be just

‘Yes, We Can’… Do What? -- In These Times : "Don’t look to the media to help you get there or to ask any candidates for even a glimpse of their roadmap. The media are more consumed with the style, not digging for the substance of anything the public hopes for. The media remain so entrenched in and completely absorbed with celebrity culture that even a presidential campaign gets reported on as though it’s the run-up to the Oscars. Who will be best actor? Best actress? Who will cry onstage? Who will give the acceptance speech that will be the talk of the nation the next morning?"

Secular Jews and the ‘Jewish State’ -- In These Times : "In the fall of 2007, the NIF brought Israeli speakers to a series of forums around the United States to examine Israel’s ethnic, cultural and economic diversity. This was discussed in the context of a “Jewish state” and how this concept resonates, if at all, with American Jews. Eliezer Yaari, the NIF’s executive director in Israel, stated a preference for describing Israel as a “state of Jews” rather than the more ideological construct of the “Jewish state.”"

Spain to Senegal: Stay Home -- In These Times : "In September 2007, Senegalese television viewers saw the image of a drowned body washed up on a rocky seashore. In the grim advertisement—paid for by Spain’s secretary of state for immigration—a grieving mother explains that she hasn’t heard from her son in months. The spot then cuts to Senegalese pop star Youssou N’Dour. Seated on a boat with ocean surf in the background, the singer tells the audience in the Wolof language, “You already know how this story ends. Thousands of young people have died. Don’t risk your life for nothing. You are the future of Africa.”"

In Praise of Reporting Reality--And The Truth -- In These Times After my government experience, it took me a while to get my footing back in journalism. I had to learn all over again that what is important for the journalist is not how close you are to power, but how close you are to reality. Over the last 40 years, I would find that reality in assignment after assignment, from covering famine in Africa and war in Central America to inner-city families trapped in urban ghettos and middle-class families struggling to survive in an era of downsizing across the heartland. I also had to learn one of journalism’s basic lessons. The job of trying to tell the truth about people whose job it is to hide the truth is almost as complicated and difficult as trying to hide it in the first place. We journalists are of course obliged to cover the news, but our deeper mission is to uncover the news that powerful people would prefer to keep hidden.