An anonymous post caught me short today. The reader accused us of exploiting the death of Kyle Andrew Coumas, the Lockeford man who was killed in Afghanistan. We are making too much of this death, he contends, in order to sell papers.
We’ve done numerous stories and photos. Frankly, we’d like to do more, including an interview with his parents, when they believe the time is right.
Fortunately, we’ve not lost many local men and women to the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. So I believe local interest in the death of this young soldier was - and remains - very high. We’ve covered it accordingly.
When it comes to telling the story of this young man, his service, his life, his death, his sacrifice, I suppose my instinct has been to err on the side of telling more, rather than less.
But perhaps the reader has a point. Perhaps we’ve gone overboard. Perhaps I am being defensive.
What do our readers think?
The young server at Dreamland BBQ looked down at my plate scrubbed clean by a piece of white bread.
“Well, glad you liked the chicken,” he said. “But we’re famous for our ribs. Since you came all the way from California, I think I can slip one to you.”
30 seconds later, a hefty pork rib appeared in front of me.
Instant salivary explosion.
I really like good barbecue. And I really like Mobile, Ala., though I didn’t expect to.
I’m a California kid. Never been to the Deep South. And never, frankly, had the urge.
But the National Newspaper Convention was set there. I was lucky enough to win a feature writing award that would be bestowed at the convention. Marty, our open-minded publisher, has visited the South, and subtly encouraged me to go. You’ll learn something at the convention, he said. You’ll enjoy the award ceremony. And you might find Mobile more interesting than you think.
So off to Mobile (pronounced moe-beel) I went, still expecting backwoodsy and boring. Muttering to myself: Why couldn’t this convention be in Chicago or D.C. — or at least Vegas, for goshsakes.
I came into town on a night humid enough to melt a silver dollar.
The next day, I awoke to a warm rain. Sticky. Even stifling. Oh, well, I will be gone in two days, I thought.
But those two days in Mobile held many surprises.
I discovered a city tracing back to 1702. Everywhere I turned in downtown Mobile, there was a sign marking history. The French, British and Spanish all left an imprint on Mobile. Floods and fires have ravaged the city, and so has yellow fever. It was a slave trading center, a cotton commercial hub. It has a rich shipbuilding history.
Downtown Mobile has undergone extensive restoration. It’s charming, with old brick buildings embroidered with fanciful ironwork. There’s an urban forest of huge, lush trees, (Mobile has one of the highest annual rainfall totals in the U.S.) some dripping with moss.
There is something about Mobile that is endearingly retro, like a rerun of “The Andy Griffith Show.”
Walking down Dauphin Street in Mobile, I smelled something earthy and rich: Peanuts.
This was the A&M Peanut Shop, I learned. Opened in 1947. The building dated from 1886. And all the store’s nuts are roasted right there in a weird, heavy-duty roaster built in 1907.
The peanuts are grown just one county over, said the very pleasant clerk.
A peanut store, selling local peanuts. That I have never seen on the West Coast.
I bought a bag. They tasted as good as they smelled. (At another spot, I tried a little bowl of boiled peanuts. They were spicy and a little mushy. An acquired taste, I think.)
There was a great used bookstore, Bienville Books, where I bought a tome called, “Myths, Mysteries and Legends of Alabama,” by Elaine Hobson. What a fascinating book. It told of, among other things, a giant pecan tree that made crying sounds and drew large crowds before returning to silence.
There was a wonderful evening at the mothballed USS Alabama, now part of a military park with aircraft and artillery on display. Our tour guides, young college students, all of them women, wore sailor suits. OK, old-fashioned. But festive and fitting, too.
Inside a hangar, surrounded by old warbirds, we were served a “Seafood Extravaganza” of fried catfish, fried oysters, fried shrimp and fried okra among other wonderful fried dishes.
“Down here,” an editor from Alabama told me, “if it ain’t fried, it ain’t cooked.”
As we ate fried seafood, the “Excelsior” a brass jazz band played. I noticed a banner stating the band dates to 1883.
There was a theater, The Crescent, where you could take a glass of beer or wine into the auditorium and relax in a big easy chair. The proprietor came out before the movie, a good film titled, “Adam,” to talk to us all about the movie, and asked if everyone was comfortable. Then he left to become the projectionist. Easy chair, glass of wine, good movie, cinematic concierge.
How — I can’t think of a better word — civilized.
There was a dog racing track, too. Alas, I didn’t have a chance to visit.
The people were, well, gracious.
Unfailingly friendly.
“Oh, don’t worry about the admission charge, sugar. You’re with a newspaper convention? Why, you just go on in and take a look around,” said the lady at the front counter of the Museum of Mobile. And it was an excellent regional museum. Honest and moving, one display showing how slaves were packed into ships like cordwood.
So I finished that complimentary rib at Dreamland BBQ, where they give you slices of Sunbeam white bread to mop up the savory liquids.
“Pecan pie for dessert. You gotta try it,” the server said.
No, I just couldn’t.
But I hope to try that pecan pie the next time I visit a sweet, sultry city called Mobile.
Maybe check out the dog racing, too.
Just back from a convention in Mobile, Ala. and a visit to New Orleans. I’d like to offer my thoughts on the trip soon, but wanted to ask your help in the meantime.
Since dropping our waiting period on submitting letters to the editor, we’ve found the flow of letters has picked up. That’s a good thing. But we’ve also found that some letter writers are submitting several letters each week, often with the same or a similar bent.
Is that OK? Or do we need to impose a new limit of say, two letters a month? Or one letter for every ten printed editions?
Our letters section, we know, is well-read. But a few voices have suggested the letters section has become less local, and less interesting, since we dropped our 30-day waiting period.
So, esteemed readers, what do you think?
• We do nothing.
• We impose a new, but more lenient policy of a letter every couple of weeks?
• We go back to the more restrictive 30-day period?
• Or?
Please leave a comment here on the blog or pop me an e-mail at richardh@lodinews.com.
Thank you.
Not enough coverage on 9-11!
That was the complaint of a few - but quite vocal - readers Friday.
Was the complaint valid?
On page one, we offered a lengthy investigative piece looking at problems with 9-11 anti-terror spending. This was accompanied by our own local angle on the issue. This package dominated page one.
Inside, we published a poignant column by Sgt. Chris Jacobson of the Lodi Police Department. The column described Jacobson’s cousin, the late John McNamara, a New York firefighter who responded to the 9-11 attacks — and who was Jacobson’s personal hero.
That’s over 100 inches of text, plus two photos.
In contrast, the Sacramento Bee ran an extended version of the same investigative piece we did, also played off page one, along with a look at upcoming 9-11 events and an opinion column.
The Record had no 9-11 reference on page one, but did run two wire stories inside, an editorial and an editorial cartoon.
If you were to compare the percentage of column inches the News-Sentinel devoted to 9-11 content versus the Bee and The Record, considering each paper’s total news space, we’d be ahead.
Yet there are other considerations.
First is this: The anniversary’s primary activities, along with opportunities for news coverage, happen on 9-11, not the day before. So I suspect most print media, including the News-Sentinel, will have more coverage today than they offered Friday.
Another consideration: Though the investigative piece was strong and well-researched, I suspect it was not the kind of 9-11 coverage our readers had in mind when they lodged their complaints.
Rather, they were looking for more coverage, like the column by Sgt. Jacobson, that thoughtfully evoked and paid homage to those who died on that terrible day in September 2001.
Could we have done more? A feature or opinion column, a respectful editorial cartoon, a wire story and photo?
Of course.
And in retrospect, I agree with our readers - we should have done more.
Pastor Dale Edwards over at Century Assembly is one of those old-school souls who still loves print.
He reads newspapers, he loves books and his Bibles are printed on paper and bound.
But the times they are a changing.
These days when he asks the congregation to open the Bible and read a verse during the service, a certain number of congregants pull out their laptops or flip open their cell phones. Their Bibles are electronic.
“It’s the younger crowd, under 30-40, mostly the guys … They don’t want to clutter their lives with books.”
Is that progress or a shame? I guess if you’re reading this online I know the answer. Let’s see what sort of reaction we get when this publishes in the Lodi News-Sentinel.
By the way, I wrote the headline thinking www.bible.com would be just a generic thing that would make my point. It turns out it’s a real Web site. I don’t know much about it but your free to click and browse. Life is about faith, isn’t Pastor Dale?
Confused about the health care debate?
Who is flat-out lying? Who is telling the truth?
I stumbled into a great site to help untangle the fibs from facts: PolitiFact.com.
This is created and reported by a team from the St. Petersburg Times. A fine newspaper, and PolitiFact.com is a wonderfully credible source.
One of the top features is devoted strictly to checking up on President Obama’s pronouncements and proclamations. This is digital journalism at its finest.
Here are some health care statements vetted by PoltiFact:
“All the really great programs in American history, Social Security, was done without Republicans. Medicare was done without Republican support until the last vote where they realized they had to get on board.” Howard Dean.
“President Obama . . . wants to mandate circumcision.” Rush Limbaugh.
True? False? Somewhere in between? You can access Polifacts by clicking here:
I didn’t have Stephen Berkowitz’s classes in high school.
But after reading the tributes to him on the obituary page, I sure wish I had.
I noted one person lamenting that he didn’t take the time to send Mr. Berkowitz a note, saying how much he appreciated his effort. It’s a common lament, I suppose. None of us says “thank you” often enough.
But one of the few times I did was after I graduated from high school. I sent notes to Lois Owen and Bill Johnson, my sophomore English and junior year chemistry teachers. They both wrote back and said how much they appreciated the effort. (Of course, my selection overlooked a dozen other wonderful teachers, but …)
If you have kids graduating from high school, recommend they attempt this little effort. They’ll feel good afterwards — for years.
A number of readers were ticked off by an editorial cartoon published Thursday that made fun of Fox news, Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin and town hall meetings.
Several readers said they were offended and were considering cancelling their subscriptions.
We try for a mix of cartoons on the page, both right and left, but some readers were especially piqued by this image, drawn by Chris Britt, who is a syndicated cartoonist.
You can view it here: http://www.lodinews.com/opinion/political_cartoons/chris_britt/
Choosing cartoons and columns can be a perilous task. We know most of our readers are conservative, but some are liberal. We want to provide a balance of viewpoints in both columns and cartoons.
We don’t intend to inflame readers, but this cartoon obviously did.
So: How do we provide a diverse and engaging page without inflaming readers?
Is that even possible?
(Not long ago, we heard from a reader who said our page was too conservative. He, too, threatened to cancel his subscription.)
I’d be interested in your thoughts on this particular cartoon — and our guiding philosophy of trying to provide a balanced blend on our editorial page.
A few quick items:
• City Editor Andrew Adams has departed for a job in the wine industry. Andrew has roots in the Napa-Sonoma region and a background in winemaking, so this sounds like a great opportunity. He was a stalwart here, first as city hall reporter, and then as city editor. All of us in the newsroom wish him the very best of luck.
• The arm I busted falling off my bike two months ago is healing nicely, so it is back on the bike and pedaling around Lodi and environs again with Judy.
Cycling through Sunwest recently, we saw a banner I liked:
“Wine a little. You’ll feel better.”
Also, took the advice of a biking buddy and headed out to Thornton last weekend. Serene vineyards, a great mixture of new, big houses, old barns and vintage farm cottages.
Thornton has always struck me as a place apart. It’s pretty. Lush and damp and with the Moke running through it. We had a gulp and a snack and headed back.
Round trip was about two hours and we covered roughly 26 miles.
If you are novice cyclists like us exploring the area, you might like this ride. Here is the route:
Woodbridge Road west to Ray Road.
North on Ray Road to Kile Road.
Kile Road west into Thornton.
And back again.
Hope you enjoy the trip as much as we did.
• Is the Starbucks parking lot in front of Safeway the busiest, bumper-bendiest place in Lodi? Having a cup with a friend, we noticed a couple of pedestrians dodge trucks and cars, several near-misses between vehicles, and one hit, though minor. Maybe it is the caffeine.
We don’t often editorialize about issues not well publicized in our paper, but I’ve always been nagged by the thought that talking on a cell phone while driving isn’t a great idea. So when I heard a story on National Public Radio about this, my ears perked up.
Rich and I usually decide the Saturday editorial on Wednesdays so I pitched him on this and he said we could probably make a link to the CalTrans worker who was killed while planting a tree beside the highway.
We didn’t have a story about driving distractions and cell phones from the Associated Press but you may want more on this topic. And there’s lots. We took our cue from NPR and NPR took it’s cue from a story from the New York Times.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration did an extensive study on the issue. According to NPR and the Times, the study was quashed by members of Congress who didn’t want the NTSHA lobbying state governments, but the study’s documents were made public after a Freedom of Information Act request by the non-profit Center for Auto Safety. Click here for a link to the documents.
A poll on NPR.org says
• 59 percent of people “often use a cell phone while driving”
• 26 percent “only in emergencies”
• 15 percent “never use one while behind the wheel.”
People often complain that Rich and I don’t sign the editorials. I supposed we might sometimes because the writing usually falls to one or the other of us. Nevertheless, we almost always work up the ideas together and read each other’s copy. And once in awhile, like on the driving distractions edit, it’s a true joint effort.
But getting back to this week’s editorial: Now I’ve editorialized against cell phone use and other cognitive distractions while driving. Does that mean I have to turn off the radio and stop listening to books on CD while I drive?
I had this weird thought while riding my bike and listening on a portable radio to the story in question: What if some guy using a cell phone swerves and hits me? What if I don’t see him coming in my rearview mirror because I’m listening to the radio? Which unsafe “cognitive distraction” is worse.
Let’s have a beer and discuss it. But not while driving … or riding a bike.
