When The Ignorant Claim Executive Privilege To You

That's a loaded title.  And probably confusing.  Since I don't expect any of my readers to be speaking directly to the president or his immediate staff, I wasn't referring to the president when I said "the ignorant."  Rather I meant people who take the president's position that the Mueller Report and the president's tax returns are protected by Executive Privilege.

But it could also mean you the reader might not have looked closely at this term since 1974, or for younger readers, ever.  And it's also to make sure I'm on reasonably sound footing when I talk about the term.

I started this post thinking about how I understood the term back when the Supreme Court rejected Richard Nixon's claim of Executive Privilege back in 1974.   Back then, Nixon argued that the private conversations he had with his advisors needed to be protected so that he could get honest advice, not colored by the fear that what his advisors told him would be made public.  That they could consider a wide range ideas - some of which might be highly controversial - without fear that their conversations being taken out of context. Without out that bubble of confidentiality, it was argued, he might not get the frank, robust advice and debate he needed to make decisions.  (What we learned was that those discussions were often about covering up Nixon's involvement in the Watergate Burglary.)  


Background On My Thinking On This

My take on this is also tinged by my doctoral dissertation which was a reflection on the concept of privacy.  I disputed the common psychological take on privacy - that we all have some private core that needs to be protected from the world - and focused on privacy really as a power issue.  That covering that core was really about the consequences of revelation.  If they were good, people opened up.  If they were bad, people needed to hide the core.   Privacy is about individuals' power to withhold access to their information and power to gain access to other people's information. (There's also a slightly different but overlapping idea of being able to physically seclude oneself from others.)

By the time Nixon resigned, I had already begun researching my dissertation.  In fact his resignation took place while I was  taking an eight day intensive graduate course on privacy taught by Vince Barabba, Nixon's head of the Census Bureau.  It was during this class that Nixon resigned.


What others say about Executive Privilege 

1.   From the Cornell Law School's Legal Information Institute:

"Executive Privilege
Definition from Nolo’s Plain-English Law Dictionary
The privilege that allows the president and other high officials of the executive branch to keep certain communications private if disclosing those communications would disrupt the functions or decision-making processes of the executive branch. As demonstrated by the Watergate hearings, this privilege does not extend to information germane to a criminal investigation."

2.  From Justin Yang in the Penn Undergraduate Law Journal:

Executive privilege is the presidential claim to a “right to preserve the confidentiality of information and documents in the face of legislative” and judicial demands. [1] Although such a privilege is not an explicit right the Constitution grants to the executive branch, its justification is rooted in the doctrine of separation of powers. The argument is that if the internal communications, deliberations, and actions of one branch can be forced into public scrutiny by the other two co-equal branches of government, it will impair the supremacy of the executive branch over its Constitutional activities. This is because the president benefits from the executive branch’s advice and exchange of ideas , and forcing it all into public scrutiny can harm the integrity of these discussions. Additionally, it undermines the ability of the executive branch to hold sensitive military, diplomatic, and national security information. [2]

Of course, because executive privilege is not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution, its exact scope and extent is ambiguous and disputed. After all, it was not until the Watergate scandal in the 1970s that such a privilege of presidential confidentiality was first judicially established “as a necessary derivative of the President’s status in the U.S. constitutional scheme of separated powers.” [1] 

I'd note that Yang's footnote 2 comes before footnote 1.  But both are worth pursuing for more information on this question. 

Footnote 1 goes to a 2014 Congressional Research Report:   "Presidential Claims of Executive Privilege: History, Law, Practice, and Recent Developments"

Footnote 2 goes to a Lawfare article "Primer on Executive Privilege and the Executive Branch Approach to Congressional Oversight"

From the Lawfare piece in Footnote 2:  

The [Supreme] Court held [in United States v. Nixon (1974)] that, notwithstanding the Constitution’s silence on the issue, executive privilege had constitutional underpinnings and derived from the nature of the president’s constitutional powers and obligations, presumably the vesting of the executive power in the president and the president’s authority and responsibility to ensure that the law is executed faithfully.  However, the Court rejected Nixon’s argument that the privilege was absolute and therefore precluded enforcement of the grand jury subpoena. Instead, at least when grounded in the president’s generalized interest in the confidentiality of his communications, the Court viewed the privilege as a qualified one, subject to a balancing of the competing interests and legitimate needs of the respective branches—and ordered the production of the tapes.

I don't expect to produce a Law Review ready article here as I explore this topic.  My main objective is to spark readers to look at this concept in more depth and be better prepared to challenge those who use as a safe-word to end further debate.

These quotes (and the articles they come from) should give people a good start.  But it also matters what the Supreme Court thinks, because this may well get there.  Since most of the pieces I saw on Executive Privilege point out the term is not in the Constitution, and because the conservative majority on the Supreme Court claim to be originalists, you might think that the idea should have no standing with them.  But that's only if you believe that originalist is more than a conservative branded anti-dote to the idea of The Living Constitution concept, which allows them to interpret the Constitution to support their own values.  [See an earlier post I did on the concept of Originalism after Justice Scalia died.]

So it seems useful to look at what The Federalist Society says on this topic.  Unfortunately, I can't find a straightforward statement on their website.  However, there is a debate in which Michael Dorf enumerates five reasons given my Democratic members of Congress why Executive Privilege would not apply.   Unfortunately, I can't really say that this debate represents Federalist Society thinking,  But it does give more practical questions that will be raised.  

It's a debate on whether President Bush (W) could use Executive Privilege to stop his "former presidential counsel Harriet Miers and former political director Sara Taylor from testifying before Congressional Committees regarding the firing of certain U.S. Attorneys."  This is law professor Michael Dorf's opening statement:

That memo states five objections to the assertion of executive privilege.  Two of them are highly technical: (1) the President himself must personally assert executive privilege, but he has not; and (2) Harriet Miers must, but did not, submit a "privilege log."
The third objection rests on what strikes me as a faulty understanding of executive privilege: (3) there has been no showing that President Bush himself received advice or was even involved in the underlying decisions regarding the U.S. Attorneys.  I consider this a faulty view because we have a doctrine of "executive" privilege rather than "Presidential" privilege.  Rooted in separation of powers, it protects the confidentiality of communications within the executive branch.  To be sure, in United States v. Nixon, the Supreme Court talked about the "privilege of confidentiality of Presidential communications," but that's because the case itself involved such communications.  InCheney v. United States District Court, although the issue was not directly presented, the Supreme Court appeared to accept that the Vice President could raise a claim of executive privilege.  (VP Cheney had not yet announced that he's a member of the legislative branch.)
Moreover, precedent aside, it makes sense to extend executive privilege beyond communications directly with the President.  In the same way that a claim of "judicial privilege" should protect (at least as a prima facie matter) case-related conversations among lower federal court judges or even their law clerks, rather than just those between Supreme Court Justices and their respective law clerks, so it seems that executive privilege ought to protect some discussions in which the President does not directly participate.  This view may pose problems for those who believe strongly in the unitary executive—including the current occupant of the White House—but that's not a reason for the House of Representatives to adopt a faulty view of the privilege.
The heart of the House case is the fourth objection: (4) Even if the privilege were properly raised and applicable, it would be outweighed by the House's need for information relevant to investigating serious wrongdoing.  As in the Nixon case, so too here, there is no plausible national security justification for keeping the material secret, and prior administrations have declined to assert executive privilege where Congress sought evidence of wrongdoing by the administration itself.  Whether this objection is correct as a matter of case law depends on whether Nixon—with its demanding burden of persuasion on the administration—applies outside the context of a criminal prosecution.  The Cheney case suggests that it may not, but this is an open question: We can grant that executive privilege is entitled to greater protection in civil cases than in criminal cases; it does not follow that it is entitled to less protection in a direct conflict between the House and the President.
The fifth and final objection appears technical: (5) When a private citizen faces a congressional subpoena and the White House asserts executive privilege, the proper course is for her to comply, unless the White House succeeds in obtaining a court order blocking her from doing so.  This is not merely a technical objection, however.  If correct, it would force the administration to go to court as plaintiff seeking a protective order rather than as a defendant against a motion to compel testimony.  It's disadvantageous to be the plaintiff in these cases because a judicial decision to stay out benefits the defendant.

OK, I've already spent way too much time on what was supposed to be a simple short post.



What can we take from this limited look?

Key Points On Executive Privilege

1.  There exists something called Executive Privilege that is not mentioned in the Constitution, but is said to be implied.   "[I]ts justification is rooted in the doctrine of separation of powers. The argument is that if the internal communications, deliberations, and actions of one branch can be forced into public scrutiny by the other two co-equal branches of government, it will impair the supremacy of the executive branch over its Constitutional activities " 2.  Its purpose is to allow :   "the president and other high officials of the executive branch to keep certain communications private if disclosing those communications would disrupt the functions or decision-making processes of the executive branch."  3.  Its limits are not absolute.  From the Congressional Research Report cited, but not quoted, above: "The privilege, however, is qualified, not absolute, and can be overcome by an adequate showing of need."

This is, of course, a simplification, but I think that at least these points are agreed on by most who use this term honestly and not as a political weapon.

 If one were to be flip, one could argue that #2 is irrelevant in Trump's case, because he's already disrupted the functions and the decision making process of the executive branch himself, way more than any disclosures to Congress might.  The damage to our country could reasonably be argued to be in far more danger from not disclosing the details than from disclosing them.


As an endnote, I should explain the source of my bias on this.   My doctoral dissertation and subsequent experience cause me to believe that when it comes to government, the danger of too much information being released is less of a problem than too little being released.

Let's look at another example of conflict between releasing information versus concealing it. Most of the information that Edward Snowden released was problematic because:

• releasing it was illegal
• it was  embarrassing to the officials involved, rather than because of provable damage it caused.  

That doesn't mean that there was no damage,  but  I would argue that whatever damage there might have been, was the cost of revealing the massive spying the US government was illegally carrying out on US citizens.

The damage seems limited to revealing intelligence techniques to other spy agencies.  And we hear a lot of risking people's lives, but so far there have been no publicly revealed cases of that happening.  Instead we get wringing of hands over what could happen.  Here, for example, is a Chicago Sun Times article titled "Snowden leak costs still being counted five years later."  What costs do they list?  

According to Melstad [Joel Melstad, a spokesman for the counterintelligence center], Snowden-disclosed documents have put U.S. personnel or facilities at risk around the world, damaged intelligence collection efforts, exposed tools used to amass intelligence, destabilized U.S. partnerships abroad, and exposed U.S. intelligence operations, capabilities and priorities.
“With each additional disclosure, the damage is compounded — providing more detail to what our adversaries have already learned,” Melstad said.

The article, despite the title,  has no 'count of losses.'  Just a hypothetical list of potential, conceptual problems.  The hypothetical risk of the death of a CIA informant  suddenly takes on great significance and justifies concealing major illegal governmental action, while the actual deaths of kids in US detention centers on the Mexican border, or of people who couldn't afford the increased price of their insulin are seen as unfortunate collateral damage to upholding anti-government ideology.

Again, secrecy and privacy give these agencies the cover of never having to give specifics.  It's about risks.  Not about specific instances of death or harm.   Snowden's lawyer, also quoted in the article counters Melstad's take:

". . . [Snowden’s lawyer, Ben Wizner] said the government has never produced any public evidence that the released materials have cause “genuine harm” to U.S. national security.
“The mainstream view among intelligence professionals is that every day and every year that has gone by has lessened the value and importance of the Snowden archives,” Wizner said. “The idea that information that was current in 2013 — and a lot of it was much older than that — might still alert somebody to anything in 2018 seems like a stretch.”

The point I'm making is that the secrecy does harm as well - like illegally spying on Americans - that also needs to be weighed in the balance.  We have to weigh whether the argument offered (in this case Executive Privilege)  is being legitimately applied, or is simply a smoke screen to cover up unsavory and illegal practices.   I hope this gives you more depth when people throw Executive Privilege around and stimulates you to find out more than my attempts at understanding allow.

Learning How Tom Clancy Novels Keeping Coming Even Though He Died In 2013

The notice said that the author of the Tom Clancy thriller series was speaking at UAA.  I knew vaguely that this was a best selling author and I even thought I'd read one of the books, but it was hazy and I didn't have time to look it up before I went.  If there's a famous author coming to talk and I can ask questions - and more importantly, I can fit it on my schedule - I try to do it.

That's where my head was when I got to the UAA bookstore.

Marc Cameron started talking.  The talk was basically about writing and publishing - very little
about his books and their characters. As he spoke my mind twisted and turned.  Here was an author telling us about how he wrote books that have a dead author's name in giant letters on the cover and his name, much smaller on the bottom.

Teachers:  He mentioned two teachers who changed his life, making him believe he could be an author. One short story was totally marked up in red ink and had a C- (I think that's what he said), but at the very end, said, "I think this is publishable."  Another teacher - in theater - told him he moved like he had a broomstick up his butt, and this scarred him for life he said.  He still won't get up on the dance floor.

Blurbs - He mentioned one author who, when thanked by an author for whom he'd written a book jacket blurb, said, "I either read 'em or blurb 'em, but not both."   And Cameron said most of his blurbs credited to him were written by the publisher.  I guess that makes sense for someone who writes books that have another author's name.  When asked about the evolution of the Tom Clancy series, he likened it to movies - how many James Bonds have there been with different actors playing Bond?

Writing methods - He has a plan for the whole book and knows how it will end before he starts.  He usually has four or five different plots going and he has to map out how they intersect. Every chapter ends with a major unresolved issue that requires the reader to go to the next one to find out what happens.  The publishers pick the titles based on marketing strategies.  He keeps some of the original author's style - like offering esoteric explanations about items used by the characters - but not the way Clancy did.  Nowadays, he said, we have Google, so readers can easily look things up.  He tries to write the best he can, but he's telling suspenseful stories, not writing art.  Though he sometimes slips in something more 'artful' which may or may not be cut by the editors.

Money - He talked about authors getting something like 8% of the price of each book.  So he has a decent cash flow - given advances, hard back, second publications, paperback editions - but that if he stops writing, that will slowly dry up.  He'd mentioned that the estate of Tom Clancy owns the rights and decide who carries on the series.  When asked if that meant his royalties were less, he said he gets paid a flat fee to write those books.

I found myself reevaluating my stereotypes of 'hack' writers.  Cameron, in answering a question, told an anecdote about Ken Follett who was host for a literary award dinner.  The well known author award recipient said something about not thinking about the reader when he wrote,  and Follett was reported to have said, "That's why you win awards and I'm rich."


The sense I got of Cameron was that

• He wanted to write from an early age.  He mentioned reading Where the Red Ferns Grow and also noting that his teacher loved it too and that it moved her to tears.  He wanted to be able to affect people like that.
• For Cameron, writing is a job.  He likes the writing and being able to have a portable office and the idea that people buy his books and are somehow affected by them.
• He is a story teller, writing stories that pump people with adrenaline, that take them out of their daily and less satisfying lives.  And he has to compete with video games and Netflix binging.  
• He likes that he can earn a good living this way.  

It was good for me to hear him talk.  It's clear he works very hard.  He may be more like a factory worker producing formulaic books than a writer of literature, but he's good at what he does and serves his audience what they want.  And he's totally honest about what he does.  And I've been reminded of one of my unwarranted prejudices and am correcting it.  I may even read one of his books.  If you check the Wikipedia link I put on his name above, you can get a list of his books.  

Sometime during the talk, I realized that the Tom Clancy book I'd read was The Hunt For Red October, a book written by Tom Clancy.   

Nature's Ways

After Vic Fischer's birthday party yesterday we went a little further south to Potter's Marsh.  It was cold and windy with errant raindrops thrown in.  While the birches on the hillside above were showing green, the grasses at the marsh weren't.

Below the end of the boardwalk was a moose carcass.  Don't know who took it down - bear, wolves?  Hunger?  Old age?  But it's the natural cycle when humans are not part of the picture.

I started thinking about this when I read a story in the ADN about the aftermath of the Hawaii volcano eruption last year.  The article talks about the volcano as a  'disaster.'   And sure, it was for the people who lost their houses either to the lava or the toxic gases that make the other houses inhabitable.

But back in 1970 when I worked at a Peace Corps training program in Hilo, Volcano National Park was already there and people nearby lost their houses in an eruption a few years later.  The volcanic eruption is different from other natural disasters the earth is experiencing because it's not, to the best of my knowledge, related to climate change.  This is a natural process that has been happening for millennia.  

Kīlauea started as a submarine volcano, gradually building itself up through underwater eruptions of alkali basalt lava before emerging from the sea with a series of explosive eruptions[20] about 50,000 to 100,000 years ago. Since then, the volcano's activity has likely been as it is now, a continual stream of effusive and explosive eruptions of roughly the same pattern as its activity in the last 200 or 300 years.[21]

The people who bought houses there knew about Pele, it was part of the beauty of the area.

[I've just deleted the rest of this post because it was wandering thoughts and needed more editing.  This is enough for now. Maybe I'll do a Part 2 of this post.  The basic idea was that human existence is hardly necessary for the earth.  In fact humans are wantonly destructive of the paradise they were given.]

Happy 95th, Vic Fischer

The state of Alaska is in a unique situation in that we still have living one of the delegates to the Alaska Constitutional Convention.  Vic Fischer turned 95 today and there was a big birthday party with lots of guests who themselves have played critical roles in the history of the state.

There's something of a Forrest Gump quality to Vic Fischer's life - he lived through many historic moments in the history of the 20th Century, and played important roles in a number of them.  His father was the famous journalist, Louis Fischer, who married to a Russian writer.  He was born in Berlin in 1924 spent his early years in Berlin and Moscow, escaping from Stalin purges through intervention from Eleanor Roosevelt in 1939.
He served in the US army in WW II (and his two best Moscow school friends served in the Russian and German armies respectively.)  I've misplaced my copy of To Russia With Love:  An Alaskan's Journey, a remarkable autobiography, so I can't check all the details.  But Vic got planning degree at MIT and eventually came to Anchorage with the Bureau of Land Management.  He was one of the youngest delegates to the Alaska Constitutional Convention.

He established what has evolved into the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) at the University of Alaska - the foremost research body of its kind in Alaska still today.  (It was through ISER I first got to meet Vic and he moved into my office when the public administration department got moved to another building.)  When relations between Russia and the US thawed and flights were permitted between Alaska and the Russian Far East,  Vic, with his fluency in Russian, was a key player in exchanges between Soviet and Alaskan scholars.

Vic has kept busy since then in a variety of Alaskan activities.  I remember a video interview with Vic in the capital building in Juneau in 2010 when I had a question about how a politician was interpreting the Alaska Constitution.  What better source than one of the writers?  Vic is still out and about regularly participating in civic affairs and clarifying constitutional questions when needed.

If you're looking for a good book with a crazy improbable life adventure, I don't think you can go wrong with To Russia With Love.  Though I realize part of my enjoyment of the book was that I knew so many of the people in the Alaska section of the book, and learned lots of details I hadn't known previously.

I'd note that Katie Hurley who was, not a delegate, but the Chief Clerk to the Constitutional Convention, is, still alive at 98.
Also, I tried to find out of there were any delegates still alive to the convention that wrote the Hawaiian Constitution, but couldn't.  However, Hawaii had at least two more constitutional conventions (1968 and 1978) and surely people are still alive from those meetings.

Consequences For Unruly Airline Passengers

I was reading a twitter thread about a journalist who got harangued by her Trump supporting seat mate on a plane ride.  She had the window seat and felt trapped as he ranted about how the media lied and wrote fake news and were the enemy of America.  Fortunately, the flight attendants responded quickly when she rang the alarm button and got her another seat.

But as I thought about it, why she should she have to move?  He's the one who should be inconvenienced for his bad behavior, not her.  He should be moved.  Maybe there should be some 'time-out' seats for such passengers like there is for kids who can't behave.

OK, I understand that airlines aren't going to leave seats unused in this seat-squeezing era.  And often trying to make the belligerent passengers on the plane move can cause them to become more hostile and dangerous.

BUT, such passengers should be guaranteed that they'll get off the plane with a 'no-fly' penalty.  It's something the FAA should enforce across all airlines and the length of the penalty should be appropriate to the disturbance and the passenger's record.  And refusing to move when asked to would surely increase the length on one's ban.  And important people shouldn't be able to get their penalties waived, though if they're wealthy enough they can probably hire private planes.

Are there due process and other legal questions involved here?  Due process surely.  We don't want passengers arbitrarily punished.  Passengers witnessing such a situation should get their phones out and record the incident because sometimes the victim can't while it's happening.

I would guess that being banned from planes is something that doesn't have to go to the courts, but I'm not sure. Not being able to fly might jeopardize some people's jobs, but that seems to be a good  incentive.  But they wouldn't be deprived of 'life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness" as they would with a jail sentence.  Well, maybe it would hinder their pursuit of happiness a bit.  But it seems that people who harass others probably are already having difficulties in their pursuit of happiness.

I'm sure some attorney would find a way to sue on behalf of such a client, but attorneys for the airlines and FAA should be able to  draft a workable policy.  It would include some descriptions of unacceptable behaviors.

The basic violation would be:
Physically or verbally disturb another passenger or passengers after being told to stop.

Then examples of what that looks like and levels of severity would be listed along with the consequences.

Other passengers would be encouraged to record such incidents and to alert flight attendants before it escalates.

These problem passengers would then be added to the no-fly list (probably more reasonably than others have been put on that list.)

After writing this I checked online whether such consequences already exist.  A 2010 NBC article cites a woman who was banned from a flight for using her phone after being told not to (she says was turning it off) :

“The airlines keep their own lists,” Bresson added. And those multiple no-fly lists create “a lot of confusion.”

That uncertainty is shared by officials at the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, a labor union representing more than 50,000 flight attendants at 22 airlines.
“Our (internal) air safety people aren’t even sure if those who have been charged with flight crew interference are even on the list,” said Corey Caldwell, spokeswoman for the AFA. “We would be interested to find out if people who have been charged — not found guilty but just initially charged with flight crew interference — even get on an airline (no-fly) list.”

A 2014 ABC  report says:

"American Airlines spokesperson Josh Freed said the airline has its own no-fly list -- separate from the government's -- that unruly passengers could potentially be added to.
'When we handle cases of disruptive passengers, one option is denying future travel,' Freed said. He stressed that that rarely happens. .  .
Delta Airlines and United Airlines, two other airlines involved in recent flight diversions, did not respond to ABC News' request for comment."

[I'd note that declining to comment sometimes happens because people weren't given enough time before the story aired.  That said, I emailed the media folks at Alaska Airlines on Wednesday May 1, and held up this post hoping I could add their policy on this, but I've heard nothing back.  If I do, I'll add it here or in a new post.]

Author Marc Cameron of Tom Clancy and the Jericho Quinn Thriller Series UAA Bookstore Friday May 3 4-6pm

I'm just copying this directly from the Bookstores announcement:

Friday, May 3 from 4:00 pm-6:00 pm at the UAA Campus Bookstore
Author Marc Cameron presents From Alaska: Writing Tom Clancy and the Jericho Quinn Thriller Series
Marc Cameron is the New York Times bestselling author of Tom Clancy Oath of Office, and Tom Clancy Power and Empire, the Arliss Cutter Mysteries, and the Jericho Quinn Thriller Series.  His forthcoming book, Tom Clancy Code of Honor, is due out in November.
A retired Chief Deputy U.S. Marshal, Marc Cameron, who is originally from Texas, spent nearly thirty years in law enforcement filling assignments from Alaska to Manhattan, from Canada to Mexico.  During his career, he served as a uniformed police officer, mounted (horse patrol) officer, SWAT officer, and detective.  In early 1991, he accepted a position with the U.S. Marshals Service where he moved through the ranks to retire as Chief of the District of Alaska.
Marc Cameron holds a second-degree black belt in Jujitsu and is a certified scuba diver and man-tracking instructor.  An avid sailor and adventure motorcyclist, his books often feature boats and bikes including OSI Agent Jericho Quinn’s beloved BMW GS Adventure.
Today, Marc Cameron’s home is Eagle River, AK where he lives with his wife and BMW GS motorcycle.

I'd note that the UAA pottery sale is also Friday, so if you come a little early you can check it out in the Hartlieb Building - near the greenhouse on the west side of campus.  These are student pieces and the money goes to the program.  And there are usually lots of interesting and useful pieces at good prices.  

Spring Pottery SaleFriday, May 3, 8 a.m.–5 p.m. Gordon Hartlieb Hall, Room 108 Come shop for pottery made by UAA students and faculty. Arrive early for the best selection! Cash, card and check accepted. Parking on campus is free on Fridays. The picture is from a 2012 sale.  This is one of the more mundane table of pottery for sale.  You can see some of the more unusual stuff at this post I did of the sale in 2012.

And looking ahead to another Bookstore event next week.

Thursday, May 9 from 3:30 pm-5:30 pm at the UAA Campus Bookstore
Language in Focus: A Celebration of Languages
In spring 2019, the UAA Department of Languages held its first Language in Focus ePortfiolio Contest.   Juniors and seniors from ASD high schools discussed the importance of language and culture study and shared their experiences in language learning. At this event, awards will be given to Language in Focus ePortfiolio Contestwinners and, in an open mic format, all attendees are encouraged to express their views on language study.
Please join us at this spring celebration of languages!   The event is co-sponsored by UAA Department of Languages, Academic Innovations and eLearning, and UAA Campus Bookstore.

Rediscovering Anchorage History: Benny's Mexican Food Wagon

Food wagons have become a big thing in urban USA for the last ten or fifteen years.  But back in the early 80s when the university lent me out to the Muni, Benny's Mexican Food Wagon would be in the old flat parking lot (where the multi-story parking structure is today) at G Street and 5th Avenue for lunch.  I had lots of good lunches from Benny's.

Today, riding home from a couple of errands I ran into the original Benny's Mexican Food Wagon on Cope Street between Northern Lights and Benson.  And it's still serving Mexican food.

The food scene in Anchorage is a lot different now.  The other evening I was going to meet my wife at the Queen of Sheba Ethiopian restaurant.  But it turned out they are closed  Mondays and Tuesdays.  So we decided on Sushi Ya, which for us is a descendent of the old Yamato Ya which moved across the street and down the block when Sagaya raised their rent.  But the new location didn't work out that well - and the sisters who were part of the original family were in their 70s and ready to retire.  It was the last Japanese owned Japanese restaurant in town at the time as a Korean family took over.  That lasted a couple of years and then a South Anchorage restaurant moved in.  We shared a Sashimi Combo.

But as we were finishing, a former student/friend walked in so we invited her to join us and talked for another couple of hours.  We hadn't seen each other in a long time - family members with health issues in both cases - so it was a wonderful Anchorage kind of event that used to happen more frequently.

Mail Trucks, Parked Cars, Sidewalks

In the last several weeks we've had some mail delivery issues.  One day there was no mail.  The next a notice that the mailbox had been blocked.  Then yesterday this notice was in our mailbox:

We're on a street where it's almost impossible to park without blocking one mailbox or another based on these guidelines. We've lived here 40 years. Once in the past we had a similar problem.  During that time we learned that postal trucks are NOT supposed to drive over the sidewalk to deliver the mail.  We have a sidewalk in front of our house.  Once that was established there haven't been any issues until now.

I looked on line and found this from a 2011 article in The Postal Record by the International Association of Mail Carriers' director of education, Jamie Lumm:

"It seems a little silly to have to say this, but driving on public sidewalks is unsafe. Furthermore, in most juris- dictions, it’s against the law. Sidewalks are made for pedestrians, not for motor vehicles. This applies where there is no curb, a gradual rolling type curb, or the more traditional squared-off curb. . .
Dismounted or park-and-loop deliv- eries take longer, as carriers have to properly park and secure their vehicle with each dismount. Nevertheless, driving on the sidewalk is inherently unsafe and it should be stopped.
The local union should insist that carriers be instructed not to drive on sidewalks. Instead, they should be directed to dismount to make such deliveries. Where there are many such deliveries in a row, consideration should be given to converting the section to park-and-loop delivery if the boxes cannot be moved to a location where they can safely be serviced from the vehicle.  . .
It is likely that some carriers will object to dismounting, claiming that they have done it that way for years and had no safety problems. Others may complain that this will add a lot of unnecessary time to their routes. Stewards should remind them that they are paid by the hour to do their job safely, which means obeying traffic laws. If the added time for dismounting puts them into overtime, they can submit a Form 3996 requesting auxiliary assistance. If they have a lot of dismounted deliveries, they may qualify for a special inspection and a route cut."

I had been trying to call the post office, but the line kept being busy.  When I finally got through, I explained the situation to the supervisor who checked our route and said there was a new mail carrier and she'll let him know that cars blocking a mailbox is not an issue where there is a sidewalk.  Problem solved.  I think.  If so, that was pretty easy.

No one here complains when the mail truck does have room to drive up over the sidewalk to deliver the mail.  But if there isn't enough room to pull the truck up to the mailbox, we expect the carrier to get out and put it into the mailbox.  Not far from here, the mail is delivered to people's doorsteps.  And then there are other places where mail is delivered to a set of many mailboxes all in one place.

AK Press Club 2: Lakshmi Singh Gives Keynote

Lakshmi Singh before her talk

Lakshmi Singh was the keynote speaker Saturday afternoon at the Alaska Press Club annual conference.  As a very well known and recognized voice on NPR and I was looking forward to the talk.

First I'll highlight some of what she said.

Below that are my rough notes of the talk.  Treat them with caution.  Videos of all these session are supposed to be available at the AK Press Club site.  But they aren't up now.   If I find out more I'll put it up.

Basically Singh talked about restoring trust of media among the public.  She talked about NPR's rules of verification.
1.  The two source rule - get the story from at least independent, reliable sources, get a third if possible or unsure.  Make sure they all aren't relying on the same original source.
2.  Take no detail for granted - always check
3.  Go to the original source of the news - say a family member or spokesperson for a death
(There was one more I didn't get down fast enough)

She mentioned that a Bartlett High School student had emailed her a couple of weeks ago in an attempt to get extra credit for class.  She didn't know Singh would be in Anchorage shortly, and she said she visited the class Friday.

She also talked about the ethical question of informing sources of risks.  Say, doing a story on drug addiction, should they alert an interviewee that the story would be online and 20 years down the road, a prospective employer might find it.  She said some didn't think that was their responsibility, but she felt it was, saying, "Would it make it harder to get the interview?  Yes.  But our job isn't  to do it the easy way."

There was a question about the amount of analysis on NPR and the questioner felt that it added to the sense of media bias, because it's basically opinion and prediction.  She said she could only talk for the news programs and what they do, but the questioner said that the listener who listens to many NPR programs a day, hears lots of 'experts' analyzing rather than reporting facts.  Earlier Singh had related how she'd suggested to the Bartlett students, who had trouble trusting any news,

 If you can't trust [the network], then start with one reporter who always seems to be on his or her game.  Maybe that's where we can start to build trust.

Her response to the question didn't seem to satisfy the questioner, nor me, nor another person I talked to afterward.  It's been my perception that NPR has leaned over backwards to appear fair.  And this attempt at neutrality, especially when dealing with a president who ignores the truth and the constitution for self-aggrandizement.  Acting 'fair' in response means you've already lost ground, just by treating the outrageous as something debatable.  And, of course, one can ask, "What's the alternative?  To also be uncivil? No, but being more relenting (and this does happen sometimes on NPR) in questions is probably one option.  But this is a bigger issue than what the questioner was proposing.

In response to another question about how she chooses items to air, Singh gave a set of priorities:

• Which affects most people?  
• Which will change fastest in next hour?  (Not sure where this was going.)
• Which grabbing national attention, even if not personal impact, but historically important?  Notre Dame fire.  Why did you lead with that:
• Immediacy and impact. 
• She said she was also focused on health, particularly women's health, stories that have been  underrepresented over the years.  Underrepresented voices and get those stories told.

Below are my rough notes of the talk:


 To Serve the Governed - LAKSHMI SINGH

Talk about personal attacks we get, something we all deal with.  Was originally titled to serve the governed.

Press was protected in the Constitution to serve the public, and only a free press can expose the government.  Supreme court ruling, Nixon attempt to suppress details of the Vietnam war.   Personal privacy vs. protection of the nation.

Begins with separating fact from fiction - requires stepping out of info silos.  Basics:
1.  two source rule
2.  take no detail for granted
3.  go to original source   ??? one more
4.  they also rely a lot of local NPR stations who have better local contacts to verify stories - but this too depends on NPR's experience with the local sources.
5.  clarify for the listener where and how they got the information rather than just report it as a fact (the next day I heard that in a report on the Poway Synagogue shooting - the reporter said they got the info from a synagogue member and friend of the woman killed.)



This is all being tested.  Channel surfing, headlines,  but now my day begins with sorting through Trump's tweeting.  So many decisions, changing policies, hires, dismissals - not confirmed yet but get an idea of where going - revealed on Twitter.

Next step for me - talking with colleagues  Which P's remarks news value for our audience.
Need to fact check president.
Recall hosting ??   - asked if considering child separation.  Pres. said it was Obama who had actually separated kids.  He, Trump, stopped.   Factcheck.org  - trying to get to the audio.  Immigration experts, during GWB and Barrack  - family separations not on same scale as Trump.  We know 2700 families affected, true figure unknown.
True he signed an order that ended family separations, but had gotten lots of pushback.  Required far more detailed explanation from journalists.
April 9 or 10, NPR covered immigrations.  He met with reporters - CNN, Fox, MSNBC in our office - see where reporters are heading, if we don't have anyone there, I have to look at where to focus in next 30 min if my news cast is coming.   Trump, talking to Rep Donors in Texas.  I was at odds with our news people on how to cover remarks about violent criminals....  He'd make charactiastions about undocumented immigrants.  This is a false characterization - fear mongering - thinking.  I'll cover this.  Fears people had shared with Trump which he repeated.  Colleague felt rhetoric so irresponsible, it would be irresponsible for NPR to cover it.  That news conference specifically.  I felt for that very reason we had to fact-check the president.  Figuring will take, some we won't.  In that conference were so out-there, that I felt we had to at least report on it and correct.  If he said this, this is actually the fact.  It took about 20 seconds coming out of him.

Same as with his comment that Obama had family separations and he stopped it.  People agreed but only aired it once  All the editorial pitfalls we have to miss minute by minute, it will get harder and harder as technology advances.  How better guide audience to distinguish fact from fiction?  What should I do to get your confidence?

Teenagers keep it real.  A few weeks ago a student at Bartlett high emailed me.  Needed to get extra credit.  She had no idea I would be in Anchorage.  I showed up in class yesterday morning - 7:30am.  I'm happy to report.  She got a solid A.

Had good discussion about whether they had trouble sorting fact from fiction.  Generation with lots of options for getting their news.  Implication of lack of trust on their personal lives.  I wanted to do more listening - genuine reasonses

Racially mixed group, socially there.  Had access to NPR teacher puts on 3x a week.  Help put what they were learning in perspective.
Some influenced by families, some not.
Overall, it was hard [for them] to figure out if things presented as fact, really are.
Say, climate change.  Crisis in trust in media overall.
Left them with - NPR exhaustive work on getting right, not perfect, and if wrong, we immediately own it and correct it.  If you can't trust that, then start with one reporter who always seems to be on his or her game.  Maybe that's where we can start to build trust.
Seemed to resonate with students who talked to me after class.

Another way journalists tested - two source rule.    How many of you 70% of time rely on two sources - say wires.  Have you adjusted that to include other sources before you include a story.
We do heavy attribution.  7:30 something has happened.  Start vetting.  Call other stations and how other news is reporting it.  And then, if we still haven't independently verified - we might say "multiple news stories are reporting" or "according to LA Times" .  Feels clunky - get story out there so audience knows you aren't oblivious, but you haven't personally verified.

Two sources ok for some stories ok
Death on prominent figure, but we don't unless verified from family member or publicist.  We can have three sources, but could get their info from the same source.
Trying to compete with other news outlets - we learned that doesn't really matter.  If we want to keep our audience we have to keep integrity.

Rely on local journalists on the ground with own sources - we recognize it varies from local journalists - weight that and if have good handle on story, reliability - they may be asked specifics about their sources.  Not unusual to get a report from a local station - we ask who the sources are - PD, which person?  Is that the spokesperson for the PD?

Covington video - at NPR realized better to wait.  We did a writeup about the process of having to wait.  Disagreements over that resulted in lawsuits.

Say, interviewing about opiod epidemic and they share their story about addiction.  20 years later, it could be discovered by future employer.  Are we required to let interviewee know.  Some yes, others no.  Make it harder to get interview?  Yes.  But our job isn't to do it easy way.

Big fan of 'reportables'.  Feeding info to editors, more vetting, ready for air.  Emailed throughout the network.  When I see 'reportable" on my email - I might be in middle of broadcast - I'll know I can just read it.  There have been errors, but more often than not, worked really well.  Can do fast turnaround on breaking stories.  Often our own reporters verifying with our own sources.

Our listeners have made NPR primary sources - still offers contextual news on multiple platforms.  Our audience growing, younger listeners, so we're doing something right.

Like to turn this over to you for questions.  1:40

Q:  ???
A;  Clear that this is a developing story and will change.  Depending on story.  When I need to know about wild fires, know I can rely on AP more than Reuters.  Going to websites, getting info directly.  Updated more frequently and faster than wire services can do.  They've decided to focus on specific pieces, regions.  NPR relying heavily on member stations.  Hard to know there's a story and we can't call a member station.    You know your local sources.

Q:   ????
A:  2 or 3 different sources - I think this is what happened.  I wasn't in newsroom.  Systematic breakdown.  Multiple people, NPR reporter, correspondent and local NPR from another source - turned out all getting from the same place.  Same law enforcement official?  not sure.  So producer at the time, no longer there . . . went with that, thinking we had multiple sources saying the same thing.  Began immediate discussion at highest level.  How could we have allowed this to happen.  Took responsibility as a network.  We won't talk about the death of anyone until we can independently verify.
Q:  What was the Q?  A:  [I didn't catch this fully, but it was about a report that someone who died, but hadn't really. I've looked up such stories at NPR and they did report Rep. Gabby Gifford had died.]  Daily News called us to stop broadcasting, she's not dead.
A:  Don't know details.
Q:  Everyone working in newsroom knows agony of being right.  Comment on perception of media bias based on - opinion itself feeds the perception of partisanship.  Too much speculation of facts.
A:  We have journalists report what we know and don't know.  Then analysts who explain what they think might happen.  We're careful to qualify what we say - expect, not sure, etc.  Using our experience to tell you what you should look out for.  But at the end of that path, it could be the exact opposite.

More on analysis vs news, how we pick the analysts.
Q:  suggesting that contributes to sense of not reporting facts?
A:  Particular example.  Last year fatigue of Trump coverage syndrome - here's the liberal voice, here's the conservative voice, let's  fight it out.
A:  I have a different perspective - we're always talking about balance.  As newscaster, there's no room for speculation.  What you're talking about is - it's the whole flavor of that media outlet.  NPR itself helps feed this perception of bias.
A:  I might agree on certain stories, or timing of an interview,  I hear you.  Overall, we've gone to great lengths.  Some think we're part of the liberal media.  Other times think we're not.  Or are we always on the fence.

A: Which affects most people?  Which will change fastest in next hour?  Which grabbing national attention, even if not personal impact, but historically important?  Notre Dame fire.  Why did you lead with that.  Immediacy and impact.  I'm also focusing on health, particularly women's health, stories that underrepresented over the years.  Underrepsented voices and get those stories told.

Q"  ??[This was a question about why they covered a story in the Iditarod]
A:  Iditarod story  followed by teachers strike.  I wanted to do story about dogs.  could switch from people are striking, dogs are striking too.

Too Nice To Stay In - Short McHugh Creek Hike And Potter Marsh Swan

The Jacob's Ladder was already blooming on the south facing slopes.  

Looking across the inlet, there was something fuzzy in that avalanche chute - blowing snow?  Or water falling already?  

Several posts in draft but needing more attention.  Lakshmi Sign was the keynote speaker at the Alaska Press Club conference yesterday and Brett Wilkison's  presentation on lessons learned from the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat's Pulitzer Prize winning coverage of the Santa Rosa fire and its aftermath had a lot of interesting bits.  Stay tuned.