News & Media

Journalist Robert Kaplan is a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly. He is the best known for his book Balkan Ghosts which became the book that former President Clinton turned to before the U.S. involvement in the Bosnian crisis. His 1990 book, Soldiers of God: with Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan has just been republished, updating the story. The book now includes a new introduction and a final chapter on how the Taliban came to power.

Shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, Onion editor Rob Siegel and writer Todd Hanson produced two issues of the paper which featured articles including "U.S. Urges Bin Laden to Form Nation It Can Attack," and "Security Beefed up at Cedar Rapids Public Library."

We remember newspaper editor and anti-apartheid activist Donald Woods. His relationship with the slain black South African activist Steve Biko was dramatized in the 1987 film, Cry Freedom. He died yesterday in England, where he had lived for over 20 years. Well listen back to a 1987 interview.

We remember one of the most respected historians of the media Erik Barnouw. He died last week at the age of 93. He was the author of the classic three-volume History of Broadcasting. Barnouw was the first chief of the Library of Congress' Motion Picture, Broadcasting, and Recording Sound Division. In 1996 Barnouw wrote a memoir about his life, Media Marathon: A 20th Century Memoir.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews –The Fourth Hand— (Random House) by John Irving.

We remember the former publisher of The Washington Post, Katharine Graham. She died July 17th at the age of 84. Graham's father owned The Post in 1933 and later her husband, Phil Graham, took over. Following her husband's suicide in 1963, Graham became publisher, knowing little about the managerial or journalistic aspects of the job. But, learning while she worked, she transformed the paper into one of the country's most respected newspapers. The Post broke the Watergate scandal and published the Pentagon Papers against a federal judge's ruling.

Andrew Kromah lives and works in Sierre Leone. The country has been rated the most dangerous country in the world for journalists. For eight years now Kromah has run an independent radio station (KISS-FM) in Freetown and has reported on the rebels and government. Each week, as Mr. Owl he investigates local corruption. Twice his building has been burned down. During the 1996 election there, Kromah and his staff were forced to broadcast from the bush to escape injury.

New York Times reporters David Barstow and Don Van Natta, Jr. went to Florida following the closest presidential election in history. During a six month investigation, the two journalists found –under intense pressure from the Republicans, Florida officials accepted hundreds of overseas absentee ballots that failed to comply with state election laws.— (NYT 7/15/01) However, the outcome of the investigation is inconclusive. If all invalid overseas ballots had been thrown out, Bush would have still maintained a narrow margin over Gore.

They are authors of the new book, Leaving Readers Behind: The Age of Corporate Newspapering (University of Arkansas Press.) The book examines how newspaper reporting is being altered by the buying, selling, and consolidation of papers. In the book, they say the age of corporate newspapering is bringing about –a change that is diminishing the amount of real news available to the consumer.— Thomas Kunkel is dean of the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland and president of American Journalism Review.

His book is Privileged Son: Otis Chandler and the rise and fall of the L.A. Times Dynasty.(Perseus) It is a history of the paper from 1960 to 1980. During that time Otis Chandler, a fourth generation member of the family, took control of the paper. His reign had elements of fabulous success and major scandal. He was described as –larger than life transforming The Times from a dreadful newspaper into one of the two or three best in the country.— (NYT magazine 1/23/2000) Dennis McDougal is a former investigative journalist for the L.A. Times.

El Tiempo is one of Columbia's leading dailies. Enrique Santos Calderon will talk about putting out a newspaper under the threat of kidnapping, torture or death from leftist guerillas and right wing paramilitary groups. In Columbia, more journalists have been killed in the past five years than in any other country.

Journalists Lou Michel (“Meh-SHELL”) and Dan Herbeck are staff writers for the Buffalo News. The two have collaborated on the new book “American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh & the Oklahoma City Bombing” (ReganBooks). MICHEL lived twenty minutes away from the McVeigh’s father, and over time he developed a relationship with the elder McVeigh which in turn helped him gain access to his son. Michel and Herbeck conducted nearly 80 hours of interviews with Timothy McVeigh.

Veteran broadcaster and executive producer of 60 Minutes, DON HEWITT. Hes been with CBS News since 1948 and was producer-director of the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite before creating 60 Minutes in 1968. Hes written a new memoir, –Tell Me a Story: Fifty Years and 60 Minutes in Television

Journalist Anne Nivet (“NEE-VAH”) is Moscow correspondent for the French paper Liberation. Two years ago, after the Russians denied her press access to Chechnya, she disguised herself as a Chechen peasant woman and snuck across the boarder. For six months she followed the war, traveling with the underground rebels and staying with families. Her reports were published in Liberation. Her new memoir is “Chienne De Guerre: A Woman Reporter Behind the Lines of the War In Chechnya”

Irish writer Nuala OFaolain. Her first novel, My Dream of You, (Riverhead Books) has just come out in paperback. Her critically acclaimed 1998 memoir, Are You Somebody? The Accidental Memoir of a Dublin Woman was on the New York Times bestseller list. OFaolain is also a columnist for the Irish Times; she has been at the paper for over 12 years.

Journalist Bill Sloan is the author of "I Watched a Wild Hog Eat My Baby!" "A Colorful History of Tabloids and Their Cultural Impact". Sloan is a former tabloid insider having worked for "The National Enquirer""Montreals" "Midnight" (now called –Globe—), and the "National Tattler." Sloan was also an investigative reporter for the Dallas Times Herald.

Whitehead reviews The Complete Vee Jay Lee Morgan-Wayne Shorter Sessions on the Mosaic box label.

White House Correspondent for the Washington Post, Dana Milbank. He covered the recent presidential campaign and the aftermath. Hes written a new book about it, Smashmouth: Two years in the Gutter with Al Gore and George W. Bush

Journalist Jeffrey Toobin. A staff writer for the New Yorker and senior analyst for television network ABC, he’s currently working on a book about the election controversy. He talks today about the election in retrospect, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that was handed down last night, and what the decision means for Bush and Gore.

Columnist Stanley Bing (a pseudonym) satirizes the corporate world in his columns for Fortune and Esquire Magazines. He revels his true identity in this interview. His book “Lloyd—what Happened: A Novel of Business” followed the aspirations of an executive who was climbing the corporate ladder. Bing’s newest book is “What Would Machiavelli Do? The Ends Justify the Means” (Harperbusiness) a satirical how-to book for the Machiavellian-minded in the corporate world.