be available again. Next, the reporter would come in and expose the duplicity. While effective, CBS tended to shy away from the technique, dubbed as “gotcha journalism.” It was my contention that the hidden camera reporting should only be used when no other way would expose the fraud.

What occurred to me is that the notion of “gotcha journalism” has been turned on its head. When Sarah Palin complained that the “lamestream media” was using “gotcha” questions, it wasn’t a hidden camera trying to entrap her over some wrongdoing. It was an open and aboveboard question over what newspapers she read or why she would be competent to be President if John McCain had been elected, and then later was incapacitated.
***
The next story I read about was the Miami Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen getting in trouble for something he said; not that unusual. But I didn’t really catch what the content was until he apologized for saying it and was suspended five games. What the heck did he remark? The Venezuelan told Time magazine he loves former Cuban leader Fidel Castro and respects the retired Cuban leader for staying in power so long. But he claims his intent was lost in translation: “I was saying I cannot believe somebody who hurt so many people over the years is still alive,” Guillen told folks at the follow-up news conference. My inclination is to believe him, and the calls in the Little Havana community to fire him I find a bit troubling. This may be more of a public relations problem than a substantive issue.

Harry Belafonte is 85

Harry Belafonte was an artist who used his celebrity for good.

Harry Belafonte, who turns 85 today, is a hero to me. Based on his record collection, my late father was likewise taken; moreover, I think Belafonte was a model for my father’s life.

If you’re not familiar with him, here’s an apt description from the Charlie Rose website:
Harold Belafonte, Jr. is an African-American musician, actor and radical social activist of Jamaican ancestry. One of the most successful Jamaican musicians in history, he was dubbed the “King of Calypso” for popularizing the Caribbean musical style in the 1950s. Belafonte is perhaps best known for singing the “Banana Boat Song”, with its signature lyric “Day-O”. Throughout his career, he has been an advocate for civil rights and humanitarian causes. In recent years he has been a vocal critic of the policies of the Bush Administration.

My father used to sing in the Binghamton, NY area when I was growing up. He was a “singer of folk songs,” which he found to be an important distinction from being a “folk singer,” a term he found too confining. And like Belafonte, he sang in a variety of styles.

My father’s musical repertoire, I understood far later, came from a variety of sources: Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Odetta, Leadbelly, Jimmie Rogers and very definitely, Belafonte. In fact, here’s one song called There’s A Hole in My Bucket by Belafonte and Odetta, which my father used to sing, until my sister Leslie and I joined his act and stole it from him.

Harry Belafonte was an artist who used his celebrity for good. He was not one to shut up and sing, or act, as though he had forfeited his rights as a citizen, something we in my household admired greatly. He was quite active, for instance, working with Martin Luther King, Jr. Read The amazing American journey of Harry Belafonte -Day-O! How the singer-activist blended Caribbean shtick and fierce political passion. Also, watch this segment of CBS News Sunday Morning.

And if sleeps through an occasional interview, he’s entitled!
***
Davy Jones of the Monkees died this week. I was not a big Monkees fan, but I distinctly remember wanting a Monkees Greatest Hits album and getting it one Christmas. Mark Evanier tells a lovely story about Davy Jones from just a few weeks ago; seemed like a great guy. Here’s the Monkees doing It’s Nice To Be With You.

 

February Rambling: Military Draft, Muppets and Graceland

“’Soul Train’ was the first and only television show to showcase and put a spotlight on black artists at a time when there were few African-Americans on television at all, and that was the great vision of Don.”

 

When I mentioned the military draft earlier in the month, I may not have been very clear. Think of a large goldfish bowl with 365 or 366 balls with every date for the year represented. The first date for a particular year pulled would be the first selected for military service, the second date pulled the second selected, etc. There would be a cutoff number, based on the need for the war effort. Check out this article and then this one.

The food stamp President; note that Arthur had this BEFORE MoveOn.com helped propel it viral. He also remembers the first anniversary of the Christchurch, New Zealand earthquake, the 50th anniversary of John Glenn’s flight aboard Friendship 7, and the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Dickens.

Rosa Parks Did Much More than Sit on a Bus

The Stories I Tell: “Like most of us I was raised to tell the truth and be honest. This can present a minor dilemma for resellers.”

How a mom used Star Wars to answer life’s questions

Marvel/Disney wages petty, vicious war against Ghost Rider creator. Yeah, there are two sides to this story, but Disney’s treatment of writer Gary Friedrich is still most unfortunate. Here’s a more nuanced piece that links to a donate to Gary site. Incidentally, in the comments to the former piece, someone was complaining that Friedrich was selling the art of Mike Ploog, penciler of Ghost Rider. I don’t know about the specifics of this case, but as former Marvel editor-in-chief Jim Shooter explained here and here, art pages, which previous to the 1970s were rarely returned at all by comic book companies, were distributed to various participants of the story; this included the writer, though they usually got last dibs. Shooter does explain Marvel’s likely point of view, and here’s a Marvel rebuttal.

I swear I had the same problem as Mitch O’Connell.

I read in Entertainment Weekly about this website that has the feature If 2012’s Oscar-nominated movie posters told the truth. This one riffing on The Help is funny, but so are several others.

I was saddened by the death of “Soul Train” host Don Cornelius of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. From the LA Times: “Don Cornelius’ legacy to music, especially black music, will be forever cemented in history,” said Clarence Avant, former chairman of Motown Records. “’Soul Train’ was the first and only television show to showcase and put a spotlight on black artists at a time when there were few African-Americans on television at all, and that was the great vision of Don.”
But I also remember tuning in when unlikely guests would show up, such as David Bowie performing Fame and Golden Years.

Read about comic book legend John Severin, who died at the age of 90, here and here and here.

The Wicker Muppet and A Muppet phenomenon and REALLY early Muppets.

The film trailer for “Under African Skies,” “the documentary from award-winning filmmaker Joe Berlinger. Paul Simon travels back to South Africa 25 years after his first visit, chronicling the creation and lasting influence of his groundbreaking album, Graceland. Simon revisits the making of the record, surveying from the vantage of history the turbulence and controversy surrounding the album’s genesis.”

HOW TO mix a grody-looking Alien Brain Hemorrhage cocktail
***
ROGER AT OTHER BLOGS

Interestingly, on most of these, I don’t get many comments. But I DO get an occasional LIKE on Facebook or retweet on Twitter, so it’s all good. Oh, and speaking of Facebook, I now have but one Facebook account. So if you want to “friend” me, it needs to be this account, the one with the duck logo.

Obviously, we’re still working on that “change the world” thing – also noting Graham Nash’s 70th birthday.

The GIANTS WIN THE PENNANT! The GIANTS WIN THE PENNANT!

Secrets of the public bathroom

Caring about Multiple Things Simultaneously, which is less about Whitney Houston, and more about people who think other folks shouldn’t care about Whitney Houston’s death

Alan Moore’s Twilight Proposal. Flashmob Fridays’ final outing.

Even a Megaphone Might Have Helped: Albany’s Black History Month bit

Scott Ritter is…complicated

In the spirit of Woody Guthrie. Well, maybe funnier.

The City of Albany didn’t even know the sign was missing until someone – OK, I – pointed it out.

Requiem of the Week – Brahms German

Albert Wood, a member of my church choir, and a March Pisces, died on Ash Wednesday.

 

Nothing gets me in the Lenten mood like a bunch of Requiems (Requia?). I have sung several of them over the years. One I haven’t sung is Brahms’ A German Requiem, though I do have a recording of it. However, I have sung the 4th movement, in English, and it is known as How Lovely is thy dwelling place.

From the Wikipedia: A German Requiem, To Words of the Holy Scriptures, Op. 45 (German: Ein deutsches Requiem, nach Worten der heiligen Schrift) by Johannes Brahms, is a large-scale work for chorus, orchestra, and a soprano and a baritone soloist, composed between 1865 and 1868. It comprises seven movements, which together last 65 to 80 minutes, making this work Brahms’s longest composition.

A German Requiem is sacred but non-liturgical, and unlike a long tradition of the Latin Requiem, A German Requiem, as its title states, is a Requiem in the German language.

It is a standard for a number of choirs. I know of at least a couple of people who would love it to be performed at their funerals, and it is on my list of pieces to be considered for that purpose.

Here are:
How Lovely is thy dwelling place, in English, by the Exultate Festival Choir
The same movement, in German, by the UCLA Chorale
The whole requiem by the UC Davis University and Alumni Choruses and Symphony Orchestra; unfortunately, the vocals often sound a bit muddy, per the recording methodology, not the singers.
***

A sad note: Albert Wood, a member of my church choir as well as other choral groups, and a March Pisces, died on Ash Wednesday. Stole this picture from someone’s Facebook page. On his LinkedIn page, a fellow choir member had written: “An incredibly talented, energetic and ethical individual, with considerable insight into the human and corporate condition.” Among other things, he was a very talented pianist.

Halloween 1986: Gary Carter and a Greyhound Bus Strike

The only time I saw Gary Carter in person was the year he was inducted into Baseball Hall of Fame, in 2003. It wasn’t at the induction ceremony, but in Cooperstown that same weekend.

For most of the 1980s, I would travel on a bus from Albany, NY, to my hometown of Binghamton, NY to attend an annual Halloween party, held by a high school friend of mine and her then-husband. The only way to get there was by Greyhound bus, and there must have been some sort of labor dispute in 1986 because they had replacement drivers. I remember the driver on the return trip to Albany get off the wrong Oneonta exit, riding through parts of the city not usually traversed on that route, and ending up in parts of the SUNY Cobleskill campus I had never seen before; two or three passengers, including myself, ended up being the navigators during a torrential downpour.

As for the Saturday night party itself, it happened to coincide with Game 6 of the World Series between the New York Mets and the Boston Red Sox. Boston was up 3 games to 2. Usually, we didn’t watch the Series at this party, but the hostess was a big Mets fan. In fact, she was wearing an excellent replica of the uniform of the Mets’ All-Star catcher, Gary Carter, her favorite player, who was the hero of Game 4; her coif even replicated the curls in his hair.

The room went wild after the Mets’ unexpected Game 6 win, due in no small part because of Carter’s 10th inning, two-out hit. There had already been quite a bit of drinking going on and there was…more afterward.

Fortunately, I didn’t miss the final game of the Series, as I had feared. The same blinding rainstorm that made my return trip to Albany on Sunday so eventful also rained out the game at New York’s Shea Stadium, so I did get to see the Mets’ victory in the decisive Game 7 on Monday when I got back to Albany. Incidentally, “NBC’s broadcast of Game 7 (which went up against a Monday Night Football game between the Washington Redskins and New York Giants on ABC) garnered a Nielsen rating of 38.9 and a 55 share, making it the highest-rated single World Series game to date.”

The only time I saw Gary Carter in person was the year he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, in 2003. It wasn’t at the induction ceremony but in Cooperstown that same weekend. He seemed like a great guy who had what Yahoo! sports called an “unapologetic joy” for the game. I was sorry to hear that he died this week of a malignant brain tumor, diagnosed in May 2011.
***
Gary Carter dead at 57, and on the passing of youth.

Social media & sharing icons powered by UltimatelySocial