Just When You Thought It Was Safe to Go Back in the Classroom

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"I'm a white lady. I'm an easy target."

Melissa Click

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Foolishly, I suppose, I thought that, when I wrote in February about Melissa Click's dismissal from her job as a journalism professor at the University of Missouri, I would never type her name again.

Sadly, that is not the case. I guess I should have known better, given my years of newspaper work. There are certain people who never go away, no matter how much you may wish they would.

And Ms. Click is one of them. She has surfaced again — to blame her dismissal on "racial politics" in a profile published in the Chronicle of Higher Education last weekend.

To read the article online, you have to be a subscriber, and I am not a subscriber, but I have heard enough about the article's contents from those who are subscribers to know that what I have heard about it is true.

Click contends that she was a victim of racial politics. She says she was fired because she is "an easy target."

"I'm a white lady," she said.

Clearly, she is white. Whether she is a lady is a matter of personal opinion. (Before you reach any conclusions on that, be sure you watch her video from last fall. I posted it with my article in February.)

I know it is fashionable these days to blame one's failures on alleged prejudice. Sometimes it's bewildering — like when one claims to be a member of another race or to be of another gender than one really is and blames a personal failure on prejudice against that race or gender.

But Click is not disputing her race or her gender, just using them as the scapegoats for her dismissal. In my mind, that is worse.

I am a journalist who has taught journalism on the college level, and, as I wrote in February, I was glad the University of Missouri dismissed her. I did not think she was an advocate of freedom of the press or freedom of speech, and I believe that people who teach journalism classes should be effective role models in their defense of both.

In calling for "some muscle" in a blatant effort to prevent a student journalist from covering a news event on a public campus, Click clearly demonstrated that she only believes in freedom of the press and freedom of speech when they are to her benefit.

But freedom of speech and freedom of the press exist to benefit everyone.

And any journalism professor who doesn't understand that has no business being a journalism professor.

Race and gender have absolutely nothing to do with it.

Teaching By Example

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I've been wanting to write about Melissa Click, the now former professor at the University of Missouri, for some time now.

I just haven't really known what to say.

That is what this is all about, you see. Freedom of speech. That is really what we as journalists — and I still count myself as a journalist even though I am no longer working in the field — are meant to defend in this country. Among other things. We are expected to be and to do many things in America, although, sadly, many of today's professional journalists have lost sight of their responsibility.

In my mind, freedom of speech and freedom of the press go hand in hand. I can't remember a time when I did not feel that way, and I can't imagine having one without the other.

The case of Melissa Click is troubling because she is the assistant mass media communications professor who was seen in the memorable video calling for "some muscle" to prevent a student journalist from reporting on a campus protest in November. She was fired this week — and rightfully so.

Click was not a journalism professor per se. But I am sure she worked with journalism students — newspaper, TV, radio, digital — as a professor of mass media communications. I always wanted to attend Mizzou. It was one of the finest journalism schools in the country when I was college age. While I haven't consulted college rankings by department recently, I'm pretty sure it still is.

It is inconceivable to me that a professor of mass media communications would not interact with journalism students at such a school.

In Click's mind, I am reasonably sure that she felt — at that moment — that she was defending freedom of speech. But what did that video tell her journalism students about her commitment to freedom of the press?

I don't know which classes she taught, but I hope she didn't teach one on the Constitution and journalism.

The protest was being held on a public university campus. The press had every right to be there, but Click did not want the press to be there. So she called for "some muscle" to rid her of that pesky press.

I wonder why Richard Nixon never tried that.

I guess the First Amendment is a problem for some people who are in the public eye. But I believe, as I say, that you can't have freedom of speech without freedom of the press and vice versa.

Since the video at the top of this post surfaced, I have been trying to reconcile her actions with that belief.

And I can't.

I wish her well. I'm not vindictive. But I am glad that she is no longer teaching those who seek careers in mass media.

Over the Line

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"I have to admit yesterday when I saw that cartoon — not much ticks me off but making fun of my girls, that'll do it."

Sen. Ted Cruz (R–Texas)

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I have always been an advocate of the First Amendment.

Now, I was brought up to believe in all of the freedoms outlined in the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, but the First Amendment has always been my thing. That is no surprise, I guess, given my background; ordinarily, I will come down on the side of freedom of speech and freedom of the press over just about anything else.

When I was in college, I took what amounted to an exception–free stance. I saw no circumstances in which freedom of the press or freedom of speech could justifiably be abridged. To do so, I felt, was contrary to the concept of true liberty.

As time has passed, though, my positions have modified, and I have come to believe that there are limits. Freedom of speech does not give one the right to yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater — to actively encourage public hysteria. There is the greater good to be considered.

And freedom of the press does not give anyone the right to publish anything. People who are in the public eye are one thing. Most of them chose to be where they are — there are exceptions, of course, but I'm not talking about people who are thrust into the spotlight through no choice of their own. I'm talking about politicians, movie stars, professional athletes. They knew — or should have known — what to expect. But usually their families are off limits.

The Washington Post crossed that line with its cartoon of Ted Cruz and his two young daughters this week.

Now, it is important to remember that there is no law that prevents a publication from running a cartoon on any topic the editor and/or the editorial board desire. There is no legal obligation for any newspaper or magazine or TV program to avoid mentioning a politician's children, but there is a moral one. It is the guideline of good taste and sound judgment, and it is a line that most news outlets, regardless of their editorial leanings, will not cross. This week the Washington Post went over the line.

One can debate, I suppose, Cruz's judgment in using his children in one of his television commercials, but the truth is that he is far from the first politician to do so. In fact, I can't recall a truly serious candidate for the presidency in my lifetime, whether he was his party's nominee or not, who did not use his family in his campaign. And I can't recall a single candidate for a lesser office, from my developmental years in Arkansas through my adult years in Oklahoma and Texas, who didn't bring forth the family during the campaign. Photo ops, TV commercials, rallies, the spouse and kids were everywhere — especially if they were photogenic.

This is the first time in my memory, however, that a candidate's children were attacked editorially for participating in that candidate's campaign advertising.

The editor of the Post tried to wriggle out of it by observing that, because Cruz had used his family in a Christmas–themed political commercial, he could understand why cartoonist Ann Telnaes thought the Post's prohibition on such depictions of a prominent politician's children had been lifted, at least in this case. He admitted failing to review the cartoon before it was published and said he disagreed with Telnaes' assessment.

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"When a politician uses his children as political props, as Ted Cruz recently did in his Christmas parody video in which his eldest daughter read (with her father's dramatic flourish) a passage of an edited Christmas classic, then I figure they are fair game."

Ann Telnaes
Washington Post cartoonist

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But the damage has been done, and the Post now acknowledges that the episode was a "gift" to the Cruz campaign, which has criticized the media for its double standard in its coverage of Democrats and Republicans. It gives him lots of ammunition to whip up the faithful in the weeks and months ahead. It may give Cruz added momentum heading into the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary.

I can only imagine the outcry if Barack Obama's daughters were portrayed in an editorial cartoon as monkeys.

In Defense of Press Freedom

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I confess that I have mixed emotions about the case of Sharyl Attkisson, formerly an investigative reporter for CBS.

As I have written here many times, I am a First Amendment advocate. Well, actually, I believe in the Constitution — always have — and I am as apt to quote passages from it as other people are to cite quotations from the Bible, but everything comes back to the First Amendment. I don't believe any of the other freedoms we enjoy (and, in many cases, take for granted) would be possible without it.

I have worked for newspapers and a trade magazine, and I can sympathize with Attkisson's apparent frustration. She has said her reputation within CBS was that she was a "troublemaker" for pursuing leads on stories that were at odds with the White House's policies/stated positions.

I'm sure that much, if not all, of what she says is true. When she submitted the results of her investigations to the decision–makers in CBS' news division, she probably did receive many compliments for her work, which has always been solid, and she probably was told, from time to time, that there wasn't sufficient time to run it in its entirety.

At that point, I suppose, the editing process in broadcasting may well have subjected her work to, as she has put it, "the death of a thousand cuts." That's the kind of thing that can easily happen when one is trying to put together a page in a newspaper and space is limited — and the article is reviewed by several sets of eyes. Cuts are made, words are changed. Things happen. It isn't a conspiracy.

I am sure it was frustrating. I have seen people on the print side — I have even been one of them myself — who put a lot of time and effort into their work, only to have it diced up before it ended up on a page.

I'm sure the same thing happens in broadcasting.

In my own experience, I can say that it is beyond frustrating to have your work shredded in such a way, and, when it is, you find yourself open to any and all suggestions for why it happened. If, as is the case with Attkisson, your politics differ from your employer's, you may wonder if that explains what happened.

Fact is, things happen. As hard as it may be to accept, it probably wasn't intentional. It's too easy — and unfair — to blame the media. But, even if it is true, it is probably going to be too hard to prove. That's how our system is set up. The burden of proof is on the accuser, not the accused.

That's in the Constitution.

The accusations of media bias by both sides have never been as shrill in my lifetime as they are today. There have been times in my life when I worked for employers who did not share my views, and it did cross my mind, when something I wrote was severely cut, that politics may have had something to do with it.

(I occupied a much lower rung on the journalist's ladder than Attkisson, though.)

But the media cannot be as conveniently labeled as paranoid extremists on both sides would like the rest of us believe. The media in this country are not as monolithic as that. Not even close. Journalists really are like any other demographic group; they do not have the same mind, and they do not think the same things — but many do share the same motivations.

I hear conservatives accusing the media of being liberal, and I hear liberals accusing the media of being conservative — both are correct, and neither is correct. Political leanings certainly play a role in the running of media outlets. It would be naive to presume that they do not. But politics is not the whole story.

The media operate the way everything else does in a free–market society. Individual decisions are made. Some are good. Some are bad. Individual decisions on the upper level have an impact on everyone below.

Profit margins have a lot to do with those decisions. In my work for newspapers, I was always aware of the importance of circulation and advertising revenue. Given a choice between their principles and their financial security, my guess is that most journalists will opt for security — even if that means they must stand up for their principles in less overt ways.

But I was also aware of the fact that journalists are eager to cultivate favor from their sources — and that can make things complicated if the reporter doesn't maintain a certain distance from the source.

Those ratings and profits rely on access to the influential and the powerful. It has been alleged as long as I can remember that there have been reporters — at the White House, on Capitol Hill, etc. — who become a bit too chummy with their sources.

And, when I hear Attkisson speak of the chilling effect that experiences like hers can have on this profession, it strikes a nerve with me. I worry about the same thing.

How does all this relate to the Attkisson situation? I don't know. I just know that profit is always a factor in a business decision, and news outlets may be particularly vulnerable; when times have been hard, newspapers traditionally are among the first to feel the influence of a bad economy and among the last to recover from one. In my own experience, when newspapers have had to make tough decisions under such circumstances, it is easy for the workers to misinterpret things that are said and/or done. Human nature, I suppose.

(I have never worked for a broadcasting outlet, but I assume that profit would be defined, in part, by ratings.)

Attkisson was with CBS for more than two decades. There have been some rocky economic years in there — as well as some boom times — but CBS never fired her. The quality of her work was not an issue.

Given that, I guess, if I had been in Attkisson's position, I might be inclined to think what she apparently thinks.

The press is free, like any other business in America. The owners of a particular newspaper or TV station may have a certain set of principles that differs from their employees, just like owners and employees in other fields can and certainly do disagree.

And Atkisson is free to take her stand, which she does at her website. If you go there, you will find this, her statement of principle, I guess: "Resisting undue corporate, political and other special interests."

Because of the nature of this business, it may be easier to suspect that politics is behind certain decisions — but suspicion is not the same as proof of guilt, in a courtroom or a newsroom.

In fairness to Attkisson, she has not accused CBS of anything resembling a conspiracy. She has merely suggested that there was a pattern in the decisions that were made and the actions that were taken. But that cannot be accepted as proof.

A person cannot be found guilty of something because of a guess or a hunch. That's in the Constitution, too.

Freedom of the press can be a complicated, sometimes fragile, thing, but its preservation is essential in the existence of a republic.

The Golden Anniversary of Times v. Sullivan

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When I was studying journalism in college, my professors all spoke of the landmark Supreme Court decision in the New York Times v. Sullivan case, and they did in reverent terms. Rightfully so.

Most of us students knew nothing about it — it had all happened before our time — but, within the context of my own experiences since college, I appreciate it more with each passing year. It reaffirms my faith in the First Amendment.

They told us that perhaps no other Supreme Court decision — certainly no modern–era decision — has been more important to the constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech and the press than the one in the Times v. Sullivan case, and they were right.

(Richard Labunski, for one, asserts without hesitation in the Providence (R.I.) Journal that it is the "most important First Amendment case in the nation's history." I'm inclined to agree.)

I teach journalism in the community college system here, and Sunday's 50th anniversary of the Times v. Sullivan decision makes me wish I could teach a class in communications law. I'm not a lawyer, though, which I suppose would prevent me from teaching such a class, but I think I understand that case well enough that I could discuss it with my students. I'm sure it would be a lively conversation.

Maybe it is enough to know that it is possible for me to tell my students so many other things because of the freedoms that decision affirmed and strengthened.

It probably would be helpful to give a little background information.

Nearly four years earlier, in 1960, the New York Times ran a full–page advertisement that had the appearance of an article but was actually an attempt to raise money for Martin Luther King Jr.'s legal defense against perjury charges in Alabama. In modern lingo, I suppose you would call it an advertorial.

At issue wasn't deception but inaccuracy and defamation. The article in the advertisement described actions that had been taken against civil rights activists in Alabama. Some of the descriptions were accurate, some were not — and some involved the police in Montgomery, Ala.

The article in the advertisement incorrectly reported that Alabama's state police had arrested King seven times; in fact, he had been arrested four times. Montgomery's public safety commissioner, L.B. Sullivan, considered the advertisement defamatory (to him because he supervised the police even though he was not mentioned by name) and demanded a retraction (which was a condition, under state law, for a public official to pursue punitive damages; he could do so if no retraction was forthcoming).

The Times refused, and Sullivan filed suit against the Times and four black ministers who were mentioned in the advertisement.

At this point, there were hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of libel actions pending against news outlets covering the civil rights movement in the South, which had kind of a paralyzing effect on many members of the press. The fear of legal action prevented many news organizations from being more aggressive in their coverage of civil rights in the South.

Half a million dollars was awarded to Sullivan by a Montgomery jury, and the Times appealed the decision. The appeal made its way to the Supreme Court, which overturned the decision by a 9–0 vote and, in the process, established the standard of actual malice.

The Alabama law was ruled to be unconstitutional because it had no provisions protecting freedom of speech and freedom of the press, which are required by the First and 14th Amendments. The Court also held that, even if such provisions had been made, the evidence did not support the judgment against the Times.

The Court's ruling imposed a new burden on public officials who are plaintiffs in a libel suit — actual malice. There must be proof that the defendant knowingly published false information or acted with "reckless disregard for the truth."

As Justice Hugo Black wrote, it is hard to prove or disprove malice. Well, it might be easier to prove today, what with the digital paper trail that is left through emails, text messages and the like. I don't know. Undoubtedly, that part of the law will be shaped and refined in the years ahead.

That's how it has worked in the last 50 years. Subsequent decisions and Supreme Court appeals have addressed elements of libel law and actual malice. For example, while the original Supreme Court ruling applied only to public officials, it has been extended to include public figures as well.

And it has had implications that went beyond the working press to include commentary, criticism, even satire as well as the definitions of concepts such as privacy, indecency and obscenity.

For advocates of the First Amendment (which should mean all Americans), the real hero in the decision was Justice William Brennan, who wrote about the critical role a free press plays in keeping the public informed and encouraging open debate. Even "caustic debate" is vital in a democracy, Brennan said.

Inevitably, Brennan observed, inaccurate statements will be made, and incomplete reports will be published in a dynamic democracy. Public debate must be "uninhibited, robust and wide open," and it "may well include vehement, caustic and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials." Consequently, "breathing space" must be permitted.

The Supreme Court didn't have to hear the case. It always has the option of refusing to hear a case. But the Justices saw the First and 14th Amendment implications in the case, and the ruling that was issued half a century ago safeguards the "unfettered interchange of ideas" that continues to be defined.

The State of Press Freedom in America

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I'm a writer.

It is fashionable these days to say that one is predisposed to be something — that such a person was born a certain way. Usually, that applies to one's sexuality; in my case, I think it means I was born to be a writer. It is what I do. It isn't something I can change.

That has meant different things at different times, I guess, but most of the time in my life it has involved journalism. Journalism was my major in college. I worked for newspapers. I have taught news writing and news editing, and currently I advise journalism students producing a college newspaper.

Perhaps that makes me overly sensitive to issues involving press freedom. I've always believed that a press that is free to report the news is the pillar of a democracy. Without a free press, nothing else means anything.

I am a strong believer in the Bill of Rights, but I am especially partial, I guess, to the First Amendment. I always believed it set the United States apart from the other countries in the world. Maybe I believed it meant the press would have more freedom here than anywhere else.

If that is what I believed — and I'm not really sure if I did or did not, to be candid — Reporters Without Borders disabuses me of that notion in its World Press Freedom Index 2014. In it, the United States is ranked 46th in the world in press freedom.

Maybe that doesn't seem so bad to you, but look at it this way. The United States ranked 32nd in press freedom a year ago. That's a decline of nearly 44%.

I don't think that is an encouraging trend — especially since places like South Africa, El Salvador, Romania, Papua New Guinea, Trinidad and Tobago, Botswana, Samoa, France, Latvia, Spain, Slovenia and Lithuania all pulled ahead of the United States in a single year.

Samoa was 16 places behind the U.S. last year; it is now six spots ahead. That is probably the most dramatic change, but the other shifts were dramatic, too. Trinidad and Tobago trailed the United States by 12 spots, now ahead by three. Papua New Guinea was nine spots behind the U.S. and now leads by two. Spain was behind by four spots, now leads by 11. Slovenia trailed the U.S. by three spots last year but now leads by 12. Lithuania trailed by a single spot and now leads by 14.

How is this possible?

I'm inclined to think the NSA surveillance scandal has had a lot to do with it. I also think the Justice Department's uncalled–for seizure of Associated Press phone records is to blame as well.

These were not "phony scandals," as the president blithely dismissed them. These were blatant assaults on freedom of the press in this country — and they should concern anyone who values freedom.

Defending Freedom of the Press

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Gary Pruitt, the CEO of the Associated Press, ended his silence on the seizure of AP reporters' records by the Department of Justice Sunday.

It was about time. I was wondering if anyone at AP would step up to the plate and take a stand for freedom of the press. (While I was waiting, I was wondering if my faith in the Associated Press that was encouraged by everyone from my college journalism professors to my editors on the job had been misplaced.)

During an interview on CBS' Face the Nation, Pruitt said the move was "unconstitutional."

He'll get no argument from me on that.

And that comes from the CEO of a news organization that is perceived as friendly to the Obama administration — for which the Department of Justice works and from which the DoJ takes its marching orders. Can you imagine, I have asked people, the kind of treatment news organizations that are not perceived as friendly to the Obama administration can expect?

Actually, we don't have to wait for an answer to that question. Even before Pruitt made his remarks on Face the Nation, the Washington Post was reporting on Justice's surveillance of Fox News' James Rosen during a 2010 probe of suspected State Department leaks on North Korea.

It is no surprise to me that Garance Franke–Ruta wonders, in The Atlantic: Who else has been put under Justice's microscope?

That doesn't seem to me to be the question here. AP and Fox News occupy opposite ends of the political spectrum, wouldn't you say? Consequently, doesn't it stand to reason that, if both have been subjected to this kind of scrutiny, anyone and everyone else could have been — or could still be — probed as well?

My question is more basic than that: Does freedom of the press still exist in this country?

When I was growing up, I felt confident in the answer to that question. It was such a preposterous question, though, that I never seriously pondered it. I took it for granted that America would always have a free press — even in the Nixon years, when the existence of an enemies' list became public knowledge, and the list included prominent names in the media.

But now, I'm not so sure. Intimidation of whistle blowers can have a chilling effect on sources, and the clear willingness of the administration to use Justice and the IRS as political weapons has the potential to make freedom of the press a thing of the past.

Without freedom of the press, there can be no freedom.

That is why it is so important for people like Pruitt to hold the administration accountable such abuses of power.

Those Second-Term Blues

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About 7½ months ago, following Mitt Romney's decisive victory over Barack Obama in their first presidential debate, I observed that what Americans saw on their TV screens was completely at odds with the narrative they had been spoon fed by the Obama administration.

"And, in my experience," I wrote, "when people conclude that they have been deceived about one thing, they become suspicious of other things that are said by that person or whoever is authorized to speak on that person's behalf."

I still believe that even though the truth of it wasn't immediately apparent — because, also in my experience, it can take awhile for these things to sink in.

Obama went on to win the election, but I believe the seeds of distrust were planted in some voters' minds that night. I think that goes a long way toward explaining why Obama was the first president in nearly a century to win a second term by smaller popular and electoral vote margins than he received the first time.

(Note: I'm not saying that was the only reason why Romney lost. He made his share of mistakes, and the Republican Party has some problems that it needs to address with certain demographic groups. But the fact remains that the Obama campaign focused on negative campaigning to the exclusion of emphasizing a vision for the future to an extent that has rarely been seen in presidential politics — and seldom from Democrats.)

It was not a resounding victory for the president. It was a tepid endorsement, much like the one George W. Bush received in 2004. And, like Bush, Obama's residual good will appears to be eroding.

Comparisons to other presidents in recent memory who lost the confidence of the people may still be a bit premature, but I keep coming back to the fact that, in my lifetime, no other recently re–elected president has been hit with three major scandals at once so early in his second term.

All three of the scandals — the failure to even attempt to defend the embassy in Benghazi and the Americans in it; the use of the IRS as a weapon against organizations because of their political leanings; and the thoroughly unjustifiable seizure of reporters' phone records by the Department of Justice — are affronts to this country's commitment to freedom and justice.

Frankly, they all concern me — but, perhaps because I am a journalist, I am most offended by the misuse of the Department of Justice. If there is no freedom of the press, then there is no freedom. Period.

Who knows what else lurks just beneath the surface in this White House?

Second terms, as I have observed here before, are notorious for being disasters, but there is usually more of a honeymoon between the election and the onset of the administration's decline. This administration, however, seems to be intent on setting a record for rapid implosion.

Obama took the oath of office to begin his second term almost four months ago, and he started suffering legislative setbacks almost immediately. He has never articulated an agenda for the second term — he avoided doing so during the campaign — and the scandals that are now overwhelming his presidency all appear to have begun with a narcissistic obsession with himself rather than a desire to further a political ideology.

Certainly, he was never motivated by anything resembling a desire to serve the will of the people. That is something that appears to be dawning on some Americans for the first time.

Even so, it should surprise no one when this presidency collapses like a house of cards.

You're Busted!

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I've been an advocate of freedom of the press all my life.

And let me tell you, it hasn't always been easy. Because if you're going to support something like freedom of the press, by definition you just about have to be opposed to censorship.

But then we get into something of a gray area. You see, even the most ardent supporters of freedom of the press will agree that there are times when censorship is necessary — and, so, certain concessions had to be made.

We've tried to be careful, even grudging at times, about the restrictions we as a society impose on the press — and we expect publications to honor the restrictions we do deem necessary.

Within the sometimes vague framework our lawmakers have created to govern the behavior of the publishing business (which, for the interests of this article, include broadcasting outlets and any other news gathering/writing outfit), I have found myself supporting some groups I never thought I would support — all in the name of protecting freedom of the press and freedom of speech.

I have always believed those freedoms were essential, but they are not absolute. Certain things are not in good taste. Certain disclosures really could jeopardize national security. People's lives can be unnecessarily threatened if you inject chaos into a previously calm situation — for example, standing up and yelling, "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

There tend to be very good reasons behind the restrictions that exist, and most newsgathering organizations make an honest effort to follow them. Most of the time it works out pretty well. Credibility is very important to most newsgatherers. Things may have been different when "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" was made, but I have never worked for a newspaper that did the kinds of irresponsible things portrayed in the attached clip.

So I would applaud Jimmy Stewart — to an extent — for his defensive response. But his character was a public figure, and he would be sure to attract some attention for it.

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Which brings me to today.

I was taking care of some personal business this morning, and, while I was driving around, I heard the end of a radio report about a new publication that currently appears to be available only in Michigan and Oregon, but the goal seems to be to make it available from coast to coast. It is called Busted, a tabloid–style newspaper.

Busted apparently publishes the names and mugshots of people who get arrested for anything and everything.This publication, we are told at its website, is printed weekly and can be found at "convenience store(s), liquor store(s), independent market(s) and gas stations."

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"Each week BUSTED publishes hundreds of Mug Shots of Local People throughout your community who were arrested during the previous week.

"Murder to Misdemeanors, Possession to Prostitution. Each week the Busted Crime Investigation Team scours the files of county courthouses across the country, Searching For the Truth!

"Was your neighbor Driving While Intoxicated, Is there a Registered Sex Offender living around the corner; What about that Rapist you heard about on the news; BUSTED Lets You Know!

"Who tops your communities (sic) Most Wanted list. Have you seen a list of Missing Children lately — BUSTED Keeps You Informed!"

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I don't know how this publication presents these police reports. But I know that, when I was a student and then when I was a reporter and an editor, the usual procedure was to say — if it was even deemed necessary to report that someone had been arrested (and if the person was not well known, the tendency was to say, "Who cares?") — that So–and–so was arrested or charged with an offense.

We never referred to anyone in a way that suggested, directly or indirectly, that he/she was guilty. If the case went to court and the defendant was convicted, then we would use that. But we never presumed that an arrest was the same thing as a conviction.

Yet, that is what it seems to me that this publication does — perhaps not so much by design as by implication.

What happens if the charges are dropped? Or if the person who was arrested contests the charges in court and wins?

If that scenario seems far–fetched to you, I can tell you that I was once selected to serve on a jury in a case in which a middle–aged woman had been charged with driving while intoxicated and entered a plea of not guilty. The prosecution had a video tape of the defendant failing field sobriety tests (although other tests revealed no alcohol in her system), but the charges were dropped midway through the prosecution's presentation when her doctor arrived and verified, in a closed–doors conference involving only the judge and the attorneys, that what she had been telling the officer repeatedly on the night she was arrested was true — that she was driving in an unfamiliar area, that she hadn't been drinking and that she was on a prescription medication.

Why hadn't the woman's doctor been consulted before the case wound up in court? I don't know. No one ever told us. Perhaps the doctor had been consulted, but the medication was fairly new and little was known about it when the woman was arrested — and now, the doctor had the results of recent studies that shed new light on the drug's effects. Perhaps the woman had been specifically instructed to take the drug before or after eating and she had done the opposite. Or maybe she had been told not to operate any kind of vehicle after taking the drug.

No such details were provided to us. We were just told that the charges had been dropped, and we were free to go.

Before her arrest, the woman was not a public figure. As I recall, she worked as a secretary. Somehow, her employers found out about her arrest and she was dismissed. I don't think her initial arrest was publicized in any way, but, if it had been, that might have opened the door for a lawsuit against the police (and the media outlet that reported the arrest) that could have been very costly, in more ways than one.

You see, private citizens are entitled to their privacy. Police departments — and news departments — are staffed by people. And people can and do make mistakes.

It's different with public figures. The mayor of your town was willing to trade the privilege of privacy for the honor of serving the public. A star athlete or a rock musician or a popular actor will know he/she cannot go to a restaurant or a bar without somebody noticing — many somebodies if he/she engages in objectionable behavior of any kind.

And if the mayor or a quarterback or the lead singer for a popular band or the star of a popular movie gets arrested for driving while intoxicated, the news will be on TV, radio, internet and the morning newspaper. Then, if it turns out to be a mistake, those outlets will run retractions.

Juries also are staffed by people, and it is possible for a jury to make a mistake as well. But it seems less likely that 12 people will make the same mistake than it does that a reporter and a couple of editors — or a police officer and a couple of his superiors — will make the same mistake.

In other words, when it comes to matters involving criminal justice, we can usually trust the judgment of juries more than we can trust a policeman or a reporter, either of whom may have an ax to grind. Jurors are summoned to a place they seldom visit to hear the facts of a case involving a person whose name they have never heard. They might make a mistake, but, theoretically, they have no prejudice, no agenda.

If Busted is prepared to run a retraction every time an arrest turns out to be unwarranted — and that could be a lot more frequently than anyone bargained for — the editors had better be prepared to set aside a lot of space for that purpose. That shouldn't be a problem in cyberspace, but what about the printed product?

But is a simple retraction enough? Some people may feel that the damage to their reputation and their privacy was so great that the retraction should take as much space and be as prominently placed as the original report.

It may sound like a good idea to publicize every single arrest — maybe it satisfies some internal need — but not every arrest is justified. Busted does post a disclaimer that says, "Any indication of an arrest is not intended to imply or infer that such individual has been convicted of a crime," in the fine print beneath the mugshots, but will that be sufficient as a CYA? Or will those who feel their good names have been smeared by Busted demand that as much space be devoted to the retraction as was dedicated to the report of the arrest?

And which side will justice's scales favor?

We'll find out when the first test case comes up.

A Matter of Faith

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"I don't see how we can have a separation of church and state in this government if you have to pass a religious test to get in this government. ... [I]f you demand expressions of religious faith from politicians, you are just begging to be lied to. They won't all lie to you, but a lot of them will. And it will be the easiest lie they ever had to tell ..."

Arnold Vinick
The West Wing

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A couple of days ago, I examined the likelihood that Barack Obama will have the opportunity, either this year or next, to nominate the replacement for Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens.

I discussed a number of the issues involved. But there was one angle I didn't explore. Today, Nina Totenberg of NPR did bring it up, and I am glad. Not because it matters to me but because it could influence the debate over Obama's nominee.

The angle Totenberg brought up? "[W]hen Justice Stevens retires, it is entirely possible that there will be no Protestant justices on the Court, for the first time ever."

That might not be an issue. When Stevens retires and Obama announces his choice for a successor, that successor could turn out to be a Baptist or a Methodist or a Presbyterian — or a member of another Protestant denomination.

But what if he nominates a Catholic? Or a Jew? Totenberg points out that three of the people who are frequently mentioned as the leading contenders are Catholic or Jewish.

And can you imagine the reaction if Obama nominates a Muslim?

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"In fact, six of the nine justices on the current court are Roman Catholic. That's half of the 12 Catholics who have ever served on the court. Only seven Jews have ever served, and two of them are there now. Depending on the Stevens replacement, there may be no Protestants left on the court at all in a majority Protestant nation where, for decades and generations, all the justices were Protestant."

Nina Totenberg
NPR

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Given the fact that, as Totenberg observes, "almost nobody has noticed" the impact that Stevens' departure could have on the religious balance on the court, it might not be important to many Americans.

On the other hand, when you consider the issue of child sexual abuse that has plagued the Catholic church, adding a seventh Catholic to the Supreme Court might do more than raise a few eyebrows.

And if another Jew was nominated to the highest court serving a self–identified Christian nation (where less than 2% of the population is Jewish), there might be some backlash in the Christian community.

Personally, I don't think a jurist's religion should be of any more consequence than his/her political party affiliation. It smacks of a litmus test, like inquiring about a potential nominee's views on abortion.

But that's probably a perfect world we're talking about — and God knows this world is far from perfect.

The fact that a nominee has a religious faith — whatever it may be — seems to me to be a good thing. It shows that he/she has given a lot of consideration to issues that affect the human condition, that go well beyond his/her personal circumstances. Even if a nominee is an agnostic or an atheist, that, too, suggests the nominee has thought about things that are bigger than himself/herself and has come to a conclusion with which he/she is comfortable.

Such a demonstration of mental acuity does have meaning for me because it shows that the nominee (or, if confirmed, the justice) is capable of evaluating an issue from many sides and arriving at a fair and reasonable conclusion. That is relevant to all sorts of matters that could come before the Supreme Court — not just cases involving religious freedom.

In my own case, I am a journalist. I believe that freedom of speech and freedom of the press matter, and protecting those freedoms is paramount to me. I believe that all of our freedoms are important, but everything else depends on those freedoms.

Justice Louis Brandeis, the first Jew appointed to the high court, penned perhaps the greatest defense of freedom of speech in the high court's history in his concurrence in the Whitney v. California (1927) case (in which the concept of a "clear and present danger" played a prominent role):

"Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty. To courageous, self–reliant men, with confidence in the power of free and fearless reasoning applied through the processes of popular government, no danger flowing from speech can be deemed clear and present, unless the incidence of the evil apprehended is so imminent that it may befall before there is opportunity for full discussion. If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the processes of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."

I am a Protestant, but I would support whole–heartedly the nomination of anyone — Catholic, Jew, Protestant, whatever — with that kind of agile mind.

It doesn't seem to me that it could be said of a nominee who has simply shown no interest in religion (or, at least, not enough to form an opinion) that he/she has an agile mind — beyond cynically calculating how an expression of religious faith (sincere or not) could help his/her career goals.

And, as Arnold Vinick implied on The West Wing, some potential nominees will say whatever they think their listeners want to hear if they believe it will make it easier to get what they want.

A nominee's religion could be very important to some Americans, though, and for good reason. Supreme Court justices are not subject to the whims of voters so Stevens' successor could very well be on the court for two or three decades.

If a Protestant is not nominated, some Protestants in America might wonder if their interests will be represented in the high court's rulings.

Timing, as they say, is everything, and a lot may depend on whether Stevens decides to leave this year or next year.

Few Republicans in Congress have shown any interest in cooperating with Obama, and it is reasonable to expect that any new Republicans who are elected this fall will be unlikely to extend an olive branch to the administration.

If Stevens retires this year, Obama knows he will have 59 Democrats in the Senate who are likely to support his choice. But, rather than risk a messy confirmation proceeding that could further endanger Senate Democrats (nearly half the Democratic seats on the Senate Judiciary Committee will be on the ballot this year, and two are already believed to be at risk of a Republican takeover), he might choose a safe nominee (which might include picking a Protestant).

If Stevens waits until next year, it's anyone's guess at this point whether Democrats will still be in the majority in the Senate. But Obama will know that the next election will be more than a year away. If he prefers a nominee who breaks boundaries, 2011 may be a better time to do so — although not if his party loses its majority.

Given all the political considerations Obama will have to juggle, one would be justified in wondering whatever happened to the (alleged) separation of church and state.

Or, to quote an exchange from The West Wing, when Vinick asked President Jed Bartlet that question, Bartlet replied, "It's hanging in there, but I'm afraid the Constitution doesn't say anything about the separation of church and politics."

The Legacy of Publick Occurrences

A good friend of mine (his name is Doug) runs a news blog that he calls Publick Occurrences.

Unless you have more than a passing interest in American history, that may not mean much to you. In fact, your initial reaction may be that the word "public" is misspelled. Of course, I tend to be a little obsessive about spelling so maybe I am the only one who noticed.

But the name is taken from the name of the first newspaper in the Americas. The newspaper was called Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick, and it was intended to be published monthly. In fact, it was published in Boston for the first and only time on this date in 1690.

(And, in case you are interested, I believe that "publick" was the preferred spelling in the 17th century. The same is true, I have been told, of the spellings of "forreign" and "domestick.")

Following its debut, the paper was shut down by the government. On Sept. 29, 1690, the following order was issued:

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"Whereas some have lately presumed to Print and Disperse a Pamphlet, Entitled, Publick Occurrences, both Forreign and Domestick: Boston, Thursday, Septemb. 25th, 1690. Without the least Privity and Countenace of Authority. The Governour and Council having had the perusal of said Pamphlet, and finding that therein contained Reflections of a very high nature: As also sundry doubtful and uncertain Reports, do hereby manifest and declare their high Resentment and Disallowance of said Pamphlet, and Order that the same be Suppressed and called in; strickly forbidden any person or persons for the future to Set forth any thing in Print without License first obtained from those that are or shall be appointed by the Government to grant the same."

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I don't recall much being said about that newspaper when I was studying journalism in college. But that may have been due to the fact that it didn't have a lengthy history.

The newspaper certainly may have had something to do with the fact that freedom of the press was included in the first amendment to the Constitution, which was approved nearly 100 years later.

The case certainly seems to have raised some points about government censorship that have been addressed — to a degree — in the last 319 years.

I don't know if the timing was deliberate or coincidental, but on this date in 1789, Congress approved the amendments that later became the Bill of Rights once they were ratified by enough states.

It doesn't receive the credit it should, but September 25 was an important day in the early life of this republic. It wouldn't be correct to say that freedom of the press was born that day, but I don't think it would be stretching the point to say it was conceived in Boston on Sept. 25, 1690.

Good News, Bad News

Sometimes it seems that you can't get some good news without getting some bad news to balance it out.

Today is a case in point.

Thanks — apparently — to the Obama administration's plan to buy nearly $1 trillion in bad bank assets, the stock market posted its biggest one-day point gain since Nov. 21, which was four months ago — 497 points.

And, because the losses of the last four months have been so staggering, the single-day percentage gain — 6.8% — is the highest since Oct. 28, which was nearly five months ago.

And the S&P did better than the Dow Jones today. It had its biggest one-day gain since Nov. 13. Its percentage gain was also its largest since Oct. 28, but S&P's percentage gain of 7.1% exceeded the Dow's.

But there was plenty of bad news in the newspaper business today:

• The Ann Arbor News announced that its last edition will be published in July. It will be replaced by a Web site called AnnArbor.com.


• Three other Michigan newspapers — the Flint Journal, the Saginaw News and the Bay City Times — are going to cut back to three publication days per week.


• The Charlotte Observer plans to cut its staff by 14.6% and reduce the pay of most of the employees it retains.


• The Tucson Citizen appears likely to fold if the Gannett Co. cannot find a buyer.

As CNN's Stephanie Chen observes, "Amid the decline comes concern over who, if anyone, can assume newspapers' traditional role as a watchdog. For more than 200 years, that role has been an integral part of American democracy."

Who will assume that role now? The internet?

Well, that seems to be the direction we're headed, but I have my doubts.

Freedom of Speech

The NAACP wants the New York Post to fire the cartoonist who drew the chimpanzee cartoon — I don't really have to explain which cartoon I'm talking about, do I?

The group also wants the cartoonist's editor to be fired.

Whatever happened to freedom of speech?

Freedom of the press isn't quite dead yet. And, even if the day comes when major cities have no daily newspaper, freedom of speech will still exist in America, won't it? It will just take a different shape.

But there are several newspapers still serving New York City. It's one of the few cities left where people can choose which local newspaper they want to read. And, if you don't like the views that are expressed — or the views you may think are being expressed — by a columnist or a cartoonist, don't buy that paper. In New York, you have other options.

But don't fire a cartoonist because he expresses an opinion. That's what a cartoonist — and a columnist, for that matter — is hired to do. It's your right to disagree with that opinion, just as it is the cartoonist's right to express that opinion.

To preserve freedom of speech, sometimes it is necessary to allow unpopular opinions to be expressed, whether that opinion comes from a cartoonist or a radio talk show host.

Newspapers Matter Because Freedom Matters

When I was growing up, my grandmother carefully saved the newspapers that reported the significant events of the day.

She lived in Dallas, Texas, so, obviously, the local reports of the JFK assassination in 1963 had an importance that the major newspapers of the time — in Washington and New York — couldn't match, even if they had better and more experienced writers on their staffs.

But my grandmother also wanted to preserve those newspapers so her grandchildren — my brother and myself — could look at them in the future and better understand an event that occurred when we were too young to know what had happened.

I guess my mother picked up that habit from my grandmother, because she saved our copies of the newspapers in Arkansas that were published following historic events like the Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969 and the resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974.

Those newspapers were lovingly stored in plastic bags, and I still have them, stashed away in boxes in my closet.

Books about those events give people more details than those individual newspapers did — but newspaper accounts were at the heart of the research that made those books possible. There is no better way for someone to learn what people of previous generations thought or why they did the things they did than to look at copies of old newspapers.

I recall, as a graduate student, doing a research paper on the presidential campaign of 1932. I learned more from reading the newspapers of that time than I ever did from books.

And one of the things I learned — or re-learned, rather, since both my master's degree and my bachelor's degree were in journalism — is that there is a very good reason why freedom of the press was mentioned in the First Amendment.

A free press is crucial if one is to have a free society.

It's a truth that often gets lost in the age of the internet. The belief is that people need information, but the argument that the internet empowers people to do the job themselves is dubious at best, deceptive at worst. Some people, like Eduardo Porter in the New York Times, understand the vital contribution made by newspapers and why it is important that they be preserved.

"The argument that if newspapers go bust there will be nobody covering city hall is true," Porter writes. "It's also true that corruption will rise, legislation will more easily be captured by vested interests and voter turnout will fall."

I worked in the newspaper field for many years — as a reporter, as an editor, even as an instructor of journalism for a few years. It was an article of faith that newspapers filled a vital role as watchdogs over those who held political power and controlled the public purse strings. Over and over, it was demonstrated to me and those working with me that journalists were the only ones who could keep the public informed — and reveal corruption.

But that important role may well be a casualty of the bottom line.

This year, there have been many alarming reports about the impending demise of many daily newspapers. Some newspapers, large and small, have been trying to avoid that by cutting their staffs — for example, there are reports today that the Muskogee (Okla.) Phoenix is cutting 9% of its staff.

The dire state of the newspaper is even leading to rumors about the extent of operations, to which newspapers are forced to respond. One such rumor claimed that Newsday would eliminate its Saturday edition. A newspaper spokeswoman has denied the rumor.

Regular readers of this blog probably have read my posts in recent weeks praising Facebook. One of the things people can do on the Facebook site is join causes they care about and encourage others to do the same. I had not been a member of Facebook very long before I became aware of a cause called "Don't Let Newspapers Die."

I joined the cause and began encouraging my friends to join as well. Among those I encouraged were people who were my journalism students in the 1990s. Some of them are still in the business, some of them are not. Not all of them have responded to my invitation. Some have. And I've been especially gratified by the positive response from people I know who are not involved in the newspaper business but whose lives are enriched by its existence.

But I was disappointed to receive the following response from one of my ex-students: "After exiting the newspaper industry six months ago, I just haven't been able to convince myself to join."

I understand that she has a lot going on in her life. In the years that have passed since I last saw her, she has gotten married and she has become a mother. I don't know what sort of work she does now.

But I didn't ask her to contribute money or be an activist — or do anything special that would require her to devote time to the effort at the expense of her husband or child or whatever job she may have now. I merely asked her to join the cause — in the belief that there is strength in numbers. I looked at it as kind of like asking her to sign a petition.

Her refusal made me feel that perhaps, during my days in the classroom, I had failed to impress upon her — and others — the necessity of the existence of a free press.

But I know that isn't true. I often spoke to my students of the role Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein played in uncovering the labyrinth of crimes in the Nixon White House. I even encouraged my students to attend when Bernstein came to campus and delivered a lecture, which I attended myself. And I often spoke in class about other, lesser known but just as significant instances when newspapers played important roles in uncovering corruption.

If people who were my students more than a decade ago are apathetic today about the continued existence of newspapers, it is due to something else that happened in their lives, not to any negligence on my part.

But that isn't really the point. The point is that newspapers are at risk today. If they go under, the most important barrier between a free society and a corrupt government will be removed.

Both large and small newspapers are vulnerable in these times. A lone individual can do little to increase circulation or ad revenues and, consequently, prevent the disappearance of a local newspaper. But I still believe there is strength in numbers.

And I urge all who care about freedom to support their local newspapers in any way they can.

The internet cannot do what needs to be done, in spite of the willingness of many people to believe that the internet holds the answer.

As Porter puts it, "Reporting the news in far–flung countries, spending weeks on investigations of uncertain payoff, fighting for freedom of information in court — is expensive. Virtually the only entities still doing it on the necessary scale are newspapers. Letting them go on the expectation that the internet will enable a better–informed citizenry seems like a risky bet."

I'm not willing to gamble my freedom like that. Are you?