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Stories of interest
Journalists tackle a political what-if: What might a second Trump presidency look like? (AP)
By DAVID BAUDER
NEW YORK (AP) — Even before anyone has cast a vote in a 2024 presidential primary, the attention of many political journalists has shifted to Jan. 20, 2025.
There has been a flurry of recent stories about the implications of a potential second presidency for Donald Trump, and his team’s planning for Inauguration Day and beyond. Polls show his continued dominance over Republican rivals and the likelihood of a close general election.
The New York Times reporting team of Charlie Savage, Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman has been mining that topic since the summer, and last week wrote in depth about the former president’s authoritarian impulses, and the possibility of fewer checks on his power. On Sunday, they examined whether Trump would leave NATO.
A special issue of The Atlantic magazine released last week collected essays by 24 writers on how a Trump presidency would affect things like foreign policy, immigration, journalism and climate change. Editor Jeffrey Goldberg wrote that people should read every one, “though perhaps not in one sitting, for reasons of mental hygiene.”
Read more here. Shared by Adolphe Bernotas.
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Former Fox host Tucker Carlson is launching his own streaming network with interviews and commentary (AP)
By DAVID BAUDER
NEW YORK (AP) — Ousted Fox News host Tucker Carlson is starting his own streaming service, promising to “tell the unadorned truth” to fans for $72 a year, he announced Monday.
Commentary, interviews, Carlson-flavored news reports and documentaries, even an advice show will be offered on the Tucker Carlson Network, which is essentially staffed by the people who used to work for him at Fox.
The new venture comes more than seven months after Fox abruptly fired Carlson, its most popular host. Fox never publicly explained the firing, and Carlson said on Monday that “it really is one of those mysteries that I’ll probably never get to the bottom of.”
Read more here.
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Opinion: The shoddy reporting on civilian deaths in Gaza
By DAN PERRY
Because journalism is muchly about clickbait these days, there has been some unserious reporting around the serious issue of the civilian casualties caused by Israel’s operation to uproot the Hamas militia from power in Gaza.
Every civilian death is a tragedy (of course!) – yet people do understand that some wars are just and that even such wars will cause some civilian deaths. That goes double for conflicts provoked by fanatical and nihilistic terrorists using human shields and operating from apartment buildings, schools, mosques and hospitals.
I’ve taken the position that after the Oct. 7 Hamas invasion of Israel, which according to eyewitness and evidence included gang rapes and torture and burning alive entire families and led to 1,200 Israeli deaths, the group must be crushed. It’s not an especially original, strange or rare position, but it has attracted the ire of some friends around the region – who see nothing but the resultant civilian casualties in Gaza.
At the same time, I have been appearing on American and Israeli TV urging everyone to show restraint and to distinguish between the 2 million people of Gaza and the terrorist criminals who in 2007 expelled the Palestinian Authority from the seaside strip and took its population hostage. Moreover, I have repeatedly urged Israel to minimize civilian casualties and to better explain actions that caused lives to be lost (most recently today, below). Earlier I argued that Israel should exhaust every option before an invasion of the strip. All that earned ire as well.
Read more here.
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Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins. A one-on-one with the SPJ’s new president. (Editor and Publisher)
Episode 215 of "E&P Reports" - A Vodcast series hosted by Mike Blinder
Recent reports concerning the future of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) have stated, with one September post from NiemanLab saying that both membership and revenues are so low that the organization is set to "end the year $391,000 in the red," according to an audit prepared by an external accountant and dated August 2023. The same article by Sarah Scire featured the sub-head, "If we don’t change our thinking, the next incoming president will be the last president.”
That new president was sworn in at the October 1, 2023, annual convention in Las Vegas. She is an Emmy Award-winning journalist, journalism professor and associate dean for the Center for Media Design at the Santa Monica College, Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins.
Hopkins also made history on that date as the first black woman ever to be elected to that post.
Hopkins feels confident that the financial issues reported are not insurmountable, stating during this interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, "I can firmly and unequivocally say that I will not be the last president of the SPJ. All of the journalism organizations across the country are facing financial situations. We have the benefit of having a foundation that was created to be in support of the society. That foundation has $12 million in the bank." She continued, "We are on our way to 'righting the ship,' and I can firmly say that will happen before the end of my term."
Read more here.
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A 3-Year Odyssey in Pursuit of a Mountain Mystery in Argentina (New York Times)
By John Branch
Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.
I got a message in 2020 from a photographer and climber in Argentina named Pablo Betancourt. He had read something I had written years earlier and had discovered something that he thought might make for a good story.
A camera had emerged from the receding ice near the top of Aconcagua, the highest mountain outside of Asia. It still had film in it, with at least 24 frames exposed. And it had a name on it: Janet Johnson. She was part of an American expedition in 1973 and died near the summit under mysterious circumstances.
Interested?
The answer, quickly, was yes.
And so began an international reporting odyssey delayed by Covid and featuring a team of colleagues. The result is Ghosts on the Glacier, a story published online this weekend.
Most Americans have not heard of Janet Johnson, or John Cooper, a NASA engineer who also died on the expedition. In the United States in the 1970s, there were a few (often inaccurate) news accounts, but the deaths were considered accidents and forgotten.
Read more here. Shared by Betty Pizac.
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