Tag Archives: Rolling Stone

Penn fails to make the case

January 18, 2016 kanelis2012 2 Comments

Sean Penn invented a word last night on “60 Minutes.”

He called himself an “experiental” journalist.

I’ve been working with words for, oh, damn near 40 years. I consider myself a journalist. I worked at four newspapers in two states. I enjoyed some modest success during my career.

“Experiental”? What the . . . ?

Penn is a movie actor of some renown. He recently ventured to Mexico, where he shook hands with Joaquin Guzman, aka El Chapo, the then-fugitive drug lord; he had escaped in early 2015 from a maximum security prison in Mexico. Penn interviewed this supremely evil individual for a 10,000-word article he wrote for Rolling Stone.

I watched with considerable pain in my gut as Penn sought to explain to CBS News correspondent Charlie Rose what he hoped to accomplish by writing a story about El Chapo, who was recaptured by Mexican authorities the day after the magazine article hit the streets.

I think I heard a tinge of sympathy in this guy’s voice as he tried to relay Guzman’s reasons for peddling drugs, for delivering so much misery to so many millions of people, for being responsible for the deaths of thousands of individuals with whom he has come in contact.

I also believe I detected a look of incredulity in Rose’s face as Penn offered his explanations.

And then Penn would drop that hideous, made-up adjective that he put in front of the word “journalist.”

This thought doesn’t come from me, but I’ll pass on what a friend of mine said this morning on social media.

My friend, too, is a trained journalist. He wants to know if he can now seek to become an “experiental movie actor.”

***

This just in: I’m advised that “experiental” is a real word. I stand corrected on that particular point.

International news, media news, national news

El Chapo interview continues to provoke debate

January 12, 2016 kanelis2012

I heard a media analyst make an astonishing comparison this afternoon on National Public Radio.

The discussion on NPR was about actor Sean Penn’s interview — published in Rolling Stone — with Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, the despicable drug lord who was on the lam from his escape from a Mexican prison.

This analyst seemed to make a direct comparison between El Chapo and Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and Moammar Gadhafi, all of whom were interviewed by the media before they met their deaths.

Hmmm. There’s something of a difference here.

Hussein and Gadhafi were heads of state; bin Laden hadn’t been convicted of anything, even though the entire world knew of his involvement in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Guzman was an escapee from a maximum-security prison. Mexican authorities had been scouring the country looking for him since his escape six months ago.

Penn’s access to this individual — whose drug activities have produced so much death and misery — was a function of his own celebrity status as an Oscar-winning film actor.

I keep coming back to what I believe is a central question: Doesn’t an American citizen such as Penn have an obligation to assist authorities in their search for a notorious drug dealer?

Sen. Marco Rubio was asked over the weekend to comment on the interview. The Republican presidential candidate said Penn is entitled to his First Amendment rights, but then he used a term with which I agree.

He called the interview “grotesque.”

entertainment news, International news, legal news, media news, national news

El Chapo saga takes strange turn

January 10, 2016 kanelis2012

I’m trying to figure this one out and, so help me, this item has me puzzled to the max.

Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman escaped six months ago from a maximum-security prison in Mexico. He is one of the world’s most notorious drug lords, responsible for dealing in death while peddling meth, heroin and assorted other killer drugs.

So, as one who practiced journalism for more than 36 years, I find myself asking tonight: If given a chance to interview this notorious criminal, would I accept the chance to do so or would I blow the whistle on his whereabouts to the authorities who are looking for him?

The actor Sean Penn took the former course. He interviewed El Chapo for a Rolling Stone interview several months ago.

I don’t think I would have done that.

Then again, Penn is an actor.

I’m also wondering tonight whether Penn has the same sense of outrage that El Chapo was on the lam that many others — such as yours truly — have had as he avoided capture by the authorities.

The Mexican police caught up with him and Guzman is now facing extradition to the United States.

I believe it’s fair to ask: What was Sean Penn thinking?

According to the New York Times: “Mr. Penn and Mr. Guzmán spoke for seven hours, the story reports, at a compound amid dense jungle. The topics of conversation turned in unexpected directions. At one stage, Mr. Penn brought up Donald J. Trump, the Republican presidential candidate; there were some reports that Mr. Guzmán had put a $100 million bounty on Mr. Trump after he made comments offensive to Mexicans. ‘Ah! Mi amigo!’ Mr. Guzmán responded.”

Perhaps there’s something about this story that goes over my head. I’ll admit that I’ve never been given a chance to interview one of the world’s most wanted fugitives . . . so I have no direct knowledge of how I’d respond to such an opportunity.

Still, I find it strange in the extreme that a celebrity of Penn’s stature — someone with no apparent experience as a journalist — would seemingly turn a blind eye toward the circumstances that led to an interview subject’s arrest and conviction while he is seeking to avoid being thrown back into the slammer.

Is it fair to question Penn’s loyalty?

Hmmm. I think I just did.

media news

Rolling Stone gets sued … good!

May 12, 2015 kanelis2012

I spent my professional life in journalism. I’m a fierce advocate for publications’ rights to print the truth and more often than not I have looked skeptically at individuals or institutions that have sued publications for libel or defamation.

Not this time.

A University of Virginia administrator has sued Rolling Stone magazine for $7.5 million, contending the magazine defamed her in a bogus story about a gang rape on the campus.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/university-of-virginia-associate-dean-sues-rolling-stone-over-gang-rape-story/ar-BBjG6jp

I hope Nicole Eramo wins.

She is UVa’s top administrator who deals with sexual assaults. The magazine portrayed her as someone more interested in protecting the school’s reputation than in protecting a woman named “Jackie,” who alleged she was raped by students at a frat house party. Well, the party never occurred, “Jackie” wasn’t raped, Rolling Stone retracted the story — and the reporter and her editors responsible for publishing the false account still have their jobs!

“I am filing this defamation lawsuit to set the record straight — and to hold the magazine and the author of the article accountable for their actions in a way they have refused to do themselves,” Eramo said in a statement.

The retraction gives this lawsuit some traction. Publications rarely retract a story, taking back what they published and in effect admitting that it was wrong. Rolling Stone admitted the story was phony, but still haven’t disciplined the principals involved in publishing it.

Nicole Eramo’s lawsuit needs to make a statement that the magazine did something grievously wrong in its so-called “reporting” of a crime that didn’t occur.

media news, national news

Rolling Stone did a hatchet job

April 8, 2015 kanelis2012

The Rolling Stone retraction of a story it published alleging a gang rape at a college frat house presents a graphic lesson in Journalism 101.

Be sure you get all sides of the story before you go to press.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/04/rolling-stone-rape-columbia-report-116714.html?hp=m1#.VSSXRFJ0yt8

The magazine is paying a huge price in its loss of credibility. And it should.

It well might pay even more — as in financially — if it loses a planned lawsuit filed by some of the principals involved in the coverage of the bogus story.

The magazine reported a woman named Jackie was raped by members of a University of Virginia fraternity. However, the magazine didn’t bother to check with Jackie’s friends, or with the fraternity members, or with others who might be able to corroborate Jackie’s story.

It turned out that on the night in question, there wasn’t even a party at the frat house.

The story broke down.

The magazine issued a retraction and an apology.

And this story now has put the media under the looking glass once again.

What still astounds me is that the reporter, her editors and the “fact checkers” still are employed by the magazine. No one has lost his or her job.

I’m scratching my head over this one. I’ve seen reporters and editors fired for less than what happened at Rolling Stone. No one bothered to check the details of Jackie’s story? No one thought to ask the reporter to talk to the fraternity members? The reporter didn’t bother to do her homework?

Where I come from, they call such so-called reporting a “hatchet job.”

To retract a story is to admit that it is false, that it is bogus, that it doesn’t stand up to the basic test of good journalism. Rolling Stone has issued its retraction.

Why hasn’t it punished the people responsible for soiling the magazine’s credibility?

media news

Retracting a story is a huge deal

April 6, 2015 kanelis2012

During my 37 years in print journalism, I had to write some corrections to news stories or editorials I’d written.

You get a fact wrong, you write a brief explainer of the actual fact. It usually goes into a file your editor would keep. I’ve written a clarification or two in my time. That’s when you report or commenting on an issue without using the proper context. Those, too, go into a file.

No journalist likes to write those.

A retraction? That’s a very big deal. That’s when you retract an entire story. It was bogus. False. It’s a firing offense. I’ve seen reporters lose their jobs because their files contained too many corrections or clarifications.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/04/rolling-stone-retracts-uva-rape-on-campus-article-205020.html?hp=c4_3

Rolling Stone magazine, a usually reliable journal, has retracted a story it published alleging that the University of Virginia fraternity house was the scene of a horrible rape in 2012. The magazine drew a scathing critique from the Columbia Journalism Review about how editors allowed the story to pass through various checkpoints before being published.

The writer of the bogus story, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, reportedly didn’t contact any of the alleged assailants.She acknowledges she relied too heavily on the alleged victim’s account of what happened.

One of the more astonishing elements of this story is that Erdely and the editors who worked on her story are continuing to work for Rolling Stone. She has apologized to the readers of Rolling Stone and has vowed never to make the mistakes she made while writing the article.

Whatever.

But can readers trust her fully again? Journalists are supposed to trade on the trust they build with their readers. That trust is built on the journalist’s ability to tell the truth, completely and fully and without a hint of doubt about the veracity of the story being told.

When a nationally known publication such as Rolling Stone retracts a story, it in effect is admitting it has inflicted a grave wound on that trust.

It’s a real big deal.

national news

Big story takes bigger hit

December 7, 2014 kanelis2012

Rolling Stone isn’t known as a publication that makes stories up.

Thus, the magazine editors’ announcement that they were retracting a story about an alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia is a very big deal.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/12/05/rolling-stone-retracts-uva-story/19954293/

It’s the retraction that makes the story so interesting, to me at least.

A woman named “Jackie” reported that she had been raped by several men at a fraternity house party at the UVa campus in Charlottesville. Then her credibility came into question.

Her story didn’t add up. There was no party the night she said one occurred, the magazine found out.

Then came the announcement that the magazine was taking back what it reported.

A retraction is a very big deal in journalism.

Publications issue “corrections” all the time when they get facts wrong. They issue “clarifications” when the facts aren’t printed as clearly as they should be printed. A retraction? Well, that means the publication no longer stands by the story or the reporter who wrote it … or even the line editors who edited the story, looking for holes in it or places that need to be fleshed out.

Meanwhile, a university’s reputation has been tarnished. Students stood before the nation and apologized for what they described as a “culture of rape” at UVa.

Well, it now turns out that one student at the university has exhibited a “culture of lying.”

national news, political news

Krugman comes to Obama's defense

October 12, 2014 kanelis2012

Paul Krugman isn’t exactly an impartial observer of American politics.

He leans hard left. He writes for the New York Times and other publications. He’s also an Nobel prize-winning economist who knows a thing or three about economics.

He also has determined that Barack Obama has crafted one of the most successful presidencies in American history.

http://www.lovebscott.com/news/rolling-stone-names-president-obama-one-of-the-most-successful-presidents-in-american-history

Go figure that one, eh?

Well, I’ll await the judgment of more historians on the Obama presidency, which still has about 26 months left before he leaves the White House.

Krugman has written a lengthy essay in Rolling Stone in which he lays out his case for the success of President Obama’s time in office.

Here’s a small part of what Krugman has written:

“Obama faces trash talk left, right and center – literally – and doesn’t deserve it. Despite bitter opposition, despite having come close to self-inflicted disaster, Obama has emerged as one of the most consequential and, yes, successful presidents in American history. His health reform is imperfect but still a huge step forward – and it’s working better than anyone expected. Financial reform fell far short of what should have happened, but it’s much more effective than you’d think. Economic management has been half-crippled by Republican obstruction, but has nonetheless been much better than in other advanced countries. And environmental policy is starting to look like it could be a major legacy.”

I get that Krugman has his critics. They sit on the opposite end of the political spectrum. They’re going to dismiss his assessment of Obama’s presidency through their own bias, contending that Krugman’s bias has tainted his own view.

Funny thing about bias. We always see it in others, never in ourselves.

I must acknowledge this much, even though it pains my friends on the right whenever we lefties bring it up: Barack Obama inherited a first-class financial and economic meltdown when he took the oath of office on Jan. 20, 2009. He took measures almost immediately to stop the free fall. The government pumped billions of dollars into bailing out auto manufacturers; it slapped important regulations on lending institutions that had loaned money to millions of Americans who couldn’t afford to pay the money back.

All of this drew stinging rebukes from Republicans, who didn’t offer any serious solutions of their own — except to say that the president’s initiatives would fail.

Health care? Oh yes. There’s that. As Krugman notes, the Affordable Care Act isn’t perfect, but it’s working.

I’ll look forward to reading the entire article. I’ll still hold my own final judgment on Barack Obama’s presidency. We need some time to take it all in.

High Plains Blogger