A package in hand, the young woman makes her way into The Washington Post newsroom. She wanders a bit, looks around uncertainly, then fixes her attention on a man who is among the many staffers who are banging away at their typewriters. “Are you someone important?” she asks, interrupting him in the midst of his […]
Category Archives: News Industry
In October 2012, On the heels of their first–and last–Vice Presidential debate, I typed “Joe Biden” and “Paul Ryan” into Google. After each name, Google offered up three words to pair with each individual politician who was on his respective party’s ticket in the U.S. Presidential race. See if you can guess which one had […]
When our heroes meet, and even exceed, our naively high expectations, it’s a wonderful thing. In November 1985, as a high school senior in suburban Boston, I had been reading Frank Deford‘s fabulous work at Sports Illustrated for seven years already. No doubt, it played a role in steering me into a journalism career, which […]
Only days away from retiring after a 67-year broadcasting career with the Brooklyn and Los Angeles Dodgers, Vin Scully has possessed many qualities that have made him one of the most respected and admired announcers in Major League Baseball history. Among those traits has been his ability to let history unfold without foisting commentary on […]
More than 30 years ago, as a young journalist enrolled in a summer journalism program, the one-liner from a veteran journalism pro prompted chuckles and laughter from me and my 90-plus high school cohorts: “If your mother tells you she loves you…check it out!” The point being: don’t take anything at face value. Question. Dig. […]
Earlier tonight, I was among the thousands of people who journeyed to the UIC Pavilion for the Donald Trump rally. Clearly, the event meant different things to different people: rally, speech, protest, performance art, commercial enterprise. And all of those activities—and then some—transpired. Only Trump didn’t take part in any of it, as security concerns […]
In my years as a journalist, I filed hundreds of requests to taxing bodies through the Illinois Freedom of Information Act. Over time, it became clear that some entities wielded FOIA as a mechanism for suppressing information—they would drag their heels before coming up with a highly questionable basis for limiting information they provided or […]
Working with my middle school-aged children on their homework, I am reminded of the need to use synonyms in order to spice up communication. Do we go with “provided” or “offered”? How about “reflects” or “illustrates”? These variations in word choice are benign, designed to break up monotony. But not all alternative word choices are so […]
In 1986, Northwestern University’s football squad, on the strength of winning two nail-biters at the end of the season against Michigan State & Illinois, attained four victories for the first time since 1973. Those details are so ingrained in my memory because I was a freshman at NU and my work-study job in the Sports […]