Being an investigative reporter used to be a lonely job. You rarely talk about your story to colleagues in your newsroom, let alone a journalist from another publication. You guard your story like a bear protecting its cub. But all … Read more
I met Kate Geiger when I was doing a piece for NPR in 2013 about a former GM assembly plant Dayton. She’s worked there most of her career, and when she talked about the last days … Read more
The media, along with former FBI Director James Comey, helped Donald Trump become president. Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com has detailed why. But it doesn’t take a mathematician to understand that critical reporting in the final days … Read more
Should advertisers spend more money at local newspapers? The question was up for debate this week after Jim Rutenberg, media columnist for The New York Times, published “Ad Buyers Have Say In Survival Of News,” on Monday. Read more
I first read the lie under a competitor’s byline: the results of DNA testing on a rape case I was covering. My reporting partner and I didn’t know it was false but believed we’d been beaten on a story. We … Read more
A longtime political consultant, David Axelrod has managed upwards of 150 local, state, and national campaigns—including Barack Obama’s 2008 and 2012 presidential runs, with a stint as the president’s senior advisor in between. But before he got his start in … Read more
Yesterday, New York Times media columnist Jim Rutenberg argued that America’s advertisers have a civic obligation to save the news. Not only is he wrong, but he’s giving a free pass to news executives to keep their … Read more
On October 11, 2011, Florida Highway Patrol trooper Donna Jane Watts clocked a car driving down the Florida turnpike at 120 miles per hour, well over the zone’s 70 mph speed limit. She tried to pull the car over, and … Read more
I am known by many people as many things, but above all I am a father, a husband, a son, a brother, and by all means, a hard-working, middle-class American. My educational background in political science and mass communications led … Read more
Most editors get lots of feedback from readers—through calls, emails, or comments in social media. For the past two years, though, The [Springfield, Illinois] State Journal-Register has had a special group of readers who are specifically … Read more