29th Anniversary of Richard Arrington's Election

Yes, 29 years have passed since Alabama's largest city elected its first black Mayor. I was fortunate enough to be at the old Parliament House on 20th Street South (torn down earlier this year) covering the Arrington Campaign that night for WERC Radio, and I still get chills listening to tape of the sounds of the excitement in the room as it became obvious Councilman Arrington was going to become Mayor Arrington. The ballroom was packed, and so noisy it took those at the podium a good fifteen minutes to get the crowd quiet enough for the Mayor-Elect to be heard. Everything he said was greeted with cheers as people stretched to see, some standing on tables. He explained he was delayed from making his victory speech by a call...a call from President Jimmy Carter in the White House, congratulating Arrington his achievement.

In subsequent decades as a TalkRadio host I had my difference with the Mayor over policy decisions, but it still is a thrill to remember the night The Magic City took the significant step away from the racism of the 60's.

Happy Halloween!

Yes, that's me, with my childhood BFF* Steve, a lot of years before BFF meant anything. I'd guess about 1960 or '61, in Queens Village, New York where we grew up. I'm not sure we were exactly huge Laurel and Hardy fans, but we were physically shaped right to portray them at least once at Halloween. The comedy duo's memory is preserved in a lot of movies and TV shows, as well as in two museums...one is in the U.S. State of Georgia and the other is in England, a testament to their widespread popularity.

* OK, 48 years isn't forever, but it's a start! Steve, thanks for keeping the photo all those years!

FTR on 10/29: One-Hour Election Special

Alabama Democratic party Chair Joe Turnham and State GOP Communictions Director Philip Bryan will join journalists Ken Hare of The Montgomery Advertiser and Eileen Jones with WSFA TV (NBC-Montgomery) this Friday for an election special FTR. The hour long broadcast will cover all of the people and issues on the ballot in Alabama, and issues of registration, turnout and ballot security. Join us from 9:00pm till 10:00pm, with a repeat on Sunday afternoon at 1:00pm.

MMMM #17 - So Much News, So Few People

How do truly dumb mistakes make it onto TV News? A few nights ago, a local Alabama station was doing a story about the Space Shuttle being rolled back from the launch site because a planned mission to Hubble had been scrubbed. The video viewers saw as the anchor read the story was of a retired Concorde supersonic jetliner on a barge being transported to The Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum on the Hudson River. I didn't know diddly about TV News when I started this part of my career fifteen years ago, but now I have the concept pretty well figured out. In order for that totally incorrect video to end up on-air, either a) NOBODY looked at it before it went on air. or b) somebody totally ignorant of the quarter-century long history of the shuttle and the SST looked at the video for a few seconds and decided, sure, that's the shuttle sitting on a barge! I suspect the job of picking the video was handed to an intern, and everyone else was so busy doing their fifth or tenth newscast of the day that nobody else saw the video before air. And the reason that might have happened is the stations have vastly increased the amount of "news" hours they air without adding, and maybe even while cutting, staff. There are tough economic times for everybody, broadcasters included, but the trend of expanding the amount of airtime devoted to "news" while keeping the number of news people the same started long before the Wall Street plunge. [By the way, newspapers are following the same trend. The L.A. Times cut 75 positions today after having shed 250 positions last Summer. And the papers are asking more and more of the remaining news staff...take video, write blogs, do web stories. Read a story in the NY Times today about that trend, including the end of all but one day's print editions of The Christian Science Monitor] [The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature on this blog. As with everything else here, it is strictly my own opinion.]

Election 2008

A viewer in Mobile was asking me about Amendment 1 on the ballot and I did my best to explain what it would allow...but I didn't do a very good job. I had not seen any printed outline of the amendments, but I subsequently found a pretty good website that gives the pros and cons. It's called Ballotpedia.org and it may help explain the complex changes being proposed. Every election we go through this...will we ever realize it really is time for a new constitution? While The Huntsville Times has decided not to endorse anyone for president...the other largest papers in the state, The Birmingham News, The Press-Register and The Montgomery Advertiser will all publish their choice for President this Sunday. Will there be any surprises?

FTR on 10/24 and 10/31

The election and the economy will dominate FTR this Friday at 9:00pm on APT. The following week's program...on Friday 10/31, FTR will be an hour long (9:00 - 10:00) and will focus only on the election the next Tuesday. Our guests that night will include the chairs of both parties...Democrat Joe Turnham and Republican Mike Hubbard and two journalists.

Crime & You

Saw a promo for a talk show (Oprah?) in which false confessions was the theme...and it reminded me of two pieces of advice I've received over the years about crime. The first was never ever talk with police about a felony without legal advice. The stakes are too high. Find a lawyer and don't let anyone pressure you to talk without one. Most cops are honest. Most D.A.'s don't want to convict an innocent suspect. But get legal representation as a precaution. And remember, if you can't afford it, the State has the obligation to provide one for you.

The second piece of advice: if some thug is trying to force you into a car, take your stand right then and there. Scream, struggle, fight. Do NOT get into the car, because the odds are you will never get out of it alive. The second piece came from a police detective in Birmingham. The first came from, yes, an attorney...who ALSO told me never to argue with an officer, even for a minor crime. Let your lawyer do that later.

Away

I'll be vacationing this week, so when you see someone else hosting FTR on Friday the 17th, don't think the worst! I'll be back hosting on the 24th...and we'll have a special one-hour long pre-election program on Friday the 31st from 9-10, with guests from both sides of the aisle. More details on that coming up.

MMMM #15 - The Final 2008 UnDebate

CBS's Bob Schieffer will be the moderator on Wednesday night at 8:00pm when Senators Obama and McCain practice their media-training before millions of people. They'll be seeing how well they can answer the question they wish Shieffer had asked them. Alabama live offers an advance story on the event. It says Sarah Palin boasted about not answering the questions asked in her debate. A partial solution would be to go to a true debate format with a panel of journalists.

The Joe-6 pack questions have their place, but journalists are paid to keep up with the issues and to know when a candidate has just contradicted himself. And as happened in the Gubernatorial Debates produced here in Montgomery by APT, journalists will sometimes work together and ask a follow ups to a question asked by another panelist.

Yes, I know the problem with that is the candidates won't agree to it, but just perhaps they would be forced to accept at least one debate in that format if the Presidential Debate Commission and the broadcasters stood firm. OK, you can stop laughing...asking the same broadcasters who produce drivel like "To Catch A Predator" to insist on real journalism is a bit unrealistic.

The only workable solution may be for voter-viewers to punish candidates who don't answer the questions by making it a factor in deciding who they'll vote for.

"Literally Watch" AND FTR

Just before 3pm, discussing the back and forth day in stocks, Wolf Blitzer reports there "was whiplash, literally, on Wall Street". Call their HMO!!!!! (-: Also, tonight on FTR, Bob Martin of The Montgomery Independent and Brian Lyman of the Press-Register are on the panel and we'll take stock of the economy and more at 9:00pm. There's a repeat at 1:00pm on Sunday and it will be online on Monday.

Corley On The Radio

As I mentioned in a previous post, the Manager of our Montgomery APT Facility has released his first CD...and now Bob Corley is getting some airtime in both Birmingham and Troy: WBHM public radio in Birmingham aired a short feature on his music on (10/09) of their Tapestry series. You can listed to it online here. WTSU-FM, Troy public radio, will feature his music on their Community Focus program airing Wed. Oct 15, at 12:10 p.m. (or so). As always, you can buy the CD at CD Baby

FTR of Friday October 3rd

Each Friday in the past few weeks I've considered making "The Economy" the one and ONLY topic on the FTR Week-In-Review. Is anyone talking about anything else? Is anything else ever remotely important compared to the worries we all have about our futures? This week Brain Lyman, The Press-Register and Bob Martin, The Montgomery Independent, will be on the panel. I suspect at least 2/3 of the time will be spent on economic issues (including The Jefferson County Sewer Debacle!).

Can I Help You Sir Sweetie?

Language has power. Power to motivate or knock down, to praise or destroy. And sometimes it is all unintended. Take, for example, what we call folks who are elderly. "Sweetie" and "Dear" and such, diminutives like those you might use for a child. There is an article in today's' NY Times about a study that says those seemingly innocuous phrases are actually harmful to the elderly! Were you never called a name as a child in the schoolyard? Or as adult in the office or the park? If you are not among the elderly, put yourself there for a moment. Wear the shoes, leg pains and all. "Sweetie"? "Dear"? Maybe not.

MMMM #14 - Fire! In The Theater!

On CNN Last week, in the midst of the economic chaos, Glen Beck was visiting with Wolf Blitzer (doesn't Beck already have enough exposure with his nightly show?) when he stated firmly that the U.S. ... "...is staring into the abyss of a Great Depression." "Nobody is saying Depression", cautioned Wolf. "I am!" shouted Beck. All of this is truly rearranging those Titanic deck-chairs...the cable networks long ago gave up any sense of separation between comment and reporting. And I've admitted that my knowledge of economics is probably no better than Sen. McCain, but shouldn't CNN should have some sense of self-regulation in a crisis? Here is a NY Times piece on The Depression and its causes. Of course we would never see so sober a conversation on CNN. Much too PBS. Much too level headed. Not enough gasoline to toss on these troubled times. [The Monday Morning Media Memo is a weekly feature of this blog. As with everything else here, it is strictly my own opinion]

The Week Ahead

The second of three debates between Senators John McCain and Barack Pbama is Tuesday night, and unless other events intervene, it will be on our FTR Week-In-Review agenda Friday night at 9:00pm. Hard to believe the election is a month from Tuesday! Despite Senator Obama's gaines in recent days, you've probably heard specualtion about a tied result, with each candidate winning 269 electoral votes. Here's a Reuters story about the possibilities. On Thursday I'll be on a media panel at Leadership Vestavia Hills with Barnett Wright of The Birmingham News. This is a repeat of last year when we were both on the panel, so the next step is for Barnett and I to hire a manager and go on tour. (-: