Looking for News in the Refrigerator

Cold Cuts News

Looking inside other people’s refrigerators to learn about them? No, I don’t do that. Who does? Apparently is done by a significant number of people because it merited coverage in our local newspaper. No, that wasn’t the A-Section Page One story in the Austin American Statesman Wednesday, August 12, 2009, but it was Page One of “Food and Life”. You must be kidding, I thought. Yeah, I read, and I guess the goal was accomplished. The newspaper grabbed me and made me read the Addie Broyles story “What does your fridge say about you? Everything.”

Actually, it told me very little. Ms. Broyles did cite a chapter in a book entitled “Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You” by University of Texas at Austin psychology professor Sam Gosling who apparently studies the contents of other people’s refrigerators.

In the spirit of openness, I’m posting our open refrigerator. Hmmm. There is milk, tortillas, leftovers, a plastic container of cantaloupe and other stuff. I’m not showing the “beverage/overflow” fridge in the garage. Suffice it to say it is stocked with 12 ounce cans and bottles including Coke Zero.

Then, I looked below the fold of the “Food and Life” section, just above the ad for Spec’s is another article, “A six-pack of Austin stores that make convenience a good thing” by Dina Guibudaldi. I actually agreed with a little of the list. I had to ask the question, however, is this news?

Have you read the little paperback book It’s Not News, It’s FARK/How Mass Media Tries to Pass Off Crap as News, by Drew Curtis? Hardly a journalistic treatise, the book is an outgrowth of his web site

www.fark.com, used by disc jockeys and who-knows-else daily. One of the favorite things media does when there is little else going on or there is little creativity in the room is to make lists. “Texas Monthly” seems to have a list for each month from the best barbeque, best burgers, to the best and worst legislators. Yes, we may get some information from these lists, but what are the criteria for these categories? Who sets the rules? Who judges?

Television listings, classified ads, and comic strips filled out the 12-pages of the American-Statesman D-Section. The back page was split between an ad and a story about a beer tour of San Antonio. Yes, San Antonio.
When in doubt, I apply my definitions of news to articles as sort of a test. The definition: Issues, events, and developments that interest or affect the greatest number of people in your audience on that day? Or, another test is the answer to the question, “Who cares?” If few people care, it’s probably not news. Further, I don’t care what’s in other people’s refrigerators. It’s none of my business. These definitions, I believe, apply to features as well as other news stories.

Anyway, while we have open refrigerators inside in the D section, it has always bothered me that many of the truly important stories of the day are on Pages 2 and 3 or deeper. Often these national and international stories merit only one paragraph. Wednesday’s A-Section was only ten pages with much of the space given to ads. Don’t get me wrong—I’m glad that the newspaper is selling ads. I hope they sell lots, and lots, and lots of ads so that they can also provide readers with lots, and lots, and lots of news. Not just summaries.

Judging from the other media that I have seen and read, much has happened during Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s historic African trip. A misunderstanding in translation resulted in an unfortunate snap response from Ms. Clinton, and that’s what got coverage while other important aspects of the trip are glossed over.

News organizations pay good money to find out what the audience wants. It is then the job of news managers to help create the stories that fit that image. Sometimes, however, news organizations must answer this grave question: Do we always give the people what they want, or do we give the citizens what they need. Granted, the Austin American-Statesman may not view itself as the daily record, leaving that to other national newspapers and media, but when I see more pages of newsprint given to open refrigerators, a list of the best convenience stores in town, TV listings, classified ads, and a beer tour of San Antonio than the important and even threatening hard news stories of the day from Iran, Afghanistan, Africa and elsewhere, questions of “news judgment” and priorities come to mind.

© Jim McNabb, 2009

Post Script: This week I’ve been assessing the topics and emphases of this medium, this blog newsmcnabb. I even considered whether I should continue writing. That question is answered with this post. I asked for comments and got them, scores of them. Most were quite gracious. A few weren’t. I’m digesting these thoughts, and I’ll share some later.

AISD's Secret Superintendent Candidates-Update

Freedom of Info

Instead of giving Austin Independent School district attorneys the go-ahead to fight an attorney general's open records rulling, the AISD Board of Trustees backed off a legal fight over releasing the names of the other applicants for superintendent for now.


Greg Abbott, Texas Attorney General, had agreed with attorneys for the Austin American-Statesman that the names should be made public in accordance with the Texas Open Records Act. The School Board was posted to decide whether to proceed with a legal defense of its secrecy in its meeting in two weeks.


The school district has already spent in excess of $21,000 to attorneys hired by the school district to support its position. AISD attorneys challenged the open records request from the American-Statesman and others saying that revealing the names of the applicants could hurt them and future searches for top talent. To proceed with the lawsuit would lead more legal expense.



Keith Elkins, executive director of the non-profit Freedom of Information Foundation in Texas spoke to the School Board meeting Monday night in oppostion to continuing the lawsuit. No others spoke. It was clear, however, that this question of whether it is legally and ethically correct to release the names of applicants for Superintendent is an issue that reaches beyond AISD to other jurisdictions in the state.


"School is about to start for the fall and Austin taxpayers should attend Monday night's meeting en masse to teach the AISD School Board Public Economics 101: $21,000 spent to repeatedly be told you are not above the law is totally unacceptable," says Keith Elkins, executive director of the non-profit Freedom of Information Foundation in Texas. "I do intend to go to the School Board meeting tonight to testify - depending on what action they do or do not take the FOIFT may take additional action later," Elkins said Monday afternoon.


“Two of the biggest threats to freedom of information in the future, in my opinion, are an apathetic citizenry and trying to balance the ‘public’s’ interest versus an ‘individual’s’ interest as it involves personal privacy,” says Elkins. Elkins was an Austin television investigative and legislative reporter for more than two decades.


“How many times do we hear that a news organization, or public watchdog group, is having to retain legal counsel to fight for governmental information that in many cases has already been ordered released by the Texas Attorney General. And yet, for whatever reason, some bureaucrat or newly elected official decides the law doesn’t apply to them. Eventually, the information is often finally released. But at what expense to the taxpayer?” Elkins continues.


Some of Mr. Elkins’ comments for this post were not a direct response to the legal issues confronting the board Monday night, but they are germane. He was talking about the ongoing threats to freedom of information in general.

“It may involve tens of thousands of dollars or possibly millions, at the federal level,” Elkins continued. “And while it makes for a sizzling investigative news story or provides ample fodder for critics of big government rarely, if ever, do taxpaying citizens rise up and say, ‘Enough is enough’ demanding to know how the bureaucrat or elected official could justify wasting THEIR tax money. Remember, Government is supposed to work for us – not the other way around.”


Elkins says this type of open records resistance is an example of just one of the threats to freedom of information in Texas.


“During this most recent legislative session multiple new laws were introduced which were designed to ‘seal-off’ previous public records and information readily available to the public – theoretically because it left state employees ‘vulnerable’ to potential identity theft, even though no hard evidence was presented to prove that theory,” Elkins says.


The Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas holds its 2009 Bernard and Audre Raporport State Conference Friday, August 21 at the Renaissance Hotel in Austin. State Senator Rodney Ellis, (D) Houston, is the conference Luncheon keynote speaker. State Senator Rodney Ellis, (D) Houston, is the conference's Luncheon Keynote Speaker. Ellis and State Representative Bob Hunter, (R) Corpus Christi, will receive the James Madison Award from the foundation. Ellis and Hunter were sponsors of the Texas Free Flow of Information Act, signed into law earlier this year by Governor Rick Perry. This award is given annually to honor those who have demonstrated outstanding commitment and service in upholding the principles of the First Amendment.


Conference agenda also includes panel discussions on social media and government, the recent legislative session, and shaping tomorrow’s open government by examining recent Freedom of Information rulings.


The Freedom of Information Foundation conference and/or luncheon is open to the public. The cost of the total conference, including the Keynote John Henry Faulk Awards Luncheon, and all sessions, is $100. The awards luncheon only is $75 per person. For more information or to register, visit www.foift.org or call the FOIFT office at (512) 377-1575.


© Jim McNabb, 2009