The Committee to Protect Journalists, whose net assts grew 12.8% in 2014 to $16.7 million, will host 1,000 blue chip and top media execs Tuesday. Emcee is ABC-TV’s David Muir, dubbed the “Anchor Monster” by the New York Post.
There will be increased interest in what is said at the dinner because of the terror incidents in Paris, Mali and elsewhere. Stars of the dinner will be journalists who have braved hostile regimes to perform their duties. |
Steven Swartz, CEO of Hearst, is chair.
NYP Page Six’s Emily Smith wrote on Sept. 9 that Muir “screams at the crew unless ABC News president James Goldston is around.” Muir returned from Rome after interviewing Pope Francis “cranky and has been lashing out at the staff,” she wrote, earning him the nickname “Anchor Monster.”
CPJ, journalism’s richest group by far, is dedicated to helping journalists ply their trade but discourages coverage of itself.
Its annual dinner is always held on the Tuesday night before Thanksgiving to discourage coverage by mainstream press. The only mention in the New York Times will be a photo or two on the Sunday “society” page.
Working press are not allowed on the ballroom floor of the Waldorf-Astoria but sit upstairs where they dine on sandwiches and potato chips. Regular seats are a minimum of $1,000 with “underwriters” paying $100K for a table of 12. “Leadership” tables of 12 are available at $50K each.
Last year another $235K was raised via a white paper bag that was passed from table to table. The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation then matched the amount. A “New Initiatives Fund” raised another $858K.
CPJ supporters include virtually all the major media and many hundreds of blue chip corporations and institutions from Altria, American Express, Blackstone, Bloomberg, and Citigroup to Time Warner, Viacom and the Washington Post. They are listed in the annual CPJ report.
CPJ (EIN: 13-3081500) reported net assets of $16,776,340 as of Dec. 31, 2014. This included publicly traded investments of $11,714,860; pledges and grants of $3,376,656; other investments of $1,327,260; cash of $529,369, and savings of $266,267.
CPJ Focus Is Outside U.S.
The focus of CPJ’s 27 fulltime staffers is almost exclusively on interference with press coverage abroad.
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We have brought to its attention the inability of The Center for Media and Democracy, Madison, Wis., to gain access to events of the American Legislative Exchange Council, called “a secretive group financed by major corporations that drafts model laws for conservative, state-level politicians” by NYT columnist Paul Krugman. He says its “supply-side” theory that lower taxes on the rich will benefit all “crashed and burned two decades ago.”
Reporters for CMD are evicted from Marriott and other hotels used by ALEC.
Gregory Kohs, founder of mywikibiz.com and the only journalist covering Wikipedia regularly, was banned from the WP conference in New York May 28-June 2, 2014.
PR Society of America banned all reporters from its annual legislative Assembly in 2011, 2012 and 2013. O’Dwyer reporters were allowed to cover in 2014 but they were then banned from the 2015 conference in Atlanta Nov. 8-10. The Society has never allowed the O’Dwyer Co. to exhibit its five products at the conference.
CPJ has either ignored attempts to bring these U.S.-based situations to its attention or has said it is “too busy” with other matters to attend to them.
An O’Dwyer reporter went to the offices of CPJ a few blocks away at 330 Seventh ave. in July 2014 in an effort to speak to some of the staffers. No one would come to the reception area. A letter addressed to executive director Joel Simon and copies of O’Dwyer’s Directory of PR Firms and the O’Dwyer NL were left with the receptionist.
CPJ Says it Helps Press Everywhere
CPJ says its mission is to “take action when journalists are censored, harassed, threatened, jailed, kidnapped or killed for their work without regard to political ideology.” It does not place any geographical limits on it activities.
Its foreign focus, while highlighting interference with press coverage abroad, ignores the loss of tens of thousands of journalist jobs in the U.S. as well as the harsh face commonly presented to reporters by companies, trade associations and municipalities, an example of which is the policy of CPJ. The CPJ dinner is the only function this reporter has ever attended where reporters are fed separately (and inferiorly) from the rest of the attendees.
Paul Steiger, managing editor of the Wall Street Journal from 1991-2007, was chair of CPJ from 2005-2010 and remains on its advisory board.
A similar harsh press policy is followed by the New York Financial Writers Assn. There were no press tickets to its “Financial Follies” Nov. 13. Reporters who wanted to cover had to buy a ticket for $400 or seek an invite from one of the corporate sponsors. Reporter members who wanted to cover got the special rate of $100. The result was no media coverage which seems to be the aim of NYFWA. Half of the 12 performers on stage last year were paid actors. They were not identified as such in the program.
Amanpour Tangled with Russian TV Host
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Christiane Amanpour, chief international correspondent of CNN, a CPJ director, and a host of last year’s event, clashed with Anissa Naouai, host of the “In the Know” show on the RT Russian news station.
Naouai, appearing on Amanpour’s nightly talk show, disputed CNN’s accusations that the Russian network is part of President Vladimir Putin’s “propaganda war.” Naouai, a native New Yorker who graduated from Hunter College and who has been with the Russian news station since 2006, noted on the CNN show that Amanpour is married to James Rubin, chief spokesperson for the U.S. State Dept. from August 1997 to April 2000 and wondered if this did not present a conflict for Amanpour.
Amanpour told Naouai that the most contentious parts of their exchange were unworthy of airtime and would be edited out. In response to the edits, RT posted a video of its half of Nouai’s satellite feed, showing her answers that were omitted from the final CNN product.
CNN then posted the full transcript on it website and the Russian network did the same.
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Barry Pollack, an attorney at Wall Street’s Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler, has registered Julian Assange as a client with the Justice Dept. “out of an abundance of caution.”
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The majority of news articles are read within the first three days of publication, according to a recent report.
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