This column first appeared in the Fall 2009 issue of Nieman Reports. Three years ago, the Nieman Foundation convened a first-of-its-kind conference for journalists, experts in infectious diseases and world, national and local public health officials to explore how to cover a potential pandemic. Then the concern was avian flu, and the gathering’s purpose was [...]

On message and with a streak of steel, Barack Obama’s senior advisor Valerie Jarrett made it clear that the president is fighting back challenges to his agenda. It “takes a certain temperament, perseverance and stubbornness” to make changes in Washington, Jarrett said. She addressed poll numbers, town hall disruptions and what it will take to [...]

Iason Athanasiadis, the journalist and photographer arrested in Tehran June 17th, has been released, it was reported today. He was said to have been the only non-Iranian among more than 40 journalists detained in the days of protest following the June 12th Iranian elections. Wire accounts quoted an Iranian official as saying Athanasiadis had been [...]

The Committee to Protect Journalists and other groups are issuing urgent appeals for the release of more than 40 journalists who have been arrested and are being held in Iran. Scant information about the arrests has been released. One of those being held is Iason Athanasiadis, a 2008 Nieman fellow who is said to have [...]

Reporting facts as facts is heartening in these times The headline over the Associated Press article in the Des Moines Register Tuesday was straightforward: “Auschwitz letter/is found in wall.” But I was surprised by one graph and even more so by my reaction to it. The story told how a construction crew in Poland found [...]

When the economy slumps, the news media serve readers and viewers with all kinds of tips on how to make one’s money go farther, how to trim spending, where to get the best buys, etc. If your local media are like Iowa’s, most of these hints are just plain common sense — do comparative shopping, [...]

“Each country has its own quirks,” President Obama noted at his London news conference last week. He was trying to show a tolerance for the differences between foreign cultures and our own. But as the news media around the world report events here in the United States, other people have learned that one particular American [...]

In the photograph, lawyer Julius Chambers stands in the rubble of his fire-bombed office. His firm is in the middle of more than 30 desegregation lawsuits before courts in North Carolina. And the Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools case – which would be a landmark win for school desegregation and the law firm – is pending [...]

My wife and I had dinner recently at a place we frequent. This time we were involuntary witnesses to the sexual abuse of a child. The party at the adjoining table consisted of six persons — a couple of girls of about seven or eight, two youngish women, one of whom appeared to be the [...]

While commentators debate whether a New York Post cartoon that links cops, a dead monkey and perhaps a president is stupid, racist or both (that last one gets my vote)… While citizens weigh in on Attorney General Eric Holder’s labeling of America as a nation of “cowards” when it comes to dealing with the issue [...]