My review was just published..
'Treme' Stew: Race, Culture, Politics...I invite you to take a look
Sunday, April 18, 2010
My Take on HBO Series "Treme"
In case you missed Part One, or are just looking for a little more info on the new hit HBO series...
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Ridenhour Awards 2010—Humble Courage
Riding the rails back to NYC from the 2010 Ridenhour Awards at the National Press Club…my annual reconnection with the nation’s power center, old friends from New Orleans, and to why I wanted to grow up to be a reporter.
For me 2010 is a year of taking stock, of gratitude that hard work and persistence, and yes some solid reporting—is paying off.
Normally, I would board the train and be writing a review of the year’s awards, but this year I was up before dawn—preparing to write a print of review of Treme aboard the DC bound train--on the way to the awards—so by the time the ride back rolled around, I needed a little time to recharge. (insert two hour nap here--now back at computer)
Work has been as plentiful in the first quarter of this year, as it was sorely lacking in the last quarter of 2009. (Life is also very full, my pal Vincent and I just returned from a wonderful week at the new Vdara hotel in Vegas--more on that in a future bulletin)
I have picked up a new side gig where I cover labor issues in New York. The long time gig continues, and this month in addition to covering my usual states- New York and Nevada—I have been filling in for a co-worker and covering Washington State as well.
Then came the call from my pal Jarrett, who asked me if I could watch the new HBO Series Treme and review it with an eye to my knowledge of New Orleans and some of the bigger issues the drama touches on, as concerns post-Katrina New Orleans. So, work life is about as full and busy as one humble reporter can handle.
Humility is one trait that I will always remember when it comes to Ron Ridenhour—he somehow had the capacity to be both brash and humble at the same time,
When he was digging into really tough stories, he would be passionate about getting to the bottom of it, and yes about nailing “the lying mother F’s to the wall,’ but as to his own roll—he was just a reporter doing his job; nothing less, nothing more.
And so it was reassuring to hear Matthew Hoh, the Winner of the 2010 Ridenhour Prize for Truth Telling confess that he was kind of incompetent with his check book, and yes, he had just messed up with his longtime girlfriend—but, when it came to our nation’s ever increasing commitment to the war in Afghanistan-that he had little choice but to tell the State Department, “F-U, I don’t want this job any more.”
America’s premier Investigative reporter-Sy Hersh introduced him, and you got the genuine feeling that this was honor enough for Hoh; he confessed that he never expected to get an award for his actions. The former Senior Civilian Representative for the US Government in Iraq on September 10, 2009 became the highest ranking government official to resign in protest over our government’s foreign policy in Iraq.
The bottom line he explained was that our men and women in the military were putting their lives on the line to allow the people of Afghanistan to participate in free and fair elections. Hoh reckons at least 100 marines have died to support the Karzai regime since he stole the election. He wrote a four page letter to the Foreign Service outlining in detail why he could no longer support our military effort and resigned from one of the best jobs he ever had.
Letter writing to the US congress in 1969 was the very act that began the transformed of Ron Ridenhour from a soldier in Viet Nam—first to a whistle-blower seeking justice for defenses civilians massacred at the village of My Lai—and then into a long career as a distinguished investigative reporter.
In 2008, Bill Moyers noted that while Ridenhour won significant praise and a Polk Award for his courage and reporting skill, he still had a rough time making a living as a reporter—as Moyers noted, truth telling is often not rewarded or a sought after by those who run news rooms. If that was true when Ron was still among us more than a decade ago-it is now all the more so, as bigger and bigger corporations consolidate their control of more and more media outlets. One wonders, what corporate news honcho would be willing to take responsibility today for a “loose cannon” like Ron —no matter how big, or important the scoops he brought to table.
Ron briefly worked for me, when I was a news director in radio. It was a running joke between us that his print stories about cracks in nuclear power plants and corruption at city hall were all so detailed and so long that nobody could possible get all the way through them. I still feel a little guilty that as a young turk in radio, I figured what people could digest is what you should give them.
When I say Ron worked for me, he did radio versions of his print stories—and in return, I was able to get him use of one of our company gas credit cars. With that, Ron could fill his gas tank, and with me looking the other way, he could also buy some food at the gas station quick mart and a six pack of beer here and there.
Moyers was right; there are no big bucks in truth telling. But Ron cared about the stories he covered, I thought they were important, and the gas card was all my station manager would let me do in terms of paying Ron, so that is the deal we made. (Note: there is a funny Op-Ed Art Piece from the Times this week that captures he absurd lengths freelance reporters go to, in order to eke out a living at http://www.nytimes.com/
Each year I make the trip to the Ridenhour Awards, I feel a sense of renewal. It reminds me of the core values of why I wanted to be a reporter in the first place. It is an event that constantly tells truth to power.
The Ridenhour Awards also constantly remind me how small the world and my profession are. This year, former WCBS-TV Anchor Dave Marash presented the Ridenhour Book Prize to Joe Sacco the author of Footnotes in Gaza.
Marash was one of the brains behind getting my pal, the former Mets Right fielder, Ron Swoboda into broadcast journalism. Today, as I watched Marash ad lib his introduction to Sacco and wrap his mind around the complexities of the long conflict in the Middle East-it reminded me of why he was one of the few people in Television I ever wanted to try to live up to—he is sharp, witty, and insightful as ever.
Ron Ridenhour often bugged me to play handball with him more often, and indeed we played barely a month before the day he took the court with another fellow and collapsed and died. We were competitive on the court, and in the newsroom, but underneath the bravado were also good friends.
Randy Fertel makes a special effort each year to bring Ron’s courage and commitment back to life, and to explain why his actions and My Lai still matter. The main thing that strikes me, each year I come back to these awards and see another trio of courageous truth tellers awarded in Ron’s memory—is that Ron…. of all people, is the last person in the world who ever would have expected that anyone would have taken the time, and effort to remember him and his work this way.
And, so it was most reassuring for me, that the winner of today’s courage award was not only like Ron in that he dared to write a letter that told truth to power—but, that he also was quite humble about all the fuss being made about his actions. He just did what he thought anybody would do in his shoes—what he thought was right.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Farewell Bobby...to your Big Grin, Big Life and Big Heart
I have known two truly great private investigators in my life. They were my sources, friends and from time to time, I did some digging for them myself. The first is
The two could not be more different in nature—
About six weeks ago, I called Bobby just to check in, and asked him how he was doing?
“I’m dying” he told me. He said he would tell me more soon, but I could tell he really did not want to talk about it…and he never did. I just learned that Bobby passed away last week.
I first met Bobby, in an unusual way for a reporter; I was his source.
It was while I was working for WWL TV on the cops, courts and corruption beat in
We met over a fine meal, with more than a few drinks, and talked about a number of members of the New Orleans Police Department who had been accused of misconduct. I could see from the very start that Bobby had done his homework. I had been covering the force for about 15 years when we met, and he had only touched down in New Orleans for a couple of days... but he had quickly sized up who the players were, what they were suspected of doing, and why it mattered.
That last point is something both Gary and Bobby shared...the WHY. They really understood why it mattered when a police officer steps over the line. They were passionate about wanting to protect the public from that kind of misconduct. It is a passion that they and I shared, along with a handful of attorneys like Mary Howell and reporters like Allen Johnston.
Like all great investigators Bobby knew how to make you feel like you were his most important source. When the truth was, I was but one of many.
Just as he was talking to reporters who knew the bad apples in the NOPD from the outside, he was also talking to cops, even some top brass…taking a little bit of what he learned from one side and figuring out a way to loosen up tidbit from the other side.
Bobby had this nervous sort of laugh, whenever you were really getting down to the nitty-gritty.
And so, there would be the good food, the drinks, and this big gangly guy with his grey curly hair, coming to the point and asking something like, “are you saying this officer ordered a 'hit' on somebody? I mean is that what we are saying here?” And then, the nervous laugh to remind you that this was both: hard to believe, and yes, dead serious.
After a couple of lunches, my phone rang in the newsroom and it was Bobby---he said, “I need you to get us a reservation at Galatoire's… Mike wants to eat there, but he can’t stand in line.” Mike was of course, Mike Wallace from 60 minutes.
In those days, Galatoire’s did not take reservations, and I told Bobby that, but he was unmoved by my explanation, so I called the restaurant and explained the situation.
It was then, I learned what I guess was a pretty closely held secret, “just say your party wants the Bouillabaisse, that takes 24 hours to prepare.” They asked me when I needed the table for and using the Bouillabaisse trick, which is typical New Orleans Black Magic, Bobby and I sat down to dinner with Mike Wallace, his producer Lowell Bergman and New Orleans print reporter Allen Johnson.
It was an evening I will never forget.
These were the days when the networks really dug deep, when they were willing to invest weeks and even months into a series, or single story. I got the chance to watch two great minds in action. To sit at the other end of a question from Mike Wallace and to watch how he and Bergman sized up your answer.
And, of course with all these outsized personalities at the table it was a night of great laughs and tall stories.
60 Minutes would eventually produce not one, but three stories on the NOPD. And, Bobby would develop a love for
Some quick memorable moments…Bobby worked with Bergman on a number of 60 minutes stories including, I believe, the story on Big Tobacco that was the basis for the Movie “The Insider” where the roll of Bergman is played by Al Pacino and Christopher Plummer plays Mike Wallace. Bobby got a speaking part in the movie (I think he played a private eye) and of course he played it up to the hilt.
That was 1999.
As the years moved on, I would check in with Bobby and ask how he was doing. He really loved working in depth projects for “Sixty,” as he called it. But there was a problem. “The dinosaurs” he told me, “they are starting to die off.” It went further, “the producers each have their own dinosaur and they are clinging to them for dear life.” By that he meant the old guard, the Ed Bradleys, Mike Wallaces and Morely Safers were doing fewer stories and that meant less work for Bobby on “Sixty.”
But, just as with his sources, Bobby never put all his eggs in one basket.
Bobby also had producers at the Nightly News desk at CBS who liked his work. He had his pitch down to a science; it came from the private investigator’s art of writing a pithy summation of the case. They were usually just a single page—a who, what, where, why and how that teased the network’s interest to the point that they would send him dashing off to some new place on their dime to figure out if there really was a story there, and whether it was time to assign a correspondent.
The news of Bobby’s passing comes to me, the very same week that one of the best News Directors I ever worked for announced that he is moving on from CBS News. Joe Duke was there in the great days of television, and he was the kind of news director that inspired fearlessness in his reporters (at least the good ones). You knew, if you went out and did the legwork and came back with a solid story, that Joe would back you both before and after the story aired.
It was after a story aired, that Bobby got a call from a particularly “green” producer at Nightly News. It turns out that there was some issue about some aspect of the story. Well, the green in this case did not refer to the environment, but instead the slight amount of experience this young lady had on the job.
She called Bobby in, and told him, “I am going to do more stories with you, but next time…next time the bar will be higher”
I would give a million dollars to have seen the expression on Bobby’s face. “The Bar” he about hollered back, “I don’t need you to tell me where the ‘f…ing bar is!” And, you can be certain Bobby’s closing argument went on through a good many more “f’s” before he was done.
Needless to say, he did not get a lot more work from that producer, but the news business has a way of knowing who has the goods and who doesn't. It wasn't long before she no longer produced for the Nightly News and Bobby was back in the saddle.
I mentioned he was a doer of good deeds…not the least of which was working hard for the compassionate release of Deborah Peagler, a victim of domestic violence who Bobby argued, had been wrongfully incarcerated since 1983.
Debbie was diagnosed with Stage IV lung cancer and Bobby was instrumental in winning her a most rare release from prison. Bobby worked the entire case Pro bono and helped raise money for a documentary on Debbie's fight.
It was only last week that I learned, from a reliable source, that it was the very same form of cancer, that for the final time, managed to silence my boisterous, generous, resourceful friend…Bobby Buechler.
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