May 23, 2022

■ 'The Air Force has rescinded its policy that led to the seizure of an accredited Pentagon journalist's cell phone on board a flight with the Deputy SecDef. A spokesman for the AF called it "unintended" and reached out to the reporter to apologize.' (Oren Liebermann) / Pentagon seizes foreign reporter's phone during official travel (POLITICO) / ’Yesterday on an official trip with Deputy U.S. Defense Secretary Hicks, my phone was confiscated by a DoD official, locked up and I was stopped from using electronics because of a new policy that bars non-US reporters from using devices on govt planes. … Since the incident yesterday morning and to their credit, the Pentagon has apologized and said my phone will not be taken from again and the new U.S. Air Force policy is being reviewed.’ (Idrees Ali)  

■ Pakistan courts bar police from arresting several TV anchors (AP/ABC News)

■ Lara Logan, once a star at CBS News, is now one for the far right (New York Times)

■ Why Insider's global editor-in-chief decided to publish the sexual harassment allegation against Elon Musk (CNN) 

■ Mea culpa: The print edition of USA Today is still very much alive (Poynter)   

■ Local news most trusted in keeping Americans informed about their communities (Knight Foundation) / ICYMI: News organizations need to relearn how to cover car collisions (Slate)

■ At 25, SuChin Pak became MTV's first Asian American news correspondent—here's her best career advice (CNBC) 

■ Journalist Bob Woodward tells BU grads: Mistakes are life's best guide (BU)

■ The Post Pub is reborn, with touches aimed to class up the joint (Washington Post) / Stamp for Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham to be issued June 14 (Linn’s Stamp News) 

■ Massive grizzly bear takes a seat right next to wildlife photographer in Alaska (Whiskey Riff)

“How you write your pitch should demonstrate how you will tell the final story. Show the editor that you can write a compelling pitch, demonstrate your reporting or writing style, and that you have access to great characters. It’s an advert for your future story and more likely to get the editor’s support, especially if you need budget or expenses.”

-- Freelance Journalism Assembly, “A handbook for pitching development stories”

New York Times writer and author Elizabeth Williamson is among journalists confronting the rampant rise and spread of conspiracy theories through her reporting and research. Her current work has focused around unraveling the targeted misinformation and lies spread after the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting in Newtown, Conn., the surviving families’ lawsuits against Infowars conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, and the election disinformation fueling the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol attack. 

In this instructional program with the National Press Club Journalism Institute, Williamson will share her reporting and research process, along with insights she gained as she connected the dots on how conspiracy theories grow. Williamson, whose critically-acclaimed book “Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth” published this spring, will describe how she threaded together more than 400 interviews, 10,000 pages of court testimony and other records, and on-the-ground reporting to trace a line from conspiracy theories around Sandy Hook to Jan. 6, 2021. 

Registration is open for this program, which will take place on Friday, June 10 from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. ET.