Take Back the Times

Remembering my Dad, One Year after his Death

2009-06-29T21:13:00.000-07:00

My father, Kenneth I. Reich, kept this blog for almost four years, until his death on June 30, 2008. I spent months trying to figure out the best way to honor him with a final post. Finally I decided to honor him with his own words.

Dad published millions of words during his 39 years at the Los Angeles Times, his three years with UPI and LIFE, and his four years as a blogger. He wrote a book, Making it Happen: Peter Ueberroth and the 1984 Olympics. I thought about posting a sample of his published work. But in the end, I opted for something more personal. In 2004, for my daughter’s first birthday, Dad gave her a memory book called “Grandfather Remembers.” It’s one of those silly books that you can buy in a stationery store, a precursor to “25 Things about Me” on Facebook. But I am so grateful that I have this book. It truly captures my father’s spirit.

Below are a few excerpts from my father’s remembrances. I hope that, as you read them, you relive your own favorite memories of my dad. There will never be someone else like him.

Kathy Reich

Early Years
I was born March 7, 1938, Cedars of Lebanon Hospital, Los Angeles

My family lived in Los Angeles and, after 6, Palm Springs, California.

A hardship my family had to overcome was World War II, long absence of my father on naval service.

As a student I was valedictorian of my high school class and student body president.

My parents taught me to value government service, academic excellence, and California as a place to live.

I graduated from Dartmouth College, June 12, 1960

After I finished school I went to work for United Press International, LIFE Magazine, and the Los Angeles Times (1965).

47 Years in Journalism
A risk that I took that worked was leaving Harvard Law School and going to work in journalism.

One that failed was going to work as an op-ed page editor of the Times (1972). I did not like being bound to a desk, and I ran pieces my superiors didn’t like.

The lesson I learned from that was to stick with reporting. My best assignments lay ahead.

The best career decision I ever made was to go into journalism and to go to work for the Los Angeles Times.

The most important promotions I ever had were to cover the 1984 Olympics (1977) and to cover Jimmy Carter’s race for President (1976).

People who influenced me the most were Lawrence Radway, Professor at Dartmouth; Norman Cherniss, Editor at Riverside Press-Enterprise; Ed Guthman, National Editor, L.A. Times; Judge Stephen Reinhardt, U.S. Ninth Circuit.

They influenced me because they were wise men who had good ideas, were very moral in their point of view, and gave good advice on occasion.

I was always proud of the time I stood up against Mark Willes and Kathryn Downing, business people who compromised the integrity of the Times.

If I had my life to live over I’d work as a foreign correspondent for awhile, perhaps in India.

Travels
My first trip on a plane was to New York—1953.

My most adventurous trip was around the world—1968—Hawaii, Hong Kong, India, Kenya, Ethiopia, Israel, and France.

What I remember most about that trip is visiting Hap and Joby Dunning in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and meeting Abe and Amrita Abraham in Bombay, India.

The funniest thing that ever happened to me on a trip was hitting a rock in the road near Delphi, Greece in 1965, ripping out the transmission, and having to drive 40 miles in reverse, backwards, to where I could turn the car in.

Places in this country I have visited All 50 states, including at one time every city in the USA over 100,000 in population.

Foreign countries I have visited 79 as of your birthday and every continent except Antarctica. (Note: Dad did make it to Antarctica, and he fulfilled his lifelong goal of visiting 100 countries. He visited his 101st, Tunisia, less than six weeks before his death.)

Values and Beliefs
As a father, I tried to be loving.

As a friend I try to be supportive and cheerful, give them honest advice when they ask.

My definition of a “good guy” is one who is loyal to family and friends.

I still like the old-fashioned ways of typewriters and Republican politics: the progressive era—Lincoln, Hiram Johnson, Warren.

My attitude about money in general is spend what you earn on worthwhile things, make many gifts to your children and charities, and don’t worry too much about the future.

A simple statement that sums up my attitude about life is stand up against evil dictators, live honestly, don’t take any guff.

A philosophy I’ve always lived by is do right by your family, love your children, defend the country.

Final Words
One of the best things about growing older is having a lovely grandchild like you.

The most precious things in the world to me are my children, grandchildren, and good friends.

My hope for the future is a more peaceful, secure world for you and your children. After all, you were born in a turbulent time. I hope you have a pleasant home, get a good education, find nice work, something professional, and meet a nice man to marry. Someday, later in the 21st century, you may be filling out a book like this entitled, “Grandmother Remembers.” Long life and good health.

--30--

Audio of Ken Reich Funeral

2008-07-07T13:35:00.000-07:00

Recording of the funeral

Many thanks to Larry Harnisch for taping the service and making this link available on his Daily Mirror blog on the LA Times website. He was one of dozens of great journalists who turned out to pay tribute to Dad.

Eulogy for our Father

2008-07-03T22:22:00.000-07:00

Posted by Kathy and David Reich

My sister and I worked on this together, and we are so grateful that you are here today. Dad always loved a good funeral. He would come home from a funeral, call one of us, and proceed to give the funeral a review. So Kathy and I are really feeling the pressure to make this funeral a memorable one.

We’ve been truly overwhelmed by the incredible postings on his blog and the emails and phone calls. Many people have focused on Dad’s impressive accomplishments as a journalist. But just as many people have commented on what a proud father he was. Today I want to talk about our Dad as Kathy and I knew him.

Dad was, at heart, a great idealist, even a champion for social justice. In high school in the 1950’s, he would insist on having his Latino, African American, and Native American friends over to dinner, even when some of my grandparents’ friends were appalled.

Dad was in Birmingham on the day of the church bombings, and in Los Angeles the night that Bobby Kennedy was shot. These events shaped his thinking for the rest of his life. Maybe this explains why, in later years, he became passionate about helping disadvantaged youth—helping kids from around the country prepare for college, supporting college scholarships for kids at my alma mater, Grant High School, and helping young MetPro reporters succeed at the Times. I think Dad’s belief in social justice also explains why he, a Republican for most of his life, became so excited in the last months of his life about supporting Barack Obama for President.
Late in his career, when he approached his consumer column with such zeal, it was because he believed that someone had to stand up for common people contending with corrupt or inept companies. And it made a great impact on us when Dad waged spirited and courageous defenses of his fellow reporters and their trade while men with no knowledge of print journalism tried to run the Los Angeles Times like it was a cereal company.

Many of you have written that Dad could be cantankerous, irascible, and contentious. Let me add short tempered and choleric. But all of you have noted Dad’s other sides. As his son I received a fair share of groundings and other common punishments. But one of the things I liked is that they nearly never lasted long. Dad just didn’t have the heart for it. Although he could say mean things, Dad was not mean.

Dad knew he wasn’t the easiest person in the world to deal with, and as a result, he was unbelievably loyal and generous to his friends and family. As the oldest member of his generation in our large extended family, he was a major influence—not always for good—on his many cousins. He liked to tell us how he and his cousin Marilyn once spiked the Passover wine with vodka.

Dad collected friends throughout his life, in Palm Springs, at Dartmouth, at the Times, in his travels. In March he celebrated his 70th birthday in Palm Springs, and more than a dozen of his high school teachers and classmates attended the party. In 1968, on an around-the-world trip, he looked up a friend’s old pen pal in Bombay, and became close friends with him. In fact, the last email he sent was to this friend, A.S. Abraham. Once you were Dad’s friend, you were his friend for life. I think it’s an amazing testament to our dad that many of you here today knew and loved him longer than we did. The love and attention of his family and friends, especially his sister Carolyn and brother-in-law Lowell, truly sustained him over the last couple of years as his health was deteriorating.

But, as many of you noted, we always came first. Dad adored us from the start, but in our earliest years he wasn’t around as much. He was traveling for work, especially during the 1976 presidential campaign. But when my parents divorced a couple of years later, Dad insisted on joint custody, and he suddenly had us three nights a week and started taking us on his reporting trips.

He didn’t always know what he was doing as a father. He wasn’t a great cook, and he was terrible with doing things like assembling toys. My sister remembers some of those early days at Dad’s house. He got it into his head that good fathers read their children a bedtime story every night. The first story he read to Kathy was a horrific tale of an African farmer being tormented by a colony of killer ants. My sister had nightmares for weeks. Dad suggested that the best way to rid her mind of the killer ants was to read another book. He suggested Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

But the key thing with Dad was the unceasing effort and the obvious devotion and joy behind his parenting. Dad’s and Mom’s agreeing to joint custody was not common; most parents would not have done that. Dad’s habit of giving me ½ birthday cakes for my half birthday wasn’t normal either, but I really loved getting them.

Dad did some typical Dad things but he did them even better, like taking me to 25 Dodger Baseball Games a year, including the first game of the 1988 World Series when Kirk Gibson hit his historic walk off home run.

And Dad did some other atypical things to help raise us. Thanks to Dad, we grew up thinking that all children meet Presidents and dine with political leaders. He viewed the Olympic assignment as the greatest accomplishment of his career, and he made it a formative experience for us as well. Thanks to Dad, we had insider access to the Sarajevo and Los Angeles Olympics, and went on trips chasing the international Olympic committee around the world to India, Switzerland, Monaco, and Holland. And because he was a consummate newsman, we were always sure to be advised of the latest important headlines or the early exit polling in an election.
Dad always had our moral development in mind, instilling in us a sense of social responsibility. He stressed the importance of not just accepting the status quo. He taught us about civil rights and the political process even before we could read. My sister and I have both made commitments to public service in our lives, and Dad’s influence is one reason for that.
Finally, Dad was as obsessive about his grandchildren Abigail and Jonathan as he was about us. When Abby was barely a month old, he tried to convince Kathy that Abby was extraordinarily intelligent, constantly giving her elders what he called “an appraising look.” Last night, as Kathy and I were writing this eulogy, Abby, who is now almost 5, chimed in with a suggestion: “How about if you say, Papa Ken was a very, very good man.”

I’d like to conclude with one of Dad’s most important traits. He was always an optimist. His last published words were, “This is a bad time in the newspaper business, as it is, economically for the country in so many ways. But, I fully believe, brighter days will come, and we must do what we can to ensure that they do.” Dad, thanks to what you have given us, we and many of those you have touched will continue to do what we can to work for brighter days. We love you and we will miss you.

LA Times Obituary

2008-07-01T07:08:00.000-07:00

There was almost nothing that Dad loved more than a good obituary. He would have been deeply moved by the recollections of his colleagues, friends, and family in today's LA Times.

Kenneth Reich, 70; Times reporter covered effort to win '84 Olympics for L.A.

In Loving Memory of My Dad, Ken Reich

2008-06-30T13:11:00.000-07:00

Dad and Abby

Dad and David at David's welcome home party

Dad with his grandchildren at the Palm Springs aerial tramway, March 1, 2008

I am deeply saddened to write that my father, Ken Reich, died early this morning at his home in Los Angeles. His passing was peaceful. His last hours were spent as he would have wished them--chatting with friends and family and posting to this blog. He sent his last email, to lifelong friends in India, at around 2 a.m., and then he went to sleep. His caregiver was unable to wake him this morning.

This was a terrible shock, although those of you who know my Dad know that he had been in failing health for several years.

When I get my thoughts together, I will write more about Dad--about what an amazing father he was, about what a committed and tenacious journalist he was, and about how, despite his many quirks, he endeared himself to literally hundreds of friends and family, from all over the world. Right now, it's all too raw for me. But I encourage people to leave their own thoughts and reminiscences on this blog. Dad would have loved that, and my brother David and I will take great comfort in reading your notes.

Dad's funeral will be on Thursday, July 3 at 2 p.m. at Mt. Sinai Hollywood Hills, 5950 Forest Lawn Drive in Los Angeles. All are welcome.

In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to Dartmouth College SEAD (Summer Enrichment at Dartmouth) Program, Oregon Shakespeare Festival Endowment Fund for Education, and Magen David Adom.

Kathy Reich

Can L.A. Times Survive Zell, Michaels, Hiller?

2008-06-30T00:20:00.004-07:00

(Readers should be aware that a series of six blogs about 75 L.A. Times staff members who have lost their jobs under the Tribune Co. precedes this one. It can easily be accessed by entering my name into Google and scanning down under the Take Back The Times entry).

It is not too surprising that a determination to resist the deterioration of the Los Angeles Times that has grown quickly out of the wrongheaded decisions and plans of Sam Zell and his colleagues should surface most clearly, for the moment, among anonymous bloggers. The bloggers are perhaps voices out of the news room who realize all too clearly what is happening, and are daring to try to stop it.

A blog known as "Save Our Trade" (www.saveourtrade.blogspot.com) is floating a survey due July 15 asking a number of devastating questions about Tribune management, such as, what do the constant layoffs and other anti-employee actions have to do with the concept under which Zell used employee stock to take over control of the company, telling the hapless employees about to be terminated that they "owned" the paper?

Meanwhile, the TellZell blog (www.tellzell.com) is passing along a suggestion from someone at the Tribune-owned Orlando Sentinel that Times and other Tribune employees either call in sick on July 9, or conduct a byline-masthead strike for the editions of July 10. Tellzell has its own survey trying to determine whether employees think this is a good idea.

Of course, I certainly associate myself with these stirrings of action.

But the greater question at this point is, I believe: Can the Zell-Michaels plan for a "redesign" of the L.A. Times be stopped in its tracks?

We've already seen, at the Orlando paper, the dumbing down and tabloid aspects of the redesign of that paper. And although Tribune is saying there won't be a template on these redesigns for all Tribune papers, we cannot be at all sanguine about what redesign of the Times, and the promised drastic reduction in the number of its news pages, will mean.

I think there is every reason to fear that it would be a point of no return -- that no matter who came to own the paper in the future, it would be too late after the redesign, and too costly, to restore the paper to essentially what it has been since Otis Chandler became publisher in 1961.

Certainly our cherished national and foreign bureaus which have served the paper and its readers so faithfully, will, to a very great extent, fall by the wayside in a redesign. After all, didn't Zell rudely tell the Washington bureau months ago that he saw no reason it should have as many reporters as the Orange County suburban office?

And I was informed by a retired foreign editor just last week that he had been asked by Russ Stanton, the David Hiller-appointed editor of the Times, whether he felt it would be a good idea to abandon the Baghdad bureau of the Times and cover the Iraq war from afar. (Speaking of journalists serving the public interest, it takes a Russ Stanton to come up with an idea like that!)

Marjorie Miller (not my source) decided to step down as foreign editor shortly after that question was asked. She became only the latest in a long, depressing series of top-ranking personnel to leave their positions under the evil Tribune reign.

Would a redesign actually enhance local coverage and the Web site? I don't think so. Every time, a new step has been taken in the recent years of Tribune ownership, we have been assured that Metro (the California section) would have more more pages, or that the Web site would grow in offerings, timeliness and sophistication. Yet, none of these promises have been kept.

No, I think it is certain that a redesign would be absolutely devastating to the paper.

So, what can be done?

Every argument must now be made to Zell and the board of directors in Chicago that they should put such a radical retooling of the Tribune papers, and especially Times operations into abeyance until they have had a chance to consult with journalistic experts around the country to see how they think it would be received. (Virtually no one who has commented from outside thinks that Zell, Michaels and company know anything about the newspaper business).

Beyond that, the civic group of luminaries here in Los Angeles who first wrote then-Tribune CEO Dennis FitzSimons last year suggesting that, if Tribune wasn't willing to expend resources in Los Angeles, it sell the paper to someone who would, should become active again to push the demand that the paper be sold to local interests. This group represents the elite of the community. It is high time they show a little backbone.

It may well be that Zell is breaking the law, in some way, abandoning his fiduciary duty to the employee stockholders, by such a radical policy of changing his papers, which are already falling drastically in both circulation and ad revenue. A skilled lawyer might have to be retained to advise the employees whether it is possible to go to court to defend their interests.

Certainly, this is not the time to lose heart.

Now is the time to search for any means that will get the Times out from under the awful Tribune yoke, and bring to a halt the malevolent influence of Zell, Michaels, Hiller and other Tribune executives. Or at least delay them in their actions, until new rays of light begin to show themselves.

This is a bad time in the newspaper business, as it is, economically for the country in so many ways. But, I fully believe, brighter days will come, and we must do what we can to insure that they do.

L.A. Times Roll of Honor, Those Who Left, 64-75

2008-06-29T00:04:00.000-07:00

Today, I'm finishing up describing what happened at the hands of the evil Tribune Co. to 75 L.A. Times writers and editors who were at the newspaper at the wrong time -- long after the halcyon years of Otis Chandler, Tom Johnson and Bill Thomas. Without the benevolent protection and enlightened employment policies of these great journalists, they found themselves helpless, in many cases, to protect their livelihoods, and they were swept aside in successive waves of buyouts, induced buyouts and layoffs.

Yet to me, and I believe, as time goes on, to many others, they will be seen as heroes. They were a great group of people, putting out one of the finest newspapers in the country, and it was through no fault of their own that a tide of Chicago disdain and neglect came rolling into Los Angeles with the Tribune purchase and almost immediately set the paper off on a downhill course toward mediocrity. It was resisted for awhile by editors John Carroll and Dean Baquet, but eventually they were swept aside, and then the floodgates of Chicago sewage opened very widely.

Also, at the end here, I have a few comments about two of the most serious losses at the Times during the early Tribune years, those of Bill Boyarsky and Narda Zacchino.

Roll of Honor:

64. Rone Tempest. A foreign correspondent in the dangerous corners of the Middle East, then a writer in Northern California, he did many things very well. The Times was lucky to have him. But, as other foreign correspondents have found, Tempest discovered he had a hard time settling into what inherently was a less glamorous job at home.

65. Wendy Thermos. She was one of the reporters who pulled themselves upward by the bootstraps, gradually becoming a stronger writer, only to have her Times career cut short. Very much her own person, modest and unassuming yet having strong willpower. I liked and admired her.

66. Kevin Thomas. A proud movie reviewer for many years, he was suddenly told one day he had to take a buyout. He was not ready for retirement, and genuinely hurt that he was being ushered out the door. Later, he was able to write some reviews for the paper as a freelancer, but he still feels, appropriately, that he was very roughly and unfairly treated. I wonder, as he commands great layoffs at all the papers he now controls, whether Sam Zell ever thinks of the interests of the Kevin Thomases.

67. Mai Tran. One of the paper's first Vietnamese reporters, for a time the only reporter who spoke Vietnamese, she brought fresh perspectives to Orange County coverage. Again, this is the newspaper that once talked diversity, yet many of its most talented ethnic writers no longer have their jobs.

68. Sam Howe Verhovek. He has now reportedly left the New York Times too. For the L.A. Times, he was a national correspondent based in the Northwest, and also worked in other capacities, including, I believe, as the paper's architectural critic, always a difficult post to fill since many editors think little of the assignment.

69. Debora Vrona. An excellent Business reporter, aspiring upward. She is one of many losses of young, vigorous personnel that the paper has sustained.

70. Amy Wallace. For a time, an important writer in both Metro and Calendar.

71. Jenifer Warren. She was one of the most serious losses in the Sacramento bureau and statewide, because she covered the vital prison beat. California prisons had fallen into a terrible mess, overcrowded and often terribly inhumane to the prisoners and under the domination of a rapacious and irresponsible prison guards union. Warren was better at covering this story than anyone else. She has not at all been adequately replaced. She was yet another improving reporter, with her best years ahead.

72. Henry Weinstein. A reporter of reporters, he was one of the greatest Timesmen, but not only on account of his legal reporting and coverage of the death penalty issue, but also because he was an outspoken voice in the staff demanding that the paper always observe the highest ethical standards. It was Weinstein's vehement denunciation of those responsible for the Staples scandal at an open employees meeting that resulted in that blossoming as the issue that finally led to the ouster of Mark Willes and Michael Parks. Highly popular amongst the staff, he was disgusted when Sam Zell went to the Washington Bureau earlier this year and dismissed what its reporters did as inconsequential, Weinstein, as was characteristic with him, said so very plainly. I understand he has now been hired by the new dean of the U.C. Irvine Law School, Erwin Chemerinsky to teach there. They are lucky to have him, and the Times is extremely unlucky to lose him.

73. Robert Welkos. The author with Joel Sappell of the Scientology series, he was an able investigative reporter who worked both in Metro and Calendar. He wrote sensitively about a surgical operation he had had, and was a resilient popular member of the staff.

74 . Nona Yates. Long in the Times library and then a senior researcher in Metro and Business, she, like Tracy Thomas, provided valuable services. Unfailingly helpful. The kind of person a great institution needs.

75. Nora Zamichow. A distinctive writer of crime, military and other stories, she specialized in the long poignant, well-researched articles that used to mark the Times as a newspaper. One of the most eloquent writers in the business, with great moral sensitivity.

In closing out this series, I should also mention as great losses both Bill Boyarsky and Narda Zacchino. Both left the paper very early in the Tribune years when, after distinguished careers, they were left through bureaucratic shuffles with little to do. The Tribune Co. was never high on independent voices, and they were two of the best.

Boyarsky was an inspirational city editor. In fact, not since Bill Thomas was city editor in the 1960s do I think the City desk was any more distinguished than when Boyarsky and Tim Rutten were running it. It was their decision to pursue the Rampart scandal at the Los Angeles Police Department with major continuing coverage. But Boyarsky reached the highest point of a long professional life that had started at the Oakland Tribune (no relation to the Tribune Co.) and the Associated Press bureau in Sacramento, when he was called upon by the retired publisher, Otis Chandler, to deliver the message Chandler had prepared expressing revulsion at the regime of Mark Willes and Kathryn Downing and their roles in the Staples scandal. Though he knew this could get him into trouble, Boyarsky did not hesitate, and his reading of the Chandler letter to a crowded City Room was one of the greatest nights in the history of the paper. When Tribune overseers arrived, they ignored a University of Oregon citation to the Times staff for standing up heroically in the cause of journalistic independence in the Staples matter, and they quickly let Boyarsky know that, with the unpopular Miriam Pawel named as Metro editor, he would have little to do. Boyarsky left quietly, but has had a distinguished retirement as a teacher at USC, an author of a biography on Jesse Unruh, a member of the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission and a writer for LAObserved and Truth.dig.

Narda Zacchino held many ranking positions at the Times before being foolishly passed over for editor of the paper in 1996 and subsequently being farmed out as an editor-at-large dealing with readers. Much at the Times might have been different had Zacchino been editor under Willes instead of Michael Parks, since, I believe, she might have been able to influence Willes in more constructive directions, and the Staples scandal and subsequent sale to the evil Tribune Co. would have been unlikely to occur. Zacchino spent six years as an editor of the San Francisco Chronicle upon leaving the Times, and is now the author of a book on the death in Afghanistan of Pat Tillman, the former professional football player.

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One of the more repulsive statements of this year's presidential campaign was made against John McCain today on CBS's Face The Nation show by the retired Gen. Wesley Clark, when he denigrated McCain's military record and heroism in the Vietnam war. Clark, an ambitious man, was undoubtedly trying to curry favor with Barack Obama when he spoke with such prejudice and venom. Obama ought to cut him off at his knees.

L.A. Times Roll of Honor, Those Who Left, 51-63

2008-06-28T00:01:00.000-07:00

In this day and age, it's quite often the victims rather than the barbaric aggressors who ultimately get the most attention. That's the way it is in Darfur, in Zimbabwe, at Ground Zero in New York, and, in the corporate world at Enron, Carter Hawley Hale, and other firms that have been destroyed by skulduggery and incompetence.

The Tribune Co. is headed the same way as other failed enterprises, under the same kind of control, a loon and his band of crackpots and sleazes who think they can pare down the news offerings of their newspapers, devote a higher percentage of pages to advertising, and still retain their readership. They will get their comeuppance in short order, (the L.A. Times under the evil Tribune Co. is already down 400,000 in daily circulation) but one terrible thing about it is that their employees will lose their livelihood and be forced to find new jobs, working for hopefully more enlightened people. The other terrible thing is that a whole city and state, Los Angeles and California will lose the public service that a good newspaper provides, reining in both government and private excesses.

This week, I've been discussing some of the talented people at the L.A. Times who have already been induced to take buyouts, often in the midst of their careers, or simply been laid off. They are far better people, of course, than the skunks who got rid of them, and they are supposed to actually own the company, but they are actually at the mercy of the neanderthals. And this is not the end. Just yesterday, the Tribune toady in Los Angeles, David Hiller, spoke of new layoffs, and the editor he named, Russ Stanton, unlike his predecessors, is unresisting. Stanton entered into a Faustian compact, and now will have to live with it the rest of his life.

I've already discussed 50 of the former employees, as listed by the courageous internal Ask Zell blog. and today and tomorrow will complete the discussions of 74 I knew well in the 39 years I was at the Times. My aim is to demonstrate clearly just what Los Angeles has lost in the purges committed by the damnable Tribune Co. since it purchased the paper eight years ago. (Zell only came along last year, replacing the inept and prejudiced Dennis FitzSimons, who, as CEO, started committing mayhem against the Times).

Roll of Honor:

51. Ruth Ryon. An engaging reporter in the Real Estate section, she worked many years for Dick Turpin, a longtime real estate editor and educational writer at the Times, who will soon celebrate his 90th birthday. He was fortunate enough to retire before the axe began to fall on the better paid and/or elderly employees. Ryon was a conscientious reporter, but, like so many, she was forced out when Tribune started cutting, cutting, cutting.

52. Kevin Sack. Dean Baquet, who had known him at the New York Times and admired his work, brought him to the L.A. Times after becoming editor, to work in the Atlanta bureau. Now, he is back at the New York Times, as is Baquet. Sack, like several other Pulitzer Prize winners, was treated with disdain by the Tribune ignoramuses. Sack has won two Pulitzers. At the L.A. Times, he and Alan Miller, who as noted a couple of days ago has also left the paper, won one of them for exploring crashes by an unsafe U.S. military airplane. Now, both Baquet and Sack have been replaced by less experienced, less skilled and, not coincidentally, more poorly paid personnel.

53. Robert Salladay. One of the more competent reporters in the Sacramento bureau, he is one of several who have been ushered out, despite their valuable understanding of the faltering state government.

54. Joel Sappell. An editor in several important coverages, including the energy crisis in California that grew out of power company deregulation, he was shuffled off to the Web site when Tribune promised to improve it, only to find he had little company support for the improvements, which naturally would have entailed hiring more staff. Sappell, who would certainly have stayed with the paper for many more years, left disillusioned, and, commendably, said so. He will certainly be missed. He usually said what he thought, not a popular thing to do at the Tribune Co. In a high point of his Times career, he authored the series on Scientology with Robert Welkos.

55. Molly Selvin. An admirable editorial writer, stood always for the highest ethics and strongest principles. Unceremoniously dumped by editorial page editor Andres Martinez in a contemptible purge that also affected others, she wrote elsewhere on the paper for awhile, but then took a buyout. The kind of person who should never lose her job, and certainly not to a squalid boss like Martinez, who lost his own job later after committing sexual peccadillos.

56. Jube Shriver. A Business section reporter who was developing into a fine journalist, and earning a better salary, just the kind of person Zell and Hiller don't like.

57. Stephanie Simon. One of the stars at the L.A. Times from the time she arrived, and most recently, the Midwestern correspondent based in St. Louis. Her stories often were on Page 1, and she traveled widely on her beat. She's now with the Wall Street Journal. She concluded wisely there was not much future for talent at the L.A. Times. An exceptional person, a Yale graduate, she cannot be successfully replaced.

58. Bill Sing. As Business section editor, he improved the section within limits and was an intelligent editor. First kicked upstairs and later left. After years of loyal service, he was one of many who were mistreated.

59. Frank Sotomayor. Along with the late Frank del Olmo, he fought for years for better coverage of Latino issues at the Times, and to advance able Latino writers. Always under-appreciated, despite his educational attainments and humanity, he was eventually sent to the useful Metro Pro minority journalists program in its somewhat waning years under Tribune. I always felt badly for him, because he was able and intelligent and a fine editor to deal with. At a more reasonable place, he would have been more successful. It is the paper's loss that he was not.

60. John Spano. The brother of travel writer Susan Spano, he was an assistant Metro editor who worked hard and conscientiously. A good journeyman of the kind the Times could not afford to lose. Very careful. Maybe, his sin was he was too loyal. Loyalty is not appreciated at Tribune.

61. Bill Stall. A Pulitzer Prize winning editorial writer, after a distinguished career with the Associated Press in Sacramento and then with the Times, where he also served as political editor. Stall was terminated by the goofy editorial page editor, Andres Martinez, who, as mentioned above, ultimately lost his own job after committing sexual peccadillos. Martinez got rid of all three Pulitzer Prize winners on his editorial page staff. But Stall knows so much about state government that he still appears occasionally, and brilliantly, on the Op Ed page. His firing by Martinez was an utter disgrace, even more so because Martinez had been vying for the Pulitzer Stall actually won. It was a case of an inferior editor firing a superior writer.

62, Larry Stammer. An able reporter who undertook such thankless tasks as becoming a religion writer. Very knowledgable, he had been with the San Jose Mercury News in Sacramento before coming to the Times. He was also a skilled writer about politics. Very pleasant. Nice to have as a colleague, like so many of those who are now gone, were.

63. John Stewart. Long a copy editor on the National Desk, always interested in what was going on elsewhere in the paper. Very supportive and friendly.

All of these writers and editors, too, should be entered in the book of Tribune damnation.

Tomorrow: Rone Tempest, Wendy Thermos, Kevin Thomas, Mai Tran, Sam Howe Verhovek, Amy Wallace, Jenifer Warren. Henry Weinstein, Robert Welkos, Nona Yates, and Nora Zamichow.

--

The New York Times has a long story this morning by Jane Perlez and Pir Zubair Shah about the imminent Taliban threat to take over the major Pakistani city of Peshawar. The rise of the terrorists of Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan threatens U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan and world stability as a whole. Pakistan is a nuclear-armed state, which would have to be destroyed if its nuclear weapons fell into terrorist hands. The L.A. Times is presently ably represented in this critical theatre of the War on Terror by Laura King.

Early this morning, the Associated Press reports that Pakistani armed forces attacked the terrorists outside Peshawar. There have been many such operations, few of them successful.

--

Another day of announced layoffs in the newspaper business. The freely-distributed Palo Alto Daily News will fire six of its staff and suspend publication on Mondays. Tne San Jose Mercury News announced nine more terminations, and is now down 63% in staff overall.

L.A. Times Roll of Honor, Those Who Left, 38-50

2008-06-27T00:06:00.000-07:00

(Bulletin precede: In his latest silly, stupid message, David Hiller, the so-called publisher of the L.A. Times, begins by saying that "the company's financial picture remains very difficult" and then suggests that the L.A. Times print edition will soon take a backseat to its Web site, thus justifying further layoffs. It is a prescription for the death of the paper, sooner rather than later.
It is Hiller, Sam Zell and other executives at the squalid Tribune Co., such as the Tulare twerp who sold his soul to become editor, who are failing. Every move they make is a wrong one. Is it necessary to remove this bunch of losers to save the paper? Certainly. Any step taken to rid Los Angeles of these bums would be justified. They are fools and knaves, make no mistake.

Although Hiller didn't say so, the L.A. Times remains the greatest profit center of Tribune. Moving away from a print edition that produces 90% of the newspaper's revenue to a Web site which, contrary to Hiller's promises has not been dramatically improved and continues to attract few ads, is a prescription for further failure).

--

Another day goes by, and more idiocy from Zell and his unfriendly band of eaters of bad Chicago food. Yesterday, it was an announcement of broad new layoffs at the Hartford Courant and the Baltimore Sun. So, it is certainly appropriate to continue my series on talented L.A. Times employees whose careers have been disrupted, forced out in the years of the evil Tribune ownership.

Roll of Honor:

39. Sonia Nazario. Her saga, "Enrique's Journey," about a Honduran teenager who crosses several borders against great odds to find his mother in the U.S., won Pulitzer Prizes for both writing and photography, and is becoming an HBO mini-series. In the days of Otis Chandler, Tom Johnson and Bill Thomas, Nazario could have written her books on the job and had them published in the paper. Now, under Tribune, there's no place for such writers, and almost all have left. The Tribune toady, Hiller, proclaimed at one point an interest in having the Times appeal more to the Latino community. Then, as usual, he showed it was all bushwa, by ushering talented Latinos out the door.

40. Jim Newton. A distinguished Times city and state reporter and editor for 19 years, most recently editor of the editorial pages, he can accurately be described as fed up with Hiller, his last supervisor. Now, he has a book contract to follow up his excellent biography of Earl Warren with a book about Dwight Eisenhower. He looks forward to his departure to Abilene, Kansas, to do the research. But any decent newspaper would have fallen all over itself to give Newton reason to stay, probably by making him editor and giving him real authority. Hiller would have had to go, but that would have been just another bonus of keeping Newton.

41. Susan Okita. Any great institution has many people in less exalted positions who do a good job. Okita for much of her Times career was in the wire room, where she impressed colleagues with her brightness and glamor. Later, she became a secretary. Now, she must be brightening some other office.

42. Myrna Oliver. The late great obituary writer Burt Folkart -- my pod mate for many years -- gave her refuge as an obituary writer when she was searching for a niche, and she became a diligent and eloquent one. Universally popular, she was the kind of person you want around the office, until Tribune took control and pushed her away. She came from John Wooden's state of Indiana and had many of his conservative virtues.

43. Jonathan Peterson. A Business and Washington writer, he covered Peter Ueberroth's effort to assist South Los Angeles to recover and develop from the 1992 riots. Useful in many ways.

44. Gina Piccolo. A biology major at Towson University in Maryland, later a physical therapist, she came to Los Angeles to find her fortune in journalism, worked hard for the Times community newspapers at a small salary and later became a talented movie critic. Always improving, she was just the kind of go-getter any decent newspaper would not want to lose. But like so many, she is now elsewhere.

45. Gayle Pollard. A writer for the editorial pages, she brought sensitivity and racial diversity to the job. Contributed to the paper in many ways.

46. Jeff Rabin. Conscientious, he had the peculiar idea he was a citizen in a worthwhile enterprise. Insisted on making his views known and was not a quiet employee. Since the Tribune Co. wants quiet ones who will take whatever shit they are given without complaint, he is no longer on the staff. But the newspaper is the loser.

47. Michael Ramirez. An idiosyncratic, conservative cartoonist, he was brought to the Times as a kind of counterpoint for Paul Conrad when that great cartoonist wore out his welcome with the smaller minds that came to dominate the paper's management. Ramirez was determined to follow his own path and was not all that popular with much of the staff. But his cartoons were often interesting. Now, with his departure, the Times dishonorably doesn't have a staff cartoonist. (Conrad, like Herblock at the Washington Post, continued to do cartoons well past retirement, and they were running widely, but not in the Times).

48. Cecilia Rasmussen. Her graceful articles on Los Angeles history were a valuable extra feature of the newspaper for many years. It is the poorer for no longer having her. Pleasant and popular.

49. David Rosenzweig. He was not the best liked city editor the paper ever had. He could be prickly and he may have focused the Metro section too much on crimes. Liked too often to say no to new ideas. But he was conscientious and honest. Even after he had to step down as city editor, he wrote usefully on the local justice system. We had our differences, but he was always fair to me, and we became friends. He died last year.

50. Alissa Rubin. One of the best correspondents the newspaper ever had in Iraq, the editors insisted that she go elsewhere. Instead, she resigned and joined the New York Times as one of their Baghdad correspondents. The Times has other very talented foreign correspondents still on staff, especially Kim Murphy (who is shortly to return to the U.S.), Borzou Daragahi and Megan Stack, but losing Rubin was unnecessary and unfortunate.

Tomorrow: Ruth Ryon, Kevin Sack, Robert Salladay, Joel Sappell, Molly Selvin, Jube Shriver, Stephanie Simon, Bill Sing, Frank Sotomayor, John Spano, Bill Stall, Larry Stammer, John Stewart.

Any great paper is made up of many different types of people, with many kinds of talent. Anyone who thinks, with all these losses, that the Times hasn't been badly hurt is deluding him or herself.

This afternoon, Zell was on CNBC mouthing extreme right wing views, among them let's do nothing, he said, to stem foreclosures in the mortgage scandal. Zell sounded in this interview like a fascist. A slumlord by profession, he may belong, as Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson suggested recently, in jail.

L.A. Times Roll of Honor--Those Who Left, 27-38

2008-06-26T00:06:00.000-07:00

On a day that Sam Zell spoke of possibly selling the L.A. Times building, continuing his evil scheme of treating his largest newspaper as a poor, undeserving step child, I thought how worthwhile it was to continue honoring those talented reporters and editors whose lives have been so disrupted by the eight-year Tribune ownership.

So, here goes, with another 12 names:

Roll of Honor

27. Vernon Loeb. He came to Los Angeles at a time when investigative reporting was the Times' forte, in every expectation that he would play a decisive role as an editor supervising these projects. Instead, by the time he left, the Times had virtually abandoned that noble calling. He could have done so much. Instead, he's back East, and the paper is poorer for it.

28. Claudia Luther. Like many reporters, she had diverse assignments in her years with the Times, concluding with membership in the talented team under Jon Thurber that wrote obituaries. Some of the best obituaries in the country still run in the Times, one of the few sections of the paper that has maintained its quality under Tribune management. But she is now gone, and, just as with Loeb, the paper is poorer for it.

29. Eric Malnic. He was with the paper well over 40 years, and seemed indestructible. Whenever I would ask him how long he thought we would last, he'd always say, proudly, "We're still here." As a reporter of everything from weather stories to plane crashes, he did a sound, responsible job. As an editor, he could be somewhat draconian. Still, I always valued our friendship,, and his strong personality was much needed in the City Room. He did a great many things and did them well.

30. Tyler Marshall. He could have become foreign editor, had he wanted to. He filled a number of foreign assignments with humor and distinction. I knew him first in his role as the paper's correspondent in India, which he regarded as quite a challenge, both personal and professional. But he was tough. From India, he used to go to Afghanistan, never an easy country to cover. Later, he served in both Europe and elsewhere in Asia, before coming to the Washington bureau. After Zell is through, there may not be many foreign correspondents left at the paper. Marshall was one of the best of them.

31. Joe Mathews. He was one of John Carroll's favorites, and for good reason. The talented son of two distinguished journalists, Linda and Jay Mathews, and a former editor of the Harvard Crimson, Joe did fine work both in Los Angeles and Washington and developed an expertise on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger that meant a lot to the newspaper. Losing people like him at such a young age would be difficult for any paper. For the Times, it approaches tragedy that he, and so many like him, have had to move on.

32. Rick Meyer. When something like the Gulf War came along, and stories were coming from all over the place, Meyer sat in Los Angeles and put them together. This is a mighty important role at any paper, that of the talented rewrite man, and Meyer followed in a great Times tradition that included Art Berman and Dial Torgerson. He did many other things well, but it was in this role in times of crisis that he shined. And always he was pleasant to deal with.

33. Alan Miller. He won a Pulitzer Prize in Washington for his work on military aircraft and other systems that didn't work. Rather self-effacing, he was one of these quiet newsmen that make a paper great. Losing him is no small loss.

34. John Montorio. When I recently lamented his departure, dismissed by the new editor, Russ Stanton, someone commented on my blog that this was a highly popular initial act on Stanton's part. I don't doubt it, because Montorio was a prickly personality, often sharp and arbitrary. But under him the Calendar section flourished and Tim Rutten and Patrick Goldstein wrote valuable columns that he encouraged. If you seek his monument, look around, an author once wrote about a dictator. Montorio may have sometimes been very much the boss, but he built great sections, and their decline since he left shows what his ouster meant.

35. Solomon Moore. Like Jean Guccione and Doug Smith, for a long time, he was stuck in the San Fernando Valley suburban section, but unlike them, he was often treated there with disdain. I remember when he started writing a few insurance stories, an editor there told me he didn't know anything about insurance. Instead, it was the editor who knew nothing about insurance. Like other black reporters, he had to struggle to be assigned non-black stories. But Moore persevered, finally found his way downtown and then abroad, as a valuable correspondent in both Africa and Iraq. He became someone the paper could not easily afford to lose, but it did.

36. Dave Morgan. Charming and able, he was a vital part of producing the Sports section every day, before it was cut back by editors outside Sports who didn't understand what the section meant to the Times' reputation. Finally, unfortunately, he left for Yahoo, and the paper remains poorer for it.

37. Lorenza Munoz. The daughter of Sergio Munoz and wife of Greg Krikorian, worked hard and produced excellent stories. She was in the process of becoming extremely able. Instead, someone else will get the benefit of her talents.

38. Sergio Munoz. He came to the Times from La Opinion, and was a distinguished part of the editorial page staff. He had encyclopedic knowledge of the Latino community and Latin America, and was free and candid in expressing his opinions. He once advised me that if I took a trip from Guatemala City to Panama City, I could easily be kidnapped somewhere along the way. Any California paper in the larger community needed more Latino voices, and he was certainly one of the most astute.

Tomorrow: Sonia Nazario, Jim Newton, Susan Okita, Myrna Oliver, Jonathan Peterson, Gina Piccolo, Gayle Pollard, Jeff Rabin, Michael Ramirez, Cecilia Rasmussen, David Rosenzweig and Alissa Rubin.

I just wish there were justice in the world. Then we could split Mark Willes' severance package amongst all these great journalists, and each one would get more than $1 million.

(Contrary to what someone has written as a comment on this blog, the quote I used in the paragraph on John Montorio came from the last words of Alan Bullock's biography of Adolf Hitler. I now feel I should not have used any quote likening Montorio, a highly honorable man, to any dictator, much less Hitler. Montorio was a strong leader of many Times sections. He deserves only compliments).

--

Rising on the speculative words of two Arab thugs -- Chakib Khalil, the Algerian who heads OPEC, and Shukri Guanem, chief oil minister of Libya -- the price of oil briefly crossed the $140-a-barrel price on the world's markets today. As I've stated before, the oil producers are at war with the rest of the world, and action should be taken to cut them off at the knees.

L.A. Times Roll of Honor--Those Who Left, 13-26

2008-06-25T00:04:00.000-07:00

I'm continuing today with describing the work and distinctive contributions writers who are no longer with the L.A. Times made to that newspaper, before they were encouraged or forced to leave by the evil Tribune Co. Examined yesterday were 12 writers. Here are another 14 in a week long series.

Roll of Honor (Continued):

13. Tom Furlong. A distinguished Business section writer, he was one of those who kept the section going at times when it wasn't very brave, restricted itself to covering mostly business and not consumer issues, and, occasionally, had weak direction. A journeyman reporter of the kind good newspapers can't afford to lose.

14. Jean Guccione. She represented the occasionally excellent suburban reporters who should have been brought downtown immediately to cover news for all of Southern California. From New Orleans originally, she worked for the Daily Journal, where she became a friend and admirer of Phil Hager, long an outstanding Times writer on the courts. Her own coverage of the legal system in the San Fernando Valley and beyond was superb. I understand she is now with the Los Angeles County D.A.'s office.

15. Bob Hilburn. His incomparable writing on rock musicians was long one of the most distinctive offerings in the Calendar section. Although he sometimes still contributes, the section is not the same without him writing every week. He is one of the nicest people in the business. Is there anyone who did not appreciate his many gifts to the paper? Admired greatly by my son, David, who met him and his wife, Kathy Barr, at Dodger games we all attended. Another person who should not have been let out the door.

16. Robert Lee Hotz. A highly talented science writer, and an esteemed colleague of mine in earthquake writing. He came to my rescue on quake coverage on occasions when my amateurism would no longer do, and teamed with me on a story the day of the Northridge quake that contributed to the Times winning a Pulitzer Prize. His series on the brain, and another series on Antarctica were among many distinctive contributions to the paper. Now with the Wall Street Journal, he is one of many reporters who no sane outfit, which Tribune is not, would have allowed to escape.

17. Shawn Hubler. An able reporter and sensitive columnist, her writings were a contribution to every edition she appeared in. The supportive and understanding wife of Bob Magnuson, an editor who was promoted and promoted, until he was unceremoniously kicked off the paper. She followed him to San Francisco and for a time wrote for the Times from there.

18. Don Hunt. He served as a weekend editor on the City Desk. Conscientious and friendly, he was the kind of supervisor who was appreciated, and the kind, unlike Noel Greenwood and a few other overbearing editors I can remember, who was modest and self-effacing, yet did a fine job.

19. Evelyn Iritani. An enterprising and eclectic Business writer, she brought a thorough understanding of Asian economics at a time when China was emerging as a world power. The kind of specialist a great newspaper needs terribly.

20. Connie Kang. Her humane and understanding reporting on the Korean community, an important part of Los Angeles city life, provided coverage that no other reporter could do nearly as well. How could Tribune Co. ever let her leave? Always friendly, she lit up the City Room.

21. Daryl Kelley. A longtime Ventura County edition reporter, he was one of the most talented members of a wide ranging suburban staff at a time when the Times had a huge suburban contingent. Allowing Kelley and many other suburban reporters to drop from the Times' rolls left it a poorer paper.

22. Johnny Mike Kennedy. A talented, brave correspondent of the newspaper in Lebanon, Iraq and other dangerous Middle Eastern locales, and an able writer in the Los Angeles office, Kennedy was the supportive husband of Becky Trounson, taking a leave and writing a novel in Jerusalem while she served there as a Times correspondent. Their daughter, Merit, studied Arabic, spent a year in Cairo, has just graduated from Stanford and looks forward to a career involving the Middle East. On the night, she was admitted to Stanford, and I told John Carroll, he remarked, acidly, "That will put them into the poor house." Later, Tribune Co. insensitively accepted Kennedy's departure, in a striking demonstration of ingratitude for brave past service.

23. Greg Krikorian. Honest, sometimes bluntly so, he wrote about terrorism and gave sympathetic treatment sometimes to those accused of such crimes. He and I did not agree on the Arab-Israeli issue, but I always respected him, and felt he showed great promise for a long career with the paper. Losing him was certainly not in either the Times' or the public's interest.

24. Lennie Laguire. How could I not like her, since she was the editor who first suggested that I write a consumer column, (that lasted three years before John Carroll killed it?) She had many different jobs with the newspaper, and to my mind performed well in each. She was imaginative, pleasant, fun to work for. A strong person. Losing a talent like hers was certainly not in the paper's interest.

25. Myron Levin. A dedicated investigative reporter for the Business section, he drove the tobacco industry nuts with his probing pieces on the dread addiction of smoking. Once he was on to something, he stuck to it single mindedly. Just exactly what a great newspaper needs, and can scarcely do without. He had a hearty appreciation for just what a scoundrel Tribune owner Sam Zell was, and did not hesitate to say so when he left.

26. Simon Li. A distinguished foreign editor, he served with great ability and perseverance until health problems forced him to step aside into a less demanding senior position. Later, he was a valued supporter of the difficult (because of overbearing Tribune supervision) managing editorship of Doug Frantz. A member of a prominent Hong Kong family, he brought to the paper an understanding of foreign affairs that was without parallel. (And he was a patient man, patient enough to listen to some of my own madcap views on foreign affairs). Good health or not, he was not the kind of editor the paper can afford to do without.

All these deserve favorable mention in the book of Tribune Co. damnation.

Tomorrow: Vernon Loeb, Claudia Luther, Eric Malnic, Tyler Marshall, Joe Mathews, Rick Meyer, Alan Miller, John Montorio, Solomon Moore, Dave Morgan, Lorenza Munoz,
and Sergio Munoz.

--

The news today that Sam Zell intends to seek offers for both the property in downtown Los Angeles on which the Los Angeles Times is located, and the Tribune Tower in Chicago, appears to be part of an ongoing plot by him and his fellow-executives at Tribune to sell off the company, and raid it for return of his $315 million investment.

The columnist Harold Meyerson suggested recently in the Washington Post that Zell be jailed for life. His policies amount to a lack of exercise of proper fiduciary control. He says this is an employee-owned company, but he is raiding it and killing it, with no real consultation with employees.

--

Maureen Dowd demonstrates again today in the New York Times why she is one of the most outstanding and sensitive political writers of the year, and certainly well attuned to the almost mythic (already) candidacy of Barack Obama. Her dissection today of Karl Rove's dismissal of Obama as an elitist is one of her best.

"Rove and company are nervous, because they see that Obama, in rejecting public financing, is not going to be a chump like some other past Democratic candidates," she observes.

The criticism of her by Clark Hoyt, the overly straight "public editor," or ombudsman, of the NYT, on Sunday showed only that Hoyt has insufficient respect for great journalism, or doesn't know what it is.

L.A. Times Roll of Honor--Those Who Left , 1-12

2008-06-24T00:07:00.000-07:00

Those who have left or were forced to leave the Los Angeles Times under the evil domain of the Tribune Co. will, I believe, be heroes, as time passes, and it is realized fully just what Los Angeles and California have lost by their departures. Many of them will surely go on to other outstanding professional endeavors.

But even now, it is worth inscribing them in a roll of honor. The valuable blog, "Tell Zell," has begun the work of doing this. But in the next week or so, I propose to continue doing so -- with a description of the work and distinctive contributions of about 75 of those who no longer are working at the Times.

Please pardon me for mistaken omissions. Some I do not know as well as others. Others I may not properly appreciate. I may add to those named later, and I hope, as I'm told, of their new jobs, to be able to list some of these new endeavors as well.

In the interest of keeping the individual blogs as brief as possible, I will discuss 12 former staffers a day, until I have gone through my list. Other daily developments will be added each day at the bottom of these blogs, or, if major developments occur, I may write two blogs a day, we'll see.

Roll of Honor

1--Alan Abrahamson. He covered the Melendez trial and later became Olympic correspondent for the Sports section, developing a reputation as one of the foremost writers in the world about the Olympic movement. He is now with NBC Sports, preparing for coverage of the Beijing Olympics. The Times Sports section is much poorer as a result of his absence.

2--Ricardo Alonso Zaldivar. He was an ever-improving reporter in the Times beleaguered Washington bureau, often covering airline disasters. Also, he was one of many minority reporters who unwisely have been allowed to depart, reducing the newspaper's diversity and depriving Californians of their wisdom.

3--John Balzar. One of the paper's most talented writers on a whole variety of subjects from politics to Alaska dog races to East Africa and the Rwandan genocide. A columnist and onetime U.S. Marine who warned presciently that we ought not to be too quick to invade Iraq. The loss of just one such reporter would be a calamity for the paper. Unfortunately, there have been many such calamities.

4--Dean Baquet. A courageous editor fired by that prime jackass, David Hiller, for defying Tribune plans to cut back both the staff and its quality. He coordinated many Pulitzer Prize-winning projects, and from his new post as Washington bureau chief of the New York Times, he has not hesitated to continue to speak out against the Tribune Co. and all the fools who lead it. He was my "Journalist of the Year" for 2006.

5--Glenn Bunting. A valuable investigative reporter for the paper, both in Los Angeles and Washington. Without such investigative journalists, the Times is no longer the great paper it once was.

6--Ed Chen. A tremendous asset to the Washington bureau in a variety of assignments, including the White House and presidential travel. Chen was born in Nanking, China, and was unusually sensitive, as one might expect, to the tyrannies of both Japan and China that laid waste to the rights of millions and were responsible for millions of deaths. Anyone who would let an Ed Chen go should be condemned unreservedly.

7--Janet Clayton. An outstanding reporter of city government, editorial pages editor and metro editor, she was, I am told, shoveled out the door in a bureaucratic maneuver of the kind so loved by the Tribune fools. She was replaced by a far more timid leadership, not nearly as able as she was and is.

8--Frank Clifford. A dedicated reporter and then farseeing environmental editor, he was so conscientious in his work that he wore himself to a frazzle. A Yale graduate and member of one of that elite school's Secret Societies, he also authored an excellent book on the West. To cut a career like his short stamps the Tribune executives as not only fools, but damned fools.

9--Mary Cox. A perceptive letters editor for the editorial pages, she worked hard to run a distinctive set of letters each day. One of many who seems to have fallen victim to the purges that marked the editorial pages under the unlamented leadership of Michael Kinsley and Andres Martinez, she left a void in the selection of letters that has not been filled.

10--Elaine Dutka. A writer for the old View section and later Calendar, she was an able writer and a friend and supporter during his illness of the late Art Berman, View editor. I did not know her as well as many others, but her absence has left Calendar less than it once was.

11--Sam Enriquez. An understanding city editor, an able and courageous Mexico City correspondent, he was one of many Latino members of the staff which any newspaper could ill-afford to lose. In Mexico, a most difficult place to cover, he did the kind of job which marked him as an outstanding reporter of the future. His Times career was unfortunately cut short.

12--Doug Frantz. Managing editor, he was left out to dry by the Tribune implant as editor, Jim O'Shea, who was finally himself fired by Hiller. Frantz is now at Conde Nast, but he continues his invaluable work on the threat of nuclear proliferation. Strong minded and fair, he was one of the losses the Times could least afford, and he was treated miserably by Tribune.

Tomorrow: Tom Furlong, Jean Guccione, Bob Hilburn, Robert Lee Hotz, Shawn Hubler, Don Hunt, Evelyn Iritani, Connie Kang, Daryl Kelley, Mike Kennedy, Greg Krikorian, Lennie Laguire, Myron Levin, and Simon Li.

Let the loss of all these wonderful writers and editors be laid at the door of the Tribune Co. May they be added to the book of its damnation.

--

The dramatic events in Zimbabwe, where a popular vote is being reversed by a bloody dictator, Robert Mugabe, were, appropriately, the subject of the lead article in the New York Times today, but rated only a reefer off Page 1 in the L.A. Times. It was yet another sign of the Times' loss of world view under a management dedicated to reducing the newspaper's foreign coverage.

Mugabe Government in Zimbabwe Illegitimate

2008-06-23T08:11:00.000-07:00

Word today that Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the opposition in Zimbabwe, has taken refuge in the Dutch Embassy in the capital of Harare introduces a new stage in the struggle to restore democratic government in the African nation next to South Africa.

The Dutch and other Western nations, including the U.S. and Britain, are now obliged to safeguard Tsvangirai and grant refuge to other members of the opposition who are being victimized by the dictatorship of Robert Mugabe.

After calling a runoff election for the 27th of this month on the very possibly spurious grounds that Tsvangirai did not win a majority of the first votes cast, Mugabe has now vowed that, regardless of the results of the runoff election, he will not allow himself to be deposed. Instead, he has sent military, police and simple thugs associated with the government to arrest, beat and even sometimes murder members of the opposition. At least 85 deaths have been reported, as well as thousands of injuries and the arrest of the chief strategist of Tsvangirai's party, the Movement for Democratic Change, on bogus treason charges.

Just the day before going to the Dutch Embassy, Tsvangirai had withdrawn from the runoff election, declaring that attacks against his followers made it unsafe for them to go to the polls.

Members of the British and American embassy staffs seeking to check on the government actions have been forcibly detained as well for brief periods.

Mugabe, 84, has emerged as the head of a criminal cabal that has wrecked the Zimbabwean economy and sent thousands of refugees fleeing into South Africa, where some have been subject to attack there by xenophobic mobs.

It is clear now that Mugabe and his minions should be removed and new elections called under international supervision to install a government desired by the people of Zimbabwe. It would be most proper for South Africa to undertake to do this, subject to a possible call by the UN Security Council. Western nations should give all necessary aid, if called upon. So far, the South African government has given far too much comfort and support to Mugabe, although in April South African courts ordered a Chinese shipment of arms to Magabe halted at the South African port of Durban.

The world should not stand by when such thuggery as taking place in Zimbabwe occurs. It is now obvious that the government should be taken down and a new one elected.

As is becoming depressingly common, the L.A. Times Web site was not reporting on its main page this afternoon the important developments in Zimbabwe. The Web site is following the yokels in Chicago and the L.A. Times editor, the Tulare twerp, in downplaying foreign news.

--

Kevin Roderick continues his excellent job of reporting what can only be termed a crisis at the L.A. Times and other Tribune newspapers. Today, he reports that the Times' great local columnist, Steve Lopez, was highly critical of Sam Zell, the Tribune Co., owner, at a Press Club dinner in Los Angeles last week.

Also, Roderick runs a long, stupid memo on the Orlando Sentinel "redesign" from Lee Abrams, a Tribune executive who has the title of Innovation Editor. It is clear from this that Abrams has little idea of what pleases most readers of newspapers. The one piece of good news, however, is that other Tribune papers will not necessarily be forced to follow the Orlando design.

Meanwhile, the New York Times' media writer, Richard Perez-Pena, has a report in the NYT Business section today that 2008 is shaping up as the worst year ever for ad revenues at newspapers. He says declines of 12% or more compared to last year threaten the survival of some newspapers and the solvency of their companies. Declines in ad revenue ran to 15% in the month of May. No figures are given for Tribune, which has in the past reported among the worst record of declines in business, a situation which has only intensified under Zell.

Agonizing Wait For New Tribune Fuck-Ups At LAT

2008-06-22T11:16:00.000-07:00

The evil Tribune Co. has never been up to running a newspaper in a world class city like Los Angeles, and now we may have come to another downward turning point in the sordid eight-year history of Tribune ownership of the L.A. Times.

At least, that is the feeling at what we fondly remember as Times-Mirror Square in the wake of closed door meetings held there last week by Randy Michaels, the newest executive named by Tribune to oversee matters as CEO.

Dennis FitzSimons is gone. Scott Smith is gone, and now it is up to Michaels to prove once and for all that Sam Zell and the new management have no idea what it is doing in L.A. New layoffs, and a foolish "redesign" dumbing down the paper would normally be expected.

Or NOT. It is always possible that the Tribune Co. may wake up and smell the roses, realizing that investment in the future of Tribune's largest newspaper is in order. (That would include fully maintaining its network of foreign and national news bureaus).

There were indeed rumors in Los Angeles last week that David Hiller, the Tribune toady sent out here as publisher in 2006, would be removed, and, perhaps as a sign of this, it was reported that Hiller's unethical move to take the L.A. Times magazine out from under the control of editorial has now been scrapped, and, for now, there will be no magazine and therefore no dispute over its control. This would be a little like killing the dog, so it could be mounted, but a new magazine dominated by advertisers would be worse than a dead dog.

A change in Tribune prospects could mean a vote of no confidence in Hiller, and, if so, could mean a start by him on a new phase in his life. I think he might be qualified to pick up the remains of the Montana cabin once owned by the Unibomber, that is if he would agree to take five years doing it.

Probably, a new publisher would mean a delay in the dreaded "redesign," which has already afflicted, and gone a long way to ruining the Orlando Sentinel, another paper victimized by the mismanagement of the Tribune Co.

Amother publisher would possibly want yet another editor than the nonentity chosen by Hiller. In the meantime, perhaps layoffs would be put off long enough to see a turnaround in bad times in the newspaper business.

So, I am perfectly willing to wait to see how it works out. We can hope for the best, even if we expect the worst from a company which has proved a fountain of ineptitude now for eight long years.

--

Clark Hoyt, the often mistaken "Public Editor" at the New York Times, proves once again this morning that he doesn't know good journalism when he sees it, with an unmannerly assault on one of the most distinguished Times writers on the 2008 election campaign -- columnist Maureen Dowd.

Dowd was rivaled only by columnist Frank Rich in detailing what an unsatisfactory candidate for president Hillary Clinton was, before she was vanquished by Barack Obama in the race for the Democratic nomination.

Now, Hoyt says that Dowd -- in my book, a candidate for Journalist of the Year -- was "over the top" in her coverage of Clinton with all her many warts, including tones reminiscent of Deep South racism.

Hoyt might consider transferring to the Tribune Co. executive, where bad journalism is so often appreciated. As for Dowd, her latest column was number two in readership on the New York Times Web site in recent days, and she frequently is the best read on the Web site. At a time when even the New York Times is losing readers, it can hardly afford to smear one of its columnists who is a leader in attracting readers.

The Shady Calderon Family In The Legislature

2008-06-21T10:14:00.000-07:00

David Lazarus, the consumer columnist in the L.A. Times, had a fairly good column in Wednesday's Business section about how state Sen. Ron Calderon had taken $80,000 in drug industry contributions and then introduced sleazy legislation that would allow the drug companies to share private individuals' prescription records with mass mailers.

The bill is thankfully dead for now, failing to get support in the pertinent legislative committee. But hold your breath -- such bills have a bad habit of being resurrected in the waning hours of a legislative session when so much is going on in the rush to get out of Sacramento that no one is paying attention.

The Calderon bill would have given individuals a right to opt out of such disclosures of private information about their personal habits. But since most people don't follow what is going on very closely and won't take the time to opt out if they know what is happening, an "opt out" provision provides scant protection to the public. Lazarus does a good job of showing this.

But I nonetheless found the Lazarus column lacking in one important particular. It did not mention that Ron Calderon is the younger sibling of Charles M. Calderon and Thomas Calderon, who served in the Legislature earlier. In fact, there has been a Calderon in the Legislature from essentially the same East Side area around Montebello since 1982.

Name identification, and heavy lobbyist contributions, have been responsible for putting one Calderon after another into the Legislature, where each have served special interests, not the public interest.

To put a rude word on the record of all three brothers, they are dishonest. They are in politics for one reason, and that is to feather their own pockets with cash from the insurance and other industries. It is a sordid story that now goes back more than a quarter century. But the weak Sacramento press corps has scarcely ever examined the depredations of this lowlife family.

I once had a clash as a reporter with Steve Peace, a San Diego state senator at the time, over some lobbyist-serving legislation he was introducing. On a back stair of the capitol, I told Peace I thought he was a crook. "How can you say that?" he demanded. "I know one when I see one," I responded.

This did not quite match the time I suggested to then-State Sen. Alan Robbins that (this was before term limits) he could "afford to go straight," because he had made a lot of money in private real estate and, in any case, he would be in the Legislature for life.

"I'm considering it," Robbins replied. But he wasn't considering it enough, or soon enough, because a few months later Robbins was indicted and later convicted of taking bribes. He served a term in the federal prison in Lompoc.

I well remember the time Robbins told me with tears in his eyes that he faced a prison term. He could easily have implicated manyh others, but he did not.

The Calderons, so far, have been luckier. Federal prosecutors have not been so diligent with them. Yet one Calderon after another has been a tool in the hands of unsavory interests, and Charles Calderon, if memory serves me, walked out of Sacramento with thousands of dollars in campaign contributions in his pocket. He wisely would not meet with me for an interview about it.

I once drove the late Ernest Debs, a Los Angeles County supervisor, out of public office after a long career by showing the special interest money he was getting persistently, and by quoting the then-mayor of Beverly Hills, the late Jake Stuchen, as saying Debs solicited a bribe to keep a high rise building from being built in West Hollywood that would have cast a shadow on certain private homes in Beverly Hills.

The reports induced then-Los Angeles City Councilman Ed Edelman to jump into a contest against Debs, and when Debs saw Edelman coming, and my heavy coverage of the race, he decided to retire, citing his health. "I want to live," Debs declared, and then he did go on living, until he finally died at age 98. He too took a large amount of campaign contributions into private life.

It was possible to get rid of Debs, because county supervisor is a more visible position than state legislator, and once he had well known opposition, Debs was a sitting duck, (although, I might add, it is rare that any serious opponent arises to a sitting supervisor either).

But with the Calderons, they seem to go on and on, and nobody, certainly not in the press corps, pays sufficient attention.

N.Y. Times Reports Israelis Practiced Iran Attack

2008-06-20T01:54:00.000-07:00

While the Los Angeles Times descends toward mediocrity, the New York Times continues its long tradition of reporting news that no one else is reporting, and the news it reports this morning may be momentous indeed.

The story by the newspaper's chief military correspondent, Michael R. Gordon, and a frequent national security reporter, Eric Schmitt, says that earlier this month the Israeli Air Force carried out an exercise of more than 100 F-15 and F-16 fighter-bombers and a number of rescue helicopters and refueling tankers over the Eastern Mediterranean and Greece that is seen as a possible practice for a long-range strike against Iranian nuclear facilities.

The story carefully says the exercise does not necessarily mean such a strike will take place, or that it is imminent.

But nonetheless, Gordon and Schmitt write that the Israelis are sending signals to America and Europe that Israel may be prepared to strike unless Iranian nuclear development is foreclosed. Efforts by the U.S. and European powers to do this have so far been unsuccessful.

The story also says that Iran is taking precautions against an Israeli attack, increasing air patrols and initiating moves that could result in a new anti-missile capability to shoot down low-flying aircraft. This could affect the timing of an Israeli attack, they note.

Just two days ago, this blog speculated about the possibility of an "October surprise" that could affect the November election in the United States. Although the speculation dealt mainly with the possibility of a new terrorist strike, it also mentioned the possibility of an Israeli strike against Iran.

It is unlikely that the Israelis would undertake such an operation without notifying the United States first. This was certainly the case last year when Israeli bombers, backed by commandos, destroyed a suspected North Korean nuclear site in Syria near the Iraqi border.

What would the Bush Administration's attitude be toward such an attack? The Gordon-Schmitt story says little on this point.

We live in a dangerous world, that is certain. But recent developments closer to Israel have brought hope of a truce in the conflict between Hamas and Israel in the Gaza Strip, and there have also been some reports of a lessening of tension in Lebanon.

Still, Iran is the "big enchilada" in Middle Eastern affairs, even bigger than Iraq.

The New York Times story will be followed by others. It can only serve to ratchet up tensions between Iran and Israel, not to mention the West.

Also, this morning there is a New York Times column by David Brooks examining closely the nature of the Barack Obama presidential candidacy. Brooks has long been sympathetic to the candidacy of John McCain. But I think his critical column about Obama today deserves to get attention.

I agree with Brooks that Obama is not the liberal that George McGovern, Michael Dukakis and John Kerry were as Democratic candidates. That is one reason why he will probably win. He has changed his mind about running on his own resources, rather than public financing. This is not an unethical decision in my view. He has changed his mind, and is showing savoir faire. We need a president who knows how to get things done.

But an Obama victory would not by any means signify an end to the crisis in the Middle East.

The Brooks column may be the best thing written about Obama all year. Let me quote the last two paragraphs:

"I have to admit, I'm ambivalent watching all this. On the one hand, Obama did sell out the primary cause of his professional life (in renouncing public financing), all for a tiny political advantage. If he'll sell that out, what won't he sell out? On the other hand, global affairs ain't beanbag. If we're going to have a president who's going to go toe to toe with the likes of Vladimir Putin, maybe it's better that he should have a ruthlessly opportunist Fast Eddie Obama lurking inside.

"All I know for sure is that this guy is no liberal goo-goo. Republicans keep calling him naive. But naive is the last word I'd use to describe Barack Obama. He's the most effectively political creature we've seen in decades. Even Bill Clinton wasn't smart enough to succeed in politics by renouncing politics."

Obama isn't the "man of the hour" yet. But I think he will be on Nov. 4. (That's me, summing it up).

--

Going through back issues of Time magazine after my recent African trips, I came across an article in the March 3 issue by managing editor Richard Stengel saying newspapers should not endorse candidates for president, because it shows bias. This is another of those nonsensical articles we see too often from journalists.

Ed Guthman, the retired editorial page editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer, once said that editorial endorsements "show the soul of the newspaper." He has it right. The First Amendment has an incomplete meaning. if newspapers do not endorse.

Stengel's opinion is an early bid for my "Mistaken Journalist of the Year" award in 2008. The L.A. Times endorsements of Obama and McCain for their respective party nominations was one of the best things the paper did this year. Readers, on the other hand, should be sophisticated enough to draw distinctions between editorial page and news page policies.

McCain Finds Issues, Oil Drilling And Atomic Power

2008-06-19T07:13:00.000-07:00

It must be frustrating for the McCain campaign to find issues that have traction against Barack Obama. There's been some sign recently of flailing around, as Obama has built up a lead in the polls, both nationwide and in key states. John McCain's campaign is finding what Hillary Clinton did: It is hard to run against Obama. Just yesterday, Mike Huckabee warned against "demonizing" him.

One reason it is difficult is that Obama comes across more as an idealist, inspirational and non-partisan, than the ultra-liberal the Republicans try to portray him as. He is no George McGovern, Mike Dukakis or John Kerry. He is much more competitive, and national opinion has shifted against the Republicans on key issues.

But this week, McCain has shown signs of getting onto his feet on the key issue of energy.

Both his proposals to allow oil drilling off America's coasts, and, especially, to build 45 nuclear plants by 2030 could easily in the present environment of skyrocketing gasoline prices find a lot of support. Also, there is new talk about developing the very substantial oil shales in North Dakota and Montana, just as the Canadians have their oil shales in Alberta. These are more costly than producing Middle Eastern oil, but with the present high prices are certainly feasible.

So far, Obama has opposed drilling, and has kind of fuzzed up nuclear power, arguing it might be a viable option to coal-fired plants. Might he alter these positions, if it becomes advantageous? Might even the L.A. Times get off its high energy horse and do the same? (The New York Times, under bullheaded editorial pages editor Andrew Rosenthal, never gets off its high horse).

For every languishing candidate, and the McCain campaign in recent weeks has certainly been languishing, it is essential to grab onto some issue that has legs. With Ronald Reagan in the 1976 primaries against Gerald Ford, it was the Panama Canal issue, the safeguarding of U.S. rights over the Canal. Ultimately, this was lost, but Reagan won with it in a whole string of Western and Southern primaries, and came close to upsetting Ford that year after a poor start. I remember that Nancy Reagan helped come up with that issue.

Energy in 2008 is one of the few issues developed thus far that seems to work for the Republicans. Already, there have been popular shifts on oil drilling, and, nuclear power is gaining support in Europe, and is bound to here as well.

Does it matter much that both would take a comparatively long time to bring on line? Not really, since it is important that we get to working on something that eventually will come to fruition. The trouble with the liberal, environmentalist position is that it calls for little except conservation, and conservation alone won't cut it.

It reminds one of General Lyautey, the French military chief in Morocco, once suggesting that a certain tree be planted in great numbers. A servant told him that the tree would not bloom for 100 years. "Then, start planting this afternoon," Lyautey replied. "We have no time to lose."

In contrast to energy, certain other issues have been doing the Republicans more harm than good. Chief among these recently as been the tasteless assaults on Michelle Obama, just repeated again this morning by Cindy McCain, wife of McCain.

The trouble with this is that polls show Michelle is quite a bit better liked than Cindy -- 48% to 39% in one survey. Cindy McCain is chiefly known as the millionairess who owns a beer producing company.

The criticisms of Michelle are basically the kind of indirect racial arguments that the Clintons tried and failed to use against Obama in the primaries. It has been postulated that some bigoted Americans have more trouble with seeing a black woman as First Lady than a black man as president.

This is hooey. For one thing, it is obvious already that Michelle Obama would be a far more polished, socially acceptable First Lady than Cindy McCain. And her children are certainly cuter.

We're going to hear a lot of this kind of thing -- trashy arguments -- between now and election day. McCain would be better served to use his energy arguments.

--

Obama announced today that he will not be using federal funds in the fall. This was not unexpected, since Obama has raised so much money he will be far better able to fight the fall campaign with his own resources than the public's. This way, as Time's Mark Halperin points out today, Obama may be able to spend $15 million in Texas, possibly forcing McCain to give up on the state. Obama should not have pledged earlier to use federal funds, but at the time he did, he had no idea he would be so primed with money.

In 2008 Vote, Will There Be An October Surprise?

2008-06-18T01:35:00.000-07:00

(Bulletin Precede: The Quinnipiac University poll this morning shows Barack Obama ahead of John McCain in three key states -- Florida, 47% to 43%, Ohio, 48% to 42% and Pennsylvania, 52% to 40%. There's got to be a lot of Hillary votes in there).

So far, there has been little talk, unlike past election years, about an "October surprise," something happening like a terrorist attack, that could have a major effect on the American election.

Yet, I don't think this can be ruled out. We see in Iraq and Afghanistan, just in the past week, with a bombing that killed 50 Shiites in Baghdad, and a prison escape that freed hundreds outside Kandahar, that the U.S. still has Islamic enemies capable of brutal conduct. Who is to say that, just as in the Spanish train bombings, or the London subway bombings, there won't be an attempt by terrorists to take some pre-election action that would have a dramatic effect on domestic politics.

Another possibility, probably not as great, is that the Israelis, or even the Bush Administration, would attack Iranian nuclear facilities before the election, sparking off a wider Middle Eastern conflict. Or that the North Korean nuclear program, which has not been shut down, may create a crisis.

It may seem that a threat to U.S. security would inevitably benefit the presidential candidacy of Sen. John McCain. Already, he is trying to make the security argument against Sen. Barack Obama, and it might seem that any step-up in tensions in the world would aid McCain in making that argument.

Yet in Spain, the train bombings of 2004 which killed 191 persons in and near Madrid, actually had the consequence of moving the country to the left. The conservatives were ousted from power just days later and replaced by the socialists, which are still in power. Part of the reason for this was that the conservative incumbents mishandled the situation, blaming the attacks initially on Basque separatists, when it quickly became much more likely that they were Islamic in origin. Also, like the American people today, the Spanish electorate was very tired of what Spanish intervention there was in foreign countries, and it was anxious to use any excuse "to bring the troops home."

So, I think it has to be said, out of caution, that we cannot say for certain that an attack in October would benefit McCain. It would depend perhaps how it unfolded.

Already, it is clear that Obama has, to some extent, moved toward the center on security questions. Just yesterday, he flared up when the Republicans suggested he might be soft on terrorism. He has announced the intent of visiting Iraq and Afghanistan before the election, and he might well select a foreign policy expert, like former Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia, as his vice presidential running mate, with the point of view, in part, of insulating himself against suggestions he is too inexperienced in foreign affairs.

What is the intent of the enemy? I'm not at all sure we understand it. Americans have been more or less expecting a new terrorist attack since 2001, but with the exception of some abortive attacks, such as the alleged attempted bombings of planes crossing the Atlantic, nothing has actually happened.

Indeed, just this week, there is new talk of a cease fire in Gaza between the Israelis and Hamas that would last six months. In the Middle East, that would put us past the election, and it is felt in many quarters that the Israeli-Arab conflict is one of the great exacerbents of extreme Islamic feeling.

We don't know. Something could happen. But, then again, perhaps it won't. Sam Zell may be more likely to upset the American psyche than Osama bin Laden in the near term.

Is Zell Redesign A Plot To Destroy His Newspapers?

2008-06-17T04:46:00.000-07:00

After all, Sam Zell is a slumlord, not a newspaperman. And the more I read about his plan to "redesign" his newspapers, beginning with the Tribune Co.'s outlet in Orlando June 22, the more I suspect that his real design is to ruin his papers and then sell off the lucrative property they occupy.

Fanciful? I think not. Zell only put $315 million of his own money into buying Tribune Co. And he could easily make quite a profit, if he were just to sell the property, much of which, such as the L.A. Times and Chicago Tribune, is located on prime downtown land.

Who would be left holding the bag? Why, the employees, of course, either before or after the inevitable layoffs. It is their stock money that is really at stake, and, the Lord knows, he, Randy Michaels, and, at the Times, publisher David Hiller and editor Russ Stanton, won't care about that stake. They will still have their golden parachutes. Their concern for their employees is zero.

The L.A. Times employees? They will go the way of the unfortunates who worked for Carter Hawley Hale.

Ken Roderick at LA Observed, and many other commentators, including just last week Harold Meyerson, now of the Washington Post, have been very precisely laying out just what the "redesigns" will bring: a precipitate decline in both circulation and advertising revenues as the readers realize that the papers have been "dumbed down," scores of pages of news removed to satisfy the 50-50 ad-news ratio dictated by Zell, and foreign and national news most sharply cut back. This in metropolitan centers that crave such news. A mockup of the Orlando Sentinel is out today; nobody in Los Angeles would want to read such a paper.

Tribune Co. is not the only newspaper publisher in trouble. McClatchy, its advertising revenue down 16% in May, announced an average 10% layoff at its papers this week. That means a loss of 1,400 workers, on top of 2,000 lost already. But Tribune is a less successful company than most. It is falling apart, actually.

Zell and Tribune Co. may be evil, but they are not stupid. They know that soon there won't be much of any of the Tribune papers left. The papers' reputation will sink into the toilet, and all that will really remain will be the land they sit on.

So, as Stephen Vincent Benet wrote in 'John Brown's Body,' his book-length, narrative Pulitzer Prize-winning poem on the Civil War, "This is the last, this is the last, the last of the wine and the white corn meal, the last high fiddle singing the reel, the last of the silk with the Paris label..."

The L.A. Times had some fine articles over the weekend -- Ken Weiss' forboding piece on the diseased salmon in the Yukon River, Tim Rutten's and Matea Gold's articles on NBC's Tim Russert, Steve Lopez's health column, and so forth.

But pretty soon, these will either disappear or be much diminished. After all, Sam Zell is in charge.

Rutten's retrospective on Russert, by the way, reminded one of the much better columnist Rutten used to be, before he was enticed away from Calendar and his media columns and onto the Op Ed page, where he has been mishandled, as most of the columnists are, by Nick Goldberg. Calendar was his home turf, and it was a mistake to give it up. But then, Stanton, in his supreme foolishness, also got rid of editor John Montorio too, so all of Calendar is much diminished. (Rutten, by the way, is announced today as the winner of this week's Hubert Humphrey $10,000 prize for his articles defending the First Amendment).

Can anything stop Zell now? I'm tempted to say, only if he chokes on some of the bad Chicago food he eats. This man is a car wreck, zooming out of control. But he will still come out of it with his $315 million investment and then some.

A Racist E-Mail On Obama Awaits Me At Home

2008-06-16T07:45:00.000-07:00

Already, it seems, the hopes that an election contest between Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama would be a high-minded debate of such issues as Iraq, the economy and global warming is giving way to racial stereotypes against Obama.

I arrived home late last night from my college reunion trip to Boston only to find a shocking e-mail from a friend, saying it might be worth consideration. It was a combination of every possible attack racially against Obama and his wife, Michelle, focusing first on whether he was a legitimate child and going down from there.

It is, I think, a matter of hope for America that Obama is a biracial candidate. But whoever the lowlife was who wrote this e-mail could only remember that at the time they married, Obama's parents were defying the miscegenation laws of half the states of the Union (but not, of course, Hawaii, where they married).

Are the voters of the USA going to let this hopeful election be dragged down into a cesspool, because that's what scurrilous messages on the Internet are doing. Is McCain going to allow his character to be sullied by not speaking out against such attacks?

I'm sorry to have to call the frequently enlightened woman who forwarded me the e-mail a friend, but the fact is she has been one since 1957. I sent her a message asking her not to forward me trash.

This came just a short time after another friend of long standing told me over lunch that America would never elect a black man to the presidency. This man calls himself a liberal.

Yet, you know what, Obama and his well-organized campaign continue to make their points in a rational way as if they actually expect him to be elected, as I do.

Our bet is that America has changed, and can rise above the bloody past of slavery and segregation to elect a man who towers intellectually over his opponent, and promises a new policy of less divisiveness at home.

Just who his parents were, and how they came to be married, is hardly worth discussing against those considerations.

--

The news comes from Salt Lake City that the Deseret News is selling property to the Mormon church, or transferring it, since the church already owns it, for $3 million, so it can fund employee layoffs.

At the L.A. Times, by contrast, the forthcoming layoffs won't cost owner Sam Zell much, because he has already vowed to reduce the scope of the severance packages.

At the weekend reunion, the wife of one of my classmates from Chicago told me she has found Zell's wife to be quite a bit more civilized than he is, and also knows, and admires, Michelle Obama.

Boston A Great Place To View History

2008-06-15T05:24:00.000-07:00

Written from Boston, Mass.

One dividend certainly of having gone East to college is that you keep coming back to class reunions during the pleasant summertime in New England. Here in the "cradle" of the American Revolution" for four days of celebrating my Dartmouth class's 70th birthdays this year, we've been lucky with the weather, until this morning, when it was drizzling.

A heatwave dissipated the day before we arrived, and the 108 members of the class who showed up here have had a splendid time -- a clambake, a gala dinner at Symphony Hall, the Boston Pops and breakfast and a panel discussion on presidential elections at Fanueil Hall, where the heroes of the revolutio0n once spoke. This time, it's me and Bob Hager, formerly of NBC News, on the podium.

Under the Boston 'Go' Card, we could travel as far as Lexington and Concord, where the first clashes of the Revolutionary War took place, as well as to see Boston's many monuments and museums, the Boston Green, the old North Church, USS Constitution, Bunker Hill, Harvard University, take boat tours in Boston Harbor and the Charles River, and even as far as Provincetown on Cape Cod, Plymouth Rock, Salem and Gloucester.

We stayed at a festive hotel, the Mariott Long Wharf on the harbor, with trolley tours and boat tours just out the front door. Our heavy drinking days are over -- this time, to hold down collective costs, it was a no-host bar throughout the weekend.

And a branch of one of my favorite restaurants -- Legal Sea Foods, was also right out the door. Its raw Little Neck, Cherrystone and fried clams are not to be missed. Even its key lime pie seemed authentic.

From Logan Airport, you can reach the hotel and this entire historic sector by water taxi for $10 one way or $17 a roundtrip.

We had our clambake, featuring steamers, huge lobsters and corn on the cob, blueberry and apple pie, at an Outward Bound facility on Thompson Island, a 15-minute boat ride.

This entire event cost each person about $1,100, including the hotel, and was arranged by two classmates, Dick Foley and Eugene Kohn. We also held a class meeting, and even a moment of remembrance for six classmates and two wives who have died since we last met, in Hanover, N.H., last October. (Dartmouth was not a Co-Ed school when we went there, although it has been since 1972).

Prices for travel have gone up. In the panel on presidential campaigns, I recalled that in six months of covering Sen. Eugene McCarthy in 1968, in 35 states, the most I ever spent for a night's hotel was at the St. Regis in New York City, $34 a night. That got a big laugh.

Actually, I think Boston, like Washington, San Francisco, New York and New Orleans, are the places to come in visiting American cities. Certainly not Sam Zell's Chicago.

Just dashing off for another event.

--

Getting back to Los Angeles late Sunday, and well after the Lakers defeated the Boston Celtics in the 5th game of the NBA championships, sending the series back to Boston, I notice that the L.A. Times Web site doesn't clearly have the game on Page 1. This contrasts with the Boston Globe leading its paper today with the Celtics.

This is more Hiller Horseshit. He promised a better Web site, and he hasn't delivered one. Oner problem is, they don't work hard, or very late. In the meantime, it was clear, talking to my classmates, the L.A. Times under Sam Zell, David Hiller and Co. is a laughing stock.

Airline Service Continues to Deteriorate Sharply

2008-06-14T09:12:00.000-07:00

Written from Boston, Mass.--

As I flew east Thursday on a United Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Boston to attend a college reunion, I asked United attendants what they thought would become of the airline industry 15 years from now.

"Only the rich will be able to afford to fly," answered one of them. "Air travel for ordinary citizens will be a thing of the past."

Of course, that depends on the price of oil. Maybe if M. King Hubbert and his "oil peaking" theories are correct, no one will be flying all that much, because, he said, by 2020 world oil production would fall drastically, and our way of life would change.

No sooner did I arrive in Boston, but I read that on the way back Sunday, United will be charging $15 for the first piece of baggage checked, and that U.S. Air will soon begin charging passengers $2 for either soft drinks or bottled water. The obnoxious American Airlines pioneered the charge for the first piece of luggage.

As a New York Times article speculated yesterday, it won't be long before at least the coach class passenger is charged for going to the toilet.

Or, as someone suggested at dinner last night, they will begin to charge $5 when, in an emergency, oxygen drops from above your seat, and you will die if you don't have the right change.

Airline service, at least in the U.S., is getting so awful that in California I take the train, and, if I have the time, I even take the train sometimes across the country. It is more expensive, but it isn't personally insulting, and they still serve food.

Among the worst carriers these days are United and American. Yet many of these personnel still try to be as pleasant and helpful as they can, even when their salaries are cut -- yet again.

It is a mess, and public resentment is growing. A lady told me recently that she hates going to the airport. "Every time I have to remove my shoes," she said, "I get angry again at the terrorists."

Coming home from Europe recently, I flew Lufthansa, where the service is still good. I wonder why the Europeans cope so much better than we do in these hard times.

--

Tim Russert, Washington bureau chief for NBC News, and a frequently blunt commentator on both NBC and MSNBC on national politics, is dead of a sudden heart attack Friday afternoon He was only 58. Both the coverage on many networks has been massive and totally laudatory. Scarcely any politician would be treated with as much respect.

Russert who was also moderator of the long running Sunday interview show, Meet the Press, was popular also because of his book about hiw working class father, who survives him, his Irish ethnicity and his sports enthusiasms (the Buffalo Bills) among other attributes.

But it was his willingness to say clearly what he thought was happening, more clearly than the other commentators, which made him a hero to many. In this fascinating political year, he will be especially missed.

Boyarsky Says Lobbyists Have The Real Power

2008-06-13T07:04:00.000-07:00

Writtern from Boston, Mass. --

Probably the most significant observation in the L.A. Times yesterday was a one-paragraph report of what former Times metro editor Bill Boyarsky had to say about the power of lobbyists. Boyarsky has been serving during his retireent on the City Ethics Commission and therefore has had a bird's eye view of government from another perspective.

The Times yesterday devoted reams of copy to a worthless story about Hollywood celebrities going bankrupt, another esample of what I call Hiller Horseshit. The Chicago toady who is publisher of the Times, David Hiller, is pie-eyed crazy when it comes to celebrities and is gradually turning the Times into something more readily resembling the National Enquirer.

So it comea as no surprise that when a former metro editor and ethics commissioners says he has concluded that lobbyists are far more a power than the ethics commission this is given short shrift in the newspaper.

But that doesn't mean it's not important, or that it doesn't jibe with my own observations from more than three decades of covering government.

First, the Times complete report on what Boyarsky had to say, under the mini-headline, "Fingering the real powers at City Hall:

"It was Bill Boyarsky's last day on the Los Angles City Ethics Commission, the five-member panel that punishes those who violate L.A. laws that govern elections, lobbying and campaign contributions. The former L.A. Times city editor tells reporter David Zahniser that the Ethics Commssion "is on the periphery of power" at City Hall. "Power is with the business lobbyists, the union lobbyists, the people who run the campaigns," he said."

This would certainly be worth a longer story. Maybe Zahniser will write one, and maybe it will actually get into the paper.

As I say, Boyarsky's views jibe with my own observations, especially when I was covering the insurers and trial lawyers on the state and national level. It turned out these groups were far more influential that the Legislature or Congress in actually determining what happened in regulation of their critical fields, which have so much sway as life is lived in our society.

When the voters approved Proposition 103, the Harvey Rosenfield insurance initiative in California, over four other insurer and trial lawyer initiatives, I was under the naive assumption that this would actually alter the state's legal and insurance systems broadly. The Times set about covering subsequent regulatory and legislative proceedings as if it would, But we discovered after awhile that it wouldn't.

What I found I was covering, instead, was the slow overwhelming of the government entities by the well paid lobbyists for both groups. They made chop liver of the reform initiative, largely because they virtually owned the legislators and regulators charged with implementing it.

At one time, I discovered the insurers had made contributions, often massive ones, to all but four of the 80 members of the state Assembly and 40 members of the State Senate. On the other hand, it turned out that Roxane Gillespie, the state insurance commissioner at the time, played a deceptive game in which she pretended to be enforcing the initiative while in fact being its major obfuscator.

Both the chairman of the Senate insurance committee, Alan Robbins, and the chief lobbyist for insurers in the state, Clay Jackson, went to jail while I was covering insurance for taking or offering bribes. But these prosecutions scarcely made a dent in the prevailing system of public deliberations, private control.

In fact, the prosecutions were strictly limited. Robbins told me once that he had worn a wire to tape record others, and he felt both the attorney general and the governor at the time, Dan Lungren and Pete Wilson, were also taking insurer bribes. But the federal prosecutors did not apparently care to take them on, and Robbins backed off from going public on the matter.

The system, as I found it, often allowed the lobbies to cancel each other out. Both the insurers and the lawyers spent millions of dollars annually to defend their respective interests. While they often could not go so far as to get what they wanted, they almost always could block what they did not want. So the status quo held, even if it was distinctly disadvantageous to the citizenry, saddled with high insurance prices and a legal system that often allowed the most unscrupulous elements to prevail.

Gradually, I came to the same conclusion as Boyarsky has -- that the real power lay with the lobbies and most of the elected lawmakers did their bidding as the price of getting reelected. The bureaucracy too seldom defied the lobbies publicly, although, here and there, you could find honest bureaucrats.

The press was often either complicit or naive, but certainly not knowledgable enough to take on the real power in Sacramento. Sometimes, it played on doing so, but it seldom went beyond that. There is no present writer in Sacramento, other than the Sacramento Bee's columnist, Dan Walters, who really seems privy to what is going on behind the scenes.

I know this is not a pretty picture. But it's a true one.

Boyarsky has told me that when he reached the ethics commission, he found the majority unwilling to adequately punish transgressors. I know one of his predecessors, the admired former Times national editor, Ed Guthman, was often frustrated as well.

We find on the national scene as well, powerful lobbies. Why do you think no meaningful action is taken on climate control or the oil industry, for example? Despite the campaigning of such presidential candidates as Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama, both of whom have vowed to take on the lobbyists, both often find their campaigns riddled with them, as was Sen. Hillary Clinton's.''

Real reform would entail a bloody public brawl to subdue these groups. as the Clintons contemplated doing when they briefly tried to insitute a broad reform of health care, only to knuckled under to power insurer and medical advertising against it.

Right now, as Boyarsky was allowed to tell us briefly, the lobbies are in the driver's seat. I fear that's not going to change.

Harold Meyerson Says Zell Should Be Jailed

2008-06-12T00:16:00.000-07:00

In perhaps the most anti-Sam Zell piece yet to appear, Harold Meyerson, formerly of the L.A. Weekly and now with the Washington Post, compares Tribune Co. owner Sam Zell with James McNamara, the man who bombed the L.A. Times, killing 21 pressmen, in 1910. Like McNamara, he writes, Zell ought to be sent to prison for life.

"Great newspapers take decades to build,"Meyerson writes. "We are discovering that they can be dismantled in relatively short order...In Zell, what Los Angeles has is a visiting Visigoth, whose civic influence is about as positive as that of the Crips, the Bloods and the Mexican Mafia. Life in San Quentin sounds about right."

Sounds a little extreme. Zell is a Chicago slumlord who didn't know anything about newspapers when he took over a few months ago, and has learned nothing since. Apparently, also, like his predecessor, Dennis FitzSimons, he also seems to bear a deep grudge against Los Angeles, or perhaps just a recognition that Los Angeles is a superior city to Chicago.

But if he would just sell out to some more socially responsible party, like Anthony Pellicano, I'd be inclined to forgive him. No jail term (as long, at least, as he paid back all the employees he had laid off).

What is the proof that Zell and his crew, Randy Michaels, David Hiller, the ignorant Russ Stanton, don't mean well is that even in the things they have promised to improve, like the Times Web site, there has been little or no improvement.

I was thinking about this the other day when I noticed that, unlike the New York Times Web site, the L.A. Times Web site doesn't list on its main page the columns that are running that day.

The New York Times editors are intelligent enough to realize that this is the era of the columnist. People want opinions, and the New York Times writers who stand out are Tom Friedman, Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich, Roger Cohen and others. When they appear, they are showcased.

The L.A. Times has some good columnists too -- Steve Lopez, George Skelton, Tim Rutten. Sandy Banks, David Lazarus. Yet, its woeful Web site isn't showcasing them.

There is a strong indication here that in revamping the paper, Zell, Hiller and Stanton are off on the wrong tack. They are fucking up the paper, not improving it.

As Meyerson writes, "A paper that is both an axiom and an ornament of Los Angeles life, that helps set the political, business and artistic agenda for one of America's two great world metropolises, is being shrunk and, if Zell continues to get his way, dumbed down."

Is this a jailable offense? I think not. Like most incompetents, they don't mean to do poorly. They are just screw ups who ought to pay with their jobs.

The days we could ride people like this out on a rail are probably behind us.

Still, if they have to be jailed, San Quentin is too good for them. I favor the maximum security federal prisons in Florence, Colorado and Marion, Illinois, where conditions are so rigorous many of the inmates go mad.

One possible grounds for jailing Zell would be his past record of virulent pot smoking. In reading the back issues of the Times since returning from my African cruise, I noticed the case of the poor San Diego woman who escaped from jail on drug offenses in 1976, led a salutary life as a wife and mother in San Diego all these years, but has now been discovered and is being sent back to prison, maybe for years.

It would be so much more socially desirable for Zell, Michaels, Hiller and Stanton to go in her stead. They too could use a bucket as a toilet. Now, we need the grounds. Could killing the Times be one?

With Oil Prices High, Why Have Congestion Pricing?

2008-06-11T08:55:00.000-07:00

Sometimes newspaper reporters, like bureaucrats in Washington and Los Angeles, hate to abandon a bad idea, even if conditions have drastically changed.

What else could explain the content of Steve Hymon's article in the L.A. Times yesterday, in which the writer seems to lament the possibility there could be delays in implementing toll lanes on the I-10 and I-210 freeways?

Since Hyman started writing about this screwy idea, the price of oil per barrel has shot up into the $130 range, and gasoline prices are headed toward $5 a gallon. Various surveys have shown something that is not surprising: Fewer people are driving. Freeway traffic in the Los Angeles area is down about 4%, which can mean considerable relief of congestion.

So, it is not necessary, at least for now, to pursue this foolhardy idea, which would introduce double taxation on the highways, and allow the wealthy to drive fast, while the poor commuter out there will be driving slow. It's a recipe for bad feeling all around.

Hymon does conscientiously report that two members of Congress from the San Gabriel Valley -- Hilda Solis and Gary Miller -- are trying to call, "Whoa."

But Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who has been so busy campaigning all over the country for Hillary Clinton, and now is going to Israel and then has plans to campaign all over the country for Barack Obama, still supports congestion pricing. Villaraigosa hasn't been spending enough time running his home city to know any longer what is happening there. No, rather than surveying the traffic, or assorted women, Villaraigosa has his eyes on the big prize: a cabinet job in the next Washington Administration.

Hymon, meanwhile, airily dismisses the notion that money should now be spent on building new light rail lines in the Los Angeles area, like extending the Gold Line to Azusa. This shouldn't be necessary, he suggests, because as an incentive to instituting congestion pricing, the federal authorities are offering $213 million to help buy new buses and improve Metrolink nearby.

He quotes none other than former legislator Richard Katz, a Villaraigosa stooge, as saying expanding the Gold Line would be unnecessary if Metrolink is improved. Yet Metrolink is several miles from the Gold Line and serves different cities altogether.

The Times, and Hymon himself, are doing a good job covering other transportation issues. But they seem to have a bug up their ass on congestion pricing. I hope it's not part of Sam Zell's plan to follow Dennis FitzSimons at treating Los Angeles as a poor stepsister of Chicago.

Already, Times "publisher" David Hiller and "editor" Russ Stanton spend more than enough time cowtowing to Zell. We certainly don't need Hymon to follow them, or anybody else on the staff for that matter.

--

The article Faye Fiore wrote yesterday in the L.A. Times on sentiments toward the Obama campaign in Neshoba County, Miss., where three civil rights workers were murdered in 1964, was, I thought, a very good political piece.

And so was Matea Gold's article on CNN's political coverage expanding its number of viewers. Gold says there is concern that when this year's scintillating presidential campaign is over, CNN may drop off again. But I don't think that would be true in an Obama administration, because he would bring such a clean sweep to Washington that there would be huge amounts of news to discuss endlessly.

I watched a good deal of CNN during my cruise around Africa. We had it on the ship all but three days crossing the Atlantic, and we did not have either Fox or NBC, so there wasn't much alternative. But that was all right, because I very much liked Wolf Blitzer's "Situation Room" broadcast, which is seen in Los Angeles in mid-afternoon, but was seen on the ship, as we moved eastward, later and later at night.

Not all the CNN commentators are great, but Jack Cafferty and David Gergen are often thought provoking and Blitzer's studied neutrality is welcome. This year, at least, as Gold points out, the network, for once, has found a winning formula.

--

It is certainly legitimate for the Wall Street Journal and the McCain campaign to make an issue of Jim Johnson, head of Obama's vice presidential search team, taking loans from the squalid Countrywide company, and to force his resignation. Johnson went today.

But it is out-of-bounds for bigots determined to do anything they can to avoid America electing a black president to go after Obama's classy wife, Michelle. This is tasteless. Michelle Obama seems to have gained unwanted attention by saying what she thinks. I imagine the contrast between her sincerity and Hillary Clinton's persistent phoniness in Clinton's late campaign annoys these people.

The fact is, Michelle Obama, is well qualified and apt to make a fine First Lady.

One Journalist Went Bad, The Other Became Good

2008-06-10T08:48:00.000-07:00

Reading back issues of the L.A. Times upon returning from my African cruise, I see that two journalists I knew very well died in late April besides the late, great Chuck Hillinger. (I did Hillinger's obituary blog on April 30 from my ship).

DeVan Shumway, bureau chief in Sacramento for United Press International part of the time when I worked there in 1962-63, died at 77 on April 23. He provides a striking example why journalists, if they can avoid it, should seldom go to work as PR men, or flaks.

Shumway was a conservative, but serviceable bureau chief for UPI. Although he was no comparison to Morrie Landsberg or Bill Stall over at the Associated Press bureau across the hall in the state capitol, he still employed some good people, including George Skelton and Bob Fairbanks.

He was ambitious, and he eventually went to work first for a Nixon cabinet member and former California lieutenant governor, Bob Finch, and then at CREEP, the Nixon relection committee in 1972, the Watergate year. It fell to Shumway to deny the stories in the Washington Post and other news outlets about the crimes of Mr. Nixon and his unsavory associates.

When the Post reported the FBI had linked the Watergate burglary to political spying and sabotage by other CREEP employees, Shumway called the story "not only fiction, but a collection of absurdities" He reacted to a New York Times story that detailed the connections between the Watergate burglars and CREEP by terming it "outrageously false and preposterous." Both stories, as the Times short obituary noted, were eventually established as true.

Shumway died in obscurity in Baltimore. During his career with Nixon, be also engaged in the "non-denial, denial," in which he denied things off the record, which also turned out to be true. Nixon had some semi-honorable spokesmen, like Herb Klein and Sandy Quinn, but Shumway and Ron Zeigler were not among them.

It is, however, barely conceivable that Shumway did not know he was prevaricating when he made his Watergate denials, just as it is barely conceivable that Sam Zell did not know he was lying when he said he would invest in the papers of the Tribune Co., rather than sell or downsize them. But it is not even barely conceivable that Los Angeles Times editor Russ Stanton did not know he was prevaricating when he said recently that Los Angeles Times employee morale was high.

The same day, the Times published the Shumway obituary, it also ran a paid obituary for the paper's longtime letters editor, Bob Jensen, who died April 27 at the age of 82.

Jensen was one of the distinguished group of writers and editors that the late Tony Day assembled around the editorial pages of the L.A. Times in the 1970s and 1980s, and he was a thoroughly outstanding editor, with whom I had a great many pleasant exchanges and dealings.

As a young Army lieutenant during World War II, Jensen was enraged by indignities he saw heaped on America's Negro soldiers, but he lived so long as to be able to see the presidential candidacy of Sen. Barack Obama.

After the war, Jensen finished his education, and embarked on a journalistic career which took him to the Associated Press in New York and to the Washington Post and Buffalo Evening News in Washington, D.C. He also served (but not dishonorably) as press secretary to Sen. Hubert Humphrey for several years, before joining the Los Angeles Times in 1971, where he became the letters editor until he retired in 1987.

During these years, the Times was at its height in circulation under Otis Chandler and Tom Johnson, and letters came in by the thousands. Jensen could always be found going through the stacks of letters for those he would publish. Day nearly never interfered with his judgment.

He had an excellent sense of humor about some of these letters. After all, President Truman had once said that he believed that "half the nuts in the world could be found within a 100-mile radius of Los Angeles," an assertion a Times editorial suggested that the newspaper would not rush to challenge, and of which Jensen saw daily proof.

Jensen, in short, was the commensurate professional, everything that Shumway, Zeigler, Zell and Stanton were or are. Of course, in those days, you could be a professional and not get fired for it, as Tribune Co. lackey David Hiller later did with the courageous Dean Baquet.

L.A. Times Magazine Falls Out Of Editor's Grasp

2008-06-09T10:32:00.000-07:00

There are so many terrible things happening at the L.A. Times these days that some of them get little attention. Yet, what it boils down to is that the newspaper's disintegration is continuing at a worsening rate.

Last week, news came that, unbeknownst to the editors, the often re-formed L.A. Times magazine is being reinvented again -- but this time it's completely out of the hands of the regular editors. A special task force has made new plans for it, drawn up a budget, hired personnel, but the implication is it will be separate from the paper, and, probably outside its ethical strictures.

Under an earlier publishing regime, that of Mark Willes, under whom the L.A. Times was sold to the evil Tribune Co., without any notice to him, the Times magazine was the focus of the Staples scandal. This was a sorry episode in which revenues from a story were shared with a private party, the Staples management. The story was more of an advertising promotion for the new indoor arena than a journalistic report.

The scandal was the subject of a special report in the Times by the late David Shaw, edited by the retired managing editor, George Cotliar, and it was among the factors leading to the end of the Willes regime, the firing of Michael Parks as editor, and the end of Times-Mirror.

I remember how Henry Weinstein and other leading reporters assailed the Willes and Kathryn Downing failures involved in the scandal at an open employees' meeting. Now, Weinstein is among many who have taken the buyout. Tbere are fewer and fewer people around now to call the company on wrongdoing.

Yet, it is evident that Sam Zell, Randy Michaels, David Hiller and other Tribune executives have even fewer scruples than Willes did.

Willes may have been in many respects a rank amateur, but at least he had grandiose ideas. He even worked assiduously to build up Times circulation. He had many ambitions for the newspaper.

Under the Tribune Co., by contrast, there are no such plans to build the paper up. Circulation has decreased by more than 400,000. The size of the staff has gone down from 1,100 editorial positions to 850, and is headed down by a further 80 to 150 in the near future, according to apparently reliable reports.

The Zell regime, despite earlier pledges, is manifesting itself through continual downsizing. Even experience is not at all wanted. The next round of layoffs, it is suggested, will target primarily those around long enough to be paid better than average salaries. In other words, those who know something about the business.

Under the burden of inept management, poor organization, such as spinning off the magazine, becomes inevitable. Looking around the paper, it's more and more every section, every enterprise, for itself.

In the New York Times today, the $12.8 billion debt the Tribune Co. board agreed to in order to facilitate taking the company private under Zell is given as among the prime causes for the continuing cutbacks, and divestments such as Newsday, and, soon apparently, the Chicago Cubs. The trouble is, this delays eventual collapse, but doesn't turn around the factors leading to it. The "less is more" philosophy of Zell is not the answer. It is accelerating the decline. The bottom line is, the man knows even less than Willes did about the newspaper business, and lacks both his imagination and ambition.

--

The L.A. Times is planning to cut back the paper in everything but the celebrity glitz that publisher David Hiller likes. Now, the paper announces today that it is hiring a celebrity court reporter and will soon form a "topics" team on this essentially lowbrow subject. The announcement came from David Lauter, who seems to be cozying up to present management, apparently in hopes he won't be one of the layoffs.

Obama Should Debate McCain, Go Abroad

2008-06-08T10:31:00.000-07:00

This is a morning of many retrospectives about what happened to Hillary Clinton, all the mistakes she made. Former Sen. Bob Kerrey, however, may have it about right when he says that if Barack Obama had been ten years younger and run in 1992, both he and Bill Clinton would have lost to him. And blogger Ben Smith makes a worthwhile point too: She should have contested more of the caucus states; Obama built his delegate advantage in them.

It is time to look ahead and not back. And, as usual, this morning, the best column is by Frank Rich, in the New York Times. Every election year, there seems to be one writer who "gets it" best, who is on the proper wave length, and then a host of them who remember the past campaigns, but don't get the present one.

Rich has two main pieces of advice for Obama today, and both of them, I believe, are good.

One is, he ought to accept John McCain's proposal for a series of "Town Hall" debates.

Second is, he ought to go abroad, to Iraq, and elsewhere, to showcase for the American people his popularity abroad, and how much the rest of the world feels it has a stake in the success of a new administration in America, a break from the past.

Rich's feeling, like some other observers of the scene, is that McCain did not do particularly well last Tuesday night when he appeared in Louisiana to make the first of the three major candidate presentations that evening. The other presentations came from Clinton and Obama.

McCain did not speak particularly well, his audience was small, and it seemed he was not well presented -- the wrong kind of hall, the wrong kind of the crowd, too white, none of the Latinos and Asians who he presumably thinks that, like Hillary, he can win against Obama.

If Obama and McCain meet frequently in these common discussions (a better term than debates, the way McCain has presented them), then it is Rich's feeling that Obama's superiority as a candidate, his youth, his ideas for the future, will come across clearly, and that McCain, by contrast, will suffer.

Is he right? I don't know, but I suspect that Obama, in this campaign, is like the circus performer on the trapeze: As long as he is sailing along, performing without hesitation, making use of his skills, he's fine. But if he hesitates, grows cautious, he is apt to fall. Obama, riding a tiger, has soared out of obscurity as an inspirational candidate. He cannot now afford to become less of one, and going up against McCain in these discussions is an important way to continue to put himself forward.

As to Obama going abroad, I just, of course, returned from visiting numerous African countries, including three Arab ones and several others with large Muslim minorities. At every hand on this trip was evidence of Obama's popularity. If Obama is elected, America will appear in all these places in a much more favorable light.

But Obama need not visit The Gambia and Togo to show his popularity. If he goes to Iraq, if he goes to Israel (as long as he talks to both the Israelis and Palestinians), if he goes to Russia, France and Britain, then he will demonstrate clearly for all the American people to see, his popularity and the advantages of a new face in Washington.

Of course, I do not underestimate McCain. If his life proves anything, it is the advantage of hanging in there, of daring to defy his North Vietnamese captors, and, for a long time, the ire of President Bush. He is an admirably resilient character, with a talent for innovation in both his life and his politics.

If events -- the soaring price of oil, a possible new terrorist attack, anything that upsets the apple cart and really further challenges America -- do occur, it may be that McCain will gain an advantage, by appearing a safer candidate than the less experienced Obama.

But Obama's emphasis on hope and a more forthcoming America has already proved its power in this campaign and may continue to do so. That and the tremendous organizational skills he has demonstrated in his campaign thus far.

As I said yesterday, I do not agree with the old friend who told me that America will never vote for a black man. The fact is, America has changed in that respect. During our adult life spans, our generation has seen black candidates elected mayor, governor or U.S. senator, in places like Los Angeles, and the states of Virginia and Massachusetts, that do not have anywhere close to black majorities. They all won primarily with white votes.

Obama, wisely, seldom talks up racial issues in his campaign, except when he is forced to, as he was in the Jeremiah Wright controversy. His vision is far wider than race, and I think most of the American people already realize that, or will come to realize it.

I also agree with Rich (who is no relation of mine, by the way), when he warns Obama against too much "preening," making too much of himself and his prospects.

Yesterday, when Obama appeared at a ceremony celebrating Chicago's selection by the International Olympic Committee, as one of four finalists for award of the 2016 Olympics, he suggested that he would just be finishing his second term in the presidency when Chicago held the 2016 Games. (Maybe both the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times will be under different ownership by then).

Obama should avoid, I think, drumming his vainglorious career too deeply into the minds of onlookers. With the kind of humility that marked Lincoln, he must go forward primarily with his idealism, organizational skills and hopes.

--

Besides Rich, another brilliant column about the campaign comes in the London Times from Andrew Sullivan, who has a very good feel for the appeal of the Obama candidacy. How telling it is, in fact, that the London Times has been so much the better reporter on the election campaign than the L.A. Times. That shows the superiority of Rupert Murdoch to Sam Zell.

But Jim Newton, the L.A. Times editorial pages editor who has now quit, can take pride in the Times editorial that originally endorsed Obama and McCain for their respective party nominations. That understood the flow of events well too. It's too bad L.A. Times "publisher," David Hiller, didn't treat Newton better. He might have stayed around for the election.

But the editorial page of the LAT does not distinguish itself as much Sunday, with a long, tedious editorial saying that on many issues Obama and McCain are much alike. Those Americans who do not yet realize how different a kind of president Obama would be from McCain are, I think, sure to understand it by election day.

Can Obama Win In November? I Think So.

2008-06-07T09:25:00.000-07:00

I'm always a little superstitious, so I am repeating, in spirit, a blog headline I had back in January: "Can Obama Win On Super Tuesday? I think so."

When the Mountain West and Southern states came in that day, despite losing California, it was Barack Obama and not Hillary Clinton, who had won the most convention delegates. He did win on Super Tuesday, when many thought he would not.

Well, contrary to some of my friends, I feel Obama can certainly win in November. In fact, just as with Ronald Reagan, he may not be the favorite at this stage, but I believe his election is fairly certain.

I went out to lunch in China Town yesterday with a friend of long political experience who kept telling me, "He won't win, because he's black...This country hasn't changed that much." Yet this man is an Obama supporter. "I will stand on my head if Obama wins," he said.

My friend ought to start practicing standing on his head. Since he weighs about as much as I do, that won't be easy. But he's going to have to do it, I believe.

Why?

Because the country is ready for something new. In fact, it is grasping for a less divisive government in Washington, after eight years of Clintons and 12 years of Bushs. It would like a new foreign policy, too, and new, inventive energy and economic policies. It is ready for a change.

Barack Obama can provide it. He is a ray of hope in a somber scene. Already, his campaign has been epic, mythic. Our grandchildren, I believe, will be telling stories to their grandchildren about the emergence of Barack Obama.

The product of a biracial marriage, of growing up in Indonesia and Hawaii, of increasing brilliance in a series of fine schools, president of the Harvard Law Review, a community organizer in Chicago, a state senator in Illinois, a U.S. senator, an inspirational figure whose composure is already famous, a soaring orator, a patriot, a loving father and husband, and, I think and hope, the next president of the United States of America.

It won't be easy. John McCain is a good candidate, I believe, really, a better candidate than Hillary Clinton. He won't make the tasteless remarks she did, and he won't have an unruly spouse hanging around his neck. He is a war hero whose own life has been exemplary.

But the issues, the feeling, in this campaign are all with Obama. He is going to win many votes from independents and even people like me, Republicans. He is something new, a man of hope, and, black, brown, yellow or white, I believe the American people will not allow this great opportunity to pass them by.

Yes, he can!

--

Hillary Clinton gave a respectable, serviceable concession speech today, but she could and should have been a little more laudatory about the great personal qualities of Obama. It wouldn't have hurt her cause any. It may even have helped her.

Zell, Stanton Practice The Big Lie At L.A. Times

2008-06-06T07:43:00.000-07:00

When Sam Zell and his fellow-butchers, Randy Michael and Russ Stanton, issued memos and made statements this week about the newspapers they intend to drastically downsize -- most notably the Los Angeles Times -- they practiced the "Big Lie" technique of tyrants.

The very salutation to the staffs of the Zell-Michaels memo, "Partners," has a Stalinist ring to it. Stalin used to call the millions of people he was about to murder a similar name -- "Comrades." In 1936, as he began the worst of his purges, Stalin said he was building democracy.

Just so with Zell and Michaels. In announcing they will slash the news hole in their newspapers to a 50-50 ratio, ads and news, they pretend to be modeling them to the future, but they are throwing excrement into the faces of everyone who works for them and every 0ne of the diminishing number who still read the papers. (Michaels said today that 82 pages of news a week would be deleted from the L.A. Times and 500 pages from Tribune newspapers all-told).

When their lackey, Stanton, claims that morale at the Times is improving, as he did this week, that is not only delusional. It is a lie, pure and simple. And when Stanton says, "I get that we may have to be a smaller news organization here at some point in the near future," he is saying that he will do whatever he is told without a peep of protest. Could he be fighting behind the scenes? There is little or no sign of it.

This contemptible Tulare twerp is now paying the price for allowing ambition to take complete hold of his squalid personality. He sold his soul like Faust when he took the editorship that the "publisher," another lackey, David Hiller, offered him.

Meanwhile, day by day, there are examples of conscientious journalists who are bailing out. Just this week, Jim Newton and Marjorie Miller stepped down as editorial pages editor and foreign editor, respectively. And Tom Mulligan, who struggled against all odds, to cover the failures of the evil Tribune Co. in articles which were necessarily inadequate to convey the enormity of what was happening, has quit to go to other, more honorable employment.

Meanwhile, word comes from back East that Zell and Michaels intend to turn the venerable Baltimore Sun into a tabloid.

How fortunate Newsday was to be sold. It's getting out from under the grip of these crazies. By the time Tribune Co. fails and is forced out of Los Angeles, it may be too late to save the Times.

I'm indebted to the normally restrained and always responsible Kevin Roderick at LA Observed yesterday for telling it like it is.

"Tribune bosses Sam Zell and Randy Michaels finally reveal today their agenda for the Times," he writes. "The plan is to cut way back on pages, so the ratio of space devoted to ads and content is 50-50 and to reduce staffers based on the theory that they are less 'productive' at the LAT than at smaller papers.

"Ugh," says the carefully accurate Roderick. "Zell and Michaels seem to think that covering the world, Washington and in-depth investigations should take no more time and resources than the crap their other papers churn out. It doesn't work that way. Basically, it sounds as if they have learned nothing from the generations of newspaper editors and publishers who figured it out before -- and who actually made tons of money doing it. The Zell long-range model now looks to be less content and less exclusive content, with less depth to that content, produced by less experienced people and delivered to readers in less attractive packages. Yeah, the magic formula to turn around the spiral."

It is, as I suggest with my customary restraint, murder. Murder of the L.A. Times and everything it stood for under Otis Chandler, Nick Williams, Tom Johnson and Bill Thomas. Treating the readers as if they were all ignorant simpletons like Russ Stanton.

I notice, by the way, that Marjorie Miller says she intends to become a senior writer. That was precisely the title they gave the late Tony Day when they put him out to pasture.

Pardon me, I want more for Marjorie than that. She will find she has no choice but to follow others outside the paper. There is the note of defiance when she says in her memo, that foreign news is the heart and soul of the L.A. Times, knowing that Zell and his minions are conspiring to forget it. Now, she will find that she must take the next step and go somewhere where her talents will be appreciated.

There is nothing dishonorable in escaping from a sinking ship. Had Einstein not fled Germany, we might not ever been able to build the atomic bomb that put an end to the last of the 20th Century Fascist dictators.

This has been a bad week, and not only for the L.A. Times and other Tribune-owned newspapers, But, of course, life will go on, and resistance is bound to mount. Fighting the Stalinists is always noble.

It might be wise for remaining Times employees to hire a lawyer. Zell is also, among his many other exploits, fixing to steal their pensions by running the company into the ground. I suspect that as a matter of law, there must be something illegal in this.

That's a good thought with which to end today -- that this son of a bitch and his cohorts may end up in jail.

--

Ron Brownstein again demonstrates today that he is a mediocre political writer, one of the few departures that the L.A. Times is well rid of, when he writes on the Times Op Ed Page that Hillary Clinton would have been a safer candidate than Barack Obama for the Democrats to put into the general election.

Poor Brownstein! He doesn't get it. He doesn't understand what is happening in America today. But the New York Times today has a similar Op Ed Page article. What cynics these Op Ed page editors are!

--

Finally, we ought to ask the question: How could Chicago have such wild diversity of talent and lack of talent as Obama and Zell?

It's really no surprise. This was the same city which once had as citizens at the same time Robert Hutchins and Al Capone.

Today Is 40th Anniversary Of RFK Assassination

2008-06-05T09:37:00.000-07:00

Forty years ago tonight, one of the most dreadful events in the history of Los Angeles, occurred -- the assassination at the Ambassador Hotel of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, just moments after he was able to claim victory in California's 1968 Democratic presidential primary.

It was Los Angeles Times cartoonist Paul Conrad who perhaps best summed up the meaning of the murder of Kennedy by a Palestinian terrorist, Sirhan Sirhan. He had a cartoon shortly thereafter which showed a scales. On one side of it was one bullet; on the other, 1.4 million California ballots for Kennedy, and the ballots were all flying away, cast to the winds.

The voters had been disenfranchised, and history changed.

It is striking today, 40 years later, that this morning's newspapers have another Kennedy in the news -- the charismatic niece of Robert Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy, named yesterday by Sen. Barack Obama as one of three persons given the mission of researching who should be his vice presidential running mate. Caroline is, of course, the only surviving child of another assassinated American leader, President John F. Kennedy.

Caroline Kennedy's emerging role in the Obama campaign -- her endorsement and Op Ed Page piece in the New York Times just after the South Carolina primary was an important event in development of the Obama candidacy, along with that of her uncle, Sen. Edward Kennedy -- is a poignant sign of the still monumental Kennedy family influence over American life and politics.

Also, of course, this week has seen Obama, the mixed-race son of a black Kenyan immigrant and a white Kansan, clinch the Democratic nomination for president of the United States.

It is not a stretch to say that Robert Kennedy, who had emerged in his life as an heroic champion of civil rights, and particularly of the black and brown citizens of America, would have been in awe of this moment.

Forty years ago tonight, a political writer for the L.A. Times, I was covering Sen. Eugene McCarthy at the Beverly Hilton Hotel at the moment Kennedy was shot. McCarthy, who received 42% of California's Democratic vote that day, compared to 46% for Kennedy, had no security that evening. It was E.W. (Ned) Kenworthy and I who called the Beverly Hills Police Department to suggest that it send over policemen to guard McCarthy. We feared a conspiracy might be afoot to slay the peace candidates in the 1968 campaign.

Of course, just two months before, the greatest champion of civil rights in America after Lincoln, The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., had been assassinated in Memphis by James Earl Ray, a white fanatic.

Just the night before he was shot, Dr. King, in a speech that will always be remembered, told an audience in Memphis that that night he could say that, he might "not get there with you, but I can tell you tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land."

The Obama candidacy, as a number of the nation's most eminent historians were quoted as telling the Washington Post today, is an historic affirmation of that King prophecy.

Forty years is, by some standards, a long time. Many of us who were young then are now old. Yet, at the same time, the events of the night of June 5-6, 1968, as of Nov. 22, 1963 and April 4, 1968, have an immediacy. They do not seem to have taken place that long ago. I remember them as if they had taken place yesterday. Many others will too.

American life is unfolding, a constant search to make a "more perfect Union." Lincoln declared, "Malice toward none, Charity for all, Firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right..."

It is those sentiments that bestowed glory on the lives of Robert F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., John F. Kennedy and, perhaps now Barack Obama. Let's hope Obama lives to fulfill them.

But in the meantime, cast our eyes backwards, and remember the gallant figures who were so unjustly gunned down by the haters who would like to destroy America and its ideals.

Hillary Proves Herself Unworthy To Be VP

2008-06-04T06:43:00.000-07:00

It's sometimes called the "dream ticket," the notion of Barack Obama choosing Hillary Clinton as his vice presidential running mate. But for Obama, this could well be the "nightmare ticket."

I confess I've gone back and forth on this. But last night's sorry performance by Hillary, combined with Bill Clinton's temper tantrum of the day before, convinces me it would be a mistake for Obama to run with her.

More than a mistake, perhaps. As Politico points out this morning, Obama has been handed the opportunity to take a "presidential decision," right off the bat. He can announce Hillary will not be on the ticket. I think the country, and ultimately many Clinton supporters will understand.

Hillary had the chance last night to be magnanimous. But she could not even bring herself to be pleasant to Obama. She never mentioned he had gone over the top and clinched the nomination. Hers was not a concession speech at all, but one designed to rile up her followers. One of the commentators compared it to Richard Nixon's "Checkers Speech," in 1952, when he called for his supporters to write in for him. Hillary did the same thing last night.

The prospect that this awful couple, Bill and Hillary Clinton, might try somehow to hold Obama in a kind of bondage, jumping to their tune, a reversion to the slave holding South, is intolerable. He must not open his presidency, if he is successful, worrying about what the two of them are doing behind his back, or perhaps right in front of the news media. He doesn't want to have to have a taster in the White House.

Through their racial undertones, their snide suggestions, their claims Obama was not ready, and their providing the McCain campaign with all the attacks lines it could possibly use, Hillary and Bill Clinton have proved themselves unacceptable running mates, and disloyal to the Democratic party. It's possible, as some suggest, they may adopt a different tone in three or four days, but this would only be temporary.

Indeed, one of the tests Obama now faces, in running against McCain, is to prove he is up to actually being president. The best possible early way to do this is to show he is in charge and will select his own choice as a running mate.

--

L.A. Times political coverage is in some trouble. Just two signs of it came Tuesday in the failure to give more than a short to Bill Clinton's tantrum in South Dakota Monday, the most violent of his sorry campaign appearances that hurt Hillary so much. By contrast, the New York Times had a long story, with a reefer on Page one.

The LAT Web site also fell down on the job. Close to midnight last night, it had a story reporting only 2% of the returns in the impassioned Los Angeles County South Side supervisorial race between two lawmakers, State Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas and City Councilman Bernard Parks. Actually, at the bottom of the story, it turned out it had 64% of the returns in terms of precincts reporting. What a disgrace! The Times did not even update the lead of a story it had on Page one of the Web site. And this is the group of numbskulls who are always saying how much they are improving the Web site.

However, Mark Barabak's story on how Obama won an epic victory, and Hillary lost, was a terrific piece, more timely than the New York Times profile of Obama.

--

Jim Newton, the latest short-term editorial pages editor, has been polite, frankly more polite than I would have been, about his decision to leave the paper after a distinguished career of 19 years.

But one paragraph of his departing note to the staff reveals plainly that he had the same kind of differences with "publisher" David Hiller that Dean Baquet and James O'Shea had.

"The external difficulties these days are known to all of you, and I won't belabor them here," he writes. "Let me say only that it's clear to me, as it is to everyone, that the paper still has challenges ahead. The publisher and I have discussed those difficulties, and he is entitled to an editorial page editor who shares his vision on how best to confront them."

This is Jim's way of saying that he couldn't stomach the layoffs apparently about to be announced, and, perhaps, also that he was fearful Hiller and his boss, Sam Zell, may drop their Obama endorsement and endorse only John McCain for president. (In the primaries, the Times endorsed the two for their respective party nominations. This would be yet another Chicago insult to liberal Los Angeles.

Over the years, I've come to admire Jim Newton more and more. The Times can scarcely afford to lose people of his caliber -- such as Henry Weinstein, Stephanie Simon, Lee Hotz, John Balzar, Myron Levin, Jenifer Warren, Robert Welkos, Greg Krikorian, Sonia Nazario, Cecilia Rasmussen, John Spano, Jeff Rabin, Connie Kang, Susan Pinkus, Bill Boyarsky, Bill Stall, Doug Frantz, Mark Arax and so many others. All gone. All marks of the paper's deterioration under the evil Tribune ownership.

What I find intolerable is the thought that these wonderful reporters and editors have departed, while Hiller and Russ Stanton still actually draw paychecks.

Is there a ray of light in all this? Maybe so. An insider told me just yesterday he thought Hiller might be gone by summer.

A Bad Pressmen's Union Letter to LAT Advertisers

2008-06-03T08:52:00.000-07:00

The Los Angeles Times has enough problems under the Tribune Co. ownership without the use of improperly threatening tactics by organized labor against the newspaper.

Yet, sadly, that is what we see this week in the disclosure of a letter from the Bargaining Committee for the Pressmen's union which threatens Times advertisers as a means of putting pressure on Times managers.

The letter, which says the union may ask customers to boycott the advertisers unless it fares better in negotiations with the Times over a contract for its pressmen members, is, I think, contrary to the long range interests not only of the newspaper and its pressmen, but all Times employees.

It is why, despite many differences with Times management over the 39 years I was a reporter at the Times, I never supported the unionization of the paper. I always feared that fanatic union members would, in effect, throw out the baby with the bathwater -- that in pursuing one more contract advantage, they would threaten the newspaper's wellbeing.

In the interest of disclosure, I must freely acknowledge here that in the fight over front page advertising sales ordered by the Tribune toady publisher, David Hiller, last year I urged a boycott of the Macy's Co. if it continued to advertise on the front page of the Times. That seems now to me to have been a mistake, although the issue was somewhat different. I was advocating action against an advertiser which I felt was jeopardizing the quality of the paper.

A general boycott of advertisers to secure a union contract would jeopardize the very existence of the paper.

No wonder a pressman who is a friend of mine e-mails me that "many of us (are) saddened and upset over this tactic."

If I were still an employee, pressman, reporter, editor or anything else, I would be upset too, because it seems to me it can only raise the possibility of deeper immediate layoffs at the Times, and we have seen enough of those already.

We cannot, and must not, forget that a strike of New York newspaper unions against that city's newspapers years ago resulted in the eventual permanent shutdown of several of the New York papers, which was a tragedy.

I certainly feel the Pressmen's union, which is part of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, is entitled to a fair contract, and I would hope that, if the talks are at an impasse, the two sides could reconsider their interests and come to a settlement.

But I would not favor a strike against the paper at this time. and I certainly do not favor a boycott of advertisers.

The union letter, after some mealy mouthed talk about realizing that the newspaper industry is in financial trouble these days, goes on to say to the advertisers:

"This letter is to advise you, our advertiser, that the (union) and its members may exercise their right under the National Labor Relations Act which includes the right to handbill in front of your establishment and ask your customers not to buy your product because you advertise in the L.A. Times.

"This is certainly not what we would prefer to do, but this is a decision that the company is forcing us employees to consider making..."

I feel this is tantamount to a mobster saying: "I don't want to commit murder, but I may be forced to."

This is truly Jimmy Hoffa's Teamsters union. It is contrary to decent conduct, and a direct threat not only to the fortunes of the L.A. Times, but, as I say, the fortunes of all its employees, not to mention the interests of Los Angelenos and all Californians to have a strong, vibrant Los Angeles Times.

--

This morning comes the shocking and depressing news that Jim Newton, the L.A. Times' outstanding editorial pages editor, has decided to leave the newspaper to write a book about Dwight D. Eisenhower.

This is the latest of a series of tragic losses of talented personnel. I will have more to say about it tomorrow. I think, from what I understand, that Newton was fed up with Tribune policies. But it is true also he enjoys book writing, after his biography of Earl Warren, and had been looking forward to getting back to it.

Are Kristof, Colker, Lazarus Leading Way at LAT?

2008-06-02T07:27:00.000-07:00

(Precede: As I told a friend tonight, the campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination is ending not with a whimper, but a bang. Yet, anti-Clinton as I have been, I feel it is too bad that Bill Clinton was goaded into a temper tantrum today about a Vanity Fair article that seemed terribly unfair to him.

(I've defended the use of anonymous sources as often necessary in journalism, but I'm talking about sources discussing government policy, diplomatic overtures, etc. Anonymous sources should not be used to discuss a politician's sex life. This was bad journalism. The Todd Purdum article in Vanity Fair used anonymous sources to smear Mr. Clinton, and his temperamental outburst, the most recent of many, followed. However, by blowing up, Bill Clinton compromised his wife Hillary's chances to be on the ticket with Obama, and sadly complicated efforts to unify a deeply divided Democratic party for the fall.)

One of the things I like at the L.A. Times these days is that there seems to be a new, harder edge to consumer and business coverage at a time when economic concerns are a dominant political issue and public concern.

The appointment of Sallie Hoffmeister as the new editor of the Business section, who has been a good reporter, may be one sign of this. But the best indication is some outstanding work by Business writers Kathy Kristof, David Colker and David Lazarus. They are writing about real things that bother people, and they are doing more of it than the New York Times is doing.

Of course, I've been reading the back issues of the L.A. Times since returning from my long voyage around Africa, and the Business section of May 11 is a particularly good sign of a new tone.

In this issue, Kristof examined the nefarious practice of big retailers, several of whom she named, of selling consumers a "no payment" option under which they pay nothing when they buy something for up to 12 months. The trouble is, the fine print, explains frequent conditions under which very large interest will be owed at the end of the period. The interest can add 25% to the payments.

Named as such cheaters of an often naive public were Best Buy, Sears, Office Max, Home Depot and American Airlines among others.

I was glad to see American Airlines listed. They are the sons of bitches who first announced a $15 charge on the first piece of luggage checked on flights. Their service to the customer has been abysmal for some time. Now, they are paying new tricks. I have given my travel agent instructions never to book me on that carrier again, or at least not until it becomes a property of a higher service carrier, like Iranian Airlines, or Aeroflot. The North Korean airline has not yet reached American Airlines service level, but it is probably working on it.

Kristof has been a leading L.A. Times writer for many years. She gets better and better.

Right on the next page of the May 11 Business section was a piece by David Colker on Internet scams -- the sudden notification of the Internet user that he or she has won a big lottery they did not enter, or is the beneficiary of a sudden bequest from someone they never knew.

These are so common that you wonder, at this point, who would ever be stupid enough to respond to them, or to agree to transfer a processing fee in exchange for that big check that never comes.

Still, the Colker article was both entertaining and useful in that it laid out what the Internet is becoming -- a trap for the unwary.

I've also become an admirer of Lazarus over recent months. He chooses his subjects carefully, and most of them are highly relevant to average concerns.

Unlike the often bland and pedestrian political coverage, which, in the L.A. Times this year, has only seldom come up to the level of the Washington Post, Mark Halperin's The Page, Politico, the Drudge Report and Daily Kos. not to mention the New York Times, the L.A. Times Business section is often leading the way.

I haven't even discussed here the outstanding columns of Tom Petruno, Peter Hong and others.
At a time when forboding new signs of additional layoffs are cropping up, this is one place where something good is happening.

Two former Business editors, Russ Stanton and Devan Maharaj, have become, respectively, editor and managing editor of the Times. I'm not high on Stanton, but Maharaj has often shown himself to be a top newsman. The main thing is, at long last the Business section, which for a long time was a weak sister of the rest of the paper, is becoming enjoyable and informative.

--

Joel Sappell's sad farewell message upon taking a buyout, as quoted in LA Observed today is a sad reflection of the disillusion many of us felt that the new Tribune Co. owner, Sam Zell, so quickly sold out on his promises that he would practice openness by listening to employees, and actually invest in his newspapers.

Of course, the reverse has happened. It seems as if the inept Dennis FitzSimons is still in charge at Tribune, and there are rumors of yet another round of layoffs.

Will Clinton Continue Campaign To The Convention?

2008-06-01T08:38:00.002-07:00

It was clear yesterday that Hillary Clinton had lost control of the Democratic National Committee to the Obama campaign. She came into the day with the supposed support of 13 members of the Rules and Bylaws Committee, with 8 known as Barack Obama supporters and 8 undecided.

But when the day was over, on the key decision over splitting the Michigan delegation, she lost the vote 19 to 8, with the chairman and a Michigan member not allowed to vote. That meant such Hillary supporters as Don Fowler of South Carolina had peeled off, and, surely knowing the significance, had voted with the Obama forces on a deal that gave her just 34 and a half votes in the Michigan delegation to his 29 and a half. She had wanted all Michigan delegates to cast full votes, and a delegate margin out of Michigan of 73 to 55.

It was, I think, a fair decision, because as was frequently noted in the debate leading to the 19-8 vote, the Michigan primary had been "deeply flawed." Clinton, flouting the DNC rules, stayed on the ballot in Michigan, which had tried to skip its primary ahead of others. Obama, a more ethical candidate, had taken his name off the ballot as did most of the other Democratic candidates still in the race at that time.

But the cost to Obama of keeping his name off the Michigan ballot is, psychologically, perhaps considerable. With Puerto Rican votes in, and Clinton winning a 2-1 victory there, she may have passed Obama in the popular vote nationwide by a very narrow margin. That includes giving him no votes in Michigan, even though 40% there voted "uncommitted," and some compilations give those votes to him. Hillary claimed to have a popular vote margin in her victory speech in San Juan Sunday, giving her an argument to make to super delegates.

Although the DNC chairman Howard Dean, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid in effect prevailed at Saturday's DNC meeting with the arguments they have been making for some time that it is necessary to bring the Democratic political bloodbath to an early closure, hopefully this week, Clinton representative Harold Ickes threw a vial of poison into the proceedings at the last moment.

Ickes, an attorney, proves the old adage that many lawyers are mainly liars. Before he went to work for Bill Clinton in the White House, he represented a number of mob-dominated unions. He has no real business appearing in respectable company.

But he surely has the same low ethical standards as Hillary. Claiming that the Rules and Bylaws committee had "hijacked" the Michigan vote, and using such expletives as "ass," Ickes said he was speaking directly for Hillary when he said she reserved the right to take the fight over the Michigan delegation to the Credentials Committee of the DNC, thus putting it one step from a floor fight at the convention itself.

This may be so. Clinton campaign manager Terry McAuliffe repeated Ickes' remarks about possbily going to the Credential Committee in interviews Sunday. Clinton herself made no mention of that when she made her Puerto-Rican victory speech, but later did in an interview with the Washington Post.

What would going to the Credentials Committee mean? It would mean that the highly divisive Clinton effort would go on with her and her husband's attempted power grab of the presidency proceeding months more, thus compromising Obama's campaign against Republican Sen. John McCain this summer.

Outside the Rules and Bylaws committee meeting, hundreds of fullthroated women, disappointed at the possible failure of Hillary's bid to become the first woman president, roared their dissatisfaction with the way the DNC proceedings had turned out.

This will be a sad week for the feminists who so ardently supported Hillary's campaign, if this week, with the South Dakota and Montana primaries closing out the primary voting, a large group of super delegates endorse Obama, putting him over the new majority (with half of Michigan's and half of Florida's votes counted) of 2,118 to secure the nomination. Obama campaign aides Sunday night claimed to be just 46 delegates short of that fjgure.

At this moment, Obama going over the top this week is the most likely scenario. A better woman candidate would have possibly won, the United States is certainly ready for a woman president. But perhaps not a woman with the downsides of Hillary. She had a remarkable capacity for making racially-tinged and tasteless remarks.

Both the New York Times and Obama himself are speculating that Hillary and Bill will, perhaps as early as this week, "do the right thing," recognize the insuperable odds, and get out of the race, perhaps endorsing Obama and helping to unite the Democratic party.

Having carefully observed this squalid couple, Hillary and Bill, over recent months, I personally doubt they will go so quietly. They are destroyers, not builders, and if they cannot command the temple, like Samson, they may try to tear it down.

If she continues to struggle despite an Obama majority of delegates, elected and super, Hillary Clinton would be a Lady MacBeth. She would be working to make McCain president, so Obama could not run as an incumbent in 2012. We can hope she will not follow this route, but she still may.

New Layoffs Rumored Impending At L.A. Times

2008-05-31T08:48:00.000-07:00

In their invitation to the vainglorious jackass who is the Tribune Co. toady publisher at the L.A. Times, David Hiller, to sing the National Anthem on June 5 at Dodger Stadium, the Dodgers are showing us why they have been something of a disappointment this year. If they honor a jerk like Hiller, no wonder they imported a manager from New York City who is past his prime.

Kevin Roderick asks in LA Observed today, "Does Hiller sing like Nero fiddled?" In light of spreading rumors that Hiller is about to launch a new round of layoffs targeting editors and perhaps veteran reporters, he will be singing at Dodger Stadium the way Nero fiddled while Rome burned.

However, Nero may have been a more farsighted administrator than Hiller or his bosses, Randy Michaels and Sam Zell. The Roman Empire outlasted Nero. It is not so clear that the L.A. Times will outlast Hiller, Michaels and Zell.

Roderick reports that Russ Stanton, the Times' editor and Hiller appointee who has the intellect of a flea, invited some, but not all, of the younger reporters at the Times in and told them that a couple of rough months loom at the Times, but that they need not worry. The implication was that others on the paper's staff need worry. These are especially the survivors who have struggled up to now against all the oddballs at Tribune Co. to keep the newspaper decent.

Stanton's predecessors, the fired editors, Dean Baquet and James O'Shea, and the editor who grew discouraged and quit, John Carroll, all resisted cutbacks at the paper ordered by the men of little business vision in Chicago. Stanton, it is becoming clear, would, if ordered to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge, ask only, "When?"

Other papers, including the New York Times and Washington Post, have recently had big buyouts and/or layoffs. But the L.A. Times has gone down, down, down in circulation, advertising revenue and staff numbers faster than just about any paper in the country.

Meanwhile, Rupert Murdoch's new acquisition, the Wall Street Journal, continues to build circulation and staff. Murdoch is no Nero, or Hiller.

If indeed new layoffs are in the offing at the L.A. Times, the termination packages are not apt to be generous ones. Mark Willes and Dennis FitzSimons walked off with "golden parachutes" worth many millions of dollars, and those taking the last buyout got as much as a year's pay in farewell, but Stanton and Hiller warned at the time of that buyout, just a few months ago, that those who didn't take it couldn't expect that the packages the next time would be as good.

When Hiller leaves, however or, more likely is ousted, I can assure you that he will get a generous golden parachute, worth a lot more than singing the National Anthem at Dodger Stadium. Those getting such parachutes need never eat the horrible Chicago food again.

The L.A. Times, for the average staffer, isn't worth working for these days, and as Stanton and Hiller proceed with changing the paper, it won't be worth reading either. This is a downward spiral without end, unless there would be, God be praised, a new owner with California-sized ambitions. Then Hiller, Stanton, Michaels and Zell could be shoveled under without the least regret.

--

Whatever happened to Hiller and Stanton's promises to improve the Times web site? Hours after the decision by the Rules committee of the Democratic National Committee Saturday to give Florida and Michigan only half-votes at the Democratic National Convention, the L.A. Times web site still was posting a story written six hours before the decision saying there would be a decision. At the same time, the New York Times web site had a full story on the decision.

We know Hiller and Stanton don't work on Saturdays. But what about the people at the web site? A shocking dereliction of duty on the biggest story of the day.

A "Face-Lift" Of Prop.13 Will Not Be At All Easy

2008-05-30T06:41:00.000-07:00

Both Bill Stall, a retired Pulitzer Prize winner for the L.A. Times, and Times state political columnist George Skelton have, most appropriately, been writing about California's ever more critical fiscal problems. Inspiration has come from editorial writer Bob Greene and editorial pages editor Jim Newton.

Looking far back in modern history, to the French Revolution, we can't forget that it began with a French fiscal crisis. The Estates-General was summoned to meet in the spring of 1789, because, over many years, the French government had been running out of money, its taxing system was inadequate, and the Revolution soon began. The deliberative body began talking May 5, 1789, and the Bastille fell just two months and nine days later, thrusting France into eventual chaos. When it was all over, after the reign of terror, Napoleon Bonaparte came to power.

Well, as Skelton and Stall have pointed out, and which really cannot be contradicted, California too is saddled with an antiquated, unworkable budget and tax process, and it would seem that reform or even upset, if not revolution, has to be around the corner. The state's needs exceed its tax revenues, and, more and more, a succession of fiscal tricks has not been able to resolve the discrepancy.

Skelton has concentrated on the obstacles in the Schwarzenegger Administration, and the Legislature, to passing a reasonable budget. The governor, after five long years of pledging no new taxes, now has come around to the concept. But he may not be able to command necessary legislative support.

Stall, in an Op Ed Page column yesterday, takes finally a more dire view than Skelton, who usually writes more about process than basic change. Stall, who also was a former gubernatorial press secretary under Jerry Brown, says the time has come for "a fair revision" of Proposition 13 under which property tax increases are supposedly limited to 2% a year, and assessments of real property value are not changed until a property is sold. Even then, they are capped at 1% of assessed property value. (Bond issues approved by the voters mean that in practice increases beyond these limits do occur, but not enough in most cases to allow the state to meet its needs).

Stall recognizes that reform will not be easy, and to get by the loathing of homeowners, particularly those straining to meet higher mortgage rates and living on fixed, or in inflationary terms, declining real incomes, he proposes that any change in Proposition 13 continue to protect their interests. But he would lift prohibitions on increases in commercial property taxes. Also, he would scrap the measure's requirement that tax increases secure a two thirds majority.

That's where he lost me in his column. He probably felt the column was long enough already, or maybe his editors did. But I don't think you can realistically consider any major change in Proposition 13 without considering the fact that both major parties in the Legislature, not to mention the governor's office, are owned by business interests. These entities are so corrupt that the notion they might voluntarily vote against the interests of their own major campaign contributors is close to impossible. Big special interests have the Legislature and the governor in their grip, and little of substance can occur until that grip is broken. We shouldn't hold our breath.

It was Bismarck who once made the sardonic crack that legislating, like sausage making, cannot be too carefully watched, because the process is too grim. The sausage making by the California Legislature is apt to be poisonous.

No, if Proposition 13 is going to be revised, this will take an initiative campaign, and, as we know, those are often fraught with almost insuperable difficulties. Those popular with the voters are often unacceptable to the courts, because they tend to be written in extravagant and constitutionally questionable terms. And the arguments made pro and con such initiatives sink into the irrationality of one-page campaign mailings and 30-second commercials.

Frankly, I have no idea how this will all turn out. It is true that progress in California is being stymied, the investments we need to make in our future are not forthcoming, the state is falling behind others with more reasonable tax systems. But the real-time political situation has led steadily toward paralysis, and it's going to take more than Skelton or Stall and all their progressive thoughts to bring about real change.

DNC Should Resist Placating Slimy Clinton Forces

2008-05-29T13:22:00.000-07:00

It is vitally necessary, out of fairness, and with regard to Democratic chances in the fall election campaign, that the Democratic National Committee group that meets Saturday to consider the matter of the Florida and Michigan delegations, not take any step that would placate the ugly Hillary Clinton effort to break rules she once agreed to, or would recognize the results of the spurious primaries in those states.

If the DNC group, the Rules and Bylaws committee, feels sitting any delegations from Michigan and Florida at the Democratic National Convention is advisable, and I think the country as a whole will understand if it does not, then the number of Hillary and Obama delegates seated should be equal, so that nothing will be done to change the ultimate course of the convention, or give Hillary any excuse for continuing a campaign which long ago on her part turned divisive and ugly.

Hillary has been beaten by Obama, fair and square. Hopefully, her political career will be over after her current term in the Senate. Her remark in South Dakota suggesting that she would stay in the race just in case Obama were assassinated went so far beyond the pale of ordinary political discourse, and was so repugnant and ugly, that the country should be through with Hillary Clinton from now forevermore.

Let's review the facts. All the Democratic presidential candidates agreed that since Florida and Michigan violated party rules, by setting their primaries too early, they would not campaign in those states, nor would those states have representation at the convention.

Obama, who customarily adheres to the highest ethical standards, observed those rules. He didn't campaign in either state and his name was not even on the ballot in Michigan.

But Hillary, unlike all the other candidates, violated the rules. She made appearances in both states, and now she argues that the delegates from both states chosen in the spurious primaries should be seated.

Already, there are hints that Hillary and her husband, the nefarious former President Bill Clinton, will cause trouble for Obama in the fall, if they can. Bill Clinton remarked this week that the press had been prejudiced against his wife, and before much longer it seems likely that the Clintons will be talking in general about conspiracies to destroy her chances in the entire race. The Clintons love to see conspiracies when, in fact, they are responsible for their own failures.

Another matter that is of concern at Saturday's meeting is the influence of this election campaign on future ones. If the Democratic National Committee doesn't stick with the rules it set in this go-around, it will be an open invitation for states to ignore them in the future, with multiple negative effects in 2012 and beyond.

So the DNC group must stand by its principles on Saturday. The Clintons have been trying to organize demonstrations outside the meeting. Obama's campaign has wisely asked his supporters not to demonstrate.

Let's hope all goes well, and there is a stand on principle. If not, Democratic chances in this election, not to mention future ones, may be compromised.

What To Do About Tyrants A Key Issue In 2008

2008-05-28T06:07:00.000-07:00

It was the poet W.H. Auden who suggested Hitler was "a psychopathic god," and wrote the classic short poem, "Epitaph On A Tyrant." It is certainly pertinent to the security debate now raging in the presidential campaign that I quote it here:

"Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after
And the poetry he invented was easy to understand
He knew human folly like the back of his hand
And was greatly interested in armies and fleets
When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter
And when he cried, the little children died in the streets"

That is not just a fanciful poem. In the world today, we have tyrants like that: Than Shwe in Burma, Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, Bashir Assad in Syria, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran. There are others in The Sudan and Belarus. Not to mention terrorist leaders who call for the extinction of Israel, but primarily just slaughter other Muslims.

Just today, there are reports that Al-Qaeda is vowing to obtain nuclear, biological and chemical weapons and use them against the West. This is no more fanciful than Auden's poem: It could actually happen. Who is the new American president will be preoccupied with trying to see it doesn't happen.

That's a good reason that the vital debate over the security of the United States and other free nations shouldn't be just a series of gaffes, one-liners and provocative television spots.

The fact that Barack Obama refers to his great-uncle liberating Auschwitz when he should have said Buchenwald is not consequential. Neither is a Hillary Clinton ad suggesting she is ready for a call about a terrorist attack at 3 a.m., while Obama as president would not be. And neither are the one-liners John McCain is fond of throwing out: "I will never surrender in Iraq." "We might be there 100 years."

The trouble with the last, by the way, is not that McCain is not expressing his true sentiments. It is just that the American people will never have the patience to keep armed forces in Iraq for 100 years. Unless our leaders can figure out how to wind this operation up expeditiously, we are going to lose in Iraq, or at least have to concentrate the War on Terror somewhere else.

As we go forward in the fall campaign, I hope it's not just a tit-for-tat between McCain and Obama to see which one can one-up the other. I'm sure both men will be diligent campaigners, leaving no stone unturned in their efforts. It's obvious that neither is lazy.

But what is most important is that it be a substantive discussion, that it draw out each of the candidates to give us a clear idea of how they think, how they would begin confronting the pro0blems we face, in short what kind of president each would be. That is what individual voters have to decide for themselves in choosing how to vote.

We haven't always had that in campaigns. Lyndon Johnson ran as the peace candidate in 1964, but within three weeks of his inauguration sharply expanded the fruitless war in Vietnam. Woodrow Wilson ran in 1916 on the slogan, "He kept us out of war," but a month after his inauguration called for, and got, a declaration of war against Germany. Even Franklin D. Roosevelt wasn't completely candid about the options facing the U.S. in 1940.

Can we do better this time?

I'm not at all adverse to McCain's suggestion that he and Obama campaign on occasion together throughout the country with a series of discussions about the issues. It would not be necessary to have ambitious, attention-seeking reporters moderate these talks, thus possibly avoiding the pointless negative questioning of some recent candidate encounters. Maybe, it wouldn't work, but I think it's worth trying. I see no merit, however, in McCain's suggestion that he and Obama take a trip to Iraq together.

We already know, to their credit, that neither McCain nor Obama want to make much of divisive racial issues. Both have denounced religious supporters who were peddling hate and nonsense. Both have fired campaign advisors who decided to go off on their own tacks. We have the sense that both want to be good presidents, and, are not, as the Clintons have been doing, simply grabbing for power.

But the two candidates do profoundly differ with each other on such issues as talking with our enemies, Iraq, and, as it will likely develop, a whole range of other issues.

So, let's go ahead. Let's not cede the field to clever lobbies, fake advertising arrangers, and people with hidden agendas. The times are critical. It is to be hoped that our democracy will live up to them.

Bill Is An Even Worse Sore Loser Than Hillary

2008-05-27T06:19:00.001-07:00

If Bill Clinton had only gone to visit his buddy, the dictator of Kazakhistan, at the beginning of the American presidential campaign, and stayed there, saying nothing, he would have served his wife, Hillary's, interests better.

The poor man just cannot pent up his anger, or keep his mouth shut, and in the present context, it is not doing the Democratic party any good at all, hurting Barack Obama's chances in the fall.

I think even Hillary might not have wandered into what the New York Times has called "disturbing racial undertones" in her campaign, had not Bill gone there first, with his remarks in and after the South Carolina primary. For this former governor of a Deep South state, the prospect of a black man like Obama winning all those white votes was just too much.

Now, Bill is suggesting the press has been biased against his wife, and it won't be long before he is threatening her Senate career by suggesting her fellow senators have been unfair to her. (Twenty Democratic senators have endorsed Obama, while only 13 have endorsed Hillary, and none since February).

It is easy to say Hillary should have shooed Bill off long ago. But the trouble is that she wouldn't be a major political figure in the first place without her association with him. So she had to be moderately nice, for fear reports of marital discord would hurt her campaign.

If Bill really cared a jot for her, he'd have been much more careful about his temperamental outbursts. That should certainly have been possible. (After all, Chelsea Clinton has never embarrassed her mom throughout this long, difficult campaign).

Now, the Clintons, by fighting on to the bitter end, are spoiling their own political futures, beyond just jeopardizing Democratic chances in the fall. The Washington Post has a piece this morning raising the question about Hillary's future in the Senate. It notes that Harry Reid of Nevada has solidified his position atop the Democratic leadership, and that other leadership positions, at least in the short term, might be difficult for her to obtain. They are only becoming more difficult as she refused to bow out quietly in the Democratic race and endorse Obama.

It would be interesting to know what Bill and Hillary are saying between themselves at this point. That is, if they're still talking with one another.

--

In the June 3 primary election next week, I'd like to endorse State Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas over City Councilman Bernard Parks for the supervisorial seat of the retiring Yvonne Brathwaite Burke.

I knew Ridley-Thomas for many years as a political reporter, and found him able and conscientious. Parks, on the other hand, as Los Angeles police chief, was quite a rigid personality too prone to stick to hard positions. The Board of Supervisors, in my view, would do better with Ridley-Thomas.

Other than that, I'm opposed to Proposition 98, another sop to business interests that would, among other bad features, do away with rent control.

Back To L.A. Times After Trip, And Glad Of It

2008-05-26T16:57:00.000-07:00

When I got back home from my cruise around Africa, there were 74 days of the L.A. Times waiting for me, and I've begun wading into them. Just this morning, I was happy to see John Johnson's comprehensive coverage of the latest Mars exploratory landing, and to note that it was far lengthier and far more prominently played than the New York Times coverage of the same event.

Of course, the L.A. Times has a three hour time advantage. The New York Times ran no picture, because apparently none was in when they went to press. but the L.A. Times had fine photographs from the scene, one showing the lay of the land around where the spacecraft put down.

Altogether it's good to get back to he newspaper. On the cruise ship Prinzsendam, I received an electronic copy of the International Herald Tribune six days a week, and this paper was not bad. Its foreign coverage is as good as any paper's and it has the use not only of New York Times articles, but of a few of its own correspondents. The net effect is an entirely professional operation.

But the L.A. Times has a broader view, is bigger in size by far. More in the days ahead about any changes I've noticed in the paper.

One change I've noticed in the New York Times already is that for reasons which may indicate the design editors of the NYT have gone crazy, it has now introduced summaries on Pages 2 and 3 of the main news section of what is to be found in the rest of the paper.

These annoyed me when such summaries appeared in the L.A. Times, because (1) it is fun to turn the paper page by page and sometimes be surprised with what is on on the inside pages, and (2) it effectly reduces the news hole.

Finally, after getting rid of Joe Hutchinson, the L.A. Times dropped its summary pages and was the better for it. Foreign news was soon moved into those pages.

Now, what has happened? Has Hutchinson gone to work for the New York Times?

My 20,000-Mile Voyage Is Over--Impressions

2008-05-24T13:56:00.000-07:00

I came home from my long cruise around Africa last night, and, thank goodness, it was on Lufthansa Airlines, which still believes in customer service. On the flights from Seville to Lisbon, then on to Munich and finally nonstop to Los Angeles, they actually served food in coach, plenty of it, and drinks of water and other beverages often enough to escape dehydration. The stewardesses and other staff were uniformly pleasant. All three airports were quite efficient. No London-Heathrow yesterday. Even with oil at $135 a barrel, some airlines are still doing the job they are supposed to do. Lufthansa even had big racks of the most prominent newspapers of both Europe and America in the Munich Airport, free for coach and first class passengers alike. It was an encouraging reminder that newspapers remain important.

The trip on the Holland-America liner Prinsendam was worth the more than $40,000 I paid for it. It was a way to see a continent I had scarcely visited, only have been before in Morocco, Kenya and Ethiopia. On this long voyage of more than 20,000 miles, my favorite places were South Africa, Egypt and Malta, where I celebrated 100 countries visited, a lifelong goal.

Don't get me wrong, a cruise ship is no place to learn a great deal about the countries visited. The ship was usually in and out of ports in only one day, often just a few hours of a single day, and the tours offered from the ship were both costly and once-over-lightly.

But in my physical condition, at age 70, the ship offers enticements. You don't have to pack and repack. There are relaxing days at sea for reading and listening to lectures, watching movies and getting to know fellow passengers and the crew, many of whom on the Prinsendam were wonderful people, eager to please.

And you do form some impressions. I cannot forget the poverty we saw in many places, but particularly The Gambia and Togo. Cairo was more splendid in parts and diversified than I had been expecting, and Egyptians were friendlier than I imagined they would be, perhaps because many realize that tourism is one of the economic salvations of modern Egypt. Still, I wondered how the Egyptian motorist feels, kept waiting for long periods, so that an armed convoy of tourists can run through intersections at high speed.

Security everywhere on the trip was tight, but particularly in Egypt, Kenya and along the coast of Somalia, where we had numerous police escorts and the ships are closed off in the ports from any outsiders. All port gates are strongly protected, and as we passed by Somalia, for four days we had an escort from a heavily armed Dutch Navy frigate.

In South Africa and Namibia, from what we saw, the minority white population remains prosperous, often holds the best jobs, and seems comfortable and secure. The teeming black slums are something else, however. We had not long left South Africa when riots broke out in these slums and more than 40 "illegal immigrants" from Zimbabwe and Mozambique were murdered.

The resort islands we visited in the Indian Ocean -- Reunion, Mauritius and the Seychelles Islands -- were not quite as fancy as I had pictured. You are better off going to Hawaii.

The intellectual curiousity of many of the mostly elderly passengers on the Prinsendam was limited. With a few exceptions, they did not seem terribly interested either in the politics or the living conditions of the countries visited. I was quite impressed with myself, reaching my goal of 100 countries. But I found many passengers who had been on so many cruises that they no longer kept track how many countries they had stopped in. In any event, it was far more than 100, and there was one lady on the Prinsendam who had been on the ship as a passenger for a year.

I got along famously with my table mates each night at dinner. In the assigned seating, I found myself with an elegant lady from Georgia and Florida, a couple from Portland, Ore. and two ladies from Tacoma, Wash. We all became quite friendly.

My room steward, a young Indonesian, was great, and the food on the ship was rich, but bland. If you were willing to eat steak every night, which is not good for you, it was more than adequate. But if you craved spicy food or authentic ethnic food, forget it. They served a taco salad one night that would have got the chefs arrested in Mexico, and their "Arab dinner" featured only one Arab dish. The coffee bar on the ship, though, was excellent.

Many people on these ships seem to drink their way through the voyage. But I don't drink any longer, and while I spent $1,250 on the ship using the Internet, partly to write this blog, I never ordered a single alcoholic beverage. That saved quite a bit of money, since drinks often went at $5.95 or above, and wine, of course, was more than that.

I found, at the end of the voyage, that there were some limits to Holland America hospitality. The ship's doctors seemed only anxious to get rid of me when my defibrillator started going off -- 17 times despite tests by the ship's doctors and a doctor in Malaga, Spain, which showed the problem was not in my heart, but in the defibrillator. When this happened in the port of Cadiz, Spain, just two days from the end of the voyage, they packed me off in an ambulance to a hospital and then later were unable to tell my children what hospital it was. My son found out only after calling numerous hospitals throughout the city to inquire whether I was there. I was never so glad as to hear my son's voice on the line after hours of inattention from the Spanish-speaking personnel. From that moment, with my son, who speaks fluent Spanish, interceding for me, their treatment of me radically improved, and, after turning off the defibrillator as broken, they released me the next day.

I left virtually everything on board the ship to be shipped home. Let's hope it gets here.

Clinton Sinks To New Abysmal Low

2008-05-23T21:58:00.000-07:00

Sen. Hillary Clinton's suggestion, in a South Dakota newspaper interview that she is not quitting her campaign, because Sen. Barack Obama may get assassinated between now and the Democratic convention is a new low in what has been for months now a disgraceful campaign.

An apology is not enough in this instance. Clinton should bow her head in shame and let the American people off the hook by quitting not only this campaign but, I believe, the U.S. Senate. We should not have sitting senators who are suggesting that their political opponents might be assassinated.

In her continual use of racial undertones, in her clear serving of Republican interests in her improper assaults on Sen. Obama, Clinton has exhibited a woeful lack of integrity now for months.
She and her gruesome husband, Bill Clinton are blots on the American political scene. Let them disappear publicly forever. We cannot abide such scurrilous conduct.

Damn this woman, damn her husband, damn everything they stand for.

Clinton Should Renounce Racist Votes For Her

2008-05-22T08:51:00.000-07:00

Written from Seville, Spain--

If Hillary Clinton has a decent sense of American history and ethics values, she should renounce any and all racist votes cast for her in the primaries and caucuses.

An exit poll taken of the Kentucky votes cast for her, showed 21% said they were influenced by race in their choice. What a disgraceful figure for this state, the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln.

Clinton has contributed to this burgeoning figure by the racial undertones of her campaign. She said she didn´t know if Obama was a Muslim, when it was clear he was not. She talked incessantly about the white vote, as did her husband. The racial innuendo became a feature of the Clinton campaign.

It is time for it to stop, if Clinton wants to maintain a shred of her reputation as she continues to serve in the Senate after, thankfully, losing the nomination to Obama.

I notice that Sen. Robert Byrd, a member in his youth in the Ku Klux Klan, endorsed Obama soon after his home state, West Virginia, voted massively for Hillary, partly on racial grounds. Byrd, oldest member in terms of service in the Senate, recognizes that America has changed. That, and, judging from Senate endorsements, Obama is liked better than Hillary there. Jay Rockefeller, the other West Virginia senator, also endorsed Obama.

Commentator David Gergen, one of the best, made the point about Hillary renouncing racial voting on CNN Tuesday night, and he is certainly right.

--

Meanwhile, I´m pleased to report I´m out of a hospital in Cadiz, Spain, after a little more than a day, where I had to go after my defibrillator discharged 17 times, all apparently in error. We turned the defibrillator off, while I make my way back to Los Angeles. I had to leave the Prinsendam two days early.

My son, who now speaks excellent Spanish after months in Spain and Argentina, argued forcefully over the phone with reluctant Spanish doctors that the defibrillator should be turned off, as did my great Los Angeles doctor, Ray Matthews of USC University Hospital. He will put in a new defibrillator next week.

--

--Oil has now reached $135 a barrel on the world markets, and it is high time that the U.S and other oil importers take this matter to the U.N. and ask for a cost sharing of oil profits. That and other action against OPEC and other greedy forces in the oil industry and elsewhere. It´s time we spoke up for ourselves and other countries which have fallen victim to these scoundrels.

Why Clinton May Have Lost To Obama

2008-05-20T08:28:00.001-07:00

Written from Malaga, Spain--

(Pre-Note: Sad word comes from the Massachusetts General Hospital today that Sen. Edward M. (Ted) Kennedy has been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. For decades, Kennedy has been a stalwart in the Senate and in American politics. There will be many bipartisan statements today, and prayers for his recovery).

Let's hope that New York Times writer Adam Nagourney was not jumping the gun when he wrote the article headlined today in the International Herald Tribune, "Clinton's decline: Blunders, bad luck and Bill."

Nagourney, who has not always been up to date about what is happening in the scintillating presidential race, puts it down to a variety of unfortunate happenstances and so forth. But, if she is gone, and I certainly hope she is, I don't think he has it right even now.

If Obama has prevailed in the impassioned race for the Democratic presidential nomination, I'd put it down primarily to these major factors:

1--He is superior to Clinton in both intellect and ethical sensitivity.

2--He has had a superb campaign, organized so wisely and carefully that it provides a solid indication he would also administer the White House well.

3--Like Charles de Gaulle, he never loses his composure.

4--Clinton unwisely put all her planning on the assumption she would clinch the nomination by Super Tuesday, Feb. 5. She unwisely spent extravagantly before that, and, then, when she did not, she had essentially inadequate resources left to contest Obama in the primaries and caucuses that followed later in February, when he built up a margin he has never given up in pledged delegates, and began making inroads in superdelegates.

I agree with Nagourney on one thing: Bill Clinton was not an asset to Hillary Clinton.

Now, there are those saying Obama will be another Michael Dukakis or John Kerry, if he wins the Democratic nomination.

This is bunk. As I suggested recently, Obama has never been, is not now, and will never be, a patsy. Already, he is firing back whenever Sen. John McCain, or anyone else, attacks him. And he is often quite personable about it, such as when he warned Tennessee Republicans, "Lay off my wife."

I recently offered to bet someone that Obama wins the election by getting at least 350 electoral votes. Sounds about right. Put me down for it.

Is China Opening Up A Little As Olympics Approach?

2008-05-19T05:02:00.000-07:00

Written On M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Malaga, Spain--

The International Herald Tribune this morning carries a fascinating article by Philip Taubman headlined, "Watching China and remembering glasnost." (This probably also appeared in the New York Times, which owns and operates the Herald Tribune).

In it, Taubman analyzes the signs that, with the Beijing Olympics approaching, and under the pressure of events in the Sichuan earthquake, Tibet, Burma, The Sudan, Zimbabwe and elsewhere, China may be opening up a little and even altering its foreign policies.

Taubman begins: "A dash of openness can be a dangerous thing in an autocratic state. Mikhail Gorbachev discovered this two decades ago when his campaign to inject some daylight into Soviet society doubled back on him like a heat-seeking missile.

"Now China's leaders are playing with the same volatile political chemistry as they give their own citizens and the world an unexpectedly vivid look at the earthquake devastation in the nation's southwest regions."

Taubman goes on to observe, "While China's response to its natural catastrophe is certainly more humane (than the Burmese junta's), and is only a small step toward openness, it could set in motion political forces that might, over time, be unsettling."

It is so like American journalism that no matter what happens, reporters always seem to be able to find a dark lining in the sunlight.

The fact is, that China's rulers have taken several steps lately that indicate they have been listening to world opinion and that they crave a good reputation, at least during the Olympic period, but perhaps also beyond.

After bitching and screaming for weeks about world reporting and popular reaction to the Tibetan uprisings, China agreed to meet with representatives of the Dalai Lama, who is initially blamed for the trouble.

After sending an arms ship to Zimbabwe in support of the tyrant Robert Mugabe, the Chinese withdrew the vessel without delivering the arms. It's true that South African dockworkers refused to unload the cargo for transshipment, and it was also turned away in Angola, but, still, the Chinese did desist without pressuring others, like Mozambique, to transship the arms.

In Burma, sketchy reports indicate the Chinese have urged the junta to be more accepting of foreign aid to cope with the deaths and destruction caused by the recent cyclone.

It may be too early to assume there's a trend, but at least these are positive steps, and, I believe, should be welcomed
worldwide. Yes, Gorbachev's "glasnost and peristroika" ended with the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the end of the Communist system, but this was not all bad, and, I think, Chinese unity may prove more durable than Soviet unity did.

--

In another terrific article this morning, Janny Scott, now with the New York Times and formerly a talented member of the L.A. Times staff, gives the intriguing details of how Sen. Barack Obama wrote and sold two books which helped launch his political career, and made him a fortune.

It's obvious that if Obama does become president of the United States, major books will one day be written how he pulled off a meteoric rise which is reminiscent of Lincoln and other leaders who climbed out of poverty and obscurity to positions of great power. Scott's recounting thus is only a start, but it is a good start.

Chinese Quake A Wake-Up Call For California

2008-05-18T04:36:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, in Western Mediterranean Sea--

The earthquake in China's Sichuan province was measured at magnitude 7.9, and some measures of the San Francisco quake of 1906 were that it was magnitude 7.8. Others put it at 8.1 or 8.3.

Regardless which San Francisco figure is correct, the earthquake's power in China is roughly about the same, and that in itself should give us in California cause for reflection. In 1995, at the time of the Kobe quake in Japan, Shelby Coffey, then editor of the L.A. Times, sent me to Japan to do stories on what bearing the quake there had on California quake issues, and I think those stories were quite useful. This time, from what I can read on the L.A. Times Web site, the newspaper, which has grown smaller, has relied on its Asian correspondents to provide all the China quake coverage, and they went in without much quake expertise.

The fact is, a quake the size of the Sichuan earthquake is going to cause terrible damage and casualties in California, were a similar quake to occur there. The high rise buildings constructed since 1906 might well be vulnerable, if the temblor were centered anywhere close to one of the big cities. Also, today, there are all kinds of aqueducts, computer systems and modern highways that have proven in other locales to be susceptible to great damage by intense shaking. Scientific studies have indicated a major quake could occur within a few years in the San Francisco Bay Area or the Inland Empire, San Bernardino, Riverside or Palm Springs, although, of course, no one can be certain where it might strike.

The Sichuan earthquake occurred at a time of day when many children were in school, and there are horrific stories of the schools collapsing, burying hundreds of children, of whom few have been rescued.

In California, several of the great earthquakes that occurred in the 20th Century took place at times of the day when the schools were closed. This was true with the San Francisco quake, the 1933 Long Beach quake, the 1971 San Fernando quake, the 1994 Northridge quake and so forth. That was fortunate, because school casualties were minimized, but we cannot count on such propitious timing being the case in future big quakes.

After 1933, California adopted the Field Act, mandating quake-related construction codes that afforded considerable protection to the state's public schools, although higher education was left uncovered. Since then, there has been an effort to extend safeguards to hospitals and to the general building codes. Many hospitals, however, have won delays in implementing the new standards.

In 2004, the year I retired, I did a story that found that in many respects that in the 10 years since Northridge, California had fallen back on earthquake safety. Many experts told me that California had failed to really improve earthquake construction standards, according to the latest findings, with the exception of retrofitting bridges on the freeways. There was also much less devotion in both the Davis and Schwarzenegger Administration to quake safety, and the state's Seismic Safety Commission had suffered devastating budgetary cutbacks and from the governors' lack of support.

Unfortunately, my story was watered down considerably before it appeared in the newspaper. Chiefly responsible for that was David Lauter, who in my absence on a South American trip before the story actually appeared, took it on himself to weaken the story, without consulting me, which he could have by telephone or e-mail. When I returned and read the story, I was very distressed and wrote a strong protest letter to Lauter and other, higher, editors.

There was never a meaningful response to my complaint. And when I retired, and science writer Lee Hotz subsequently left the newspaper for the Wall Street Journal, the coverage that had won the Times a Pulitzer Prize for Northridge coverage was allowed to languish. There is no one at the paper today who has the concern, or I daresay the knowledge, that we had on earthquake coverage.

I bring all this up now to urge in the strongest terms I can muster that the Times revive its interest in California quake protections. Sharon Bernstein and Hector Becerra have both done some good work in this area, and Shelby Grad has quite a bit of interest in it. But more detailed, tougher coverage is needed. (Another writer who contributed valuable stories on the Northridge quake, Doug Smith, also would be a great earthquake reporter).

We don't want to wake up some day to a major earthquake and find that as a result of not being ready, the quake had caused much greater loss of life and property damage than might have been the case had more protections been approved and implemented.

Incidentally, the Washington Post has an excellent story today about how the Chinese press has been covering the Sichuan quake with much more openness than was in evidence in China in the past.

Obama-McCain: A Detailed Security Debate Needed

2008-05-17T10:28:00.000-07:00

Written from Gabes, Tunisia--

President Bush got a lot of flak from Democrats for his remarks before the Knesset in Israel questioning Democratic "appeasers" of terrorists, with an implication that he was talking about Sen. Barack Obama.

I thought the President had vowed to stay out of the 2008 election, and I find it hard to believe that Sen. John McCain is happy he now seems to be commenting. By a very large margin, polls indicate that voters are not pleased with the Bush policies.

That said, however, the security of the United States is an extremely important issue in this election, and there certainly needs to be a great deal of debate--with as little fearmongering as possible--about what direction the country should now go. As an Obama Republican, I feel the same way generally that I felt when the Jeremiah Wright controversy exploded: Questions of all the candidates, including Obama, are necessary, and the hardest questions are the most necessary. And, of course, their candid answers are required.

Both McCain and Obama, assuming he is the Democratic nominee, and Sen. Hillary Clinton, if she is, must tell us in the most possible detail how they view the options facing the U.S. It is a life or death matter, because, with nuclear proliferation, the chance that some fanatic is going to try to attack American cities or the cities of our allies, with nuclear weapons can, on no count, be discounted.

The same thing with Iraq. Public unhappiness with the way the war is going has already induced McCain to amend his statement we might remain there 100 years, to say he hopes to win the war by 2013. Obama must continue to air his Iraq views completely.

As to whom U.S. diplomats should talk to or not talk to, I'm surprised to hear suggestions from any quarter that we should not talk to Iran. The fact is, the Bush Administration itself has had discussions with Iranian representatives, and both the Secretary of State and the Defense Secretary have supported such talks.

There is a difference between talking to governments, and talking to terrorist organizations, like Hamas and Hezbollah, which are Iranian proxies, but not Iran itself.

I continue to have some hope for constructive talks with Iran.

But we must await the comprehensive views of all the presidential candidates before we can legitimately decide who to vote for in November.

--

Anita Busch, a former L.A. Times reporter threatened by the now convicted Anthony Pellicano has made charges of Times complicity with Pellicano which must be completely investigated, perhaps by an outside ethics expert. Her charges are disquieting, and it is important they be resolved in such a way that the public will feel confident in the findings.

Realization Of A Goal: Malta Is My 100th Country

2008-05-16T08:48:00.000-07:00

Written from Valletta, Malta--

I celebrated reaching my 100th country or dependency today by hosting a luncheon for my tablemates from the cruise ship Prinsendam. Also guests were the sister and niece of my friend, Anton Calleia, who grew up on Malta and left for the U.S., and an eventual career as Los Angeles' chief budget officer. His sister, Ellen, and niece, Janet, remain on Malta, as does his 97-year-old mother. We dined and drank a very good Italian wine, Gazi, at Rubino's restaurant in downtown Valletta.

All those who are acquainted with me know I'm an inveterate traveler -- be it still hitchhiking around Los Angeles on occasion, to a 2005, 11,000-mile drive to Alaska and Canada's Northwest Territory, 20 automobile trips across the U.S., or nine trips to India, five to Italy, a voyage to Antarctica, and various visits to every continent. About 25 countries were in connection with L.A. Times assignments, mainly on the Olympics, but also several volcanoes in the Phillippines and the Caribbean.

Travel, as has been observed, is more a function of willpower than financial resources. When I was 20 years old, while studying a year in Paris, I hitchiked around Europe with a friend on spring vacation on the princely sum of $5 a day for two, and once hitchiked as well most of the way from Lima over the Andes, to Cuzco, Peru. I thought nothing of taking just $100 with me on a trip to the Canadian Rockies in 1967.

In 1968, while covering the presidential campaign of Sen. Eugene McCarthy, I kept track of how much I spent on hotels. The most expensive in the six months with him was the St. Regis in New York, $34 for the night, and the least expensive was in Bismarck, N.D., $4. I used to stay in the Manger-Hay Adams in Washington, D.C. for $16 a night. Those were the days, and one of my proudest moments was when Mark Murphy, Metro editor of the Times, remarked that he could send me to Europe for what it would cost to send another reporter to Fresno.

Years later, when I had children, I often took them on long trips, a month in Australia, to the Sarajevo Winter Olympics, to the World Olympic Congress at Baden-Baden, West Germany, to India and the Normandy beaches. Both my son and daughter now travel a lot on their own, and both have been to 30 countries or more. Even my little granddaughter, four and a half, has been to 12 states and Canada and Mexico.

With so much traveling, I've found myself in some interesting spots when major events occurred. I was in Birmingham, Ala., on Sept. 15, 1963, the day of the church bombing by Klansmen that killed four little black girls. On the terrible day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, I heard the news while standing on the steps of Widener Library at Harvard University. I was in Athens, Greece, the day President Johnson expanded the war in Vietnam, on Feb. 7, 1965, in Wilmington, N.C., on the day of the 1971 San Fernando earthquake, and in Lausanne, Switzerland the day President Jimmy Carter tried and failed to rescue the American hostages in Iran. But I was close to home, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel with Sen. McCarthy, the horrible night that Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was gunned down at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Of course, these days, unable to walk very well, I go on more expensive trips. The present one, around Africa, took me to 15 new dependencies and countries: the Turks and Caicos Islands, Madeira, Senegal, The Gambia, Ghana, Togo, Namibia, South Africa, Lesotho, Reunion, Mauritius, the Seychelles islands, Egypt. Malta and, tomorrow, Tunisia. The cruise will end next week in Spain and Portugal. One of the best things about a cruise at my age is that you don't have to pack and unpack at every stop, but seeing the world from a cruise ship is not as good as renting a car and driving through a foreign land.

The first time I went to Spain, in 1958, Franco was still in power, and the police wore three-cornered Napoleon-style hats. Sometimes, such as with my daughter on the West Bank and in Kashmir, I wandered into areas which were pretty tense. It freaked out my kids when I went to the Middle East a few months after 9-11.

I have a long memory, and while I cannot tell you day to day about each trip, I remember most details of the lion's share of trips and still have a memory of my first, with my parents, to Palm Springs at the age of 2, and I have a pungent memory of a cross-country trip by rail my sister and I took with our mother in wartime 1942.

Obviously, I have some favorite places:

In California, Yosemite National Park, Lassen Peak, San Francisco, Big Sur and the Redwood Highway.

In the U.S., Ashland, Ore., Monument Valley, Ouray, Colo., the Beartooth Pass leading into Yellowstone, the Lemhi Pass, where Lewis and Clark crossed the Continental Divide, Homer, Alaska, Dutch Harbor in the Aleutians, New Orleans, Tampa's Old Spanish section, Greenville, Miss., Sanibel Island, Fla., Mobile, Ala., Washington, D.C., Harpers Ferry, Concord, Mass, and, I hate to admit it, New York City and Boston. I attended Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., but found it too cold. Now, as class secretary of my Dartmouth class, I enjoy going to Hanover every fall.

In Canada, Vancouver, Victoria, Jasper, Lake Louise, the Stikine River, Yellowknife, Montreal and Quebec City.

In Latin America, Mexico, Guatemala, Peru, Bolivia, the Amazon part of Brazil, Argentina and Chile. I've never been to Rio, or to Panama or Costa Rica, and have only stopped briefly in Ecuador.

In Europe, Norway, Denmark, Austria, France, Italy, Greece and Turkey (the part of Istanbul on the European side of the Bosporus). Moscow was pretty grim when I went there in 1980.

In Asia, Japan, China, Singapore, India (especially Kashmir, Bombay and the Kerala state), Israel, and, I hate to admit, Dubai.

In Africa, Morocco, South Africa and Egypt.

100 countries and dependencies. But that's not really anywhere close to the travels of Juan Antonio Samaranch, the onetime president of the International Olympic Committee. He traveled to 256 governmental entities on Olympic business.

Will I match Samaranch? No.

My favorite trips of all? It would have to be hiking in Yosemite with my father, just home from the war, in 1947 when I was nine years old, and my 1983 trip with my daughter to India when she was 11, where we saw my dear friends, Abraham S. Abraham and his wife, Amrita, in Bombay. In Yosemite, we climbed the old ledge trail, no longer in existence, from the Valley to Glacier Point, to the top of Yosemite Falls and quite a few others. But, being scared of heights, I never climbed Half Dome. That was left to my father and my grandfather, Harris A. Reich, who went to Yosemite regularly for 6o years, and my son, who climbed it much later.

It was more hiking than traveling, but while he was growing up, my son and I hiked about 1,000 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail and greatly enjoyed the campouts and day-hikes in the San Jacinto, San Bernardino, San Gabriel, Sierra and Cascade ranges.

Would Edwards Make A Good Obama Running Mate?

2008-05-15T04:45:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Malta--

The 2008 presidential race is perhaps the most riveting political story of my life time. Every day brings a fresh perspective, a new twist and turn. If it ends with an Obama election, it will be without peer in modern history.

Today (for me -- this came at 2 a.m. Thursday, Middle Eastern time), there's the endorsement of Sen. Barack Obama by former Sen. John Edwards.

Normally, I'd be comparing the vigorous Chinese response to the Sichuan earthquake with the disgraceful response to the typhoon by the Burmese junta and cautioning on the need for more earthquake preparedness in California. Or I'd be commenting on President Bush's trip to Israel to commemorate the Jewish state's 60th birthday.

But, as usual, the presidential campaign trumps everything. And the Edwards endorsement, coming just when it does, opens up options for Obama if, as appears likely, he is the Democratic presidential nominee.

Up until this well-timed endorsement, it appeared that Obama was increasingly being forced into a position where he would have to take Sen. Hillary Clinton as his running mate, and I've been writing that might be necessary to unite the Democratic party. But Hillary has not waged a very upright campaign, she has pandered, and, in any event, she carries a lot of baggage. Having Bill and Hillary Clinton beside him in the Administration would be a very great burden on Obama. Who wants another menage-a-trois in the White House?

Edwards would be a lot easier match. He could appeal to the same groups of elderly and low-income voters that Hillary has been winning in her campaign, and, judging from his speech last night in Grand Rapids, which CNN showed in its entirety on its international service, he would be prepared this time to make an energetic and resounding defense of the Obama candidacy.

Edwards was criticized in 2004 for not being a sufficient hatchet man for Sen. John Kerry when he was his vice presidential running mate. This go-around, he seems prepared to be, and, while he's ambitious and something of a slick trial lawyer, I still felt last night that he and Obama looked great together.

Edwards waited quite a while to make his endorsement, although as early as the New Hampshire campaign he seemed to be siding with Obama most often against Hillary. He probably would, as Time magazine's Mark Halperin speculates this morning, been of considerable help to Obama in Pennsylvania, Ohio or Texas, had he endorsed him before those primaries.

Still, we can't expect Edwards to be an angel. He has calculated what would be of most use to his own career, and politicians do that. As it was, his endorsement, coming right after the drubbing Obama took in West Virginia, was opportune.

Clinton, by the way, was on her best behavior yesterday when she was interviewed by CNN's Wolf Blitzer. Had she taken that tone throughout the campaign, she might conceivably have fared better. But running against a Barack Obama would not be a cup of tea for anyone.

Clinton keeps saying she will stay in. It would be far better, both for Obama and her, were she to get out after the last primary in early June. Even some of her prominent supporters, such as Gov. Ed Rendel in Pennsylvania and James Carville now seem prepared to accept that.

--

I've finished reading Bill Boyarsky's book on the life of Jesse Unruh and found it often entertaining and insightful, though I agree with Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters that Bill might have tried to evaluate why the Unruh legislative reforms, the full-time legislature in California, have not proven a success. His book may have been a little longer, but anything anyone does constructively in retirement deserves commendation. Bill worked hard on this book, and should be congratulated.

I had friendly relations with Unruh when he served as state treasurer, and my fondest memory was the day I learned from the news wires that Gov. Jerry Brown's parole board was considering the release of Sirhan Sirhan, the assassin of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy. (Unruh had been present at the assassination in the Ambassador Hotel, and in fact had been instrumental in saving Sirhan from injury or death at the hands of the outraged crowd).

Calling Unruh the afternoon I learned of the possible parole, I asked him, "Are you going to let this happen?" "Absolutely not," Unruh replied. "I'm going right across the street to see the parole board, and I can promise you one thing: Sirhan will never get out." I can still remember the emphasis with which Jess used the word, "Never."

Sirhan remains in prison to this day. As an early terrible example of Palestinian terrorism, he should never be free to boast of his crime, and Unruh's determination is something I will always appreciate.

Oregon Emerges As A Key Democratic Primary

2008-05-14T04:24:00.000-07:00

Written On M.S. Prinsendam, off Libya--

Sen. Barack Obama better win the Oregon primary next Tuesday. If he doesn't, then I think his grip on the Democratic nomination may seriously be loosened.

Obama is, for the moment, well ahead of Sen. Hillary Clinton in delegates, superdelegates, popular votes won and states won. But he is going to lose in Kentucky next Tuesday, another state with many low income white voters, and he needs to win traditionally independent-minded Oregon and then South Dakota and Montana June 3. If he does, he has the nomination. If not, I think he's in trouble.

So, if this is correct, it stands to reason that Obama must suspend his visits to possible swing states next November, such as Missouri and Michigan, where he has gone this week, and concentrate on wrapping this thing up, by visiting Oregon, South Dakota and Montana -- and more than once, plus advertise heavily in all three places. He shouldn't for the moment be running primarily against Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee.

I don't buy the argument frequently heard now from the Clinton camp that the pattern of states where Hillary has won proves that Obama can't win a general election because he can't win whites. In many states, Obama has won whites in many states, and, in any event, this continues to look like a solid Democratic year. Whoever wins the Democratic nomination is likely to win the election, and as November comes on, and the choice seems clear, Obama would, I think, naturally win the preponderant share of voters who went to Clinton in the primaries and caucuses. They might not be terribly satisfied, but they would come to his side in the end.

One further indication of that came last night in Mississippi, where Democrat Travis Childers won a congressional seat in a special election in a district which not only had recently gone Republican, but where the Republican, Greg Davis, ran a racially-oriented campaign trying to tie the white Democratic candidate to Obama. It didn't work, and it didn't work in another recent district where a Democrat won a Republican seat, in Louisiana.

In fact, the Clinton argument about swing states may not be as valid this year, because it seems, from primary results, that Obama is running very well across the South, and could capture a large number of Southern states in the fall.

After her big win in West Virginia Tuesday night, Clinton sounded as if she were in the race to stay, and may even try to change the rules and lobby for the admission of Florida and Michigan delegates who come out of primaries held in violation of Democratic National Committee rules that Clinton herself had once agreed to. This just is another demonstration of how dishonorable Clinton is. She and her husband are involved in a power grab of chilling proportions.

But that is not to say that if he wins the nomination, Obama shouldn't put her on the ticket with him as the Democratic vice presidential nominee. As I said last week, that may be ncessary.

Obama naturally doesn't want to do this, because who would want the Clintons ensconced in a vice presidency where they could make trouble for an Obama administration? He'd almost need a food taster in the White House. But the Democratic hierarchy might demand her as the vice presidential nominee, and Hillary now seems to be angling for it.

The pressure in that direction only grows when Clinton wins primaries like she did last night.

Some have said an Obama-Clinton ticket, or a Clinton-Obama ticket would be more change than the American people could take, with the first woman and the first black. But such a Democratic tide is running that this year I don't think so. The fact is that McCain probably stands a reasonable chance only if Hillary is the presidential nominee and doesn't put Obama on the ticket.

--

Many of the political commentary panels being run by the networks on the impassioned presidential race simply include partisans of one side or the other, and not independent observers. What it seems is that a bunch of lawyers for the various candidates are always arguing with another, coming up, as lawyers often do, with the most ridiculous arguments. The viewers deserve better than that.

Into Teeming Cairo, The Pyramids And Sphinx

2008-05-13T10:52:00.000-07:00

Written from Alexandria, Egypt--

For a long time, I had skipped Egypt on my travels, not being in great sympathy with its policies, and somewhat concerned about the security of such a visit. But that was a mistake. Egypt is a marvelous travel experience and no one who can afford such a trip should miss it.

Today, hundreds of Prinsendam passengers took a 12-hour tour from the ship, docked here at Alexandria, into Cairo and Giza to see the great pyramids, the Sphinx and the Egyptian Museum, which has many more King Tut articles than have appeared in periodic tours of the U.S.

Cairo has a population roughly estimated at 20 million people, but it was not quite the ramshackle, disorganized place I'd been led to expect. It turns out to have many fancy sections, high-rise buildings of splendid architecture and a subway line that is longer than Los Angeles'. It even, recently, has built a freeway or two.

The pyramids and Sphinx are west of the city, but the city has kind of grown up around them, and the Egyptian authorities might be well advised to form a national park and buy out property owners who now impede the long views of the monuments, which date from 2600 B.C. There are good perspectives now, but the views from the desert are missing. There are obviously no monuments in all the world like these, and it was a thrill to see them. They loom even larger than expected. I skipped the $3 camel ride, however.

We had a guide today, an Egyptology graduate student, who felt constrained to lecture us for some minutes on the virtues of women wearing the veil and in many cases total burkas on the streets of Cairo. He claimed the women like it, although he said Islam does not dictate it. My fellow passengers sat mute through this exercise, which reminded me so much of the Southern whites who used to say the Negroes loved segregation.

But I did speak up. I told him of my feeling that not until women are liberated and put on an equal footing with men, will Egypt and other Arab countries advance. Right now, these countries labor under a severe handicap: Only half their population really participates in the economic life of the community. I expressed a view that men, like women, here would be better off with a new arrangement.

In accord with the ship's advice, many of the women going on the tour wore scarfs, and many of the men long-sleeved shirts. But Cairo has many tourists and I noticed that particularly the Asians, the Japanese and Chinese women who were visiting and on the streets, were wearing shorts. I imagine Arab men enjoyed the view.

Security on the trip from Alexandria to Cairo was light. No convoy, as to Luxor the other day, and buses drove separately, each with a security man in a front seat riding shot gun. In Cairo itself, and particularly around the Egyptian Museum, there was heavy security.

Tourists get a good reception in this country, by the way.

The Nile flows right through the center of downtown Cairo.

--

Kudos to the L.A. Times editorial pages for running an editorial contrary to a position taken by Sam Zell and opposing Proposition 98, which under the guise of undoing the foolish court decisions allowing muncipalities to seize property by eminent domain for commercial projects would also do away with rent control and do other things as a favor for the wealthy. This is a sound position, and tends to verify Zell's earlier assurances that he would not interfere in editorial policy.

--

Today is the 50th anniversary of the uprising of French settlers and Army officers in Algeria that ultimately brought Charles de Gaulle back to power in France and paved the way, eventually, for French withdrawal from Algeria.

After being restored, de Gaulle went down to Algiers and made one of the great Machiavellian statements of modern history: "I have understood you," he roared. The crowd of Colons roared back. They thought he was saying he understood them and would support them. What he, in fact, was saying, as it turned out, was that he had understood them and was against them.

Suez Canal Pespectives--Sinai Side Undeveloped

2008-05-12T05:57:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Port Said, Egypt--

Our 11-hour passage through the Suez Canal is complete, and we're in the Mediterranean Sea. There were no warships today, so the Prinsendam led the northbound convoy of 46 ships, and actually got underway at 3:30 a.m. There were no halts, since the southbound convoy of the day, 18 ships, was waiting for us in Great Bitter Lake when we passed, south of Ismailia.

Signs of Middle Eastern conflict were everywhere. To protect the canal and its shipping, the Egyptian government stations soldiers every few hundred feet all along the 101-mile length of the waterway. Mostly, they live in flimsy tents and stand solo watch out in the bright sunlight. It cannot be pleasant duty.

The Suez Canal, finished in 1869 and containing no locks, since it is at sea level throughout, was first conceived by ancient Egyptian monarchs in the 6th century BC. It is traversed each year by about 25,000 ships, about 14% of the world's shipping, and individual ships frequently pay tolls of $200,000 or more. Of course, it marks the boundary between Africa and Asia.

There is a very marked difference, as we saw today, between the east bank, the Sinai desert, and the west bank, which is irrigated and part of the Nile river delta. So, on the one side there is lush farm land, and on the other side, the east side, almost no development at all. It's as if the Egyptians expect the Israelis to be back some day, as they were in 1956 and 1967-73.

There are signs along most of the way of the remainders of the Israeli Bar Lev line, built to defend their positions on the east side of the canal. Israeli engineers built berms and ramparts 25 feet high, and there are still the ruins of some military equipment destroyed in the Israeli-Arab wars.

On the other hand, Ismailia and other cities along the way on the west bank look fairly prosperous, as did Luxor a few days ago.

There is only one bridge across the canal, and that is a spectacular suspension bridge built a few years ago by the Japanese. Otherwise, there are multiple ferries, every few miles, and some with a huge backup of truck traffic. (The Asian influence is quite noticeable here in Egypt. When we went to Luxor the other day, we rode in Chinese-made buses, very comfortable with every modern feature).

Tomorrow early we dock in Alexandria, and many passengers, including me, will take a 12-hour tour from there to Cairo and the Pyramids. Malta has been substituted for Libya as the following stop, Libya having been cancelled because the Khadafy government would not give visas to the American passengers.

--

Two articles in the Herald-Tribune today deal with the Obama candidacy. Maureen Dowd makes a rather compelling case for him not putting Hillary on the ticket as a Vice Presidential running mate, calling her a "Trojan rabbit," a disruptive force who could jinx Obama. And Edward Luttwak, in a chilling article, warns that to fundamentalist Muslims, Obama is an apostate, because his father renounced Islam, and that accordingly his murder is regarded as mandated by Islamic law. Luttwak notes that Iran has endorsed apostate murder and that Obama could, under no circumstances, go there for any talks.

Luttwak concludes, "Of all the well-meaning desires projected on Obama, the hope that he would decisively improve relations with the world's Muslims is the least realistic."

Maybe so, but many Muslims I've met while circumventing Africa have expressed admiration of Obama, and enthusastically backed his candidacy.

Through The Suez Canal Tomorrow On My Cruise

2008-05-11T04:27:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam Approaching Suez Canal--

So far, my cruise from Fort Lauderdale, Fla., across the Atlantic, and then around Africa, has gone more than 18,000 miles, and now one of the climactic moments will come tomorrow, the passage in convoy through the Suez Canal.

At the moment, we are in the Gulf of Suez about 50 miles below the anchorage at which convoys through the canal are formed. What happens is that the northbound convoy enters the canal about 6 a.m., proceeds to a holding spot near Ismailia, lets the southbound convoy pass, and then proceeds to the Mediterranean Sea, reaching it about 5 p.m.

In the convoys, according to our captain, any warships go first, then passenger ships and cruise ships and finally freighters.

It's highly evident we are in the Middle East. Earlier this morning we passed the offshore oil wells developed by both the Israelis, during their Sinai occupation (1967-73), and Egyptians just off the Sinai peninsula. Then, the first big sight tomorrow is supposed to be all the Egyptian tanks and other military equipment destroyed by the Israeli army in three wars. You can be assured I'll be out on deck to see this.

My trip is also reaching a significant personal milestone. Egypt was my 99th country yesterday, and Malta, next Friday, will be my 100th. Naturally, I'm happy about this, and will take a few friends from the ship to a gala luncheon on Malta, renowned for its gallant resistance to the Axis powers in World War II.

--

Now Rupert Murdoch has dropped his bid to buy Newsday, and the New York Times this morning says that Cablevision might have the inside track to the purchase from the faltering Tribune Co.

But, alas, it is not faltering enough to divest itself of the L.A. Times to someone who would run it with more ambition and more competence.

--

Sen. Barack Obama's chances against Sen. John McCain have, in my view, been underestimated. I notice he is ahead of McCain in a poll out this morning, 46% to 40% -- and that's even before Hillary throws her support to him.

Dollar Still Counts On The Streets Of Luxor

2008-05-10T13:08:00.000-07:00

Written After Visit To Luxor, Egypt--

Five hundred Prinsendam passengers went in a police-protected convoy on a 300-mile roundtrip to see the ancient temples and tombs of Luxor, on the Nile River, Saturday, and it was a great trip by several counts.

But on a voyage when we have often been reminded how far the dollar has sunk compared to the Euro (although it has rebounded a little in recent weeks), we found a deal while stalled in traffic in downtown Luxor that outmatched anything on the trip. In the hotel where we had lunch, they were asking $25 each for colorful papyrus prints. A peddler on the street, however, was selling the same prints, which look like paintings, for a dollar each. And one woman on our tour bus finally bought everything another peddler had for 50 cents apiece.

We had many impressions on the 13-hour trip in ten buses. Of course, the antiquities were wonderful, and it was great to see the Nile River, almost a mile wide and 100 feet deep at Luxor, with some of the 350 luxury craft which cruise up and down the river, at anchor on the river bank adjacent to downtown Luxor (an impressive city of 1.4 million people).

A few years ago, in a tragic day, Islamic terrorists slaughtered scores of tourists visiting the antiquities in Luxor, including 60 Swiss tourists. After that horrific episode, Egypt's president, Hosni Mubarak, vowed never to let it happen again, and he has subsequently assigned strong police and military guards to tourists traveling to Luxor and elsewhere in Egypt. Tourism is probably the biggest revenue-producer Egypt has, so this makes eminent good sense.

We saw the security guard in operation today, and it was well done. When we left the port of Safaga on the Red Sea first thing in the morning, the convoy of buses was headed by a police truck carrying several machine gun-wielding officers. Police cars followed the procession, and at each intersection, all other traffic was blocked, including that coming from the opposite direction, and police and soldiers carrying rifles or machine guns stood guard on the streets. It all came off without a hitch. Whoever said, Egypt was poorly organized?

The first 110 miles of the trip was through a barren desert, with hardly a bush or a tree, and no irrigated farmland. But 40 miles from the Nile, we began running aside an irrigation canal, and from then on, it was lush farm land, every square inch beyond houses and huts it seemed covered with a variety of crops, and even on the banks of the canal, sugar cane was growing. It was a repeat of something we've seen elsewhere in Africa on this tour: The inhabitants are often poverty-stricking, but they make use of everything they have to eke out a living.

Still, life is not easy. For every tractor or truck we saw hauling produce to market, we saw at least 10 simple wagons, pulled by a donkey. And many people carried their own produce to market.

In every village we went through, the most impressive buildings were the minarets of mosques, towering over everything, a striking display of the preeminent role of Islam in Egypt.

But also impressive to me was that nearly every woman we saw, and there were far fewer women on the streets than men, was not only veiled but covered from head to toe in usually totally black garments.

I could not help but think what a boon it would be to all these countries in the Middle East to liberate the women, to allow them to take their place in the modern world, rather than to be so subservient (and, in the customary heat here, uncomfortable).

Nonetheless, Luxor itself often conveyed an impression of prosperity. There are many fine hotels and gift shops of all kinds. This is in a way, a tourists' paradise. Many of the cruise ships that sail from Luxor up the river to Aswan looked very appealing.

We are leaving Safaga late tonight, and will be passing up the Gulf of Suez tomorrow and then through the Suez Canal on Monday.

--

I'm glad to see Sen. Hillary Clinton has said she regrets her statement to USA Today about the support she's been getting from the "hard working Americans, white Americans." Bob Herbert has an excellent column in today's New York Times about that statement, with its racist tinge. Hillary should abandon all her snide attacks on Sen. Barack Obama, and start going with the flow. He deserves her full support, for his campaign has been a dignified and worthy one, not to say inspirational, and there is every prospect he will be the next President. Hillary should be worried about her next Senate campaign in New York, not to mention her standing in the U.S. Senate if she begins to sound like Bilbo and Talmadge.

A woman on the trip complained to me today, "It seems like everyone in Africa is for Obama." I replied, "Nearly everyone in the world is for him. Let's just hope the American people have the good sense to go along with that opinion."

Obama Moves To Reconcile Hillary Backers

2008-05-09T02:04:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Safaga, Egypt--

I saw Sen. Barack Obama being interviewed by Wolf Blitzer on CNN last night, looking relaxed but gearing up for the fall campaign. He was magnanimous toward Hillary, which, of course, he should be. It was Winston Churchill who once said, "if you have to kill someone, it costs nothing to be polite."

Mrs. Clinton also should have a great interest, in terms of restoring her reputation for integrity and fair dealing, to follow the New York Times' editorial advice today and drop her attacks against Obama and especially what the New York Times called the "disturbing racial undertones" of her campaign in whatever campaigning she chooses to do before withdrawing and endorsing Obama.

Going up against Sen. John McCain, Obama will have the upscale Democrats, the young, African-Americans, independents and a few Obama Republicans like me. He'll have to work to bring aboard the groups who have voted for Hillary in the primaries, blue collar whites, Latinos, Catholics and the elderly. But the issues are with the Democrats this year. I certainly do not share the fears expressed in some quarters that Obama will be a patsy in the fall and a victim, like Michael Dukakis, to Republican attacks.

Obama never has been, is not today, and will never be, a patsy.

In this vein, in the International Herald Tribune this morning, there's a wonderful column by Ellen Goodman about Obama's mother, who had the first name of Stanley, because her father had wanted a boy.

This was the Kansas white woman who had the temerity to marry a black Kenyan at a time when racial intermarriage was anathema to most Americans and illegal in some states. She gave Obama great genes of courage and wisdom, as did his father.

Obama, in accord with the greatest American presidential traditions, had remarkable parents. Their influence and his rise is already one of the great stories in the illustrious history of American politics.

Now, as many have said quietly to themselves, may the Secret Service do a good job of protecting him.

--

The unspeakably obscene military junta which has enslaved the people of Burma for 46 years now has committed a new outrage -- confiscating the first military aid carried in two UN planes into the country in the wake of the catasthropic cyclone that has struck it, killing many thousands. This has forced a suspension of the aid shipments, many of which had been unconscionably delayed by the junta anyway.

In the cases of Idi Amin's Uganda and Pol Pot's genocidal Cambodia, outside powers had to step in, sending military units to wrest control from the dictators and turning government over to the people. Much the same kind of thing should be done in Burma. Fortunately, in its case, the legally elected leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, held under house arrest for 12 years, is on hand to take over.

The world can and must not stand idly by any longer.

Words For Mr. Bush, And Some Critical Of Him

2008-05-08T03:09:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, in the Red Sea, off Saudi Arabia--

A passenger on board this ship with whom I've become friendly on my African cruise exclaimed to me the other day, "George Bush is the worst President in Ameican history." He was quite taken aback when I did not agree, especially since he knows I am a Republican who supports Barack Obama for president.

Actually, I told him, at least three presidents were worse than Mr. Bush: James Buchanan, who did nothing as the country drifted into disunion and civil war, Herbert Hoover, who sat idly by while the Great Depression worsened, and Warren Harding, corrupt and an adulterer, whose wife may have poisoned him.

And that does not count the nonentities, who accomplished little or nothing as President, such as Millard Fillmore, William Henry Harrison and Chester Arthur. Poor Harrison caught a cold on inauguration day and died just a month later.

My feeling is that President Bush has acted forthrightly in accord with his judgment and has tried, in difficult circumstances, to do the best he could by the American people.

There are several matters with which I find myself in serious disagreement with the President, who I voted for in 2004 but not in 2000. One is his Supreme Court appointments of John Roberts and Samuel Alito. I think they have moved the Supreme Court disastrously to the right, and that Sen. John McCain, by the way, is wrong to extoll them. Second, is the President's total failure to even try to cope with global warming or the oil price crisis. Third, of course, was his inadequacy in dealing with Hurricane Katrina.

But there are matters in which I think the President is to be honored for his service.

First, I'd say, he has been strong for civil rights. If Obama indeed is elected president, Mr. Bush will have helped pave the way for an African-American by naming Gen. Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice secretaries of state. He also went to Atlanta to speak at a ceremony honoring The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and to the Capitol Rotunda to honor Rosa Parks when she died.

Some will say that the President, through some of the tactics he has adopted in the War on Terror, has compromised civil liberties. I can't agree. Civil liberties in America are intact. Giving harsh treatment to foreign terrorists does not constitute an abridgement of our liberties. It may, in fact, protect them. Murderers like Osama bin Laden are not entitled to good treatment. We dare not lose the fight with such scoundrels, because if we do, we will no longer be free.

Some will also say the President did not get along with the press and was not always candid with them. Although I spent 50 years in the newspaper business, this does not really bother me. Sometimes, it is advantageous for a President to be buddies with the press, and sometimes it isn't.

Of course, history will judge Mr. Bush on his initiation and conduct of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. All polls show the American people have soured on Iraq, and this may cost the Republican party heavy losses in the 2008 election, as it did the one in 2006.

But I persist in feeling that putting an American army into the Middle East served our interest at the time. Whether we are ultimately successful there, I agree with McCain, depends on our perseverance. I was very proud when my own son served two tours of duty in Iraq. And I question whether either Obama or Sen. Hillary Clinton would find the consequences of removing American troops from Iraq to be palatable.

I wish George W. Bush had been a better, more skillful, perhaps more intellectual president. But I think he has been dedicated to doing the right thing, as he understood the right, and I believe he should be thanked and honored for that.

Clinton Should Quit Now And Fully Back Obama

2008-05-07T03:49:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, off Yemen in the Red Sea--

If she were sensible and wanted to do what's best for the Democratic party, the country, and her own reputation and political future, Sen. Hillary Clinton would quit the race for the Democratic nomination now and give her full endorsement to Sen. Barack Obama.

Obama, after last night's one-sided victory in North Carolina and losing only very narrowly in Indiana now has a 155-delegate lead and solid prospects for new commitments from the super-delegates, among whom he has been doing well, even during the rough period following the Pennsylvania primary. He is, at last, closing the deal, and I believe after his strong unifying speech last night is already shaping the fall strategy that will give him victory over Sen. John McCain.

If she fights on, Clinton will only look more and more power mad. Already, she has been behaving very strangely with her "obliterate Iran" talk and ditsy gas-tax moratorium. She is becoming more and more wild in her statements and attacks.

On Sunday, when she appeared on ABC, Clinton described her only strong backer among New York Times columnists, Paul Krugman, as a shill for President Bush when she was asked about his expression of doubts about her gas tax proposal. This showed she is becoming paranoid. Is this the way, she thinks about such a loyal supporter as Krugman?

Speaking of news media personalities, it was the far-rightist Republican talk show host Russ Limbaugh who really provided much of Clinton's 22,000-vote margin in Indiana, by suggesting that GOP voters should cross over and vote for her. Exit polls show that thousands did. When Clinton has to rely on Russ Limbaugh and protests from the Iranian government about her bellicose talk, she is about through.

If, ultimately, she wishes to have a fruitful career in the U.S. Senate, and avoid the psychiatric examination she probably needs, Clinton ought to fold her tents.

The reader of this blog might say that is unlikely. But Hillary is a retread of another "fighter to the last," Richard Nixon, and even Nixon, when the writing was on the wall, finally resigned. I think beginning now, just in the next few days, Clinton is going to come under tremendous pressure from the party hierarchy to get out of the race, and I wouldn't be surprised if she finally gives in.

Also, it is important now for usually cynical politicians to realize just what a tremendous candidate Barack Obama is. He described himself last night in his North Carolina speech as "imperfect," but the fact is that not since Franklin D. Roosevelt have we seen such a master politician. And he is more candid than Roosevelt, who was quite devious. With Obama, you see and hear what he is, an admirable leader for the 21st Century.

It is a great thing too for the USA that a man like Obama has come out of the black community to demonstrate once and for all that the work of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was not in vain and that as Dr. King said in his last speech, black people in America can, at last, "reach the Promised land."

The day he wins, in fact, all of America will reach the Promised Land, displayed to all the world as a nation of idealism and harmony. It is a splendid opportunity which we, as a people, should not miss.

--

The returns began coming in on M.S. Prinsendam at 2 a.m. Yemeni time. But CNN was the only avenue of watching them on the ship, and CNN kept coming on and off, along with a peculiar written message on the screen that said, "CNN not authorised." I don't know who was not authorizing them, but was able eventually to receive enough of the returns to be vastly reassured about the good sense of the American electorate.

Mexico Grows Increasingly Disfunctional

2008-05-06T04:29:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, in the Gulf of Aden--

Somalia, Burma, Zimbabwe, North Korea, Lebanon and Iraq are not the only countries in the world which are threatening because they are so dysfunctional. Increasingly, Mexico is joining them, and it, of course, is right next to the U.S.

The news from Mexico recently has not been at all good. The courageous campaign of the new president, Felipe Calderon, to use the army and police to curtail rampant drug peddlers has only been followed by a large number of assassinations of law enforcement personnel. The situation along the border, particularly in the cities of Tijuana and Juarez, has grown critical.

According to a New York Times article (its International Herald Tribune saw fit to only pick up a couple of paragraphs of it), the mayhem has cost at least 3,500 lives, including those of 200 police officers.

The spreading corruption of the drug trade threatened to destabilize the whole country. Mexico has a volcanic past of sudden eruptions of domestic trouble, and this is a danger sign that neither we nor the Mexican government can afford to ignore.

In addition, relying by Mexican law only on its own resources, the Mexican oil industry is sinking fast. Without investments that the big international oil companies could provide, production has been dropping off, and there doesn't seem to be the willingness to do anything about it. Mexico, always rocky economically, is falling into a downward spiral that has to be disquieting, particularly to us as neighbors.

--

My ship is now racing, at full speed of about 20 knots, through the Gulf of Aden, and is scheduled at the moment to enter the Red Sea, beyond the reach of Somali pirates, at 6 a.m. tomorrow. Our Dutch Navy escort has turned back to Mombasa, to resume convoying food shipments to Somalia, although other NATO military ships are reportedly nearby. The ship is more or less hugging the Yemeni coast, as far from Somalia as possible. Our captain, Christopher Turner, has been very good at keeping the passengers informed, and photographs of the Dutch frigate are being sold on the ship.

--

David Brooks, the New York Times columnist, who is hard to fool, remarks in a column today of Sen. Hillary Clinton, in her appearance Sunday on ABC that "for the first 30 minutes, she did not utter a single candid word."

Hillary, as I've remarked before, is a Richard Nixon retread, just as demagogic and dishonest. By contrast, as Brooks declares, Sen. Barack Obama "gave off an entirely different vibe on 'Meet The Press.' He still seems like a human being. He still seems to return each night to some zone of normalcy, where personal reflection lives."

Will the voters of Indiana and North Carolina appreciate the difference? We'll see when the returns come in tonight.

And will the press as a whole start giving the disgraceful Clintons' grab for power, the negative attention it deserves? I'm not holding my breath,

Obama Draws Endorsements Acorss Spectrum

2008-05-05T03:12:00.000-07:00

Written from Salalah, Oman--

I never thought I'd be quoting him favorably, but producer Michael Moore was on the Larry King show last night on CNN, and some of what he said about Sen. Barack Obama, whom he has now endorsed, bears repeating.

One, he noted that Julie Nixon had endorsed Obama last week. (And Jenna Bush implied recently she might back him). Such endorsements do tend to disprove the claim that Obama really can't cross partisan lines and would, perforce, lose to Sen. John McCain, if he wins the Democratic nomination.

Moore also pointed out that Sen. Hillary Clinton is "disgusting" in her attempts to concoct phony issues in the struggle for the Democratic nomination. Obama, he noted, never, never has suggested that people not vote for Clinton because she is a woman, or tried to use gender in any way. But Clinton constantly refers at least obliquely to the racial issue, and, has even said, duplicitiously that she doesn't know if Obama is a Muslim.

This is a disgrace. Now, Hillary declares on the Bill O'Reilly program that had she been a congregant in Rev. Jeremiah Wright's Christian church she would have left long ago. Well, la te da, Hillary will do anything to keep Wright's perverse racial sentiments, disavowed completely by Obama, in voters' minds.

And, we also find out today, she has a last-minute commercial in Indiana, questioning Obama's devotion to guns. This is another way of reminding the voters he is black. But who doesn't know that already?

So now the woman who is pandering to the voters by offering a gas tax moratorium that will never come to pass, and has suggested she would "obliterate" Iran if it attacks Israel, is turning to the support of guns. This too is absolutely disgraceful. But it's what we have come to expect from Clinton just before primary day in important states.

Such tactics worked in Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania, but they may not work in Indiana, the home state of the upright John Wooden. Voters there might be a little more skeptical of the authenticity of purported liberals who suggest obliterating other countries and support guns.

I think it's great that even Julie Nixon is backing Obama, especially since Hillary continues to emulate her father, who had the well-deserved nickname, "Tricky Dick." Richard Nixon said he had a plan to end the war in Vietnam in the 1968 campaign. Yet, when he came to the Presidency, he invaded Cambodia, sparking off the genocide there, and allowed many thousands more American troops to die in a war in Vietnam he would not end.

Now, Clinton says she would end the war in Iraq, which she would not, and she strikes a bellicose tone in Afghanistan and Iran. She, more than McCain, is the war candidate.

--

Our guide this morning in Oman said that men in the Muslim kingdom customarily have four wives. I wanted to be culturally sensitive and diplomatic, so I said, "Well, even our Hillary Clinton has been part of a harem."

Hillary Panders To Voters On Gas Tax Moratorium

2008-05-04T02:41:00.000-07:00

Written On M.S. Prinsendam Approaching Salalah, Oman--

I'm endebted to Mark Halperin, political guru for Time magazine, for pointing out this morning that Sen. Hillary Clinton enthusiastically endorsed the filly Eight Belles to win the Kentucky Derby yesterday. Eight Belles finished second to the winner, Big Brown. Tragically, Eight Belles broke both ankles at the finish line and had to be euthanized.

Of course, I wish Hillary good health and long life, preferably in the U.S. Senate, or just raking in the dough with her husband, Bill Clinton.

But, as the Indiana and North Carolina primary campaigns draw to a close, Hillary is pandering to the voters once again -- this time by suggesting that the oil companies pay the 18-cent-a-gallon gas tax over the summer.

Sen. Barack Obama calls this "a shell game," and he is right. For one thing, either the oil companies would simply up their gas prices to pay for the tax, or litigate such a measure to delay it all summer. That assumes, it would ever clear the oil industry-dominated Congress.

Of course, the fact is we need the gas tax to build and maintain federal highways. Already, it is insufficient to do so. The gas tax is part of a sound energy policy. Hillary is just trying a cheap trick on the voters. Let's hope they are not so gullible.

Maureen Dowd and Frank Rich, both New York Times columnists, and Jack Cafferty, a commentator for CNN, have all distinguished themselves this year with their campaign commentaries. I might particularly commend Dowd this morning for her brilliant column on Obama, entitled, "This Bud's For You."

In it, she writes, notably, "Why does Obama, the one with the bumpy background and mixed racial heritage, the one raised by a single mother who was on food stamps, seem so forced when he mingles with the common folk?....

"Voters also don't seem to mind Hillary, with her $109 million bank account, selling herself as the champion of the little people. As first lady, the blue-collar queen was renowned for her high-handed treatment of the little people in the (White House) travel office, on the switchboard and on the residence staff.

"Obama, on the other hand, may seem esoteric, and sometimes looks haughty or put-upon when he should merely offer that ensorcelling smile. But he is very well liked by his Secret Service agents, and shoots hoops with them. And I watched him take the time one night after a long day of campaigning to stand and take individual pictures with a squadron of Dallas motorcycle officers on the tarmac..."

Dowd is smart enough to realize that in Obama we have a terrific human being. Beyond that, I believe he is just what America needs at this time to make a great President of the U.S. I have contributed $600 to his campaign, and am proud to be a supporter. Good luck to him this week, and to the American people.

--

Approaching Oman on the Arabian peninsula, we are losing our escort today, the Dutch frigate which has been with us along the Somalia coast since Mombasa. I'm not sure whether we will have an escort later in the week when we sail along Somalia again, this time in the Gulf of Aden, heading for the Red Sea.

Need For Economic Adjustments To Cope

2008-05-03T06:21:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, In Arabian Sea--

One of the most memorable days spent thus far on my cruise around Africa was the ship's visit to The Gambia, a tiny West African country sandwiched in between parts of Senegal. The poverty was depressing. Toward the end of a long day in the hinterland, I saw a girl of about five, beautiful in a simple green dress, her eyes gleaming with intelligence, one of many who ran to the side of the road to see the tourists. I could not help thinking: What kind of future does this child have?

With oil prices skyrocketing, a push for biofuels to replace oil increasing, interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve Board which have encouraged inflation and reduced the value of the dollar, and population control languishing, it is often the poorest countries in the world who absorb the brunt of such developments.

What is needed now?

1--In The Gambia, it is certainly population control. Those who resist it are being completely unrealistic. It, and countries like it, have already stripped their resources. They simply cannot support a greater population without desperate privation.

2--There has to be a careful assessment of the costs of biofuel production. It is fueling also in many cases a rise of food prices which has led to riots in Haiti, Egypt and other countries. Ethanol production in the U.S. has certainly led to a rise in corn prices. Some biofuels can be produced without affecting the food supply and food prices. Those must be emphasized, and others, which are shown to be counterproductive, need to be dropped. There is indeed a "food crisis," as is seen by the recent proposals made by Thailand for a world rice cartail, like, God forbid, OPEC.

3--Currency stabilization. The Federal Reserve Board seems more solicitous of Wall Street and its stock prices than it should be. An ever more valuable Euro is, paradoxically, contributing to European tensions, since it works in Germany's interest but not in those of France, Italy, Spain and Portugal. The fall in the dollar has generated ever higher oil prices in dollars, and most countries without oil pay in dollars, as do the American people. The adverse consequences economically of the drastic Federal Reserve cuts in interest rates over the past few months may well outweigh the benefits, such as lessening chances of a Recession.

4--Atomic power. It requires careful handling and a foolproof method needs to be developed for disposing of nuclear waste. But it produces electricity without the use of the global warming villains, oil and coal, and it is an absolutely necessary part of the mix. Certain countries like France are far ahead of the U.S. in its use.

5--I have previously suggested taking the matter of oil prices to the U.N. Security Council to begin discussions about a consortium which would share oil revenues worldwide. This may seem an idea the oil producers would never accept. But four of the five powers with a veto power in the Security Council -- the U.S., Britain, France and China -- are net oil importers, so there could be powerful support for such an idea, sort of a National Football League profit-sharing scheme.

It is fine to send economic aid to places like The Gambia. I'm all for it. But the underlying steps and reforms suggested above could do more good than whatever aid is being sent.

Obama-Clinton Or Clinton-Obama Ticket Necessary

2008-05-02T02:45:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam 240 miles off Mogadishu, Somalia--

Distasteful as taking the other onto the Democratic ticket with them may be, it appears that Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, no matter who finally wins the Democratic nomination, must reconcile to accepting the loser as his or her vice presidential running mate. It appears this would be the only way of avoiding sizable defections to Sen. John McCain, from either low income whites and retired, or African-Americans. And, of course, the loser must agree to go onto the ticket.

I hope the winner of the nomination is Obama. He would at least treat a Vice President Clinton respectfully. I'm not sure it would be as easy for Obama if he were the vice presidnetial nominee, since Bill Clinton would constantly be horning in, and this is a menage-a-trois Obama would not need. However, if he could put up with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright all these years, he probably would survive.

During my voyage, I've been reading Bill Boyarsky's book, "Big Daddy -- Jesse Unruh And The Art Of Power Politics." It is striking that in his chapter regarding the Rumford Fair Housing Act of 1963 and its ultimate renunctiation by the voters, Boyarsky notes in considerable detail that low income white and retired voters proved most resistant to sweeping desegregation, as shown in a Berkeley election on fair housing, even before the Rumford Act was passed. Even Hispanics apparently lined up against the housing measure.

What this demonstrates is that the present-day situation in the Democratic presidential race, where Hillary has been getting the majority of low income and retired voters, not to mention Hispanics and Catholics, while Obama has been getting a majority of the younger voters, blacks and highly-educated, goes back decades when a civil rights question is involved. And obviously, the 2008 presidential campaign has brought civil rights to the fore, with the prospect of the first time a major party nominee would be either black or a woman.

The split in sentiment, as Boyarsky shows, thus did not begin with the Pennsylvania primary, and it is doubtful, given the impassioned character of the struggle between Obama and Clinton, that either could run successfully without the other also being present on the ticket.

I presume that neither side would be totally happy with such a ticket at the beginning, and normallty such a ticket might not be a favorite with a majority. But this is an unusual year. We have both two wars and an economy in trouble. Public dissatisfaction with the present Republican administration is evident to all. Under these circumstances, I think the low income whites and others backing Hillary would accept Obama as head of the ticket and vote for it, while the blacks and young would be at least somewhat satisfied with Hillary on top, so long as Obama were her running mate.

As I say, a ticket of the two may not be fully acceptable, but it is necessary.

As to when the Democratic race may be settled, we are just going to have to wait until there is a clear winner. And regardless what Democratic chairman Howard Dean wants, that cannot be assigned an arbitrary date. It may have to go to the convention floor.

But this is the most exciting presidential contest in memory, and we can afford the time to see how it comes out. If Obama and Clinton would accept the other as running mate, the time it takes will not make any difference.

--

A helicopter from the Dutch Navy frigate escorting the Prinsendam landed Marines on the Prinsendam deck at about 3 p.m. Middle Eastern time (4 a.m. in California) to practice a medivac evacuation. The 600 passengers were invited to the top deck to view the exercise from aft as the helicopter hovered about 50 feet above for half an hour. The frigate was half a mile away.
With U.S. action in Somalia yesterday, and a big suicide bombing in Yemen today, most passengers are glad to have NATO protection, judging from the cheers.

Off Somalia, We Get A Dutch Navy Escort

2008-05-01T03:13:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, 165 Miles Off Kismaayo, Somalia--

Since leaving the Kenyan port of Mombasa last night, the Holland-America liner M.S. Prinsendam, upon which I've been circumventing Africa, has had a military escort. She is HMS Everestyn, a 6,000-ton Dutch frigate carrying missiles, a complement of 202 men and 10 Dutch Marines, plus a helicopter which could land on this ship, is just a mile off our stern as I write.

It's a certain comfort to passengers, because there have been several instances of Islamic pirates off Somalia in recent weeks. A French yacht was seized, as was a Spanish cargo ship, and a missile was fired at an oil tanker. Several Western navies are now in the Gulf of Aden, further north of where we are, to fend off pirates. A couple of weeks ago, French commandos captured six pirates and found some of the $4 million in ransom which had been paid for release of the crew of the French yacht.

Just this morning, news comes that U.S. warplanes or cruise missiles have attacked again in Somalia, this time reportedly killing the Al-Qaeda commander there, Aden Hashi Ayso. As this is being written, our captain, Christopher Turner, has just announced that the Dutch ship will launch its helicopter in a few minutes to make a sweep of waters ahead of our ship.

Our ship has taken other security measures during the wide berth we are giving the Somali coast. Most exterior lights on the ship are being kept off at night. Curtains have been drawn around the dining room. Two acoustic guns have been mounted on the ship's bow, capable of firing such loud charges that they are supposed to split the ear drums of any attackers.

Even in Mombasa, where I saw a contingent of U.S. Marines at an outlying hotel Monday, security around the ship was tight, with armed guards at dockside, a police boat constantly going back and forth beside the ship, and all vehicles kept well away from the ship. We had to walk to our tour buses a quarter mile away. Mombasa was the site of an al-Qaeda attack a few years ago against hotels housing Israeli tourists, and is about 500 miles from the Somali border.

This is the War on Terror as seen in East Africa, just one of its many locales.

--

A New York Times-CBS poll this morning reflects some of the damage that has been done to the Obama campaign by his fanatic, treasonous former pastor, James Wright. For instance, the number of Democrats expecting Sen. Barack Obama to win the Democratic nomination has slipped from 69 to 51%.

It is worth noting, I think, that Obama is not the only candidate to have been betrayed by dishonest, or fanatic associates or supporters. Sen. Hillary Clinton demoted her chief strategist, Mzrk Penn, when it was divulged that he was taking money from the Columbian government to support its trade treaty with the U.S. at a time when Clinton opposed the treaty. Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, was betrayed by a "supportive" Protestant minister from Texas who made embarrassing anti-Catholic remarks.

Even Jesus had his Judas. But it is distressing that these low-lifes surface in modern campaigns. And the betrayal may have been particularly devastating to Obama, who had a long, close relationship to his pastor before he fully appreciating that the man was a violent, America-hating extremist and virulent anti-Semite. Although Obama has now responded forcefully, cutting all ties, the sordid episode has raised questions about his judgment and political seasoning.

The 2008 campaign has been dramatic and often uplifting, largely because of the inspirational messages of Obama. If he were to falter now, and we will know more after next week's Indiana and North Carolina primaries, millions of Americans would lose their hope for something immediately better in our politics than retreads of the Bush-Clinton failures of the past two decades.

Chuck Hillinger, Dies At 82, A Great Loss

2008-04-30T10:23:00.000-07:00

Written from Mombasa, Kenya--

It is hard to believe that our friend and esteemed colleague, Chuck Hillinger, is gone. Even in old age, he was such a lively, optimistic part of our lives in the retired employees association, he believed so much in the newspaper business, he was so justifiably proud of the many achievements of his life, that he commanded countless admirers.

I was lucky to have known him for more than 40 years. Chuck, who died of cancer Monday at 82 was a feature writer par excellence during the halcyon days of the Los Angeles Times, when Otis Chandler was publisher and Bill Thomas was editor. He worked 46 years for the paper.

He traveled everywhere, he wrote prolifically, he worked long hours, and many of the thousands of stories he wrote made their mark as a wonderful view of life, first in our state, then gradually throughout the nation and elsewhere in the world. The Times never stinted giving him the necessary financial backing for his reporting endeavors, and he richly repaid the backing he got.

There are many tributes to Chuck today, from Bob Gibson, Bob Rawitch, Ben Mintz and others, but one of the nicest and truest came from Bill Thomas' who recalled that he wrote so many stories it was hard to get them all into the newspaper. Some say there were 10,000 Chuck Hillinger stories in all. He was a treasure for the readers.

Chuck commanded admiration in the newsroom, and he was always on the spot, whereever he was needed. In November of 1970, with my wedding in Birmingham, Alabama, just around the corner, I was stuck in Montreal, covering a Quebec separatist kidnapping that had gotten much news coverage. I had already missed some of the pre-wedding events, when Chuck arrived in Montreal one night and told me I was free to leave in the morning for the wedding.

He always remembered doing this good turn, and would never cease to remind me, whenever we met, how grateful I was for the relief he provided. And I was. I have seldom been happier to see anyone than I was Chuck Hillinger that night.

In later years, Chuck was grieved, as we all have been, about the decline of the Times under new, uncaring ownership.

But he thought too much of newspapers to believe they would ever disappear or lose their ability to make distinctive contributions to their readers.

American journalism needs its Chuck Hillingers, those who never lose their thirst to provide newsworthy entertainment and whose interest in what they are doing is unbounded. His work, like that of Jack Smith, Art Seidenbaum, Paul Coates and so many other great Times writers, is part of our heritage.

We pause today in sadness to pay tribute to him, and to wish his family well at this sad time.

Tale Of Two Newspapers: WSJ and L.A. Times

2008-04-29T06:11:00.000-07:00

Written from Mombasa, Kenya--

I'm beginning to think more of Rupert Murdoch. He invests in his newspapers. He builds them up, rather than tears them down. The proof this week is two fold: First, there's the report that the Wall Street Journal, which Murdoch recently purchased, is one of the few American newspapers actually up in daily circulation over the last six months -- to 2,069,000, a gain of 0.4%. Second is the news that the Journal is adding four pages a day of international news.

The Journal, under Murdoch, is giving the readers more, and may be winning the competitive fight with the New York Times, which is down 3.9% in circulation to 1,077,000.

Now contrast the Journal with the Los Angeles Times. LAT circulation losses are consistent. Its situation is worsening, as the evil Tribune Co., the owners and their appointees cut the paper further and further back, losing the most able reporters and editors. They give the readers less all the time, so naturally they attract fewer readers. Circulation is down almost 40% since Tribune bought the paper in 2000. The latest figures show, it has sunk to 773,000 daily and 1,101,000 Sundays.

Why is this? Beyond the inroads of the Internet, which has hurt many newspapers, another answer is that the Times is afflicted with a company that refuses to invest in the paper, or to adequately promote circulation. It has fired or forced out three talented editors and ousted two publishers. Succeeding to these positions has been the most inept publisher in the history of the paper -- David Hiller -- so accurately described by a former editor as "a pain in the ass."

Hiller, who writes many worthless memos, each one further depressing staff morale, fired two editors, the distinguished Dean Baquet, and James O'Shea, for resisting cutbacks, and has now appointed one, Russ Stanton, who is totally unsuitable. Stanton too likes to write memos, and each one is dumber than the one before. He is a lackey to Hiller, nothing more and nothing less.

Together, this squalid duet, Hiller and Stanton, are as destructive of the newspaper as the Rev. Jeremiah Wright is to the Obama presidential campaign. Every time any of these characters open their mouth, it is bad news for everything they profess to believe in.

The Wall Street Journal is heading up, up, up. The L.A. Times is heading down, down, down, and that will not change until an able, imaginative new owner comes board, such as David Geffen.

Another way to look at it is personnel. Lee Hotz and Stephanie Simon moved from the L.A. Times to the Wall Street Journal. Just with those two, we can see what's wrong in Los Angeles. And that does not even get into the scores of talented people laid off or forced into buyouts.

--

It is sad news indeed that the great retired L.A. Times writer, Chuck Hillinger, is critically ill with cancer. Hillinger, an indefatigible world traveler, brought the newspaper some of its finest feature stories for many years. A world class personality, his curiousity was unbounded. His contributions to the great newspaper the late Otis Chandler built cannot be overstated. All best wishes to him and to his family. Time passes, and we are losing or threatened with the loss of paper's elite. How sad!

--

At a luxury hotel five miles north of Mombasa yesterday, I saw a contingent of United States Marines. I was told they are committed to the fight against Islamic terrorists in Somalia, several hundred miles up the coast. I did not see them, but I've been told U.S. Marines are also in the Seychelles islands, where we stopped on the African cruise before coming to Kenya.

Resurfacing Of Wright May Doom Obama Campaign

2008-04-27T22:21:00.000-07:00

Written from Mombasa, Kenya--

The resurfacing of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, at the National Press Club no less, certainly is a terrible blow to Sen. Barack Obama. It probably destroys his chances to win the Indiana primary, and it could doom his entire campaign.

Wright is such a poison to Obama at this stage that, while not usually conspiratorially minded, I wonder if it's possible the Clintons may have somehow arranged his Press Club speech.

Since his San Francisco miscue, suggesting bitterness by blue collar Pennsylvanians who cling to religion and guns, Obama has been self-destructing, I'm afraid. On that Sunday, he was trailing Clinton by only four points in Pennsylvania and on the ascent. Since then, he has gone steadily down hill.

For various reasons I've described in recent months, Hillary is a terrible candidate. But now, she is on the offensive, and as Democratic National Chairman Howard Dean stated over the weekend, it is only correct for the Democratic super delegates to make a judgment as to who would have the best chance to defeat Sen. John McCain in November. Put this way, given Wright's blatherings, and, it may be, Obama's fatigue, Hillary is going to be the nominee.

In that event, this blog will support McCain.

But what a tragedy it is that the U.S. may miss the chance Obama seemed to afford for racial conciliation and less divisive government. He is more intelligent that Hillary and far, far more pleasant as a personality. Unlike her, he is honest, as much as any politician. Every time I see that awful woman, I cringe.

What can Obama do at this point? He has to criticize Wright sharply for seeking publicity at the very least. And whatever he does, it may be too late. With his inopportune comments, Wright is getting back at Obama, and at the American dream, which it is obvious he does not like. Or maybe, he is being paid to do so.

Anonymous Sources Must Be Used, Stanton Wrong

2008-04-27T04:51:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Mombasa--

Russ Stanton, the new editor of the L.A. Times, and Randy Harvey, the sports editor, have taken the wrong step in trying to crack down, in many instances, on the use of anonymous sources in the L.A. Times.

What this means is that (1) the paper won't be very interesting and (2) its reporters won't learn what's going on. The losers will be both reader loyalty and Times circulation.

I know there are exceptions to the rule against use of such sources in the Times policy, but altogether this is tighter than it's been in the past, and is a step backward not forward. Just today, the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter Barry Bearak (who formerly worked for the L.A. Times) has a long account in the New York Times of his recent arrest and imprisonment in Zimbabwe. If he had not used unnamed sources in that story, there would have not been a story. Obviously, he couldn't name the people in the security forces of the Mugabe regime who had helped him, without endangering them.

The fact is that the best sources won't talk to you most of the time, if they realize they are going to be identified. Every decent paper in the world uses anonymous sources, and the L.A. Times, sinking now all the time toward mediocrity, can simply not afford to be any different. Rather, it should be explaining to readers why they are necessary.

For Harvey to threaten his reporters with adverse marks in their personnel file if they violate the Times policy shows he is cowtowing to Stanton, the Tulare neophyte, and joining in the steady denigration of the Times as a world-class newspaper. It is the most serious mistake he has made as sports editor.

As far as Stanton is concerned, with the exception of his decision naming Davan Maharaj managing editor, he continues to show his lack of intellect and sophistication. Under him, and his patron, David Hiller, the paper is slowly becoming a laughing stock.

McCain, As A Precaution, Pitches For Black Votes

2008-04-26T01:25:00.000-07:00

Written from M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Mombasa--

Sen. John McCain has seldom missed many bets in his life. He wouldn't be where he is today, had he not worked hard to make himself distinctive.

So the fact that he has begun to pitch for the black vote, making visits to Memphis on the anniversary of the King assassination, Selma, Ala., and New Orleans, cannot be surprising. If Sen. Hillary Clinton is the Democratic presidential nominee, he realizes that many African-Americans will be looking for another place to go, or not voting at all this fall, and he wants to show at least that he is sympathetic with their positions.

Black Americans have been in the Democratic column since 1932, brought there by Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Great Depression. Before that, most blacks had voted Republican.

As Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina noted in statements this week, the Clintons' racial remarks and innuendos in their campaign to sidetrack Sen. Barack Obama have been greeted with revulsion in the African-American community. It is not inconceivable there could be an historic switch in their position, if Hillary prevails over Obama.

McCain is only getting prepared for that possibility when he makes the visits he has, or when he tries to abort a North Carolina ad he believes unfairly critical of Obama.

At the same time, in this increasingly bitter campaign, Obama has to take care not to get caught up in the statements of his radical pastor, Jeremiah Wright. Wright should, at this time, be keeping quiet, not out there giving interviews.

New York Times columnist Bob Herbert warns this morning that various things, including Wright's continued prominence, is taking the air out of the Obama campaign. And a new CNN poll shows he has sunk into a tie with Clinton in the Indiana primary campaign. If he doesn't win Indiana, Obama could be in terminal difficulty.

Curtis LeMay, Hillary Clinton, Both Bipolar?

2008-04-25T03:35:00.001-07:00

Written from Victoria, Seychelles Islands--

After Gen. Curtis LeMay suggested that the U.S. bomb North Vietnam "back into the stone age," he proved an embarrassing vice presidential candidate for Gov. George C. Wallace in the 1968 presidential campaign. Americans did not want to go that far, and they quickly dismissed the idea of LeMay in power.

But isn't Sen. Hillary Clinton's remark in an ABC news interview on Tuesday, Pennsylvania primary day, threatening to "obliterate" Iran seem just as excessive? We certainly don't need a U.S. president who is joining Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in threatening to obliterate anyone (except Al-Qaeda, that is). Ahmadinejad keeps threatening to obliterate Israel. Now, Clinton says, if this happens, we could obliterate Iran.

We're talking about destroying whole peoples here. That means a nuclear holocaust. It's what Hitler would have done, if he could have.

This dangerously bellicose statement is so out of place, it raises the thought, when I think about it, that Clinton might be bipolar.

Bipolarity is a tragic condition marked by excessive mood changes. And when we pay careful attention to Hillary in this campaign, she certainly exhibits those characteristics. One day, she's all peaches and cream, saying it's an "honor" to be running against Sen. Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination. The next, she's suddenly dismissing Obama as effete and elitist, which is ridiculous. One day, she's saying she's full of good ideas, and the next she's suggesting that because her father and grandfather were Christians, it puts her on a pedestal above Obama, who became a Christian only when he grew up.

In short, like Robert Louis Stevenson's story, "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,' there's a possible pathological shifting of positions and roles by Mrs. Clinton (not to mention her husband, former President Bill Clinton, who seems also to be highly tempermental and moody these days).

What a contrast with Obama, and for that matter Sen. John McCain. Neither Obama or McCain would ever talk about obliterating anyone. Neither of them would suggest in any way that they are another Ahmadinejad. Now, Hillary Clinton has.

And that's why, the more I think about it, the more uncomfortable I become with the idea that this politician could ever obtain power. Not only our country, but the world, might be at risk.

Prior to the vote in North Carolina and Indiana, I wonder whether it might not be possible to commit Hillary for mental examination by a battery of psychiatrists. It's obvious from her cut and slash campaign that she has a problem, and it might well be a dire problem.

Mentioning the word 'dire,' reminds me of Gen. Reginald Dyer, the British general who ordered his troops to fire on demonstrators in Amritsar in 1919, slaughtering hundreds.

That destroyed the prospects of British rule in India, and no less an Empire advocate than Winston Churchill gave a speech in the British House of Commons condemning Dyer and insisting that he be punished.

There is a difference between bellicosity, such as Churchill and Charles de Gaulle exhibited against the Nazis, and anyone who is willing to contemplate the extinction of entire peoples. We certainly don't need a General Dyer in charge at the White House beginning next year.

So I think this election is mighty important. I hope ever so much that the major party candidates are Obama and McCain. Neither one of them, as I said, is a Hillary Clinton.

--

The Chinese government is offering today to meet with representatives of the Dalai Lama to discuss the Tibetan situation. This is the second time this week that calmer heads seem to be prevailing in Beijing. Earlier in the week, China announced it would withdraw a ship carrying arms for the dictator of Zimbabwe, Robert Mugabe.

Is this a ploy designed to defuse controversy over the Beijing Olympics? Perhaps. But still it is welcome news. Any sign that the Chinese government is willing to reconsider its backing for dictatorships in Tibet, Zimbabwe, Burma and North Korea is good news for the world.

--

Someone reminds me that this blog has been devoted in the past to lamenting the decline of the L.A. Times. I still feel that way, but since I don't read the newspaper on my African cruise am hardly in a position from the Indian Ocean to comment in detail on what is happening there. Those commentaries will resume when I return home at the end of May.

--

I took a trip to see coral today off small Seychelle islands, but the glass bottom boat was not as good as the one on Santa Catalina island. What we saw, however, was plenty of dead coral, and very little live coral. The tour guide said that, as in many places, global warming is killing coral. The ocean is simply getting too warm.

Options Narrow With Oil Prices, Global Warming

2008-04-24T02:05:00.000-07:00

Written from M.S. Prinsendam approaching Seychelles Islands--

As oil prices rise to record heights week by week, and global warming initiatives such as President Bush's latest proposal on it fail to show any substantial promise, the world's options are narrowing. Recent news is not good at all.

The price of oil seems to be forcing countries, such as Italy, which has just announced plans for a huge new, coal-fired electric power plant, to frantically seeks alternatives to the use of oil, even if such plants can only intensify pollution and global warming. Meanwhile, the use of bio-fuels as an alternative to oil are causing the price of basic foods, such as corn and rice, to increase, causing riots in a number of poverty-stricken countries not fortunate enough to have oil resources of their own.

In America, the economy is going downhill, and the airline industry is teetering toward bankruptcy and/or dramatically higher fares and reduced capacity by the rise in the oil price.

Greedy Arab countries and other oil producers are getting rich off these developments. We have to recognize the damage that they are causing us and take steps to control it.

It will not be long, at this rate, before we have energy wars. Perhaps the entire question of oil prices should be taken now to the UN Security Council, so that discussions can at least be initiated on palliative steps. Oil-produing Russia might veto such action, but China and India could well support it.

Some experts believe that worldwide oil production has already peaked and that tentatives, such as the Saudi announcement of plans to increase oil production in that country from 9 to 12 million barrels a day, cannot sufficiently affect the worldwide picture, with even recession in the U.S. and Europe, not curtailing the demand sufficiently to compensate for the rising demand in China and India.

Reduction in the availability of oil, if it happened by itself, could help stem the carbon emissions that fuel global warming. But the prospect of a shift to coal could make a bad situation worse.

President Bush's plan last week to reduce the rate of carbon emission increases now and stop the increases by 2025 is no solution. The next president, no matter who, is going to be constrained to do more.

What is frankly disheartening is that technological advance does not seem to be happening quickly enough to avoid a crisis. Nuclear energy could do so, but there is resistance to more nuclear plants in many countries, and the investment costs for it are, in any event, quite high.

--

Russ Stanton's appointment of Davan Maharaj as new managing editor of the L.A. Times is, I think, a positive step. Maharaj is an able editor, and, with his Business section expertise, he may be able to move more economic news out front in the newspaper, which has been too slow in happening.

Clinton Moves Far To Right In Winning PA Primary

2008-04-23T04:33:00.000-07:00

Written from M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Seychelles Islands--

Hillary Clinton pandered to the voters, used Karl Rove tactics, resurfaced racism and ended up threatening to obliterate Iran, in winning big in the Pennsylvania primary.

Don't take that only from me: It's the subject of the New York Times editorial this morning, "The Low Road To Victory." (The New York Times should logically switch its backing to Obama; it seems in the editorial to be heading in that direction).

Hillary politics are reminiscent, as I've pointed out before, of Richard Nixon. If she wins the Democratic nomination, she could well manage, in some respects, to get to the right of John McCain. He's got to watch out for this snake, or pair of snakes, if you count her husband, Bill Clinton. They will do anything, no matter how disgraceful, to grab back power.

All that said, Sen. Barack Obama, an honorable man and the only Democratic candidate left standing who truly represents the liberal values of that party, did not perform well in Pennsylvania.

His impolitic observations about bitterness, and Pennsylvania working people "clinging" to religion and guns, delivered in San Francisco of all places, I believe cost him dearly in Pennsylvania. He failed to make inroads in the Catholic vote, ended up losing almost as decisively as he did in Ohio, and allowed the view to spread that he might be a weak Dukakis-like candidate in November, if he does manage to secure the Democratic nomination.

David Broder, the astute Washington Post political columnist, suggests this morning that the Clinton-Obama struggle is going to elect McCain.

Although Broder might be right, this is not the most important thing for now: The key thing is that Obama must rally his forces, and wage his campaign more skillfully. He's got to parry the lowdown attacks of Clinton while not seeming to sink to the same level. He certainly must rally the liberal base of the Democratic party.

Yet, some of the states about to vote in primaries -- namely Indiana, West Virginia and Kentucky, are populated by the very kind of low income white voters that Obama has not succeeded in reaching. Indiana in particular has a long tradition of racism; it was one of the biggest states for the Ku Klux Klan. Obama may do well in Oregon and North Carolina, but that's not likely to be enough.

We thought, based on the vote in the Iowa caucuses, that America was putting racism behind it. But the Clintons have sinfully played the race card successfully, tying Obama to a black vote and to black radicals. That puts him in a tough place, because, as we're finding out, racism is not dead in America. Many voters are taken in by it.

Yet, as we go forward toward the Democratic convention (and this struggle is now likely to last right into the convention), the heart of the Democratic party is going to have to rally behind Obama. Otherwise, it will find itself with another Lyndon Johnson, a candidate in Hillary who will squander everything the Democratic party is supposed to represent.

After all, she's the old Goldwater girl. And that's mighty bad news for America. Worse than John McCain would ever be.

We live, as everyone points out, in dangerous times. We can't afford a person of low character in the White House. So we have to pray and work to see that Hillary Clinton doesn't get there.

--

As a kind of sacred text this morning, I will quote the New York Times editorial, as it appeared this morning in the Times-owned International Herald Tribune (which I get each morning on board ship during my African cruise):

..."On the eve of this primary, Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11, A Clinton television ad -- torn right from Karl Rove's playbook -- evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. 'If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,' the narrator intoned.

"If that was supposed to bolster Clinton's argument that she is the better prepared to be president in a dangerous world, she sent the opposite message on Tuesday by declaring in an interview on ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president, 'We would be able to totally oblierate Iran.'

"By staying on the attack and not engaging Obama on the substance of issues like terrorism, the economy and how to organize an orderly exit from Iraq, Clinton does more than turn off voters who don't like negative campaigning. She undercuts the rationale for her candidacy that led this page and others to support her: that she is more qualified, right now, to be president than Obama."

Now, I wonder whether Andrew Rosenthal, editorial page editor of the New York Times, will swallow his pride, admit he was wrong at first, and move to endorsing Obama. Thank goodness, the L.A. Times endorsed him months ago.

Diplomacy May Work With China, But Not Hamas

2008-04-22T04:08:00.000-07:00

Written from Mauritius, Indian Ocean--

There are reports today that a Chinese vessel that sailed into South Africa last week with arms for the brutal Mugabe dictatorship in Zimbabwe, only to be diverted to Mozambique or Angola when South African dockworkers refused to unload it and a court backed them up, may now turn back to China without delivering the arms.

This would be a rare victory for diplomacy in the Zimbabwe crisis, which is now seeing an estimated 1,000 people a day fleeing to South Africa, and thousands of arrests and beatings, even some murders, in Zimbabwe itself by forces loyal to Robert Mugabe. The U.S., Britain and other Western countries have been pressuring African ones to block aid for him and take steps to see that results from the election held three weeks ago are, at last, released.

It would be heartening to find that China is not impervious to diplomatic efforts, and is taking at least some steps to placate world opinion. It would be a great credit to China, and a boon to the forthcoming Beijing Olympics, were China to start showing a decent regard for correct international behavior, not only in Zimbabwe but in Burma, Darfur and Tibet as well.

Diplomacy may end up working with China, despite rising nationalism there. But it can't work for now with the terrorist organization, Hamas, in the Middle East, even if the naive former U.S. president Jimmy Carter thinks it can.

Carter who means well but has proved weak-kneed in dealing with terrorists from Iran to the Holy Land over the last 30 years, tried again last week to engage the Hamas leadership in talks looking to an ease of tensions.

But the same day he was in Damascus seeing the Syrian dictator, Bashir Assad, and the exiled leader of Hamas, Khaled Mashal, who uses Syria as a base, Hamas units assaulted Israeli forces at one of the Gaza border crossings where the Israelis have been delivering some goods to Gaza, wounding 13 Israelis.

Carter came away from the Damascus meetings saying that Hamas had agreed to a referendum on peace with Israel, and to recognize the Jewish state, if Israel withdrew to the pre-1967 boundaries.

But he had no sooner spoken than Meshal himself appeared at a rare news conference to say there would be no peace unless Israel recognized a right of return of Arab refugees, that any referendum would have to include Palestinians scattered worldwide, and that even then, Hamas would not recognize Israel.

Carter was left looking totally ineffective, and taken in besides. Diplomacy may one day, after many further battles, be possible with a changing Hamas, but it will not be Carter who facilitates it. He has merely been meddling in foreign policy, which U.S. citizens are not supposed to do, and in effect giving comfort to sworn enemes of both the U.S. and Israel.

--

The New York Times reports today that Rupert Murdoch may be nearing a deal to buy Newsday from the Tribune Co. for a price of about $580 million, and turn it into a joint venture with his New York Post. This would be good news for Newsday, moving from a bunch of losers to a man who continually makes money out of his media businesses. But it would be bad news for the L.A. Times, doomed apparently to be stuck with the Tribune ownership.

Why doesn't Sam Zell throw in the towel altogether in the newspaper business, which he has no touch for, and go back to slum real estate?

It's Hard To Mail A Postcard From This Trip

2008-04-21T08:23:00.000-07:00

Written from the French island of Reunion, Indian Ocean--

The Internet is not only adversely affecting the newspaper business, it's also causing a retrenchment in post office services, and making it harder and harder to send postcards back home.

I confess I'm a big postcard addict. I send them out to many relatives and friends, and try to provide a plethora of African stamps from my cruise circumventing the continent, to my grandchildren.

But this is not easy at many places. I've just had a typically difficult experience on the French island of Reunion. It's a prosperous island, an overseas department of France, 6,500 miles from the mother country. The population is 770,000. It looks French and has been French since 1638. The Tricolor seems as much at home here as it is in Paris. Today, we saw a volcanic crater 8,500 feet high which last erupted just two years ago. It's a scenic island, with some of the highest rainfall totals in the world.

I was able to buy postcards at a store at the lip of the crater, but failed in repeated tries to buy stamps to send them home. First, they said, the post offices on the island were not open Mondays. Then, there were supposed to be stamps at the tourist office. But all they had were envelopes. Besides, three different guides and clerks gave me varying figures for how many Euros it would cost to mail a card home.

Finally, I gave the guide on our bus a large tip and he assured me he would mail the cards. This worked, I've had confirmation, in Morocco and Senegal, and a friend e-mailed me that he had received my card sent from a hotel in Ghana.

But with all the e-mail and digital photography these days, it seems many people no longer send postcards. The market for them has clearly diminished, and post offices have, as I said, retrenched. Just another sign of modern life.

I notice even the New York Times lost money in the first quarter.

As to how I'm liking my long cruise (now in its 40th day, with 33 more to follow), I'm enjoying it. I'm not big into such activities as nightclub-style shows, bingo, bridge playing, sunbathing on deck, and some of the other ways many passengers pass their time.

But I do enjoy the long days at sea (39 of the 73 days are spent entirely at sea). And the improvement in international communications means that I now am able to get an electronic copy of the International Herald Tribune delivered to my stateroom six days a week, plus a short digest of the New York Times every day. We've only been out of range of CNN four days in the middle of the Atlantic. And E-mail has been available every day of the voyage, at my usual Yahoo E-mail address. All this is quite different from my last major cruise to Antarctica. I thought I would hardly write this blog at all during the voyage, but I've been writing it every couple of days. And I sent a classnote back to the Dartmouth Alumni magazine from the ship in Cape Town.

Many of my fellow-passengers are, frankly, rich people who go on long cruises every year. I've been so far to 96 countries or dependencies, but many of them have been to more. Their curiousity about the places we have visited has been limited, and their disdain for struggling African countries we have seen is palpable. But I have met some thoughtful people aboard, and a few just as interested in the American presidential race as I am.

It's true this cruise, on the Holland America liner Prinsendam, with about 600 passengers aboard, has skipped many unstable or even dangerous countries. We passed by Mauritania, the Guineas, Sierra Leone, Liberia, the Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Benin, Gabon, the Congo, Angola and Mozambique, and are going to give Somalia a wide berth, sailing from Mombasa all the way east to Oman and then relying on the protection of a Dutch Navy vessel to get us safely through the Gulf of Aden, which was the scene a couple of weeks ago, of the seizure by pirates from Somalia of a French yacht. (The French sent special forces to Djibouti. After a ransom was paid for liberation of the ship's crew, the French Navy attacked the pirates in a Somalian port, retaking the ship, recovering much of the ransom money and capturing six pirates who were flown back to France for a well-deserved trial. It's interesting to see the U.S. is not by any means the only country who feels constrained to fight fundamentalist or free-booting Muslims).

Tomorrow, we visit Mauritius, a country 120 miles east of Reunion, that remains closely aligned with Great Britain. It's good to see the British and French have not disappeared from this part of the world.

We are now 12,500 miles out of Fort Lauderdale, where we started March 11. By the time we end up in Lisbon, this is going to be close to a 20,000-mile voyage. I'm happy I'm taking it.

Hard Questioning Of Obama, Clinton, Is Only Proper

2008-04-19T03:03:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Cruising Off Madagascar--

With the crucial Pennsylvania primary approaching, the final debate between Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton was an acerbic one, with ABC reporters (one of whom once worked for the Clintons) asking Obama many negative questions and Hillary piling it on.

We'll have to see which way this cuts. In some debates, the public has an adverse reaction to being too negative toward one of the candidates. A Washington Post poll shows Hillary's negatives mounting, and it is conceivable there will be a voter backlash in the Pennsylvania vote against all the questioning of Obama.

Nonetheless, I feel there should be no real complaint about the debate. Obama wants to be President of the U.S. There can be no objection to his being subject to real tests, the hardest questions that test his mettle. We are learning more about him, and most of what we have learned is that he is a resilient charcter who displays great intelligence, and even wisdom. All this is to the good.

The fact that just yesterday, Obama picked up three estimable endorsements -- those of former Labor Secretary (under Bill Clinton) Robert Reich, and former Sens. Sam Nunn of Georgia and David Boren of Oklahoma -- demonstrates once again that Obama is winning very important backing in the heartland of the Democratic party, which, as Time columnist Joe Klein writes, shows that many Democrats are getting fed up with Hillary's incessant attacks on Obama, going so far as to give Sen. John McCain talking points in a fall campaign against Obama. Klein in the past has been a Clinton supporter in his column. The fact that he writes the Democratic race may be about over is indicative of Clinton slippage. But, of course, we have to watch for the Pennsylvania results. If an Obama tide is really running, that should show up there, at least in a very close race and possibly in an Obama victory.

--

Bill Boyarsky has written a good memo on Russ Stanton's memo regarding the recent L.A. Times editors' retreat, pointing out it is filled with platitudes, and that cutbacks at the Times can only deprive the Los Angeles readers of essential information. Boyarsky is too kind to say that Stanton is dumb, but the evidence accumulates that he is.

Arrogant China Sends Arms To Zimbabwe

2008-04-18T04:54:00.000-07:00

Written from Richards Bay, South Africa--

China seems determined to arouse world opinion against it, endangering the Beijing Olympics.

The latest example of this, and it is not a minor one, is the arrival in South Africa of a ship laden with Chinese arms destined for the dictatorship of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe.

Let it be said right away, it is a sign of a developing crisis in southern Africa that the South African regime of Thabo Mbeke originally said it would let the arms go through, that there is no arms embargo on Zimbabwe, which has refused to recognize the results, or even release the results, of an election held several weeks ago. This showed the insensitivity of the Mbeke government toward democracy in this region, and was, I think, a gross mistake comparable to Mbeke's downplaying AIDS as a continuing tragedy in South Africa. But there were subsequent developments that prove South Africa remains fundamentally a democratic state in the post-Mandela period. Dockworkers in Durban Harbor refused to unload the arms, including 3 million rounds of ammunition, from the Chinese ship, and an Anglican group successfully petitioned a South African court to uphold the dockworkers. The ship has now had to sail on to Mozambique, which also borders Zimbabwe, in an attempt to unload its cargo. But there are reports the dockworkers in Mozambique may refuse to unload and tranship the cargo there as well.

Of course, it is the Chinese who are primarily culpable for buttressing the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe. This is the latest example of Chinese misbehavior which needs to be taken down a peg by the rest of the world. In the months leading up to the Olympics, for which the Chinese profess but do not show great regard, Communist China has sided with repression in Zimbabwe, genocide in the Darfur region of The Sudan, and the military junta in Burma, as well as mistreating North Korean refugees in China and trying to crush dissidents in Tibet, a country the Chinese have no right to, but have occupied now for half a century.

At the same time, the xenophobic Chinese regime continues to suppress any kind of dissent at home. And when foreigners protest these policies, then the Chinese threaten boycotts against Western companies, as they are now doing in reprisal for French demonstrations against China in the recent torch relay in Paris.

The fact is, if this continues, the Olympics really ought not to be held in Beijing. The Chinese promised, when they obtained the 2008 Games, that they would ease repressive policies. Instead, this year, they have gotten far worse.

It is wrong too for the French Olympic Committee to tell French athletes bound for Beijing that they may not wear badges calling for a more peaceful world. If this is the price of staging the Olympics, then the hell with them.

China increasingly is showing contempt for humanitarian values. There must and should be a response.

My African cruise is now leaving South Africa, which I found a beautiful country with many problems. I had a terrific time here, traveling high into the mountains, out of Durban, into the remote Kingdom of Lesotho, over a 9,400-foot pass, visiting the Cape of Good Hope from Cape Town, and going to a remarkable big game refuge from Richards Bay, where we saw huge numbers of African elephants, which are bigger than Asian ones or any seen routinely in U.S. zoos, giraffe, rhinos, crocodiles and other wildlife.

But guides told us that unemployment in South Africa is running 25%, and at a higher rate in the black population, and that AIDS now afflicts anywhere from one third to 40% of the South African population. Two thousand people a day are now dying of AIDS in South Africa, and the prospect is that millions more will die in the years ahead. Indeed, the black population of South Africa is now declining. And the Mbeke regime continues to resist treating this epidemic as the national tragedy it is.

Again, this is such a beautiful country in many ways that I'd like to come back with my entire family. But unless it is careful, it could slide backward.

A guide, by the way, told us a good Mugabe joke. According to this story, some of Mugabe's own administration advised him to "say goodbye to the Zimbabwean people. " "Why?" Mugabe is said to have responded. "Are they leaving?"

New York Times Should Shift To Obama From Hillary

2008-04-15T04:21:00.000-07:00

Written from M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Durban, So. Africa--

It would potentially make a lot of difference, and it would reflect an attempt to be honest after recent campaign developments, for the New York Times to switch its endorsement for the Democratic presidential nomination from Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama.

The Clintons' campaign to restore themselves to the presidency has become such a "disgrace," to use the word of a CNN political analyst, Jeff Toomer, that integrity requires newspapers that started out backing Hillary to revise their opinions. The same is true of many politicians.

With the New York Times, one of its columnists after another, has pointed up the deep divisiveness of the Clinton campaign. It's high time that Andrew Rosenthal, editorial pages editor of the paper, falls in line with their honorable position.

The latest examples are columns by Roger Cohen and Maureen Dowd. Cohen remarks, "I'm troubled by Hillary Clinton's recent innuendo-dripping remark that her Christian faith "is the faith of my parents and my grandparents." Dowd notes that Bill Clinton took $800,000 in speaking fees from backers of a Columbia trade agreement that Hillary says she opposes (a sin comparable to consultant Mark Penn's work for the trade agreement, which got him demoted, but not fired, as he should have been).

Cohen's observation is particularly noteworthy: "We live in the Age of Interaction, Fluidity and connectedness define the world, forging hybrid identificaties, not fixed in formaldehyde. Clinton, on an Obama-is-aloof kick, is touting the line that she's a pro-gun churchgoer. That may play in west Pennsylvania, but won't heal the world's or America's post-Bush wounds.

"'I used to support Hillary, but now I look at her eyes and see someone always wired, always calculating, whereas in Berry I see some widom,' said Kisjanto."

The more one looks at the sleazy, racist and religiously-biased Clinton campaign, the more backing this Richard Nixon retread appears to be a unrespectable position. Indeed, she may be the worst presidential candidate since Aaron Burr, or, at least, Strom Thurmond.

Also, on CNN, I see one of its political commentators saying that if Clinton wins the nomination, most Obama backers will support her. This is not true of me. If Clinton wins the nomination, I will endorse the more honest, honorable and better educated (by experience) John McCain for president.

We are coming to the crunch time of this long struggle for the Democratic nomination. There is only one of the candidates who would be a respectable choice: He is Barack Obama.

--

My long African cruise has now rounded the Cape of Good Hope and is sailing toward other South African ports on the Indian ocean. The big game part of the trip is about to commence in earnest, although we have already seen 20 baboons on the cape. Tomorrow, I'm taking a tour to the Zulu Kingdom of Lesotho.

South Africa is a truly beautiful country. I hope it prospers, but believe it will do better if the South African regime intervenes to ensure democratic rule in neighboring Zimbabwe.

For the most part, this has been a calm voyage through the 10,500 miles already sailed from Fort Lauderdale. We've had "rough" seas only a few days, defined as waves up to 12 feet, and the ship is well stabilized. Many, but not all, the land excursions have been well done, if expensive. On occasions, such as in Togo, we have had superb guides, who have made a big difference. The food on the ship has been a little spotty (the Holland America line chefs are not always proficient at preparing ethnic foods) but there has really been little to complain about. The accommodations, the room stewards, other members of the crew, have been nothing but friendly. Going on such a long cruise is not cheap, but this has been, all in all, well worth the value.

There are many things to do on the ship that I skip -- the bingo, the gambling, the dance lessons, bridge, some of the entertainment, etc. But the long days at sea are pleasantly spent. I've been using the binoculars my daughter and son-in-law gave me, and wearing some of the clothes they and my son, bought. I'm sleeping better than at home. I'm fortunate in table mates. All in all, I'd take a long cruise again. This one, at 73 days, may not be long enough.

Obama Statements True, But Highly Impolitic

2008-04-13T10:46:00.000-07:00

Written from Cape Town, South Africa--

Sen. Barack Obama seems to have trouble finishing the contest with Sen. Hillary Clinton. In New Hampshire, he lost to her unexpectedly. In Texas, he failed to close the deal with an inadequate response to Hilllary's implicitly racist 3 a.m. telephone call ad. Now, in Pennsylvania, just when he was gaining, he may have blown it once again, with remarks in San Francisco about the bitterness of Pennsylvania deadenders in small towns.

It's not that what Obama said is not true. But it is often the case in politics that saying unpleasant truths can hurt those who say them. John McCain found that out when he was running against George W. Bush in South Carolina in 2000 and slammed religious fundamentalists. He was right about them, but Bush won the primary, and the Republican nomination.

It certainly is no surprise that the Clintons have jumped all over Obama for his remarks. They will pander to anyone, anytime. Their power grab is so blatant, Hillary so poorly qualified for the presidency, that there are many of us who would never support the Clintons in another election. It would be interesting to know what Hillary and Bill say about Pennsylvanians behind their backs. Certainly, Bill Clinton did nothing in the White House to really help the economically hardpressed Pennsylvanians, and there is no sign in this campaign that Hillary is anything but beholden to the corporate interests, and the global free traders that have caused so many lower income Pennsylvanians to feel bitter.

But Hillary, as I've remarked before, is like Richard Nixon. Shameless and corrupt, she will say or do anything to be elected. And many voters, particularly in her own party, are taken in.

Obama has nine days to recoup in Pennsylvania. He is candid, and in his racial speech in Philadelphia, he was able to satisfy many of his critics. Sunday night, he had it all over the glib Hillary for the depth of his responses on the compassion issues in a CNN debate. As usual, all the former Goldwater girl gave us was pap.

But now his work is cut out for Obama, and he has only himself to blame for not being more careful in San Francisco, of all places.

--

It is clear from Russ Stanton's memo following a retreat with L.A. Times editors, that he does not have the intellect to be a successful editor of the Times. And his closing remark that the Times has some of the best journalists in the business is no longer true. He helped David Hiller and Sam Zell to drive them away.

--

It is clear from the comment posted below that some gullible Clintonite is back at me for opposing the Nixon lookalike and her Dogpatch husband. If this person doesn't like the blog, he shouldn't read it. I might also add that not liking Muslim fundamentalism is a characteristic of all those who love freedom. It isn't racism; it is common sense.

Obama Could Win Pennsylvania, Finishing Hillary

2008-04-11T06:41:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Cape Town, South Africa--

With the polls tightening, his television spending vastly exceeding Hillary's, and both Clintons continuing to put their feet in their mouths, Sen. Barack Obama could narrowly win Pennsylvania April 22, and force Clinton out of the race.

That is certainly to be hoped for.

The latest CNN poll last night showed Clinton with only a four-point lead over Obama in Pennsylvania. Obama's currently outspending Clinton 5-1 in the Keystone state, and that has to count for something. Plus, the Clintons continue to compound the damage done to themselves by Hillary's lie about braving sniper fire in Bosnia. Now, Bill Clinton says she merely mispoke at night, because she was tired. Of course, this is hooey, and everyone knows it. Hillary told the Boisnia lie several times over weeks and only gave it up when CBS showed a video depicting her being peacefully greeted by an eight year old child when she went to Bosnia.

Clinton is beginning to flail around, changing her pitch daily on the war, the economy and welfare. She sounds desperate and deceitful. She probably will yet try to come up with something like the scruillous Texas ad that stated, in Al Campanis fashion, that Obama would not be capable of handling a 3 a.m. phone call about terrorism. But this time, Obama may be readier to deal with it.

The undertone of racism in the Clintons' campaign -- Obama is unelectable, and Bill Clinton's remark about stealing cars -- cannot mean success. Obama has a lesser albatross around his neck -- his hinted backer, former President Jimmy Carter, going to Syria to meet with the leader of Hamas. He should forcefully tell Carter that this is not the time for him to do anything that would embarrass him.

Obama can, in short, close the Democratic contest out. He should press ahead. Can he win Pennsylvania? I think so.

Namibia An Empty Quarter of Africa With Potential

2008-04-10T06:01:00.000-07:00

Written from Luderitz, Namibia--

This largely desert country in the southwest of Africa is three times larger than California, but has only 1.8 million people. Much of it gets rain only once every five years, and it has spectacular scenery reminescent of the South Dakota badlands. They call one section the Valley of the Moon. Sand dunes rise as high as 1,200 feet, and yesterday, when we visited one of them on my African cruise, young people were climbing to the top and then surfing downward on huge boards. Some were able to surf from top to bottom without falling.

Our guide in a tour by four-wheel drive vehicles was a former South African Apartheid policeman who said he is on his way to Iraq for security duty, a high priced job he claimed is now held by 20,000 former South African security people. I wonder whether this can be true, and also wonder if it is the American taxpayers who are paying for it. I've never read any article talking of Apartheid cops' role in Iraq.

Before World War I, Namibia, then called Southwest Africa, was a German possession, and there are still German attitude traces here. Our tour was so regitmented, they would not even stop to permit us from buying postcards, although I managed to buy and send some today.

The population in Namibia is said, at present, to be 12% white, 8% "colored," or mixed, and 80% black. Judging from our stops here today and Walvis Bay yesterday, the lion's share of good jobs are held by whites and a few coloreds, and there is much evidence, as in the rest of Africa, of young black men sitting around the streets all day, unemployed.

Yet Namibia has obvious potential, including the largest uranium mine in the world, and, close to this city, diamond mines. It would take an aqueduct nearly 1,500 miles long to bring water here from Botswana. In the meantime, it is pretty bleak, a few palm trees, but mostly barren land broken by a few exotic plants that can get by on the moisture they pick up from fog rolling in from the sea.

Below the Tropic of Capricorn, the weather at this time of the year, is marvelous, bright clear days and temperatures in the high 70s, as the Southern fall begins.

Next stop, South Africa, in two days, where the M.S. Prinsendam will be visiting Capetown for three days, Durban and Richards Bay. Some passengers are getting off the ship to take a trip to Victoria Falls, or to the game refuges, and some will even be going to Zimbabwe. I decided to skip that and will be going on two day trips to game refuges and also down to the Cape of Good Hope.

--

Russ Stanton's view of what editors should read for a three-day retreat apparently devoted to further downsizing and diminishing of the L.A. Times, might be suitable for Stanton's remedial reading course, but it has little or nothing to offer serious thinkers about the future of the newspaper business.

Two former L.A. Timers who are working elsewhere were among the Pulitizer winners this year, including Amy Harmon, the talented former reporter in Business, now working for the New York Times. Naturally, while the Washington Post was winning six Pulitzers, and the New York Times two, the L.A. Times won none. Most of the people who would have competed for them in recent years have left the paper, victims of Dennis FitzSimons, David Hiller and Sam Zell.

Dumping Hiller Over The Side Would Be Smart

2008-04-08T08:29:00.000-07:00

Written Aboard M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Namibia--

Giving it the coolest of all evaluations, it seems evident that getting rid of David Hiller as publisher of the L.A. Times, especially if he were to replace him with Jack Klunder, would be the smartest move Sam Zell could make.

New published reports about the Tribune Co., including an article by Richard Perez Pena in the New York Times, say Tribune is in danger of default and that more assets, such as the Chicago Cubs and Newsday, may have to be jettisoned. Advertising revenue at the Tribune newspapers is now down 10.5% below levels a year ago, and the television stations, where Zell has been making many moves, are said to have twice the profit margin of the newspapers.

But the L.A. Times remains the biggest single source of revenue at Tribune, and making a change of publishers, bringing in someone who understands California, could only enhance its return to the company.

Hiller is not only a failure, but an adject failure. If they want to be nice to him, maybe he could be traded to Singleton.

I'd set two goals by the end of my African trip May 23: Obama's becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee, and Hiller going. Both may be closer within reach than I had thought upon departure they would be. For one thing, Hillary Clinton continues, with her unwillingness to completely get rid of Mark Penn, to prove that she is a totally incompetent manager, unfit not only to be President "on day one," but also on day 1,000. She does not have the smarts of Obama, and now even her supporter in Pennsylvania, Gov. Rendell, says Penn should go, not simply be demoted.

Poor Hillary! Bill put her up to running, because he thought he could easily dominate her in the White House.

--

The ship today is 8,900 miles out of Fort Lauderdale and closing in on the first of two port calls in Namibia. Seas are rough, and a charity walk on the Prominade deck had to be postponed for fear of someone falling overboard. As we move away from the equator, it's getting cooler, and we're now in autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. We have intersected the Antarctic current.

Disruption Of Torch Relay Embarrasses China

2008-04-07T05:23:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, Approaching Namibia--

I learned as an Olympic reporter that you can try to separate the Olympics from politics, but it won't work.

We see that again today as we learn of protests in London and Paris that have disrupted the running of the Olympic torch relay and greatly embarrassed the organizers of the Chinese Olympics. It is clear now that the rebellion in Tibet is overshadowing preparations for the Olympics this summer and could even severely damage the Beijing Games.

A couple of little historical footnotes are pertinent. First, it was Adolf Hitler who reputedly had the first idea for a torch relay in the Modern Olympics. The torch has caused trouble, or been the opportunity for causing trouble before. Now, it is again.

Second, as long as the International Olympic Commitee insists on awarding the Games to tyrannical regimes, such as Nazi Germany in 1936, militaristic Japan in 1940 (those Games were cancelled by World War II), Soviet Russia in 1980 and now Communist China in 2008, there is no way the Games will not be exploited for political ends, to buttress or condemn foul regimes. The IOC has on these occasions created its own mess, and then been forced to live with it.

It is worth noting too just like the Nazis and the Russian Communists, the Chinese Communists promised the IOC that they would behave properly in the runup to the Games. And all of these tyrannies lied. The Nazis continued to persecure the Jews, rearm feverishly and prepare for a world war. Just months before the Games, Hitler remiliterized the Rhineland. Then, in the runup to the Moscow Games, the Russians invaded Afghanistan. And now, with the Beijing Games approaching, the Chinese have intensified their effort of more than half a century to subjugate Tibet.

It is not at all surprising that human rights advocates and those who uphold democracy might think turnabout is fair play, and if tyrannies try to exploit the Olympics by following aggressive policies, it is fair to resist these policies by using the Olympics too.

That's what's going on now. Talk of another Olympic boycott is rising, and, at the very least, the bloom is off the Olympic rose once again. Even the IOC president is pleading with the Chinese government to ease the pressure on Tibet. The atmosphere of the approaching Games is being polluted by politics.

I don't think a boycott is an answer, because it will only hurt the athletes. But if the silly torch relay conceived by Hitler is going forward in so many localities, it is certainly proper for protestors to disrupt it.

--

In the latese embarassment for the woeful Clinton campaign, its high-priced media consultant, Mark Penn, has been demoted after it was revealed he was negotiating to represent the Columbian government for trade concessions as a lobbyist at the same time Hillary was opposing the concessions.

The Clintons are not only crooks themselves; they have many corrupt people working for them. Penn is only the latest.

For the good of the Democratic party and the country, it is time that Hillary give up her campaign and let America choose between two honorable candidates, John McCain and Barack Obama.

Voodoo Ceremony In Togo Displays Values

2008-04-05T04:58:00.000-07:00

traWritten On M.S. Prinsendam After Departing Lome, Togo--

Togo, a small strip of a country neighboring Ghana, is not nearly as prosperous as Ghana. But I was still impressed, in a long rural tour I took yesterday, of certain values in that country.

Our tour party saw a most impressive voodoo dance performed in a village by more than 100 young people attired in yellow t-shirts. It was evident that, as in most religions, voodoo incorporates an ethical values system that can give great consolation to its adherents. And unlike some other fundamentalists, the voodooists in Togo are not out killing people who may disagree with them. trt

Also, Togo has an impressive, if relatively undiversified, rural infrastructure, a farming community which does not, as in The Gambia, seem overpowered by overpopulation.

We had an excellent guide for the day, an educated man who told us that in Togo, the motto is, "Nothing should be lost." It was astonishing to hear about the multiple uses that a date or coconut palm tree can be put, and, with the huge cassava crop, they even use the leaves to make vegetables, or other parts of the plant to make soap.

Togo lost its English-speaking sections at independence to English-speaking Ghana. It has few natural resources other than phosphate. But the, "Yes We Can" spirit of its people is admirable.

The M.S. Prinsendam has now left West Africa after making five fascinating, if sometimes depressing stops, and today at 2 p.m. we cross the equator. We also are now in the Eastern Hemisphere. We are more than 8,000 miles out of Fort Lauderdale, and our next stop, in four days, is Namibia.

--

Matthew Mosk, a political reporter for the Washington Postl, has an excellent article today on how the rapacious Clintons feel "spent and outspent" in the context for the Democratic nomination. Since they just reported $109 million in personal income since the 2000 election, it would not be too much to suggest that they spend some of their own money on their campaign to restore Dog Patch government to the White House, if they really desire to go on.

With the money he had been able to raise, primarily from small donors on the Internet, Barack Obama should now press on to finish the job, pouring a crushing amount of what he has raised into Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Indiana. Victory for his inspired campaign, at least for the Democratic nomination, now appears in sight.

--

One of the most distinguished foreign reporters in recent years, for the Los Angeles Times and more recently for the New York Times, has been arrested by police thugs working in Zimbabwe for the dictator, Robert Mugave. The Pulitzer Prize-winning Barry Bearak has repeatedly in his career courted danger to bring deeply perceptive reports on the evils of our times to the rest of the world. We can only hope now that he is safe and will soon be released.

Mugabe is a dope. He could give up power and go public speaking, like the Clintons, thus making himself an even greater fortune than what he has been able to steal from the poor people of Zimbawe.

In Ghana, Comparative Prosperity in West Africa

2008-04-03T06:44:00.000-07:00

Written from Accra, Ghana--

Of all the countries we've visited on my Holland-America cruise in West Africa, Ghana, the first modern nation to emerge independently out of colonial Africa in 1957, is today far more prosperous and dynamic than its neighbors in West Africa. This is obvious to any visitor. One modern building after another is going up, the highways are often wide and busy. The markets are teeming.

Our guide explained to us on the way into town that one reason Ghana is booming is that in recent years much trade from landlocked central Africa countries to the rest of the world has been diverted through Ghana to avoid the religious and other conflicts that have embroiled other coastal countries, such as the neighboring Ivory Coast and Nigeria, or even further distant coastal countries such as Senegal, The Gambia, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

One advantage Ghana has is that it only has about 16% Muslim population, thus avoiding the interrnecene strife that has marked Nigeria and the Ivory Coast where fundamentalist Muslims constitute a majority or close to it and live in constant disturbance with Christian citizens.

We're now going to bypass such conflict-ridden countries as Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, the Congo and Angola while sailing to Namibia (four days at sea). But first, we stop tomorrow in Lome, capital of Togo.

On the way out of Accra this afternoon, we stopped to see some of the elaborate caskets people have constructed to accompany them into eternity. Some are automobiles, others airplanes, the way they'd like to go. I thought of ordering coffins in advance for Sam Zell and David Hiller, but wasn't certain what they'd like. Perhaps a huge dollar bill.

Cruise ships are not too common in this part of the world -- just two this year for Accra's port of Tema. But there were dozens of other ships, freighters, in port. And the Ghana authorities gave our tour buses motorcycle escorts.

--

Bill Clinton's ugly assault on Bill Richardson for endorsing Barack Obama shows once again the power-grabbing instincts of the Clintons. It can only hurt Hillary in the Puerto Rican primary June 3, because Latinos will wake up to the machinations of the Clintons.

There are also reports that Bill Clinton blew up and launched a tirade against Richardson in a private meeting last weekend with California super delegates. He is certainly not doing his wife any good. He needs relaxation, perhaps from his old sidekick, Monica Lewinsky.

Obama and Sen. John McCain, as proven both by their public service and their positions in this campaign, are warriors for the right, as God has given them to understand the right, while the Clintons are snivelers, would-be petty tyrants.

With McCain, it is partially his heroic service in the Vietnam war, five years of capitivity and torture in North Vietnamese prison camps, plus his independence in Congress. With Obama, it is his brave, ever perseverant campaign, and his noble speech recently on the race issue. Both are devoted to the highest American ideals

Like Richard Nixon and Robert Mugabe, the Clintons are devoted only to their own vainglorious power. They should, they certainly must, be send packing by the electorate. Hillary keeps saying she is too tough to quit, very similar to what Nixon said during Watergate. Later, we learned he had drank heavily that last year.

Again, a salute to Richardson, to Lee Hamilton, to Ted Kennedy, to Bob Casey, to Pat Leahy, to other honest public servants who have stood up to the power grab. They all have come to know the Clintons for what they are, and, in endorsing Obama, they show they know a good candidate when they see one. Now, today, there are reports that Jimmy Carter is hinting he's for Obama and that Gov. Corzine of New Jersey may switch to him.

North Korea, Gaza, Even Dubai, Evils Persist

2008-04-02T06:14:00.000-07:00

Written from Takoradi, Ghana--

No matter that some situations, like in Zimbawe, show signs of improving, there are many that seem intractible.

We hear today that, once again, the duplicitous North Korean regime, which has repeatedly welshed on the commitments it made last year to eliminate its nuclear weapons programs and provide a full accounting of what it developed to the U.S. and other countries in exchange for aid, is threatening the new South Korean president and has expelled many South Koreans there to help its economy. It shows once again that nuclear proliferation is very hard to eliminate when we have people like Kim Il Jong in the world.

Then there was a story in the International Herald Tribune yesteday about the hatred being officially spewed by the Hamas regime in Gaza, comparing Jews to vermin and calling for eradication of Israel. These too are scoundrels, and if they have to be destroyed to stop cease issuing venom, and rocketing Israel, they should be.

Also, today, there's a story out of Washington that the United Arab Emirates, which would like to invest in the U.S., has been taking U.S. exports with military components and reexporting them to Iran and Syria. Repeated efforts to stop this have been resisted. American soldiers are dying in Iraq, because Iran has been sending detonation components originally produced in America to Iraq.

There are rumors, too, that United Emirate interests have bribed the Clintons. We may find out, if Hillary ever releases her tax returns. And my son-in-law tells me that some Arabs are circulating the rumor that Barack Obama is Jewish. The reason is that his first name is similar to Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak's last name. Poor guy. He is damned no matter which way he turns. Yet he bravely carries on.

It is truly a dangerous world, and it is clear we need a new President who will keep America as safe as possible in these treacherous times, and is not afraid to take military action when necessary. On Dec. 26, this blog endorsed Obama for the Democratic nomination and John McCain for the Republican. I will make up my mind finally between these two candidates later, and will be endorsing no others in the fall.

Also, I note that Gov. Bill Richardson has an Op Ed page piece in the Washington Post defending his endorsement of Obama as an example of loyalty to the country. He is responding to the scullilous assaults of James Carville and other Clinton patsies that he sold out Hillary with the endorsement.

Richardson is eminitely qualified to advise the American people on who he thinks would make the best president. We owe him our deepest thanks and highest respects.

Hillary Sinks To New Low With Scaife Overture

2008-04-01T14:52:00.000-07:00

Written From M.S. Prinsendam, approaching Ghana--

I've received criticism from pro-Clinton readers by comparing Hillary Clinton's qualifications for the Presidency with those of Bess Truman and Mamie Eisenhower. Perhaps, I should be more precise about this. All my experience as a political reporter indicates that Hillary would be another Robert Mugabe, a terror in power. It has taken the poor people of his country 28 years to get rid of Mugabe. Let's hope, if she should prevail, we don't have as hard a time getting rid of Hillary.

Hillary sunk to a new low this week with reports that she had made an overture to the rightwing newspaper publisher, Richard Mellon Scaife, in Pittsburgh, in an apparent attempt to convince Republican voters in the Pennsylvania primary to cross over and vote for her, ostensibly so that John McCain will have an easier opponent than Barack Obama.

It reminds me of City Councilman Arthur Snyder in Los Angeles years ago campaigning in a special state senate election that he would be more conservative than Newton Russell. But the day before the election mail suddenly appeared in Democratic voters' homes claiming he was more liberal than Russell. I plastered this all over in a Page one story the day of the election, and Russell won narrowly -- one of my proudest accomplishments as a reporter. Russell was a conscientious senator. Snyder would have been a horribly unscrupulous one.

I don't like phonies, and Hillary Clinton is as phony as a three-dollar bill. By contrast, Obama and McCain are honorable candidates. A choice between them, and the country can only win.

Aboard the ship, I've been getting in my stateroom early each morning a full electronic copy of the International Herald-Tribune every day for $1.95 a copy. The L.A. Times could lower its price to that amount from $3.95 and probably get many more subscribers on cruise ships.

But the Herald Tribune, owned now wholly by the New York Times, is an excellent newspaper, perhaps the best newspaper on foreign news now publishing.

Today, it reports that the Huffington Post is becoming the first Internet newspaper. In their understanding of the Internet, Adrianna Huffington has it all over L.A. Times publisher David Hiller. What progress are we making in getting rid of him?

I keep thinking on this trip about the loss of such wonderfully-creative and publicly-spirited L.A. Times reporters as Stephanie Simon, Henry Weinstein and Myron Levin. Perhaps some kind of award of gratitude should be made to these and others -- John Balzar, Alan Miller, Robert Welkos and Lee Hotz -- come immediately to mind, so that we can mark our great appreciation for all they brought to the paper. I'd certainly be willing, when I return, to contribute to the organization of such an award, and a ceremony, perhaps a dinner, to bestow it.

Are we going to wallow in the gutter with Sam Zell or David Hiller, or remembers the ones who truly created the L.A. Times?

Weinstein, Levin, Frank Rich Tell The Truth.

2008-03-31T09:34:00.000-07:00

Written on M.S. Prinsendam, cruising off Liberia--

Yet another wonderfully, talented L.A. Times reporter, Stephanie Simon, has left the newspaper, going to the Wall Street Journal. She has always been a distinguished part of the Times staff, but like Henry Weinstein, Myron Levin and other reporters who have taken The Times buyout, I will miss them, but can't fault them. Who wants to work for a jackass like Sam Zell?

Weinstein, one of the greatest and most courageous Times staffers, said it all when he commented on the temerity of Zell's remark while visiting the Times' Washington bureau, that all the bureau had to offer was "overhead." What a disgrace!

Also, I should pay tribute today to Frank Rich, the New York Times columnist, who continues to write great columns about the lying Hillary Clinton and the courageous Barack Obama. Even the New York Times' editorials now show signs of beginning to follow Rich's lead. Since the paper does the right thing most of the time, I wouldn't be surprised to see a switch in their editorial endorsement -- even before the Pennsylvania primary. Like Sen. Bob Casey's endorsement of the Obama candidacy, this would be a courageous and wholly merited act.

My cruise is going well. We are now headed for Ghana, where we have two port stops. We are bypassing Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Cote D'Ivoire, all countries consumed by corruption, brutality and/or war.

We are off the regular cruise ship path, and even Holland-America will not have an African cruise next year. This one has filled only about 580 of its 790 places, despite all that the cruise line has done to make this a memorable voyage.

I must confess to feeling only discouragement when we took a bush tour two days ago of The Gambia. Of the 90 countries I've visited in my life, this was by far my poorest country. I kept looking at all those small children who came out to cheer our tour trucks. I kept wondering what kinds of lives they could expect.

Gambia is a country that juts up the Gambia river 270 miles into Senegal, and is only 15 miles wide on either side of the river.

I'll write more about the cruise when we reach Cape Town, and I can find an inexpensive internet cafe.

Myron Levin Right On Money About Sam Zell

2008-03-30T09:55:00.000-07:00

Written from M.S. Prinsendam, after Senegal an The Gambia--

I cannot resist complimenting our esteemed colleague Myron Levin for his parting e-mail to the L.A. Times staff.

Myron notes with precision that Sam Zell does not know so much as a 10-year-old lemonade stand operator when he "trashes the product."

This is strictly accurate. This guy is a prime number one jackass when he denigrates the L.A. Times. It's time he started behaving better. It's time he stops denigrating the L.A. Times.

What a jerk!

Myron Levin has done a lot more for the L.A. Times than Sam Zell ever will.

Hillary Lies About Coming Under Fire In Bosnia

2008-03-26T04:00:00.000-07:00

Written from Agadir, Morocco--

When federalist Alexander Hamilton was asked to choose between Democrats Aaron Burr and Thomas Jefferson for President in 1800, he said that he had nothing against Burr other than that he was an unscrupulous demagagogue who would ruin the country. He chose Jefferson, not because he agreed with him, but because he was "an honest man."

The same comparison could be made between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Hillary is a lying, scheming unscrupulous and unqualified candidate for President. Obama is an honest, intelligent and qualified one.

The latest evidence for this comes from Hillary's silly lie about her and daughter Chelsea running under the threat of sniper fire on a 1996 visit to a Bosnian airport. Videos instead show her landing peacefully, walking across the tarmac and being greeted, among others, by an eight-year-old girl.

The fact of the matter is that Hillary Clinton is no more qualified to become President than Bess Truman or Mamie Eisenhower were. Less so, in fact, since I doubt very much whether Bess Truman would ever have lied about her experiences or whether Mamie Eisenhower would have made things up.

This is like John Edwards' $400 haircuts. After the revelation of those, his candidacy began sinking, and after this latest revelation of Hillary duplicity, hers ought to sink like a rock.

She simply is not in the same class as Obama or Republican candidate John McCain. As a first lady, she was not distinguished, except for putting up with her husband's philandering. The only serious job she was ever given was to a fashion a national health care reform, and she failed miserably at that.

Now, with her sudden remarks about Obama's pastor, Hillary seems to be fixing for another scurrilous ad like the one she used in Texas (which in itself was a lie, using a girl who has grown up and become an Obama supporter, without her permission).

Enough of Hillary for President. Her candidacy is a joke.

--

I'm sorry to hear that Joe Mathews is becoming the latest distinguished writer to leave the L.A. Times, but wish him well in his new career of writing independently about California affairs. The losses from Tribune mismanagement continue to mount, threatening the whole future of the newspaper. Mathews knows more about the newspaper business, than Sam Zell probably ever will.

--

This has been my third visit to Morocco, and each one has shown what a marvelous country it is, and what a fine place to visit. Yesterday, I went on a ship's tour to the town of Taroudant, 40 miles from Agadir, and was impressed to see that, 50 years after a successful uprising there against the French, many women in the town still wear the bright blue burkas honoring the Sheikh who led the uprising. I'm not generally for women wearing burkas, but these looked great.

Agadir has been rebuilt splendidly since the devastating earthquake in 1960 that killed 15,000, there, and it could now be mistaken in some respects for the French Riviera, with its white buildings, splendid beaches, hotels and shops, and great views.