When Jean Ronald Saint Preux started live-streaming on Facebook, the police had already smashed his driver seat window. On a clear day, May 20th, in the parking lot of the town hall of Albany, a … Read more
Nieman curator Howard Simons used to tease our class of ’77 about the number of members who abandoned journalism. Mel Goo became a lawyer; Dolly Katz, an epidemiologist. Al Larkin stayed at The Boston Globe, but switched to the business … Read more
The reporters were used to getting stonewalled by the administration, but now the protesters demanding change were also shutting them out. One news organization, determined to tell the protesters’ stories, struck a deal: reporters would not identify the protesters or … Read more
Shooting a glance at the uncanny paraphernalia on my desk feels like watching a “Breaking Bad” teaser: A fist-sized rock near my monitor, a half-burnt tear gas canister on the rock, holding a pen, and a handwritten letter from a … Read more
I began writing this piece with trepidation, wondering if it would be fair to compare the president of the United States of America to a president in SyFy’s cult classic made-for-TV movie franchise “Sharknado.” Serious-sober journalistic … Read more
On July 19, Black Lives Matter Toronto activists held a press conference about the release of three demonstrators from police custody in connection with pink paint that had been thrown on three statues — including one … Read more
When a Twitter user named @Guccifer_2 direct messaged reporter Sheera Frenkel in June 2016, offering hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee, she demonstrated an instinct that will be crucial for journalists covering the election this fall. “Can you explain … Read more
Some years ago, I was turning in my invoice for payment to NPR at the end of a month. I haven’t been a full-time employee at NPR, where I spent 20+ years as a producer and live-show director, since 2008. Read more
Today, nearly every African country holds multiparty elections of some kind, but – as in the case worldwide – relatively few fully respect political rights and civil liberties. This situation was already worrying before the pandemic. In 2019, advocacy group Freedom … Read more
Goenawan Mohamad, the Indonesian journalist and poet, had considerable impact on the members of my Nieman class. His parents had suffered exile to an internment camp; his father was later executed for political activism. Tempo, the magazine he founded, … Read more
