Vietnam 'Old Hacks'
 

Colleagues,

Good Monday morning - here's to a great week ahead.

The 40th anniversary of the fall of Saigon will be marked on Thursday, April 30.

The date has special significance to our nation - and the world - but especially to those of our Connecting colleagues who either served in the military in Vietnam or who reported on the war for The Associated Press and other news organizations.

If you are included in either category, please send along your thoughts, memories, reactions of the upcoming anniversary, for a special Connecting edition planned for the anniversary date Thursday.

Some of our Connecting colleagues are already in Ho Chi Minh City, formerly known as Saigon, for a Press Week "to mark the 40th anniversary of the South Liberation and National Reunification Day (April 30th), featuring a fascinating array of governmental and municipal activities," according to the sponsoring People's Committee of Ho Chi Minh City in coordination with the Foreign Press Center, Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

They are there as members of Vietnam Old Hacks, a membership-based Google Group composed primarily of journalists who covered the Vietnam War, including conflicts in neighboring Cambodia and Laos, up until 1975. Also included are those who've covered the region since the end of the war, including present-day journalists in Vietnam and Cambodia and region. 

 The group is managed by Connecting colleague Carl Robinson, photographer/correspondent with The Associated Press in Saigon, 1968-75 and previously with USAID in Mekong Delta (1964-68) and now a resident of Sydney, Australia. He and Bangkok-based ex-CBS Derek Williams are the designated owners of this Google Group site.  Carl said 24 Old Hacks are attending this year's reunion.

From the opening day of the Press Week, which continues until Friday, James Pringle, a former correspondent for Reuters, Newsweek and the Sunday Times of London, filed this report:

By JAMES PRINGLE

The 40th anniversary get-together of the Old Hacks got off the ground today with Carl Robinson saying through the microphone in a loud conspiratorial whisper: "The Cat Herder is here!"

This was just after he was introduced by our new Vietnamese hosts from the Press and Information Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.  

 James Pringle in 2010.

References to a cat herder, were not, as one might suspect,  picked up by the Vietnamese.  

However, for the first time ever, our Vietnamese counterparts began treating us as people well worth knowing, likely to be on their side, and valued for our supposed expertise of war as waged in South East Asia.

Not only were they paying our hotel bills for the three star Huong Sen hotel on Dong Khoi Street, whom Old Hacks will remember as the former Astor Hotel, (for some of us may have had assignations here in the days of long ago) they paid for pleasant venues to eat in other venues. 

But our Vietnamese hosts immediately began to honor us with a deference we did not remember from earlier visits.

Suddenly, after years of being treated with a certain suspicion, it seems we are now viewed as bosom buddies of the Vietnamese side.

Our knowledge of Vietnam and the Vietnam War, and war in general, have suddenly made us highly depositorists of desired knowledge .

The truth is that Vietnam is concerned over the war clouds that seem to be clustering  over South China Sea.  This has seen an aggressive China throwing its weight around and claiming most vast parts of the sea as theirs.

We, however, and rightly so, were intent on raisings glasses of libation to honor our old friends no longer with us such as the late Ron Moreau, Brian 'Digger' Williams, and the always much remembered Hugh van Es, much missed spouse of  Annie van Es, whose husband is famous for the iconic picture of the war.

Also, it is worth saying that the Old Hacks were welcomed this time alongside press from elsewhere in the world, including a well-informed and attractive Russian journalist who is only 22, two Algerians anxious to find out how the earlier war against the French colonialists had affected them, as many Algerians fought in the French ranks,(more on this in a later story) and  a Cambodia TV reporter.  

We all of us, and not just Peter Arnett and Tim Page, were suddenly bathing in a warm glow, valued for our supposed expertise:  this included Tony Clifton, Stewart Dalby, John Giannini, Loren Jenkins, Don Kirk, Don and Deanna North, Lance Woodruff, Sarah Elizabeth Errington, Willis 'Skip' Brown and William M. Reilly of UPI from Ireland, and  Edie Lederer, not yet arrived but who was expected at any minute, and Tiana Thanh Nga, an American Vietnamese film-maker, friend of the late great Marshal Vo Nguyen Giap. Tiana is much admired by the elderly gentlemen of the Politbureau in Hanoi for her poetic inventions and her not inconsiderable charms.

As I said earlier, and I almost have to pinch myself at the change,  a sense of genuine welcome from the Vietnamese side, and it was made clear that we had become 'dear friends' and people who understood the Vietnamese, and who would stand by them. 

Suddenly, the Vietnamese seem to regard the surviving Old Hacks as people who know the scene here, having covered a bloody war once here.   Was this really the Old Hacks they are praising up? 

This all apparently has come about because the Vietnamese understand they are facing prospects which have led to brutal killings of numbers of Vietnamese soldiers in the Paracel and Spratly Islands by the Chinese. 

Under the leadership of President Xi Jinping, a Chinese leader who is described by insiders as the toughest Chinese boss  since the era of the late Chairman  Mao, is famous for saying that 'political power grows out of the barrel of a gun,'' the Chinese Communist Party has become hard-line again. 

The trouble has emerged over the aptly named Mischief Reef, transforming a submerged coral reef  into an island on which the outline of an airfield is appearing under the water - water that will soon rise by artificial schemes.

China has long asserted ownership of the two archipelagos known as the Paracel and Spratly Islands, also claimed by at least three other countries, including Vietnam and the Philippines. (Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have claims of their own) all in an area believed to be rich in oil and gas.

Recently, Admiral Harry Harris, the commander of the US Pacific fleet, recently accused China of undertaking an enormous and unprecedented artificial land creation operation.

Tensions rise and fall in this region of the world with China refusing  to conduct relations with the countries of Asia as a group and insisting that each country carries out separate negotiations with the People's Republic of China.

China is presently building on atolls it has seized and is building runways, or at least one large runway, at tremendous expense.   Some of the smaller nations are doing the same, though they can hardly afford it.

It seems it is only really President Aquino of the Philippines who is standing up to the Chinese at present, and even Vietnam is approaching the problem with great care, having been burned before, with about 60 Chinese soldiers shot while up to their knees in water on an atoll attacked by the Chinese.

The Vietnamese know they have a population of 90 million, which sounds a lot until you compare it with China's 1.3 billion souls.     

But, back to the present, on Sunday morning, at the hottest time of the year, the Old Hacks watched a rehearsal for next Thursday's 'Liberation' parade, with the army practicing its goose-stepping skills;  somehow the goose step, Vietnamese style, does not have the menace of, say, the Nazi goose-step, especially when it is carried out by lissome young women.

After standing outside the Majestic Hotel, for the rehearsal, it was off for a meeting with the War Veterans' Association of Ho Chi Minhville. 

Admiral Tran Thanh Huyen and a dozen senior officers gave us a warm welcome over bananas, grapes, tangerines and refreshing cold water under a picture of Marx and Lenin, and before a statue of the late revered President Ho Chi Minh.   

We were also introduced to Col. Vu Ngoc Dinh, aged 76, who looks much younger than his years, and who is credited with shooting down six American planes, presumably over North Vietnam, though he said he was a southerner.  He wears six medals, one for each prang.

Then there was a question and answer session, and Loren Jenkins seemed to do best here.  Though most answers seemed to this writer rather like a selection of political clich?s, Loren raised the issue of why it took the communist armies so long to enter Saigon at the end of April, 1975, and thus let the ambassador and the Marines have plenty of time to move out of harm's way.

Admiral Huyen said this was a 'humanitarian issue.'

The Vietnamese had basically let the evacuation go ahead smoothly so that the Americans could withdraw ''whether enemy or not.''

Tim Page asked if Admiral Huyen could try to trace what had happened to 14 journalists who had disappeared during or after their capture during the first months after the war spread in to Cambodia.  Tim said that he ''might not be around' during the next get-together in presumably ten years  time. 

The Admiral gave an assurance that he would.  He also reminded his audience of press from around the world who had joined the Old Hacks at this press conference, that Vietnam had lost three million dead during the war, and  about the anxieties they had had, and continued to have, in the years that followed the end of the war on 30 April, 1975.

Tim, seemingly emotionally drained, acknowledged this was the case, but he hoped the admiral would try to establish the fate of the 14, who included, though he did not on this occasion say so, the fates of Sean Flynn and his companion on that fatetul day and most days, Dana Stone.

The admiral indicated once again he would do his best, and the other dignified senior Vietnamese nodded in approval - they clearly support Page's efforts to locate his friends.  And at the same time it was easy to believe that the admiral would be sincere in his efforts.

So there you have it Old Hacks, in the US and around the world.

The Vietnamese are treating us, for the first time really, as valued friends, and as experts who could help solve the sorry mess in the South China Sea.  This is a new role for us - as pundits.

This reporter, thanks to seven years spent in China,  believes that the Chinese navy lags 15 to 20 years behind the American one, and is not likely to be a threat for a decade and a half.  At the same time, the smaller Asian nations are worried - only Cambodia supports the Chinese militant posture, and they are well recompensed for this.

The Vietnamese like to say, as they did today, that relations with the US grow from strength to strength.  It helps keep their courage up.  Could you believe this 40 years after the US lost the Vietnam War? 

Sorry to put so much political and current affairs in this one, but it is necessary to understand how we have become, as far as the Vietnamese are concerned, among the best blokes on the block.

Connecting Mailbox

Celebrating the life of Madge Stager

About 300 family, friends and former colleagues of Madge Stager, retired New York AP photo editor who died April 4 at the age of 61, gathered at an overflowing Tibet House in Manhattan on Sunday to celebrate her life and hear anecdotes and remembrances of her long and loving marriage to her husband Chris, her spiritual life, friendships and her distinguished 37-year career at The Associated Press.

Connecting colleague Sam Heiman (Email) said that Chris led the services and "there weren't too many dry eyes during his amusing  and touching remembrance of his late wife. Some of the attendees came  from as far away as Switzerland - where most of Chris' family lives - and from around the United States.  Michael Feldman (Email) said the Tibet House in the Village is not far from the Stagers' apartment. He said, "Madge had become very involved with Buddhism the last few years. It was a beautiful spot for a very beautiful event. Many family members and friends spoke. It was a prayer for a lovely woman and colleague. Everyone was there - Hal Buell, Vin Alabiso, Santiago Lyon, Claude Erbsen and others. Madge's brother and the whole Kelly Clan were so upbeat and charming. Chris held us all together. Her family and the AP family will always remember her. The voice of the NY photo desk. We all said rest in peace."

Michael Feldman (left) shares story of Madge as her husband Chris looks on. 

Kathy Willens (Email) shared that among the many who turned out to memorialize Madge were former AP photo director Vin Alabiso, retired International photo editor Michael Feldman, former AP NewsFeatures editor Claudia Counts, who remained a good friend of Madge's, and photographer Amy Sancetta who came from Ohio for the occasion. Chuck Zoeller displayed a slide show that interspersed personal photographs of Madge along with many of Madge working at AP headquarters and on assignments, including the Beijing Olympics. One memorable image showed Madge among an all-female crew working at the New York headquarters photo desk in the 1980's, a rarity at the time. The closing image, taken by friend and former colleague Claudia Counts, showed Madge standing in a chalk-drawn circle on the sidewalk that read, "Happiness Here." Speakers included Madge's nieces and nephews, as well as the young brother of a four-year-old cancer patient who read a tribute to "Miss Madge," acknowledging Madge's hospital visits to see the girl. A common thread related to Madge's compassion and her unique ability to give advice and support to family, friends, and co-workers without passing judgment. Other speakers recalled Madge's colorful and salty language and her ability to lighten the mood in a roomful of colleagues. It was clear how many lives she had touched in her too-brief life.

Santiago Lyon (Email), director of AP Photos, shared the program with his Connecting colleagues and said that all aspects of Madge's life were touched upon by the speakers and others in the audience, "perhaps above all her love for Chris. Chris, while obviously devastated to lose her, was for the most part composed and very often hilarious as he regaled us with stories of his life with her.

"It was a heartfelt tribute to someone who touched so many hearts."

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When did 'lead' become 'lede'

Connecting colleague Joseph Benham (Email) asks:

I'm curious as to when "lede" replaced "lead" when identifying the first graf (is that word still in use?) of a new story. Many thanks."

From AP standards editor Tom Kent:

"No idea. People were writing "lede" when I joined the AP. It struck me as one of those self-conscious misspellings, like "fone," that I guess journalists engaged in to break the monotony of always having to spell things right in their stories. Spelling things wrong never really appealed to me, humorlessly enough, so I always write "lead."

And from Corporate Archives director Valerie Komor, who sent this 2011 explanation:

A Sunday morning tweet from NYU's Jay Rosen provoked a conversation about why journalists call the opening of a story a "lede."

Jennifer Connic, a social media producer at NJ.com, tweeted, "I kind of like lede still. I can't describe why, but I do. Maybe it's my newspaper roots." Steve Buttry responded, "I don't think you should spell it 'lede' unless you can remember how molten lead smells. I can, and I don't."

Howard Owens, who apparently has collected hundreds of old journalism books over the years, informed people that "lede" doesn't appear in any of those old texts until the 1980s. (Merriam-Webster says the first usage was in 1976.) The American Heritage Dictionary says the mispelled version - no longer considered misspelled - was "revived in modern journalism to distinguish the word from lead, [a] strip of metal separating lines of type." Considering that journalists didn't begin using the jargonistic spelling until Linotype machines started to disappear from newsrooms in the 1970s and 1980s, Owens wrote on his blog, " 'Lede' is an invention of linotype romanticists, not something used in newsrooms of the linotype era."

He noted on Twitter, "I'm no enemy of romanticism and nostalgia in the news game. I just believe in historical accuracy."

AP's Josh Lederman honored at White House dinner

The Washington Post reports (see this link):

As for the journalism awards, Peter Baker of the New York Times won the Aldo Beckman Award (excellence in White House reporting).

Josh Lederman (right) of the AP won the Merriman Smith Memorial Award (coverage under deadline pressure) for covering the White House fence jumper. On the broadcast side, ABC News's Jim Avila won for the "Cuba/Alan Gross" story.

The Washington Post's Carol Leonnig won the Edgar A. Poe Award (excellence in national and regional news coverage) for her Pulitzer Prize-winning series about lapses in the Secret Service.

The Wall Street Journal's Gary Fields, John R. Emshwiller, Rob Barry and Coulter Jones also won the award for their "America's Rap Sheet" series.

Connecting wishes Happy Birthday

To

Larry McDermott  (Email)

Welcome to Connecting

Morry Gash (Email) - AP Milwaukee photographer

Stories of interest

Winding up, Obama tosses zingers at press, political foes (AP)

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama says he's bringing a new attitude to the final quarter of his presidency: Bucket!

"After the midterm elections, my advisers asked me, 'Mr. President, do you have a bucket list?'" he told those attending the annual dinner of the White House Correspondents' Association. "And I said, well, I have something that rhymes with bucket list ..."

"Take executive action on immigration? Bucket! New climate regulations? Bucket!"

The correspondents' association dinner is the night the president does stand-up comedy to raise money for scholarships for young journalists - and provides tongue-in-cheek payback for those already on the job as well as political opponents. A few of the presidential zingers tossed out Saturday night:

AND

Obama and His Anger Translator Get Candid at the White House Correspondents' Dinner  (Slate)

Saturday's White House Correspondents' Dinner saw Cecily Strong and President Obama crack some very funny jokes, but the latter had a little help: At the end of his set, the president was joined at the podium by his outspoken anger translator, Luther, played by Key & Peele's Keegan-Michael Key.

The result was predictably hilarious, with Obama deploying an admirable deadpan as Key's hysterics occur beside him. The segment's high point? Luther's exclamation that "Khaleesi is coming to Westeros!" when Obama mentions Hillary Clinton.

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NBC News finds Brian Williams embellished at least 11 times  (Washington Post)

A months-long internal investigation of Brian Williams by NBC News has turned up 11 instances in which the anchorman publicly embellished details of his reporting exploits, according to a person familiar with details of the probe.

NBC undertook the examination of Williams' statement after he apologized in early February for saying on "NBC Nightly News" that a military helicopter in which he was traveling at the start of the Iraq War had been damaged by rocket fire. His account was challenged by soldiers who were on the flight, leading to a furor that prompted NBC to suspend Williams for six months without pay and to investigate other statements he's made.

The Iraq claim was one of the 11 suspect statements that a team of NBC News journalists has identified during the inquiry, said the individual, who asked not to be identified because he isn't authorized to talk about an internal matter.

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An 'Exclusive' Arrangement on a Clinton Book, and Many Questions  (New York Times)  (Shared by Sibby Christensen)

A sentence in an article this week about a new book critical of the Clinton Foundation stopped a lot of Times readers cold.

After the story noted that Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign staff has become adept at "swatting down critical books as conservative propaganda," it said of the book, which is due out next month:

But "Clinton Cash" is potentially more unsettling, both because of its focused reporting and because major news organizations including The Times, The Washington Post and Fox News have exclusive agreements with the author to pursue the story lines found in the book.

More than 70 readers have written to me about the article, written by Amy Chozick, who has been covering Mrs. Clinton for many months. The Times article has also prompted commentary in publications from Salon to National Journal and plenty of negative notice on Twitter. Tom Watson was one of those who objected to the background and reputation of the book's author, Peter Schweizer.

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Leonard Pitts Jr.: It's a fact: Some people hate the facts  (Miami Herald)

"Obama is a Muslim," it said. "That is a FACT."

As best I can recall - my computer ate the email - that was how the key line went in a reader missive that had me doing a double take last week. It was not the outlandish assertion that struck me but, rather, the emphatic claim of its veracity. We're talking Shift-Lock and all-caps so there would be no mistaking: "Obama is a Muslim. That is a FACT."

Actually, it is not a fact, but let that slide. We're not here to renew the tired debate over Barack Obama's religion. No, we're only here to lament that so many of us seem to know "facts" that aren't and that one party - guess which - has cynically nurtured, used and manipulated this ignorance for political gain.

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30+ Crazy Photographers Who Will Do ANYTHING For The Perfect Shot (boredpanda)

Getting the angle and perspective for a photo just right can sometimes be very tricky, but these crazy photographers don't mind - when it comes to taking the perfect shot, they will do whatever it takes.

The acts of devotion to their craft that some of the world's best photographers perform can be truly outstanding. Wildlife photographers have spent weeks camped out in the wild, allowing animals to get accustomed to their presence so that they can get the rare or intimate glimpses at their lives that others only dream of.

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Is the White House press corps becoming obsolete?  (Politico Magazine)

Beyond the red carpet and cocktail tents, the White House press corps that will gather for its celebrity-filled annual dinner Saturday is an institution in crisis.

Over the last six years, a confluence of forces have eroded the foundation of the relationship between the White House and the reporters who cover it most regularly.

Financial pressures have reduced the number of news organizations committed to daily coverage of the White House and to participating in its cycle of pools, briefings and trips on Air Force One. And technologies including Twitter, YouTube and livestreaming of events mean the White House can communicate directly with the public without going through the traditional media that still dominates the Brady Briefing Room.

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Despite downturn, journalists still prefer to not use press releases (Poynter)

As American newsrooms have shrunk, reporters are increasingly shills for the dubious declarations of public officials.

Or, ah, is it all rather more complicated?

Research by a Georgia Southern University political scientist is suggesting that despite obvious trends in newsroom resources, there's not necessarily any sharp hike in reporters being mere putty in the hands of politicians.

Michael Romano outlined a study of 10,000 congressional press releases to a small group at a large international academic gathering in Chicago last week. This constitutes the first real public disclosure of his paper, "Ventriloquism or an Echo Chamber? Measuring the Strength of House Members' Rhetoric in Local Newspapers."

He concludes that journalists come off far more as autonomous agents with their own standards than "ventriloquist dummies" blindly running with politicians' claims.

The Final Word

21 undeniable signs that you drew up in a small town

Click here for link to the story.

Today in History - April 27, 2015

By The Associated Press

Thought for Today: "The newest computer can merely compound, at speed, the oldest problem in the relations between human beings, and in the end the communicator will be confronted with the old problem, of what to say and how to say it." - Edward R. Murrow (1908-1965).