Dan Kennedy

Checking in with ethnic news

I’ve got a feature on the New England Ethnic Newswire in the new issue of CommonWealth Magazine. The NEWz, a Web site that aggregates the best of the local ethnic press, is expanding into original journalism focused on health care.

“The thing that I think is really intriguing about it is this idea of connecting different communities,” says former Boston Globe editorialist Robert Turner, an adviser to the NEWz. “You see over and over again various communities building their own strength as their numbers increase. But how much of an effort around town is there to make cross-connections among them?”

The NEWz is a work in progress, as is the case with most new-media ventures. But it’s got the potential to grow into something truly important. Ethnic communities are already speaking for themselves. Now there’s a way for all of us to hear them.

Technology Tuesday

We are celebrating in Media Nation. The AirPort Express really did configure itself.

I called Apple customer service, and a terrific guy walked me through it. I think what happened yesterday was (a) I messed around and screwed up the AirPort’s internal settings; (b) incompetently performed a hard reset; (c) then did it properly, but couldn’t configure the AirPort because it needed to be reset.

Anyway, we are back in business. Now I need to catch up on some e-mail.

McCain’s factually inaccurate op-ed

The John McCain op-ed piece that was rejected by the New York Times contains at least one bit of factually inaccurate information about Barack Obama. That alone is sufficient reason to send it back for a rewrite. Instead, McCain has chosen to go public and claim that the Times refused to publish what he had written despite having run a commentary by Obama last week.

Here is the inaccuracy:

The success of the surge has not changed Senator Obama’s determination to pull out all of our combat troops. All that has changed is his rationale. In a New York Times op-ed and a speech this week, he offered his “plan for Iraq” in advance of his first “fact finding” trip to that country in more than three years. It consisted of the same old proposal to pull all of our troops out within 16 months. In 2007 he wanted to withdraw because he thought the war was lost. If we had taken his advice, it would have been. Now he wants to withdraw because he thinks Iraqis no longer need our assistance.

To make this point, he mangles the evidence. He makes it sound as if Prime Minister Maliki has endorsed the Obama timetable, when all he has said is that he would like a plan for the eventual withdrawal of U.S. troops at some unspecified point in the future.

The truth, of course, is that Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has indeed endorsed Obama’s 16-month timetable for withdrawal. Republicans are now spinning like mad to make it appear that Maliki’s remarks had not been properly translated. But this Josh Marshall post makes it clear that Maliki said what he meant and meant what he said.

In fairness, it should be noted, as Time’s Joe Klein does, that McCain’s piece was rejected last Friday, and Maliki’s remarks were not reported until the next day. But Klein goes on to observe that the McCain campaign still refuses to acknowledge that Maliki said what he said. In any case, there’s no doubt McCain’s op-ed would need to be revised in order to avoid making a false statement about Obama (and Maliki).

According to the Times, the newspaper has published at least seven op-eds by McCain since 1996. I can’t imagine that it won’t be publishing another one or two before this campaign is over.

But if McCain wants his words published without any editing or vetting whatsoever, then he ought to buy an ad.

Keeping the heat on the heat

In case you missed it, Kevin Cullen has a first-rate column in today’s Boston Globe on the death of David Woodman following last month’s Celtics victory. Cullen speaks with a fan named John Rufo, who remains incredulous at the aggressive show of force by Boston police at the celebration. Cullen writes:

Now, you can dress this up any way you want: that Woodman had a preexisting heart condition, that it was an unfortunate accident, that it was any number of things. But the bottom line is David Woodman is dead and he died as a result of being taken into custody by some cops who didn’t like some kid mouthing off to them.

You will never convince Jim Rufo that David Woodman is dead for any other reason than that the show of force put on by police the night the Celtics won their 17th championship was something of a self-fulfilling prophecy: that if you hype police officers up for battle, if you send them into a crowd of civilians with weapons, you are asking for trouble.

Good for Cullen for keeping the heat on the police.

What liberal media?*

Check out the nominally liberal Boston Globe columnist Joan Vennochi, who absolutely unloaded on Barack Obama in Sunday’s paper in a piece headlined “The Audacity of Ego.” Ouch.

No doubt Obama is possessed of a healthy self-regard and then some. But isn’t it pretty typical for a presidential candidate — especially one who’s new to the national political scene — to undertake a foreign trip?

*Eric Alterman wrote the book.

Technology Monday

Which is another way of saying all is not right in Media Nation.

Got the digital box from Comcast this morning. I only had to go back once before everything was working properly.

Now I am dealing with our wireless Internet problem. I picked up an AirPort Express at the Apple Store after talking with a guy at the Genius Bar who seemed pretty knowledgeable (if not quite a genius). Here’s what I’m trying to do:

Attach the cable coming in from outside the house to the back of the cable modem.
Run an Ethernet cable from the back of the cable modem to the AirPort Express.
Set up a wireless network using the AirPort Utility software.

I’ve come close a couple of times. I’ve had a strong signal coming from the AirPort. By all appearances, we should be good to go.

But none of our Macs will connect to the Internet. (For the moment, I’m running the EtherNet cable directly into the back of the family iMac. Very frustrating.) And then sometimes, when I try again, the AirPort doesn’t even show up in AirPort Utility.

I’ve got a 7:15 p.m. appointment at the Genius Bar, and I’m hoping someone will walk me through it step by step.

Comcast paranoia

As many of you know, Comcast is in the process of messing things up even more than it normally does.

Weirdly enough, on Friday night the signal coming out of our ancient, coal-powered Airport base station suddenly dropped to the point where I had to drag my laptop into the same room in order to get a decent connection. I’ve done enough testing to convince myself that it’s the base station and not the laptop. The situation persisted throughout the day on Saturday.

Last night, the problem appeared to have healed itself. Early this morning, too. But now the signal is back to being ridiculously weak.

The family iMac, connected directly to the cable modem, does not seem to be affected.

Is anyone else experiencing this? Is my suspicion that it might be Comcast realistic, or does it stem from my near-total technological ignorance?

Is that all there is?

I’ll reserve judgment over the latest contretemps regarding Manny Ramírez. But I do want to flag an unsettling quote from Bob Lobel in Dan Shaughnessy’s column today.

It was Lobel, formerly of WBZ-TV (Channel 4), who took to WEEI Radio (AM 850) earlier in the week to report that Ramírez had (a) been fined six figures for shoving traveling secretary Jack McCormick and (b) infuriated management by taking three straight called strikes from Mariano Rivera to protest his punishment. Now Red Sox officials are denying it — especially (b).

Here’s Lobel talking to Shaughnessy:

I don’t think this is false information. It’s not something I’d make up. It didn’t come to me in a dream. I know it’s not in their best interests to talk about this, but I’m pretty confident with what I said.

Whoa. Lobel doesn’t think this is false information? Now, there’s a lofty standard. Given that Gordon Edes has reported the fine was about 10 percent of what Lobel claims, I think Lobel owes us more, although he obviously can’t out any anonymous sources he may have.

As for Manny looking at three straight pitches, I watched that game, and yes, it was disconcerting. But Ramírez had preceded that with some big-time loosening-up in the on-deck circle. If he were trying to send a message to management, you’d think he’d just kneel there, immobile.

I forget who the television analyst was, but his explanation that Manny was looking for a pitch in a specific location made sense to me. When Rivera is on, he’s not exactly easy to hit.

Sorry for the relative dearth of links. I’m having Internet problems today.

Bill O’Reilly and “shut up”

In a letter to the Phoenix, Rich Goggin of Peabody says I was wrong to claim, as I did in the recent Muzzle Awards, that Fox News Channel host Bill O’Reilly “loves nothing more than to tell his guests to ‘shut up.'” Goggin instructs me thusly: “Except O’Reilly only did that once, seven years ago.”

Really. Now, I’m going to make an assumption, but I’m pretty sure the source of Goggin’s misinformation is O’Reilly himself. O’Reilly’s claim was included in Robert Greenwald’s documentary “OutFoxed.” It is followed by a hilarious stream of O’Reilly telling both guests and non-guests alike, over and over, to “shut up.” Here is the clip:

As Ronald Reagan once said, facts are stupid things. And if that’s not enough for you, Mr. Goggin, Jack Shafer of Slate wrote way back in 2003, “Bill O’Reilly says ‘shut up’ the way other people say ‘um.'” He follows that with one, two, three … OK, make that 30 examples.

I posted a comment to Goggin’s letter, but it doesn’t seem to have taken yet. I don’t know if he’s a Media Nation reader, but perhaps someone will send him this way. Meanwhile, my advice for him is to shut up.

It’s all about the debt

Boston Herald reporter Christine McConville quotes me today in a story about GateHouse Media’s ongoing financial woes, which have now extended to closing the chain’s weeklies in Taunton and Avon.

As best as I can figure out — and I’ve been making some inquiries — it’s all about GateHouse’s $1.2 billion debt. But as McConville notes, when you talk to insiders, you can’t help but be surprised by lack of panic.

What you hear is that the debt has been structured in a way that makes it quite a bit less onerous than outside analysts assume. The truth? Well, it’s out there, I guess.

As for the closing of those two papers, it’s always a shame when the doors are padlocked, but this doesn’t strike me as a huge deal. The weekly Taunton Call and Avon Messenger operated in the shadow of the Taunton Gazette and the Brockton Enterprise, dailies also owned by GateHouse. The company’s Wicked Local Web sites for the two communities remain intact.

Regional publisher Mark Olivieri explains here and here.