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The New York Times announced Monday that it won a George Polk Award for its "news report" about Hasidic Yeshivas, which was exposed to have been part of a political operation targeting the religious group, through an investigation published by Breitbart.The Times bragged on its website how its report that "exposed how private schools in New York's Hasidic Jewish community were failing to provide students with an adequate education, despite receiving more than a quarter of a billion dollars in public funds annually," was given the once-prestigious award.However, the Times story -- alleging Hasidic students "[know] nothing" and grow up...

One of the stories for which the New York Times won a coveted George Polk Award was a Russia-Trump report that was repudiated by former FBI Director James Comey. The Times won the award on Feb. 20 for 12 stories it submitted on Donald Trump and his associates ties to Russia, according to a list provided by Polk to The Washington Times. One of them was a Feb. 14, 2017 story headlined, “Trump Campaign Aides Had Repeated Contacts with Russian Intelligence.”

In his fourth book, "American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures in North America," award-winning author Colin Woodard identifies 11 distinct cultures that have historically divided the US. "The country has been arguing about a lot of fundamental things lately including state roles and individual liberty," Woodard, a Maine native who won the 2012 George Polk Award for investigative reporting, told Business Insider. "[But] in order to have any productive conversation on these issues," he added, "you need to know where you come from. Once you know where you are coming from it will help move the...

Mr. Kessler talked about his book A Matter Of Character: Inside The White House Of George W. Bush, published by Sentinel. Mr. Kessler conducted interviews with the President's college friends, and former and current aids in an attempt to unveil the "real" George W. Bush. The author argues that despite his negative portrayal in the media, President Bush has strong moral values and is the primary decision maker in his administration. After the discussion, Mr. Kessler answered questions from members of the audience.

"If absolute power corrupts absolutely," the actor Harry Shearer once asked, "does absolute powerlessness make you pure?" The answer, according to a lot of people, is yes. Upon receiving the George Polk Career Award last month, Gary Trudeau, the creator of the satirical comic strip Doonesbury, attacked the staff of the French magazine Charlie Hebdo: "By punching downward, by attacking a powerless, disenfranchised minority with crude, vulgar drawings closer to graffiti than cartoons, Charlie wandered into the realm of hate speech, which in France is only illegal if it directly incites violence. Well, voilà -- the 7 million copies...

I don't think I've read "Doonesbury" since the Eighties, although I assumed it was still out there somewhere - like "Blondie", but less edgy and with worse draftsmanship and drearier characters. So I didn't pay much attention when Garry Trudeau became the first cartoonist to be awarded the George Polk Award? The Polk Award is named after a journalist shot dead at point-blank range in 1948 while covering the Greek civil war. So you might have thought it would be in ever so mildly bad taste to use the opportunity of a Polk acceptance speech to piss on the graves...

Newsweek magazine decided to greet the start of 2015 with a massive cover story on the Bible. For decades now, major newsmagazines have tended to feature cover articles timed for Christmas and Easter, taking an opportunity to consider some major question about Christianity and the modern world. Leading the journalistic pack for years, both TIME and Newsweek dedicated cover article after article, following a rather predictable format. In the main, scholars or leaders from very liberal quarters commented side-by-side those committed to historic Christianity on questions ranging from the virgin birth to the resurrection of Christ. When written by journalists...

You’ve seen the story of the Mike Brown family autopsy, and the grand press conference they produced to deliver it to the public. But a closer look points out why the Scheme Team actually used New York Times Frances Robles to deliver the ruse: Frances worked with the Scheme Team in 2012 (2012 bio below) while she was at the Miami Herald and was part of their inner circle of media types willing to sell the Trayvon Story. The actual truth appears to be – a rather controversial person Shawn Parcells, who is NOT a forensic pathologist, was used by...

“We have got to win back the trust not just of governments, but, more importantly, of ordinary citizens,” President Obama said recently at a press conference at the Hague, “And that’s not going to happen overnight, because there’s a tendency to be skeptical of government and to be skeptical of the US intelligence services.” Nearly a year after Edward Snowden’s revelations, President Obama announced last Tuesday that his administration will be pushing legislation to curb the National Security Agency’s (NSA) bulk collection of phone records. The proposed law would mark a turning point in mass surveillance but is still a...

NEW YORK — The reporter for Mother Jones magazine who broke the story of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's remarks that 47 percent of Americans "believe they are victims" is among the winners of the 64th annual George Polk Awards in Journalism. David Corn, Mother Jones' Washington bureau chief, received the political reporting prize for his work, which shook up the campaign when he reported on the remarks in September.

Al Jazeera-English and Sara Ganim, the reporter who broke open the Jerry Sandusky sexual abuse scandal at Penn State, were among the winners of George Polk Awards in Journalism, announced Sunday by Long Island University

I was surprised, and horrified, to learn that Barack Obama endorsed Alderman Dorothy Tillman for re-election in Tuesday's runoff. For those of you who aren't local or who wisely avoid the open sewer of Chicago politics, Dorothy Tillman is the disastrously corrupt, incompetent, and even demented alderman of the south side's long-decrepit 3rd Ward... I just can't understand is how he could throw in with Tillman, the one example I know of the kind of person white right-wingers imagine when they think of black politicians linking militant race rhetoric to city machine corruption.

Mass communication turns election campaigns into sound bite contests and makes millionaires of impudent paparazzi. But it also offers the press more opportunity to live up to the billing William Hazlitt gave the British journalist William Cobbett more than 175 years ago as "a kind of fourth estate." By unearthing myriad forms of scandal and deceit in the last half-century, reporters have assumed an increasingly vital role in alerting and, ultimately, protecting the public. Nowhere is this phenomenon more evident than in the list of winners of the George Polk Awards. Established by Long Island University in 1949 to memorialize...

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This article is the product of extensive research in archives and secondary sources, as well as consultation with other historians who are specialists in naval air combat in the Pacific on both sides. Individuals like John Lundstrom, Barrett Tillman, and James Sawruk not only looked at the same official records I did but, in the case of Lundstrom and Tillman, also interviewed surviving pilots and read letters and diaries. For the sake of brevity and accessibility, this article does not attempt to discuss the sources in detail, but a much longer narrative, along with many of the key...

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This article is the product of extensive research in archives and secondary sources, as well as consultation with other historians who are specialists in naval air combat in the Pacific on both sides. Individuals like John Lundstrom, Barrett Tillman, and James Sawruk not only looked at the same official records I did but, in the case of Lundstrom and Tillman, also interviewed surviving pilots and read letters and diaries. For the sake of brevity and accessibility, this article does not attempt to discuss the sources in detail, but a much longer narrative, along with many of the key...

Somini Sengupta, a New York Times reporter files a story from Islamabad on how the India-Pakistan peace process is running into rough weather. Her article is an example on how to write an entire article about India-Pakistan peace process without once using the word ‘terrorist’. Across the border, Indian leaders wonder aloud whether continued guerrilla attacks, which they say are backed by Pakistan, will derail the peace negotiations. Ah guerrillas. And they are backed by Pakistan only because Indian leaders say so.In Kashmir, the abiding source of India-Pakistan troubles, violence has been on a steady, savage rise in recent weeks,...

It's been been more than a month since human-interest-focused metro columnist Diana Griego Erwin left The Sacramento Bee amid an investigation into whether several people she wrote about actually exist, and still the Bee has been largely silent to its readers about the extent of her alleged fabrications and its investigation into them. SN&R, through interviews with several Bee staffers (most of whom spoke on the condition that their names not be printed here), learned how the investigation is progressing. Last week, Griego Erwin’s former supervisor, City Editor Stuart Drown, ceased working on the investigation after several Bee staffers complained...

The New York Times Names Joseph Lelyveld Interim Executive Editor, Howell Raines Resigns as Executive Editor, Gerald M. Boyd Resigns as Managing Editor Thursday June 5, 10:49 am ET NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 5, 2003--The New York Times announced today that Joseph Lelyveld, former executive editor of The Times, has been named interim executive editor, assuming the responsibilities held by Howell Raines, who has resigned as executive editor. Gerald M. Boyd has also resigned as managing editor. No one will be named interim managing editor. "Howell and Gerald have tendered their resignations, and I have accepted them with sadness based on...

Philip Taubman, the deputy editor of the editorial page at The New York Times, has been named the newspaper's Washington bureau chief. Mr. Taubman's appointment was announced yesterday by Bill Keller, the executive editor. In his new position, Mr. Taubman, 55, will oversee all aspects of the newspaper's coverage of the nation's capital. He replaces Jill Abramson, who was recently appointed as one of two managing editors at The Times. "Phil (like Jill) brings an investigative reporter's patience and tough-mindedness to the news," Mr. Keller said in a statement. Mr. Taubman said in an interview that his "hope is to...

Well, it's Black History Month, and I'll bet you haven't heard one thing about George S. Schuyler (1895-1977). George S. Schuyler was, simply, the greatest black journalist this country has ever produced. (Normally, I eschew qualifiers like "greatest black," as opposed to "greatest," period, but this is journalism we're talking about. I will never, in five lifetimes of sitting in newspaper morgues, looking at microfilms of ancient newsprint, be able to read enough to determine who America's greatest journalist was.) From 1924-1966, he bestrode the black press like a colossus. Working for Robert Lee Vann's (1879-1940) Pittsburgh Courier weekly newspaper,...