Ira Glass: “Newspapers and network news deserve to die”

Christiane Amanpour attended the DuPont Awards Winners’ Circle inside the Lecture Hall this year to talk about her winning documentary “God’s Warriors” but also to react to criticism by earlier remarks from Ira Glass who said he could have never voted for this years winners.

Amanpour: “Yes, we are serious about that. The world is a serious place. The things that confront us are serious things. We don’t want to make fun or make light of the serious things. That does not mean that we cannot create compelling, interesting television.”

(Click more for full Ira Glass remarks) (more…)

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Andrew Rosenthal explains why McCain wasn’t published in NYT

Photo: Andrew Rosenthal (by Katya Wachtel)

Andrew Rosenthal, the New York Times Editorial Page Editor, visited the student center at the Journalism School tonight and talked for 90 minutes about his job.

It would be an understatement to say he surprised people in the school with his pointed comments. He managed to make everyone laugh out loud at least once - and that after a long day in classes or on the reporting beat.

Talking about the controversy around Obamas published op-ed piece, followed by denying McCain the same opportunity - at least when you ask his campaign management - Rosenthal had the following words to say about a process that started with telling Senator Obama of what to write and what not.

(audio temporarily removed…)
“We can’t accept this piece but if you take out all those quotes from last week’s speech and the ones from the commercial and you focus less on attacking John McCain and you focus more on your own policies. And they sent us two more drafts and we accepted the third one.

“And when we accepted it I said to David Shipley, our editor, ‘okay here’s how this is gonna go. We are going to run this thing and the McCain people will ask for equal time. And we are going to give it to them because it’s only fair. And they are going to send us a horrible, unprintable op-ed piece. And we’re going to ask them for the same exact changes we asked Barack Obama for and we are never going to hear from them and they’re going to leak it to Drudge and attack us for dissing McCain and that is exactly what happened.

“Our public editor has criticized us. They sent in the piece. They called on a Thursday and wanted it to go on Sunday. I said ‘fine.’ Our editor said to them ‘you understand the rules, it can’t be a press release, it can’t be a rehash speech and we really don’t want you to just criticize Obama, we need to hear about your opinions.’

“They said ‘yes, yes, yes.’ They sent us a rehash speech that criticized Obama and said nothing about what McCain wanted. We wrote them back - a slightly inartfully worded email but basically said them same thing: ‘We can’t accept this.’ And they just went straight to Fox News, Drudge.”

Click more to read my tweets during his talk (Start at the bottom) and take a look at the slideshow.

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Protesters Demand Bailout for Main Street

Photo: Assembleyman Hakeem Jeffries (by Franz Strasser)

On Tuesday, members of ACORN and local politicians gathered across the Federal Reserve building in Lower Manhattan to demand a bailout for Main Street, not just Wall Street.

INTRO: WITH FED CHAIRMAN BEN BERNANKE AND TREASURY SECRETARY HENRY PAULSON TESTIFYING IN CONGRESS TODAY, PROTESTERS NEAR WALL STREET CALLED FOR THE GOVERNMENT BAIL OUT MAIN STREET AND NOT JUST WALL STREET. FRANZ STRASSER WAS THERE.

> Click more for Slideshow.
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Elmhurst, Queens reacts to Sarah Palin

Last week, I was out on my beat in the neighborhood of Elmhurst to ask female voters about their impression of Sarah Palin. The gouverneur of Alaska just delivered her speech to accept the nomination as Vice President as the first female candidate in the history of the Republican Party.

INTRO: AFTER ANNOUNCING SARAH PALIN AS HIS V.P. PICK, THE LATEST POLLS FIND JOHN MCCAIN GAINING 11 PERCENT WITH WHITE WOMEN IN AMERICA. IN THE QUEENS NEIGHBORHOOD OF ELMHURST, FRANZ STRASSER TALKED TO A DIVERSE GROUP OF FEMALE VOTERS ABOUT THEIR IMPRESSIONS.

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Audio Sound Card: Dell’Anima

Last Sunday, I had the great pleasure of producing an Audio Sound Card for my radio class at Dell’Anima on 8th Avenue and Jane Street - in the heart of the West Village. My topic was Sunday Brunch and how the atmosphere inside the restaurant differs completely from a typical night in this trendy restaurant.

Intro: Sunday Brunch is something many people enjoy. For residents of the West Village it’s much more than just a bite - it’s a culture. Franz Strasser has the details.

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First Radio productions

In my first week at the Journalism School at Columbia University, I produced two pieces for my radio class. Here’s one of them:

Intro: You need a break from work and want to stay in shape? There are many people who do that, right in the heart of New York City. Franz Strasser caught up with one of them.

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