Esther J. Cepeda

Ken Burns back at bat with 'Baseball' documentary

http://www.suntimes.com/entertainment/television/2742310,ken-burns-baseball-092610.article

　

 

Ken Burns back at bat with 'Baseball' documentary

September 26, 2010

BY ESTHER J. CEPEDA

From the moment the iconic black-and-white archival footage rolls, then fades into shots of impoverished Latin American children playing ball to the tune of Jose Feliciano’s sweet rendition of "The Star-Spangled Banner," Ken Burns and Lynn Novick’s new documentary is a magic carpet ride through the last 20 years of baseball.

Never mind your crummy job (or lack thereof), never mind the pressures of everyday life — heck, never mind whether you’re a fan of the game or not. The momentum of this film carries you effortlessly off on the beer ’n’ hot dog, roasted peanut-scented American romp called baseball.

Manager Joe Torre and the Yankees celebrate after winning the 2000 World Series, less than a year before baseball would help New York and the nation heal after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

"The Tenth Inning," a two-part, four-hour documentary, is the next chapter in the 1994 series "Baseball." From the crippling 1994 strike to the increasing dominance of Latino and Asian players, to mega-stadiums, interleague play and the wild card, we see America’s national pastime at its best and worst. Two decades of ups and downs — from doping scandal darlings Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds to the Cinderella-story Boston Red Sox — are put under a microscope and into the context of baseball’s past heroes and villains, then held up to the mirror of today’s America.

With the same deep love of the hallowed institution that permeated "Baseball," "The Tenth Inning" wastes little time in tackling the 100-pound gorilla in the diamond and jumps right into a discussion of what doping has done for — and to — the game. But it does so by first putting the issue of steroid use into the context of other soap-opera-esque discrepancies that have hovered at the margins of the game since its infancy: bribery attempts, game-fixing conspiracies and corked bats.

Then, Burns walks the issue home, straight into our medicine cabinets.

"We are a society that turns to performance-enhancement drugs for everything. There’s vitamins, sleeping aids — there’s Viagra!" Burns said back in August when he was in Chicago to pre-screen his film for WTTW members. He was echoing the very point that historian Paul Thorn made near the beginning of the first night’s episode: "We live in a time when we think anything can be cured by medication. If you want to talk about a performance-enhancing culture, let’s look at Viagra, Levitra, all the things that are advertised on daytime TV. This is the time we live in. We believe that modern medicine can make us supermen."

The film’s writers, David McMahon, Novick and Burns, don’t merely rely on luminaries such as comedian Chris Rock to point out that human nature dictates most people would take steroids to make it big in the big leagues. They anchor two decades’ worth of lightning-quick record smashes on the story of how Barry Bonds went from being a frustrated, mostly ignored son of a record-setting right fielder to the buff, steroid-popping home run king who never felt he’d gotten the respect or the due he deserved from both ballclubs and fans.

Based on exclusive pre-screenings, there is already some criticism of the documentary that implies the filmmakers went easy on Bonds by telling his personal story in such heart-wrenching detail, but Burns continually points to the bigger picture beyond any one player. The filmmakers point out the role fans played in Bonds’ saga, but Burns says the tension between succeeding and succeeding at any cost essentially boils down to the complexities of being human in our modern world. "Baseball is a precise mirror of who we are," Burns said.

This is not to say that "The Tenth Inning" dwells just on scandal; there are many complex and intertwined themes. For instance, the stories of immigrant baseball players and their struggles are woven throughout the film. And those stories dovetailed nicely with the business and marketing aspects of the game that are both a threat and an opportunity as baseball becomes more global and America becomes more diverse.

One particularly touching section of the documentary recalls what happened to baseball in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York City’s World Trade Center. Then-Yankees manager Joe Torre talks about the morning the attacks occurred while archival footage plays, taking the viewers directly back into the moment before recalling Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2001, when the Yankees resumed play against the White Sox in Chicago.

Images of fans holding signs saying "We are all Yankees" immediately bring us back to Burns’ basic premise: that baseball reflects the continuing evolution of a diverse America seeking to hold its athlete heroes to high standards even while forgiving their peccadilloes in order to enjoy the game, warts and all, and that this instinct binds us together as a community.

Burns and Novick also spend time on the 1994 strike, and the dramatic way then-hero Roger Clemens brought an ethic of hard work and fan love to the game and drove a resurgence in the game’s popularity.

Though there have been phenomenal changes to how athletes get into the game and fans experience it — enhanced minor league baseball recruitment and marketing; split screen; real-time viewing; smart-phone apps for fans to follow games, which bolster fantasy leagues, and whole communities devoted to following baseball from a strictly statistical viewpoint — Burns and Novick were not able to fit it all into this installment.

"The biggest criticism I ever hear is about all I’ve left out, which is actually a huge compliment," Burns said. "But I think we did get in some really important turning points in this inning.

"Baseball reflects who we are as a community, as a country. It reflects the sentimental values we hold dear and is the greatest game that has ever been invented," Burns said. "It has a rhythm; it’s like breathing."

Burns’ reverence and enthusiasm are present in almost every moment of this film — from the looks on the faces of impoverished children in the Dominican Republic who play their hearts out with broom-handle bats in the hopes of becoming the next Sammy Sosa, to the looks on fans’ faces when the infamous "Bartman ball" was exploded, to testimonials from Boston fans about how life-altering was the Red Sox’s 2004 World Series win — their first in 86 years.

This is a TV experience well worth blocking out two evenings’ worth of time. Viewers will not only revisit where baseball has been for the last 20 years but also catch a glimpse of what it might look like for generations to come.

Esther J. Cepeda writes a weekly column for the Sun-Times

 

 

Documentary filmmaker Ken Burns: '"Baseball is a precise mirror of who we are"

http://www.suntimes.com/news/cepeda/2625738,CST-EDT-esther23.article

　

"Latinos making baseball better"

　

August 23, 2010

BY ESTHER J. CEPEDA, Sun-Times Columnist

　

The United States of America has been buffeted by the winds of transnational change and the storms of our punctured economy. As a nation, we're looking in the mirror and wondering if what we see is the America we all thought we knew.

Times being as tough as they are, there is a growing chorus of people inclined to look at me -- and others whose skin is brown and have the gift of speaking a second language -- and very literally say things like: "I don't know you, why are you here? You're dragging our schools and our job market down. You need to go back home."

Home? I was born in a hospital on the North Side of Chicago, grew up 1.2 miles west of Wrigley Field. Ironic: My soccer-crazy family moved from south of the border to a country where the language is studded with baseball metaphors and settled a stone's throw away from one of the game's crown jewels.

Alas, I never really took to baseball. But I always reveled in its status as the quintessential symbol of Americana -- as patriotic a pastime as kissing your mom and eating apple pie. So when documentary filmmaker Ken Burns swept through town last week to promote "Baseball: The Tenth Inning," a four-hour follow-up to his 1994 Emmy-winning documentary, I sat down with him to talk about that mirror of America we call baseball.

In the first three minutes of the film, broadcaster Keith Olbermann gives this stirring testimonial:

"Other sports have some interest in its own history and will occasionally make reference to it but [in] baseball . . . it's there. You come in the start of the game or the start of the season or the start of your own family, you feel as if you're joining the river midstream and all that has gone before. You can enjoy as much as if you were there, it's as simple as that."

Gulp. That's exactly how I feel about the Latino population's integration into our country -- we're joining the great American river midstream.

Not everyone sees it that way, but even as anti-Hispanic sentiment has geared up in the last few years, there has been no lack of talented Latino players being actively recruited to enliven our national pastime.

Ever since 1928, when Emilio Navarro blazed the Hispanic major league trail by becoming the first Puerto Rican to play in the Negro Leagues, Americans have been able to see Hispanics not just as resource-sucking immigrants, but as sports heroes who make the game -- and our country -- better.

In the new documentary, Burns and his co-director, Lynn Novick, delve into the Hispanic contribution to baseball with great compassion, presenting a fascinating and honest look at the rise of Latino players in the game.

While we're on the subject of baseball, by the way, Burns gave me his take on White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen's recent inflammatory complaint that new Latino players don't get the red carpet treatment that superstar Japanese players get.

"Guillen was absolutely right," Burns said without hesitation. "Sure, it's not economically viable to provide translators to individual players, but we always have to be sensitive to the needs of new players."

When I asked Burns if he thought the current anti-immigrant atmosphere threatened to dull fans' love of the game, he said that hateful nativist sentiments are harming our society in many ways, and he tried to put it in historical context.

"There is this 'otherness' that people fear," he said. "And right now, the Latino population is growing and this is just a continuation of the story, this demonization of the 'others.' "

In time, he predicted, this will pass for Latinos, as it has for so many other groups.

"Baseball is such a precise mirror of who we are," Burns said. "It is the story of immigration -- and assimilation. There were the Italians, the Irish and of course now the Latin Americans; the most common names in baseball today are Ramirez and Rodriguez."

Burns revels in holding up this mirror to America, and in "Tenth Inning" he shows us the America that he sees -- this magnificent, diverse, baseball-loving melting pot.

The 'View' angle Obama ignored: an open call for Latinas on mainstream TV

http://www.suntimes.com/news/cepeda/2556194,CST-EDT-esther02.article

　

The 'View' angle Obama ignored

　

August 2, 2010

ESTHER J. CEPEDA, Sun-Times columnist

President Obama has made history yet again, this time for the dubious distinction of being the first sitting president to appear on the daytime television chatfest ''The View.''

Millions of people watched to see if he'd reveal some juicy personal tidbit or say something controversial. To the contrary, his well-scripted topics were designed to boost his all-time low approval ratings by gabbing with The Ladies about the benefits of the economic stimulus, Wall Street reform and a strong presence in Afghanistan.

But I wasn't interested in any of that. I spent my morning before air time fantasizing that Obama -- who chose the popular program to connect to everyday American women because it's a show "Michelle actually watched" -- would pitch this important question at The Ladies: "Why don't you have any Hispanic women on your show?"

I know, I know -- a pipe dream. Obama, in fact, went out of his way, when asked about the Shirley Sherrod race debate, to say he's "less interested in how we label ourselves" and "more interested in how we treat each other."

But because I live in a world where labels often determine how we treat each other, the question was at the top of my list.

A few weeks ago, CBS announced that when the long-running soap opera "As the World Turns" ends in September, it'll introduce its own estrogen-infused daytime talk show. It is a massive understatement to say I was disappointed when I read the proposed lineup of the new mom-centric show.

Sara Gilbert, Sharon Osbourne, Holly Robinson-Peete, Marissa Jaret Winokur, Leah Remini and Julie Chen are without a doubt all gorgeous, talented, dynamic and interesting women. They are younger, older, Asian, African-American, Caucasian and gay (Sara Gilbert has a partner, compared with the other hosts' heterosexual spouses) moms. This is wonderful.

But ... where's me?!

No, I don't literally mean me. I mean a Hispanic woman. Any Hispanic woman. There are plenty of U.S.-born Latina stage, TV and screen actors --old ones, young ones, gay ones -- and even a few broadcast journalists who could chitchat with the likes of a Sharon Osbourne.

The omission bugs me. It bugged me back in 2007 when ''The View'' was looking for a smart, sassy, fun new face to replace Rosie O'Donnell and they even considered a man -- but not a Latina -- and it bugs me today.

Latinos are already the nation's largest minority group. We'll account for most of the population growth from 2005 through 2050, when census data predict our numbers will have tripled. Of the 50 million or so Hispanic adults counted in this year's census, about half are . . . drum roll, please ... women.

And I don't mean just poor, Spanish-speaking immigrant women who don't watch ''The View'' -- or ''As the World Turns,'' for that matter -- because they're too busy working in apple orchards or in factories cleaning toilets. I'm talking about educated, 61.9 percent U.S.-born, English-fluent, dollar-spending Latino women who know how to TiVo a daytime talk show if their mommy duties or professional day jobs make it impossible to watch the gabfest live.

If the people who create these programs ever read ''The View'' website's message board, they'd find impassioned requests for Latino representation. It would be plain old good business: Consider that many of the top 100 consumer brands either have an English-language Latino marketing campaign or one in the works to reach out to what is the nation's second-largest consumer market.

Those products underwrite TV shows.

This is a win-win situation, folks!

No, I fear Latinas are simply in a blind spot. For years, their roles on TV and film have been limited to that of nanny, maid or super sexy fill-in-the-blank.

Just imagine the ratings a network would enjoy if it were brave enough to add an intelligent, all-American, professional Latina to its stable of coffee talkers!

Too bad the president didn't think to bring it up to The Ladies on ''The View.''

　

　

Statement from President Obama on the Passing of Chicago Reporter Carlos Hernandez Gomez

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

I’m sad to say I never had the unique pleasure of meeting the celebrated journalist Carlos Hernandez Gomez.

This is how his obituary in the Chicago Sun-Times described him:

"Carlos Hernandez Gomez, political reporter for CLTV, stood out among Chicago reporters not only because of his old-school fedora, but also because of his encyclopedic knowledge of Chicago politics.

He didn’t need notes to tell his audience who was backing whom in a campaign, why a specific endorsement was so important — or why two politicians couldn’t stand each other.

Off camera, he was the life of the party, a friendly, down-to-earth storyteller who would do spot-on renditions of politicians’ speaking styles — often at their request.

Mr. Hernandez died Sunday evening following a battle with cancer that was diagnosed on Christmas Day, 2008. He was 36.

"Carlos was more than a great reporter and a great friend to hundreds of people. He had a great heart," said Sun-Times investigative reporter Steve Warmbir, who was best man at Mr. Hernandez’s wedding.

"In a business filled with cynics, he was one of the kindest and most decent people you would ever want to meet."

Mr. Hernandez grew up in the Chicago neighborhoods of Lincoln Park and Portage Park, and was fiercely proud of his ancestral home of Puerto Rico.

A graduate of Quigley Seminary, he attended DePaul University and was an editor at the DePaulian, the school’s student newspaper.

He covered local and national politics for WBEZ-FM and the Chicago Reporter before joining CLTV in 2005.

"To a certain extent he was a throwback," said U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley, who visited Mr. Hernandez at Northwestern Memorial Hospital Sunday. "He wanted to dress the part with the glasses and the hat. He was kind of retro. He decried modern journalism where you do a superficial story as fast as you can."

"Coming from public radio, he was determined not to dumb down the news. He would rather do a thorough story about a complicated issue and he explained it. He had this great sense of humor and could do great impressions of elected officials. With his boyish sense of humor he made us all laugh and smile."

Survivors include his wife, WGN-TV reporter Randi Belisomo Hernandez; father, Carlos Hernandez Sr.; mother and stepfather, Myrna and Tom Kinsella and brother Jason.

Funeral arrangements were pending

President Barack Obama released the following statement at 12:45 today:

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

_______________________________________________________________________________________

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 18, 2010　

Statement from the President on the Passing of Carlos Hernandez Gomez

"I was saddened to hear of the passing of Carlos Hernandez Gomez.　 Our paths first crossed when I was a State Senator.　 He was a throwback in the style of Chicago’s storied political reporters.　 He loved Chicago, and he relentlessly sought to tell its story with the commitment to truth and the insatiable curiosity that any good reporter has to have.　 I quickly learned that when you saw his sharp fedora in a crowd, hard questions were coming.　 But Carlos always played it straight.　 And I always enjoyed our interactions in Springfield, Chicago, or on the campaign trail.　 Carlos was a role model to many, and an integral part of the Chicago story he strived to tell.　 My thoughts and prayers are with his wife Randi and his family."

##

Mr. Gomez had the same profound impact on the city as many of the stalwart reporters Chicago is famous for but he did it as one of a very, very few Hispanic journalists working today – and, most notably to me, as a journalist who neither highlighted his heritage for any sort of gain, nor shrank away from it.

My very favorite part of his reporting was when he said his name! It was always this perfect, perfect English throughout the report and then his perfectly pronounced name in all it’s rolled R’s glory. I loved that!

Yet people would complain about it to me! They were literally surprised, or offended at the aural intrusion, they felt he was waiving his heritage in their faces when the guy was simply just pronouncing his name correctly.

Either way, people took notice of Carlos Hernandez Gomez – and not mostly for his name. He was a respected and knowledgeable journalist with a style all his own. A real American original.

And he will be missed.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

How to deal with violent DVDs, games for kids

Say no to violent DVDs, games for kids

 
http://www.suntimes.com/news/commentary/1924559,CST-EDT-esther07.article

December 7, 2009

BY ESTHER J. CEPEDA Sun-Times Columnist

Just in time for the biggest gift-buying, extended-family-all-shoved-into-one-house holiday extravaganza of the year, the Federal Trade Commission has again wagged its finger at Hollywood for peddling violent and inappropriate fare to kiddies.

For the seventh time since 2000, their report, titled "Marketing Violent Entertainment to Children," points out that even though the pushing of violent images by the film, music and gaming industries has become more restricted, they're basically still explicitly and pervasively targeting young children. No surprises there.

The FTC bemoans the entertainment conglomerates that put out unrated DVDs with more materials more explicit than what originally was released in theaters and calls out retailers that, more often than not when they get the chance, sell the stuff to children who don't meet the minimum age requirements. The FTC says Hollywood advertises PG-13 and R-rated movies during TV shows and on Internet sites where they'll be seen by too-young kids. The FTC also criticizes the music industry for not appropriately displaying their Tipper Gore-ian warning labels prominently enough in ads, but it gives an approving nod to the gaming industry for imposing strong self-regulatory codes.

What the FTC really ought to do -- though it's clearly out of its purview -- is create a rating system for parents. It could run the gamut from a gold star for the enlightened soul who engages in a thoughtful dialogue with his young 'un when something uncomfortably violent and sexual penetrates the cocoon of familial safety, down to a big fat dummy sticker on the forehead for the idiot who shows up to an 8 p.m. Saturday night screening of "Zombieland" with his 5-year-old girl and 7-year-old boy. The kids cried quietly the whole time.

What I'm illustrating here is that, yes, the FTC should absolutely continue to monitor the entertainment industry so that advertisements for "Grand Theft Auto" aren't stamped onto our 6-year-old's fruit roll-ups. But those really to blame for the pervasive exposure of kids to violent and sexually inappropriate entertainment are the families that either encourage it or do nothing to deal with it.

Take, for instance, a 2002 study by the Albert Einstein Children's Hospital in New York.

Researchers, who were testing the wisdom of the American Academy of Pediatrics' television viewing recommendations, observed 199 child patients and their parents when the kids were alert and awake. They found a "consistent exposure to inappropriate programming" -- with the number of instances going up when an adult was in the room.

Which brings me back to the gift-giving and movie-going season. If you're buying presents for pre-teen-wannabes, tweens or young teens, there are a couple of reasonable approaches you can take.

One: Have some spine and say "no." Don't go being the "cool" mom, dad, aunt or uncle by slipping your favorite 10-year-old that video game or DVD that makes you squirm. Accepting the role of hated villain now is good practice. If your kids are young, you'll be putting your foot down on 7 million other things, so get over it now.

Two: Bond over it. If you're going to buy that killing video game, go to that bloody movie or just out and get a dose of environmental sexually-charged violent make- believe, acknowledge it. Talk about it.

It sounds stupid, I know, but if you keep it real with the kids in your life -- "You know in real life you'd go to jail if you cut your neighbor in half with a sword, don't you?" or "Do you know how much money computer animation artists make!?" -- you can turn a negative into a not-as-negative that you can live with.

Ken Burns' "National Parks" all about stories, not just scenery

Ken Burns' latest all about stories, not just scenery

http://www.suntimes.com/news/cepeda/1781153,CST-EDT-esther21.article

September 21, 2009

BY ESTHER J. CEPEDA

Acclaimed documentary filmmaker Ken Burns has seen a lot of things in his day, but I, of course, took the cake.

Burns was in town last week promoting his new documentary, "The National Parks: America's Best Idea," airing on PBS stations across the country starting next Sunday when we met up to grab coffee. As much as I'm a Ken Burns fan -- don't get me started about that "Civil War," I can quote full passages in Shelby Foote's drawl -- right away I had to flat out ask him: "Why would I -- or anyone else -- want to watch 12 hours worth of scenery?"

"Oh, c'mon! You say 'national parks,' and people have a huge emotional reaction, they remember all their childhood memories and the wonderful associations," he said.

I gave him a blank stare and said: "Sorry, never been."

"What?! You've never been to a national park?!" he said, shaking his head incredulously.

Nope. No wood-paneled station wagon loaded with camping gear, no oversize picnic baskets, no whining, "Are we there yet?" from the back seat to Mama and Papa Cepeda for hours on end.

And I'll bet a lot of other Chicagoans have never visited a national park, either, so I just had to know what in the world makes Ken Burns think a bunch of city dwellers are going to tune in for six straight nights of geysers and such.

As preposterous a question as it was, he didn't hesitate to lay it on me: stories. Really great stories.

"Esther, this is not a travelogue, this is about conflict and drama; this is as interesting a tale as we've ever been able to tell," Burns gushed. "You've got the story of the most spectacular scenery on earth that wouldn't even be there if there hadn't been people who said, 'We need to set this aside.'"

Burns tantalized me with the story of Lancelot Jones, who in 1898 was born in a boat in Biscayne Bay to a former slave father and a Bahamian mother. He inherited from his parents the tiny island known as Porgy Key, near the southern end of the bay, and remained its only private resident -- serving as a fishing guide to millionaires and dignitaries vacationing in Miami Beach -- until 1992, when he was forced to evacuate because Hurricane Andrew.

Burns told me about fiery Chicagoan Harold Ickes, considered "the meanest man who ever sat in a Cabinet office in Washington." Ickes was the guy who, back in the 1940s, ordered managers at Shenandoah National Park to take down signs racially segregating campgrounds and picnic areas.

And, in an appeal to my vanity, Burns told me about Virginia McClurg, a reporter for the New York Daily Graphic who was sent to write about the archeological finds of Mesa Verde in the 1880s and ended up being the driving force behind President Teddy Roosevelt signing the bill creating Mesa Verde National Park on June 29, 1906.

Oh, I was sold all right. Burns makes magic out of historical figures and old black-and-white pictures, and just watching him tie his tongue into knots trying to cram all 12 hours worth of awesome into one cup of coffee had me contemplating how to ditch the keyboard in favor of the TV all next week.

Another fan sauntered over to tell the filmmaker all about his favorite national park. Burns asked him if he'd first gone as a child with his parents.

"Actually, no," Chicagoan Nick Kant told us as I sat up in my seat, regaining a little dignity. "I went my first time as an adult just because I wanted to witness the beautiful aspects of nature. You have to go out there and find them, they don't find you."

Those grand national parks have certainly found me -- if only on TV, for now. Maybe they'll find you, too.

Chicago Tonight Week in Review video August 21 2009

Friday August 21 this episode of Chicago Tonight week in review aired. The host, Joel Weisman, plus me, Bruce Dold and David Greising of the Chicago Tribune, and Mike North, Comcast SportsNet talked about politicians stumping at the state fair; Chicago’s Uptown area: the latest neighborhood grappling with rising violence; Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr.'s a town hall meeting on health care; Chicago learning its Olympic fate in just six weeks; Bears quarterback Jay Cutler hoping to rebound from his dismal pre-season debut; and the Cubs struggling down the stretch.

Watch for priceless on-camera cell-phone call in the last segment, it was a fun show to tape!

Their embed function seems to not be working for me so follow this link:

  http://www.wttw.com/main.taf?p=42,8,73&vid=082109a

Bob Novak and Me: a journalistic journey from old school to new school and back

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

There was no "me and Bob Novak" per se, it’s not like we’d walk out of the Chicago Sun-Times building together – back when it wasn’t the basement of the Trump Tower – and head over to the Billy Goat for a cold one after deadline had past and the paper was most of the way put to bed for the night.

No, Bob Novak was my frequent companion as I grew up in Wrigleyville in the eighties, a weirdo kid who was always read nearly every word of the paper and whose bedroom wall was a mosaic of cutout columns and pictures from the Sun-Times.

So Novak, the "pugnacious political columnist" as today’s New York Timescalled him, has been with me every step of the way even though he didn’t know it.

Keep in mind that I really was a weirdo kid: the kind who, as young as 10, looked forward to getting up early on Sunday mornings to flip around all the channels and catch pieces of all the political talk shows where staid white men raised their voices at each other about important people and things.

During the week, through his column, Novak whispered in my ear about who these people were and what the important issues they were talking about meant.

Novak taught me – a child of immigrant parents who spoke only Spanish at home – how to construct a sentence, how to turn a phrase, how to use a big word when necessary and stick to the smaller ones to make important points.

Through the TV Novak taught me how to be cool in front of the camera, how to wither a sparring partner with a well-informed-glare, and smile honestly when it was all over.

Novak taught me – and the country – that there is great power in sashaying behind closed doors, digging for the truth, and then getting it out there in the paper, on the TV, on the radio, in magazines, in books, and on the internet.

Novak became a star by letting the story – and the reporting – be the star of his work, he taught me that too.

My colleague at the paper, Lynn Sweet, in her remembrance today, quoted Jim Walton, the president of CNN Worldwide talking about what a treasure Novak was.

What better way to honor the passing of this giant than to pledge that in Novak’s passing I, too, will strive to be "a journalist of the old school, hardworking, practical, and passionate about our profession."

If I can have a tiny fraction of impact on a young journalist that Robert Novak had on me, I’ll consider it a job well done.

 

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

White House TV Blackout Warning: This is not a test

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

It’s not like today was a slow news day around the White House; a Monday June 15 health care speech at the Chicago American Medical Association was announced, there was a tragic shooting at the Holocaust Museum, tons of details to iron out in terms of the GM situation, TARP funds, and the bank bail-out dollar pay-backs, and, of course, more scuttlebutt about angry Republicans trying to slow down the Sotomayor hearings.

But today’s White House press briefing spent enormous amounts of time on…drumroll please…the digital TV transition – coming to an oldie set near you this Friday June 12.

Press Secretary Robert Gibbs trotted out Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke and subjected the poor fella to the grueling mosh-pit of a press briefing and the questions on the TV timetable ensued.

As you know, we all got a reprieve in the analog-to-digital switch in February (read my column "The End of Television As We Know It!" here) but it’s now time to pay the piper.

Secretary Locke said 2.5 percent of American households, or 2.8 million households are still unprepared, according to his Neilsen data. Are you?

"If you currently have cable, satellite, or some other paid-for television service, you have nothing to worry about," Locke said. "You are prepared; you don't need to do anything, and June 12th you'll see no change in your television reception or programming."  

ok…

"If you have a new television set purchased, let's say, within the last one year, those new television sets come automatically with a digital tuner.  So if you have a television set a year old or newer, you're prepared; you don't need to do anything, you don't need to worry," Locke continued.

uuummmmm…

 "But if you have a television set more than a year old and you're not on cable or satellite, and you're relying basically on free over-the-air service, you are not ready," Locke said. "And you will lose your television service this Friday if you don't act now."

Ouch! Looks like I’m S-O-L; outta luck.  (What can I say? I read a lot! Besides, who has time for appointment TV when there’s YouTube and Hulu?)

Locke continued:

"So you have three options:  You can subscribe to cable or satellite; you can purchase a newer television set that has these automatic digital tuners built in; or you can purchase a converter box.  The Recovery Act provided Commerce with money to help consumers having trouble affording a digital converter box. Millions of households have applied for and received the $40 coupons to cover the cost of these converter boxes.  And the converter boxes start at $40 and we mail out two coupons per household, requesting household.  So that basically means that with the coupons you get a free converter box."

Alright, so, never mind that I ordered one and got one and then let it expire - ooops.

More from Locke:

"While coupons are still available for eligible households, it will take some nine days for us to process and send out, first-class mail, these coupons, and so they will not arrive in time for this Friday's conversion.  We will have these coupons available until the end of July -- July 31st -- or as long as supplies last.  The coupons are good for 90 days each.

If you already have a coupon, please make sure to purchase the converter box immediately at a partnering retail store like Target, RadioShack, Circuit City, or Wal-Mart.  Take it home, hook it up right away -- in fact, you can use these converter boxes now and receive the digital signal now."

(Someone check this guy’s e-trade account, I’ll betcha he bought some Radio Shack stock last week.)

All right, so enough with the smart-alecky "ha-ha." The reason why I’m actually passing this on is that just because I watch my "TV" the same place I read my newspaper – on a high speed broadband internet connection – doesn’t mean real people won’t actually be left with no immediate home or work access to breaking news.

I hate to put the bad vibe out but, around midnight on Friday June 12 would be a perfect time for some ne’er-do-well to strike some pandemonium and showcase just how many low-income and non-English fluent people would get left out of the loop in an emergency.

According to Locke, the propensity to be unprepared for the switch is primarily on the West Coast and the Southwest. He said:

"Los Angeles, while having a small percentage of families unprepared, a small percentage of a huge market is about a quarter-million households that are unprepared.

We're also finding that it's -- ethnic groups are more unprepared than the general population:  African American, Hispanic, almost twice the national average; Asian Americans just slightly above the national average. 

Ethnic minorities, for whatever reason -- it may be due to language -- are not as prepared as others.  But we've been reaching out using Hispanic -- Telemundo, Univision; held a press conference with Mayor Villaraigosa in Los Angeles, Mayor Kevin Johnson in Sacramento. 

Surprisingly enough, seniors are prepared.  And it's the younger generation, households of under 30 that are also more unprepared than the national average."

So here’s my public service announcement…make sure you help your less-technically savvy family and acquaintances with this transition. You may think no one who isn’t living under a rock will be affected by this change but I will be experiencing life without regular TV starting Friday.

And if I don’t have cable, a new TV, or a converter box, what are the chances you don’t know an uncle, grandma, or neighbor who’s going to be reallllllly upset that they’re going to miss Wheel of Fortune on Friday?

Apply for a coupon or find a place to buy a converter by calling 1-888-DTV-2009 or call the FCC if you can’t get the danged thing to work, call 1-888-CALL-FCC.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Sotomayor’s treatment in the media; on being talked about but not being allowed to talk

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Tom Rosenstiel, the Director at the Project for Excellence in Journalism, puts out a report every week about what was covered in the news the preceding week. Yesterday when I cracked it opened, it came as no surprise that for May 25-31, 2009, "Sotomayor Spin Wars Dominate[d] the Narrative."

His opening statement stood in awe of how big a story this was, "based on [the] velocity and ferocity of the new media ecosystem in 2009, one forged by the election, by the rise of social media and cable, and even more than ever defined by speed, political surrogates, diversity and argument."

The report said Sotomayor’s nomination filled 24% of the newshole the week of May 25-31 and ethnicity played a central role in that coverage. "Fully 40% of stories about the nominee referenced her cultural background, meaning her Latina heritage accounted for at least 25% of those stories."

And what was bugging me all week about that coverage? This was very much missing in Rosensteil’s analysis: most of the media ecosystem talking heads helping to fill that news hole were not as diverse as, perhaps, the people they’re covering.

They were pro – like Neil Steinberg in the Chicago Sun-Times who agreed with me that the media should have focused on her qualifications more than with her backstory. And they were con, like the Chicago Tribune’s John Kass who followed the "reverse racist" storyline. And they were even black, like Clarence Thomas who gawked at the drama, and also female, like Kathleen Star Parker who said we should wait to see what the woman has to say for herself before declaring her guilty of a leftist Latino agenda.

Hmmmm…let’s see who are we missing here?…I’ll give you a hint. Here’s what media columnist Richard "Journal-isms" Prince pointed out in his piece "Latino Commentators Scarce on Sotomayor" when referring to the number of Hispanic journalists who spoke about Sotomayor’s nomination on the Sunday morning political talk-shows:

"There are no Latino journalists on that list.

It's not just this Sunday. In an analysis of the four Sunday broadcast shows this year through April 12, Media Matters for America found that black Americans had been on the Sunday shows 40 times.

"Media Matters also measured the number of Latino guests or panelists on 'Meet the Press,' 'This Week,' 'Face the Nation' and 'Fox News Sunday' this year for the same period," wrote David Bauder of the Associated Press, which commissioned the study.

"The count?

"Zero."

Playing Devil’s advocate as I so often like doing, I contacted Kevin Olivas, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists’ Parity Project Director, and asked whether this even mattered, since a good reporter can report on anything.

He responded in an email:

"It is true that there are good journalists out there who do not happen to be Hispanic who have done a good job in covering the Latino community," Olivas said, "This may mirror Judge Sotomayor’s now infamous quote, but it is very difficult to relate the experiences of Latinos when you have not lived that experience yourself.

If we were back in time and there was an opportunity to have a panel on the civil rights struggle for African Americans and the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. or Ralph Abernathy or Rosa Parks were available, but someone said, ‘Nah, let’s just go with a panel of people who are not African American to discuss this issue,’ how representative would that be?"

Kevin makes an excellent point. I explained it this way to someone else who was having a hard time understanding where Latino journalists – rare as we are – are coming from regarding this slight.

Look at it this way: You know how English-only speakers dislike it when Spanish-speakers chatter away within earshot? The natural human instinct is to imagine that the chatterers are talking about them but they can’t understand so therefore it makes them uncomfortable.

Now imagine how Hispanics feel in a similar situation: here’s a national story about the first Latina Supreme Court Justice nominee and there are plenty of us who can objectively articulate the pros and cons of her merits – with the bonus of a culturally diverse viewpoint – but we’re not allowed to speak. We have to let non-Hispanic news and opinion journalists speak for us, even though we’re very much within ear shot and capable of answering for ourselves.

"How is it possible that Latinos can be left out of the discussion among journalists regarding such a historic event as the nomination of the first Hispanic to the U.S. Supreme Court," Olivas said. "Are there no qualified Latino journalists who could take part in this discussion?"

Of course, I’d have been more than happy to help Meet the Press’ David Gregory pronounce Sonia’s last name – it’s "Soto-‘my’-or" – but I guess I’ll just have to wait until next time.

"Latinos are part of the American experience," Olivas commiserated, "Leaving out our voices means telling an incomplete story."

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Tempest in a taco shell – the Mexi-centric fast food blues

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

If you know me at all, you know I like to eat. A lot. My runs to the Taco Bell border are legendary – don’t get me started on the cinnamon twists, we’ll be here all night.

And so in that vein, I bring you some fast foodie news, one involving a pathetic and cowardly caving to political correctness and another violating the sanctity of two all-beef patties!

Exhibit A:

Burger King’s pathetic caving to lunatic political correctness.

Here’s the recap; so, according to The Nation’s Restaurant News, a restaurant industry trade paper, Burger King sells a thing called "the Texican Whopper" in Europe. It’s a flame-grilled patty topped with chile-con-carne, spicy jalapenos, onion, crispy lettuce and Cajun mayonnaise on a sesame seed bun, but that wasn’t the controversial part.

BK created an ad campaign featuring – gasp!!! – a tall "American cowboy" next to a midget (oops, I meant to say "little person") lucha libre wrestler with a Mexican flag cape.

Long-story-short (if you’ll pardon the pun – I just couldn’t resist!) Mexican ambassador to Spain Jorge Zermeno – who clearly hasn’t been to ANY lucha libre matches because he’d see all manner of tall and tiny luchadores wearing Mexican flag underwear, capes, masks, etc. – complained about the ads denigrating Mexico’s national image and improperly using Mexico’s national flag.

O.K., so I guess no more girlies wearing Mexican flag thong bikinis at Cinco De Mayo celebrations, huh? Darn.

But, I’m not going to complain about Jorge "I’ve got a stick up my butt" Zermeno, it’s his job to defend his mother country’s honor, ahem, abroad.

Nope, I reserve my disgust for Burger King – they’re cowards to bow to the pressure of a humorless bureaucrat. Their PR flacks released a statement Tuesday that said the commercials "were not intended to offend anyone." Duh.

It further stated: "Burger King Corp. values and respects all of its guests as well as the countries and communities we serve…With regard to the Texican Whopper advertisement shown in Spain and the United Kingdom, it was our intention to promote a product whose culinary origin lies in both the American and Mexican cultures, and was meant to appeal to those who enjoy the flavors and ingredients that each country offers."

Apparently Burger King will, from now on, appeal only to those who cannot bear to laugh at Mexican midgets who dress up in their country’s flags to make money off people who come out to laugh at them.

What’s this world coming to?

 Exhibit B: Darn that Jim Skinner, what the heck is he doing to my Big Mac’s honor? Doesn’t he know wrapping it in a flour tortilla is going to make the racists hate Mexicans even more?!?!?!

O.K., so it’s not quite that serious. But, if you hadn’t heard, according to Advertising Age magazine, our pals at Oakbrook-based McDonald’s are testing the "Snack Wrap Mac," a half –beef-patty, with lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions that’s smothered in "special sauce" and wrapped in a flour tortilla. For a buck-forty-nine.

Huh?

Why would they do this? And, more importantly, why can’t I get one?

Of the 400 of the chain's 14,000 locations who get to take the new snack for a spin, our neighbors in Wisconsin, and those crazy Texas Hustonians get to feast their tastebuds on the Big tortilla-clad Mac but Chicago doesn’t get to take a taste test – that’s just plain loco.

Note to Jim Skinner: like the geniuses who combined peanut butter and chocolate, you might just have created my newest taste treat sensation by mixing my Taco Bell needs with my Mac daddy love…so let me at it, already.

Perhaps a trip to the Oak Brook McLaboratory for a quickie taste?

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

What the "J." stands for

"Pregunta del Dia" by Esther J. Cepeda"

"Pregunta del Dia" translates from Spanish into Question of the Day and today's is a frequent one. I get a lot of inquiries thrown my way but this my absolute very favorite, and most recently came from constant reader Carleton J. Blanchard:

Q.

What does the J stand for?

A.

Carleton, Carleton, Carleton, if you only knew!

People often kid me about the prominence I give the "J" in my life because the pure vanity of insisting my middle initial never gets left off anyplace my name appears stands in stark contrast to my unadorned personality.

Yes, I know it's an affectation, like opera gloves, monocles, or velvet smoking jackets but I love my middle initial. It is – in addition to being the tenth letter of the alphabet, also the last of the 26 letters to be added to it – the funniest middle initial. For instance:

Stimpson J. Cat – one-half of my favorite cartoon duo "Ren and Stimpy." He is an obese, tail-less red and white manx cat with a giant blue nose, purple eyelids, a lovely pair of human-style buns (yes, I mean buttocks) and flat feet. Best known as "Stimpy" he's cognitively impaired and chills with a socio-pathic Asthma-Hound Chihuahua named "Ren."

What does his J. stand for? Nobody knows…but it's been speculated that it was inspired by the following:

Rocket J. Squirrel and Bullwinkle J. Moose – Rocket, best known as "Rocky" was the flying squirrel protagonist of the 1960's "Rocky and Bullwinkle Show" which was produced by Jay Ward. His sidekick Bullwinkle J. Moose never really did it for me, but both their middle initials were an homage to the legendary Jay Ward. Which brings me to…

Homer J. Simpson – Homie's MI stands for "Jay" as an homage to Rocky, Bullwinkle, and Jay Ward. Simpsonistas will tell you that every Simpson family member’s middle name begins with "J" for the same reason. But…

I found this nugget on a trivia website and if it's just a complete web-lie, you'll forgive me but it was interesting:

"Bart Simpson's middle name is Jojo - at a script reading one day, Nancy Cartwright (the voice of Bart - and the new voice of Chuckie on Rugrats) asked The Simpsons creator Matt Groening what the J in "Bartholomew J. Simpson" stood for; Matt asked Nancy what she thought it stood for, Nancy said Jojo, and Matt said that's what the name would be."

Moving right along I must mention a spiritual cousin. Why? Who can say but it is…

  Michigan J. Frog – the immensely talented frog, whose sex appeal far outshines Kermit, was a rarely broadcast Warner Bros. cartoon. According to Wikipedia, his name comes from the song "The Michigan Rag" which he sings lustily in the cartoon, but only to a poor sap who – like website proprietors of today – couldn't monetize him. Apparently in some sort of DVD special it was revealed that the "J." was inspired by a writer named Jay Cox. Go figure.

But in addition to being funny, the initial J. really lends an air of, oh, shall we say, gravitas to a name; a mark of distinguished respectability. For example:

Harrison Ford – he doesn't actually have a middle name but temporarily adopted the "J." for his screen credit in the move "A Time for Killing" in order to avoid confusion with another Harrison Ford who was an actor at the time.

Michael J. Fox – though his actual middle name is Andrew, very early in his career he changed it to Michael J. Fox because he didn't want to be known as Michael A. Fox. Good choice.

John J. Rambo – yes, that Rambo. According to a blog post on the Internet Movie Database website, "In the novel written by David Morrell, the character only had the last name Rambo, the name John J. was added for the movie." The author of this bit went on to speculate that the scriptwriters for the movie gave him a first name "John", as in the song about a returning WWII veteran, "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" but had no idea why the middle initial.

Last, and least (because I'm far more a fan of her inspiration and role model Anita Baker) is Mary J Blige, a nine time Grammy winner whose work is by all accounts important in the musical pantheon though I wouldn't recognize any of her songs if I had a million bucks riding on it. The "J" is for Jane.

So there it is, and with that I'll answer Carleton's question directly:

What DOES the "J." stand for?

Drumroll please…Just not gonna tell ya!

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

The end of television as we know it

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

I am one of "those people" who was going to be screwed out of watching the ten o’clock news because I don’t have cable TV and the digital switchover was almost upon me.

Yes, I’d long ago applied for the discount coupons for the special receiver I imagined I’d hook up to the aluminum foil-ed bunny ears in order to watch my recommended daily allowance of TV.

But the vouchers came and I never got out to wherever one gets these mystery transformer boxes, then they expired, and then… well, you see where that went.

So I threw in the towel last Friday – before all us non-cable-TV-viewers were given the four month changeover reprieve – and I broke up with my TV.

Instead of bothering with the reception and the unforgiving schedules (no, I also don’t have TiVo or DV-R) I just watched my TV shows on my computer.

Even better than that, I went a step further: I took my laptop upstairs, snuggled into my warm cozy bed and spent several quality hours with limited-commercial TV news reports, and full-length television shows.

Highlights from the Golden Globes, twenty-seven hours of "Miami Vice," all the "Lost" you’d ever need, "24," "House," "CSI," and countless others; I named it, and I downloaded them for free. Even HBO – a premium cable channel – is starting to put its stuff online ("In Treatment," starring Gabriel Byrne) for free.

High quality, on my schedule, in any and every room of my house. Free.

Little did I know that Monday, the Senate would vote to delay the switchover start date (it had been slated for February 17) because so many of the estimated 6.5 million U.S. households had either not ordered or received their vouchers for the special receiver or had but couldn’t find any in stores.

The measure got tripped up in Congress today, handing the Obama administration a bit of a setback, but several news outlets are reporting that to be just that: a setback.

The LA Times’ Jim Puzzanghera reports:

"Rep. Rick Boucher, the Virginia Democrat who chairs the House telecommunications subcommittee, told me he was optimistic the chamber would agree to President Obama's request and vote to put off the digital transition until June so about 6.5 million viewers won't lose their TV signals next month. "The likelihood is we’ll come back next week" and pass it, he said.

Not that it matters because from now on, unless I’m popping in a DVD, I’m watching TV on my computer or laptop. For free.

Well, I guess there is one price: the cost of my guilt from the knowledge that FREE is not a workable business model.

My tuning in through the internet and by-passing 90% of all commercials will eventually (and probably sooner than later) kill some significant portion of the advertising industry, the sales of consumer products – or both – and will put people out of jobs, which stinks.

It’s the same guilt that keeps me paying for subscriptions to three wonderful newspapers when I know damn well I mostly read them on-line because I leave my house so early the newspaper delivery man (now there’s a dude who’s hurtin’!) can’t get to my house before the 6am train pulls out of the station. Plus, I keep up-to-date during the day on their websites because it’s, yes, FREE.

From open source software – much of the art you see on this page was made on GIMP, a free graphics software I downloaded off the internet – to free printed newspapers and free web access to my favorite sites, there’s a whole lot of people paying a whole lot of money to get very little in return from me, and it’s not far from stopping.

So add fear to the guilt. Fear that at some point I’m going to – somehow – end up paying dearly for it all.

You know what they say, there’s no such thing as a "free"…anything.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA Inaugural Address Tuesday January 20, 2009

REMARKS OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA

Inaugural Address

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Washington, D.C.

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.  I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition. 

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath.  The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace.  Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms.  At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents. 

So it has been.  So it must be with this generation of Americans. 

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood.  Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred.  Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age.  Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered.  Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics.  Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.  

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real.  They are serious and they are many.  They will not be met easily or in a short span of time.  But know this, America -  they will be met. 

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord. 

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics. 

We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things.  The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation:  the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given.  It must be earned.  Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less.  It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame.  Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn. 

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life.  They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction. 

This is the journey we continue today.  We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on Earth.  Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began.  Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year.  Our capacity remains undiminished.  But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed.  Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done.  The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth.  We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together.  We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost.  We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.  And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age.  All this we can do.  And all this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans.  Their memories are short.  For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage. 

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply.  The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified.  Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward.  Where the answer is no, programs will end.  And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill.  Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - and that a nation cannot prosper long when it favors only the prosperous.  The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on the ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals.  Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations.  Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake.  And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born:  know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and we are ready to lead once more. 

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions.  They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please.  Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy.  Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort - even greater cooperation and understanding between nations.  We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan.  With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet.  We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness.  We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and non-believers.  We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace. 

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect.  To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West - know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy.  To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds.  And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect.  For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains.  They have something to tell us today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages.  We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves.  And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies.  It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours.  It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate. 

Our challenges may be new.  The instruments with which we meet them may be new.  But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old.  These things are true.  They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history.  What is demanded then is a return to these truths.  What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed - why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled.  In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river.  The capital was abandoned.  The enemy was advancing.  The snow was stained with blood.  At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

"Let it be told to future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."

America.  In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words.  With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come.  Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Thank you, God bless you, and God Bless America.

###

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

He Welcomed us to Fantasy Island: Ricardo Montalban dead at 88

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Growing up, I spent 90 percent of my waking hours living with perfect strangers who snuck into my room via my television set. I had a rich fantasy life, which meshed perfectly with one of my very favorite shows: Fantasy Island, where you could go to make your wildest dreams come true.

A quick episode plot search on TV.com brought up a long list of nearly forgotten gems (now watchable on Hulu.com) about miracles that – through the scary benevolence of Mr. Roarke – you could try on, then take back. Even though much of the nuance was lost on me, the show taught me waaaay more about life than any nine-year-old should know.

A few plots:

In "The Other Man - Mr. Roarke" a woman in her forties wishes to find romance, but the man Mr. Roarke has chosen for her is all wrong, she would rather have Mr. Roarke himself.

In "The Big Switch" a wife wishes for her husband to experience what it is like to be a woman.

In "Hooker's Holiday" a woman of the evening wishes for a normal life with love and romance.

In "Random Choices" a billionaire shipping tycoon with a great lust for life wishes to seek out people who desperately need help so he can use his vast wealth and influence to change their lives.

In "My Mother, the Swinger" a woman who dedicated her life to raising her children wishes to become a swinger.

See what I mean? Waaaay too much information for a kid, but I ate it all up. And, it’s important to note, that as I watched this show time and again, I never ever gave a second thought to the fact that I was actually watching a trailblazing Latino man opening up the Hollywood world to other Hispanics who, growing up watching TV, never thought they couldn’t be up there, too.

Nope, I wasn’t thinking that because I had no idea Ricardo Montalban was Latino! Not until I was at least 20-something, anyway, I mean really, after a while he was just Scary Guy Trying To Put That Bug in That One Star Trek Guy’s Ear, not a trailblazer I could thank for Hispanic acceptance in society. But he was.

According to the Los Angeles Times’ obituary written by Lorenza Munoz, not only was Ricardo Montalban one of the first Mexican-born actors to hit it big in Hollywood, but he did it despite being a vocal activist to improve the image and increase the employment of Hispanics in TV and movies.

Montalban, 88 and who passed away from complications of old age, in Los Angeles Wednesday morning, "paved the way for being outspoken about the images and roles that Latinos were playing in movies," according to Luis Reyes, co-author of "Hispanics in Hollywood" (2000), in the LA Times obit.

Already, a star of Mexican movies in the 1940s, he got his first American big break when MGM cast him as a bullfighter opposite Esther Williams in "Fiesta" and put him under contract.

From there it was on to movies starring the likes of Clark Gable and Lana Turner, pitchman duties for Chrysler (c’mon, who can forget the "The soft, Co-REEN-THE-AN leather?) and the Wrath of Khan Duties (yes, geekies, I mean, Trekkies, I know it was Khan Noonien Singh in the "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" – but only because the obit said so).

Seemed easy as pie to me. Uh-uh.

Montalban, showed up in LA a teenager with stars in his eyes and only Spanish in his mouth. He got scouted by an MGM talent agent who got him a few gigs that eventually took him to the big leagues in Mexico, where he’d had to return when his mother’s health necessitated a return trip.

MGM, however had a type it needed to cast, and wanted Montalban to be their signature "Latin Lover," and who was going to say no to that?

But, it’s painful when you’re a professional with something to give to the world but end up stuck being viewed by the world through the prism of your color, race, or ethnicity. Instead of just lamenting it, though, Montalban did something about it.

"Mexican is not a nice-sounding word and Hollywood is at fault for this because we have been portrayed in this ungodly manner," he said in his autobiography. According to his obituary, "he challenged Hollywood to stop stereotyping Latin actors by casting them only as prostitutes, maids, gang-bangers and bandidos."

Through his foundation Nosotros -- "we" in Spanish -- Montalban attempted to highlight Latino participation in the arts and entertainment. In 1970, the foundation created the Golden Eagle Awards, which annually honors Latino stars, shows and movies. But, also importantly, he did perfectly un-Latino things like: from 1965 to 1970, Montalban served as vice president of the Screen Actors Guild.

He had a marvelous career playing lovers, bikers, aliens, and granddads but to me he’ll always be Mr. Roarke – elegantly dressed and perfectly polished Mr. Roarke who hung out with the "Plane, the PLANE!!!" midget, Tattoo (yes, the inimitable Herve Villechaize who himself died in 1993).

He was a maker and breaker of dreams; the man you went to when you needed to feel that "greener grass on the other side of the fence" between your toes. Little did I know how hard he was working to make those Hollywood dreams come true for other Latinos who wanted to be leading men and ladies, simply "gangbanger number 3" and "maid number 1" in some gritty, urban drama.

Thank you for that Ricardo, I hope you’re comfy on the great, big Corinthian leather couch in the sky.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Es a Wonderful Vida: George Bailey and the American Assimilation process

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

My family has been here, in the United States, for about 35 years.

My father, an Ecuadorian immigrant to Mexico, somehow connected to my mother, a Mexico City resident, about 36 years ago and through some miracle, they found themselves taking their wedding vows on December 22, 1973 at St. Vincent DePaul's Cathedral in Chicago, the city where they raised their family.

Through the Christmases, my blended Ecua-Mex family neither went the Christmas tamales route, nor did they go the South-American-roast-the-guinea-pig path to celebrate the holidays, but it definitely wasn't an "American" affair. We celebrated on Christmas Eve, with our own traditional foods, drinks, music and customs – none of which included the annual viewing of It's a Wonderful Life.

As the years passed, I never watched it, never cared to, even though even my cousins (one known for being extremely passionate about his heritage) adopted the holiday tradition and sometimes even inserted it into the household Christmas Eve routine. After all, what could some old white-people movie possibly say to me?

More years passed and I ended up connected to a passionate over-the-top-in-love-with-It's a Wonderful Life fan. It took him ten – count 'em ten! – years to wear me down. After all that time it had become a point of pride that I'd never watched it but I finally softened enough to yield from my hard-headed fear that watching the exploits of George and Mary Bailey would somehow make me…white.

And isn't that what the fear of assimilation is all about? People come to the United States from all over the world, hoping to find streets paved with gold and maybe a familiar face to connect to while working toward an American Dream. Their biggest fear: losing that part of them that grew and thrived back home. Their kids, however, either lament that they aren't "just like everyone else" or hope they never are.

Sure, I was born and raised in the U.S. but even though I always felt American, I never felt mainstream i.e. "white" and I never wanted to. Watching IaWL that first time felt like a betrayal. But it's been three years since my "first time" and I actually got my half-white, non-Spanish-speaking seven-year-old to sit on the couch with us for the annual viewing.

As I sat watching – passing on a crucial bit of Americana to my half-breed – I realized how many times in the last three years I've tossed off Violet Bicks' classic line "Why this old thing? Why I only wear this when I don't care how I look," in response to a compliment.

And I can't count how many times I've quoted Nick the Bartender's exhortation about serving "hard drinks for men who wanna get drunk fast." Who knows how many other IaWL lines have seeped into my consciousness, I know my Trivial Pursuit performance has certainly benefitted!

That's the funny thing about fully assimilating into American culture – a lifelong process even for second and third generation U.S. citizens – while there may be a few traditions lost along the way (heck, I still don't know how to make tamales so there's little chance my two ninos will ever learn) there's just so much to be gained.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Se habla Oprah: Spanish-language translation actually ignores Hispanics

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

Oprah Winfrey spoke to "Hispanics" on Monday. This is what she said: "You don’t need to learn English, I’ll tell you what to buy and how to live your life by my tenets in Spanish. And those of you who only watch English-language TV - I don't care about you."

Well, she didn’t actually say that, nor did she actually learn to speak the language of the very people she’s targeting. Instead Harpo Productions, through the magic of Secondary Audio Programming and closed captioning (sponsored by a tortilla-maker, perhaps?) started broadcasting her cult of personality in Spanish in Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Houston, and Dallas on Monday.

"With this action we want to serve the largest-growing segment of the population in the country: Hispanics," Angela Depaul, a Harpo Productions, Inc. spokeswoman told a reporter for Hoy, Chicago’s Spanish-language daily newspaper. "With Spanish subtitles, Hispanic viewers will a have a more direct experience with Oprah."

And Oprah gave Spanish-only speakers yet one more reason to not have to learn English to "get along" in this country.

But Oprah’s crack market-research team didn’t do their homework. The fastest-growing segment of the population is overwhelmingly U.S.- born and fluent in English.

And guess what? Despite the breathless banner ads on Oprah.com exclaiming "Finally! Oprah in Spanish!" the kind of women living in the U.S. who don’t speak English are probably not the type who are going to be able to afford the $60 LeMystere bras or $30 Yves Saint Laurent lipsticks that the Queen of Consumerism shills on her show, in her magazine and on her website.

No, that would be me: young, female, affluent, English-speaking, U.S.-born Latinas.

Let’s compare: Oprah’s 7.4 million daily viewers are overwhelmingly female, white, and over the age of 55, according to MSNBC’s Aswini Anburajan. She also reported that Oprah’s reach among the Hispanic population is tiny -- only about 230,000.

Now, will Oprah do the things that would actually make me stomach her show like easing up on pop stars like Ricky Martin, and feature more Hispanic doctors, lawyers, scientists or dieticians in her stable of experts? How about having a touchingly emotional segment on racism against Hispanics? Or just flat out making an effort to have any Latino faces in her hyper-estrogenized audience?

"I can’t comment on that," spokeswoman Depaul told Hoy in answer to a direct question about whether we can expect to see more Latino guests on the Oprah show. "Of course that would be spectacular." Nice save, but I’m not holding my breath.

Oprah has been called the most-successful business woman in History. Is she smart enough to actively and meaningfully tap into the Latino market by truly speaking to a Hispanic audience in a way that reflects and respects them?

Nah. Why should she? No one else does.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Two white guys “At the Movies”

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

First off, let me put this out there… I love white people. Half my family (the half that isn’t, by the numbers, even more Filipino than it is Hispanic) is white.

I’m also not the type to go around being all bitter that "da man" is trying to keep me down. But sometimes it sorta, kinda feels like maybe…

Here’s what gets me: Roger Ebert and Rich Roeper walked away from At the Movies and were replaced by...drumroll please… two pasty white guys.

Fine, upstanding, imminently qualified guys, perhaps funny and – to some tastes – attractive guys. But… well… white guys!

It’s 2008 and some black dude is running for president, but the movie review show based in Chicago – which has one of the largest black and Latino populations in America – couldn’t find one single movie writer, reviewer, or blogger "of color" as the kids like to say, to fill one of the seats? Give me a break!

Back when the world was young and movies were no longer the sort of place you got dressed up to go to, Roger Ebert invented the newspaper beat of "Movie critic." And God bless him for doing so, he took what could have been a meritless, fluffy opinion column and created serious scholarly discourse on an important American art form.

In 1982, Rog, along with Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune brought movie criticism into the mainstream with their inimitable TV show Sneak Previews which went onto become At the Movies. About a year after Gene died in 1999, Roger’s fellow Sun-Times columnist became his new balcony-mate. I was thrilled!

Never mind that Rich was totally cool, an awesome writer on many things including –

but not limited to – movies, he had great chemistry. But not only that, Roeper was the final pick after a long slew of many male, female, and diverse "guest hosts" auditioned for over a year. He was the best, no problem – merit-based success is really the only kind that should exist.

I’ll take a side-note here to say I’m sure the show’s producers had a really hard time finding such a diverse array of talent to fill that guest slot. There are very, very few popular minority media people, much less those with cushy entertainment beats…editors generally send black reporters to the South Side and the Latino ones to the local factories to investigate immigration raids. (Yes, that is a true statement.) Let’s face it, people who aren’t white have had a tough time cracking into such elite white-collar positions as "movie critic."

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not just crushing sour grapes here, it’s not like I sent an audition tape, but last week when I read about Ben Mankiewicz and Ben Lyons’ new gigs in Sun-Times columnist Robert Feder’s piece ABC 7 ready to raise curtain on new 'At the Movies' , what could I do but just shake my weary head?

I’ve got nothing against Ben and Ben. Feder called them "both scions of famed show-biz families; Mankiewicz was a host for Turner Classic Movies and Sirius Satellite Radio, and Lyons reported for E! Entertainment," so clearly they’re qualified. But c’mon, only white people get to give their take on talkies?

What about George Singleton? What about some talented blogger? Hey, how’s this: how about a woman – any color’s fine.

Yep, it’s 2008 and women and blacks are not only allowed to vote but they get to do so for someone who looks like them. Good times, in perspective.

But though I don’t think there’s some anti-minority media bias, sadly, there seems to be a terrible confluence of managerial blind spots and lack of imagination and – even worse – a lack of opportunity for writers who aren’t white.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Melendez made Snoopy dance and sing

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

If Charles M. Schulz gave birth to the inimitable beagle Snoopy, it was Bill Melendez who gave him his strut, his voice, and ultimately his spirit.

The "happy dance," the way his floppy black ears moved when he was being sneaky, the look on his face when sailing through the skies of his own imagination as the Red Baron; the furrow of his dog brow as he tapped out "It was a dark and stormy night" on his roof-top typewriter – they were all due to Melendez' deft hand at animating the Peanuts characters.

Melendez died of natural causes a few days ago at St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica, California at the ripe old age of 91. I read his obituary in several different places, thrilled to death that none of the headlines I saw said anything about him being "Latino."

That would have been incorrect, as I quickly learned, because he wasn't Hispanic, he was Mexican. It turned out Bill Melendez was one of those success stories that, happily, went untold because his nativity, professional struggles, and barrier-breaking were completely overshadowed by his talent and his incredible success.

Born Jose Cuauhtemoc Melendez in Hermosillo, Mexico on Nov. 15, 1916, he moved to Douglas, Ariz., in 1928, and later to Los Angeles, where he started drawing as a child, according to the Washington Post.

The New York Times mentioned in their obituary: "One of the very few Hispanics in the business when he began his career in the 1930s, Mr. Melendez was the only animator Mr. Schulz allowed to shepherd his characters onto the screen. He did so in more than four dozen TV specials, four feature films, a slew of Saturday-morning cartoons and scores of commercials."

I won't reprint Mr. Melendez' long, long list of incredible accomplishments, but will highlight what some would shake their heads in disappointment as "go along to get along" and I find admirable and the perfect example of another great American immigrant story: he let his name be changed.

As the story goes, as a twelve-year-old he was put into a kindergarden class because of his inability to speak English fluently – a great humiliation, according to his son Steven Melendez' comments to the New York Times. He learned the language in a flash, even as he started honing his skills by drawing everything in sight. After making his opportunity to crack into Disney in 1938 – a mere seven years after Mexican children had been turned away from Lemon Grove Middle School, leading to the first successful school desegregation court decision in the history of the United States – he went to work helping to animate "Fantasia" and "Pinocchio"

When it was time to be credited on-screen, Melendez' ultra-Aztec moniker was dumped. Disney said "Cuauhtémoc Melendez" was too wide for the credits and they informed him he would hereafter be known as Bill.

Living, as we do, in a time of political correctness and respect for diversity, it's almost unbearable to imagine having to change one's name for work – whether it because it's "too long" or, frankly, just too ethnic. But those were different times, and Bill must have imagined himself bigger than his given name, and willing to leave it behind. He was right.

A true Mexican through and through, though, he wound up leaving Disney after a strike he helped organize! From there he formed his own studio and then took up with Schulz, who died eight years ago.

Melendez went on to change the world through his work on the internationally-adored animated Peanuts specials like "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and, my favorite, "Snoopy, Come Home." One little-known fact is that Snoopy's voice, often heard when the pup's ire was up, was actually voice track Melendez made by talking into a tape recorder then playing it back at a faster speed.

The Mexican boy who had been put into a kindergarden class to learn English grew up to become the animator and voice of one of America's favorite dogs. That's a perfect American story.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

The next extinct species: the Latino journalist

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

UNITY 08, the quadrennial gathering of the National Associations of Asian American, Black, Native American and Hispanic journalists, hits Chicago this week surrounded by wall-to-wall bad news about minorities and the media.

Never mind that the headline duo of McCain-Obama let the UNITY planners down by flaking out of the main-draw debate because of international travel schedules – Obama eventually decided to make nice by dropping by Sunday morning – it’s a shock there are enough employed journalists of color left to even have a convention!

Hardly a day passes when you don’t hear about some major newsroom losing hundreds of journalists due to a newspaper industry collapse resulting from advertisers spending what little money they have on the internet and not on the dead trees that consumers under 35 shun like the plague.

What you don’t hear about is that the hard-fought gains in newsroom diversity that were made throughout the last three decades are being flushed down the toilet by the common "last-in, first-out" practices. "Seniority policies" are shutting what few journalists of color there are out of major American newsrooms, I was one of them.

In January of this year when the Chicago Sun-Times let go dozens of journalists, I made headlines (visit my Press Room and read from the bottom up) by being let go even though I was Chicago’s only Hispanic metro columnist and the newsroom’s only Latino reporter. With no seniority on a roster that included people who had been there for over twenty years, I was out on my can despite the fact there are 1.7 million Latinos in the six-county Chicago metro region and the number grows every day.

You’d think the same editors and station managers who complain they can’t get new audiences would add Hispanic journalists to their line-ups. But no, they’re usually the first to go. Just in the last six months Chicago’s CBS affiliate WBBM-Channel 2 lost Antonio Mora – its’ first Latino anchor – and let go Rafael Romo, a Latino TV reporter. The Chicago Sun-Times waved bye-bye to me and Guillermo Munroe, a gifted artist who was the staff illustrator. Chicago Tribune Managing Editor George DeLama just stepped down after having ushered in an era of rich diversity in the paper’s pages that took it from being a singularly white paper to offering in-depth coverage of all of Chicago’s multi-colored communities. The Trib is back to having no Hispanic leadership.

Even two years ago things weren’t looking so great, a report from the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) found the percentage of Hispanic journalists employed in the nation’s English-language newsrooms declined slightly in 2006 from the year before for the first time in 29 years that ASNE had been keeping track. Way back then – when things were much rosier – the expected date for American newsrooms to reflect the U.S population was 2025. I’m guessing today it’s looking like 2080, not that any major media outlets are taking notice.

Brandon A. Benavides, Region 6 Director of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists and News Producer for KSTP-TV/5 Eyewitness News in Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN has been keeping NAHJ members informed of the carnage with seemingly daily emails detailing the fallen.

"Nearly a dozen NAHJ members were laid off this year," Benavides told me in an email last week. "The layoffs affected print and broadcast journalists just entering the field and veterans. This is devastating news as a journalist of color."

Gary Pina, a 52-year-old page designer with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram with 23 years in the biz had his position eliminated last month. He told me, "I was shocked when I was told I was being laid off. I didn't think it would happen to me. On our design desk, there's four or five of us over 50, and I'm the youngest. I was also the only Hispanic on the design desk. ... I was expecting to receive an envelope with the buyout option like everybody else, but instead, I got a bigger envelope telling me my position was eliminated. I couldn't believe it. I've seen two young Hispanics, both in their early 20s, lose their jobs because of the last in-first out concept."

He’s not mad or bitter. But like me – and like all people of color who are concerned that negative or limited portrayal of minorities in the media feed racial stereotypes such as reported in a recent University of Illinois study – he worries about what this means for America’s view of the society we live in.

"At the moment, I think diversity has been thrown out the window in newsrooms across the country. This is now a business, and the company has to make money. I've been told that the Star-Telegram makes money, and is one of the top producers in the McClatchy chain, but apparently we aren't making enough.  I only hope that they consider keeping as diverse staff as possible when they are making their cuts."

"News is news," Gary continued, "our stories will be told if it's newsworthy, and if there's space to do it. The stories will likely be shorter, and probably won't appear as often as they should. And they may not be told by Hispanic reporters."

I’m not as optimistic as Gary. Those are too many "ifs" for the fastest growing segment of the population – and the rest of the people who live alongside them.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact

eejaycee@600words.com

Amy Jacobson Redux

"600 Words by Esther J. Cepeda"

It takes a lot of guts to relive a humiliating – and very public – professional embarrassment. But, hey, Amy Jacobson has got guts in spades.

I was in a Chicago newsroom one year ago when the story broke of how Amy Jacobson came to be suspended from WMAQ-5 in Chicago after she was caught on tape at the home of presumed-killer Craig Stebic in a bikini, and I can tell you the comments and snickers from both male and female journalists were both highly sexist and vilely cruel – and this was before anyone had even asked for Amy’s side of the story.

According to Jacobson, then a popular reporter who’d been with WMAQ-5 in Chicago for ten years, she had been on her way to the East Bank Club for a swim date with her two little kids when she got a call from Craig Stebic's sister inviting her –and her kids – over to the house to talk.

On July 10, 2007, a few days after CBS-affiliate/rival station WBBM-Ch. 2 aired video of her in a bikini top with a towel around her waist at the Stebic home – where perky suburban mom Lisa Stebic had lived with her two kids and presumed-guilty husband until her April 2007 disappearance – she got fired from WMAQ-Ch. 5.

This week Jacobson filed suit against Channel 2, seeking more than $1 million in damages – and some vestige of her professional dignity – for portraying her as "’an adulteress and disreputable reporter.’" According to Jacobson, her reputation was tarred and feathered such that even though a year has passed she hasn’t been able to get a comparable job in a comparable media market and had to sell her house and move her family into a small apartment. They’ve already said the suit has no merit.

How Channel 2 got the video was never made public and Amy’s side of the story was literally laughed off by both media people and Chicago viewers. Not only was she made the butt of countless tasteless jokes, but she was highly criticized for not exercising "better judgment" though she did what most reporters would have done.

It’s a jungle out there in the media world. Even a year ago the journalism career path was a fool’s errand, and the adage that you’re only as good as your last top story or front page piece will never die. What they don’t teach you in Journalism school, however, is that no one cares how you get that story.

Good judgment? Journalists are not trained to exercise good judgment, they are conditioned to squeal "how high" when editors say "jump," and even when they aren’t blessed with the obedience gene, they instinctively run toward the gunshots, toward the burning building, and toward the lunatics. And if the family member of the summer’s hottest wife-murderer story happens to call and you might get the scoop of the city YOU RUN.

After hours or on your day off? Of course! In a bikini? You grab a towel. With your kids? Hmmmm…are there other kids there? According to Jacobson, she was told she was walking into a family get-together and decided it was probably ok, little did she know she was the one in danger.

And now, she’s living the nightmare over in a quest to clear her name, and she should get a medal for courage in the line of fire.

There’s no question in my mind that if any of the lead reporters on the ex-cop Drew Peterson story were called by a family member with the promise of a break in his young wife Stacy Peterson’s disappearance case, they’d be on it like white on rice under any given circumstance, and no one would bat an eye – such are the pressures to drive a news story that reporters are under these days.

But if you happen to have a pretty face attached to a hard-nosed reporter’s brain it seems there’s a double standard that opens you up to every dirty insinuation in the book.

Bravo to Amy for sticking up for herself, even if she loses the lawsuit, she’s won her integrity. No, scratch that – she never lost it to begin with.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the "600 Words" & "Pregunta del Dia" columns, and is also the Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for the Illinois Student Assistance Commission. Her views and reporting do not necessarily reflect those of ISAC. "600 words" is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact

eejaycee@600words.com

Men are from Mars, Women are from Shoe-piter

"600 Words" by Esther J. Cepeda

The most recent pop-culture phenomenon uninteresting to anyone possessing what Shakespeare referred to as a "bauble" in Romeo and Juliet (read between the loins!) is the chick flick Sex and the City – aka an extended advertisement for shoes.

Frankly, I can't conceive of any shoe that would make S&tC worth sitting through, but it does bring up the question: "what is it with women and shoes?!"

It seems inexplicable – I don’t know any men who give a rat’s ass about what a woman has on her feet. The way I hear it, the male glance usually doesn’t get that far in the few moments he has to adequately check a woman out.

Sit and learn, grasshoppas, I shall clue you in to the truth behind the shoe fetish: women don’t wear nice shoes to impress men, or convey their sexuality or personality to men- they do it to convey all those things to other women. "I’m sexy, I have it all together, I’m professional, I have impeccable taste, I may be older but I’m still flirty," or as the Abercrombie and Fitch t-shirts used to say: "Hotter Than Your Girlfriend."

It's the wrath of the garden-variety amateur fashionista that instills fear into women dressing for the office, a club, and even grocery shopping. As little girls this same lot might have gone for the jugular with: "You look funny. I don’t like your clothes. You’re ugly!" The grown-up equivalent of these daggers to the heart is quietly whispered to a female co-conspirator, intoned perfectly so that the comment will be sure to be heard by its intended victim: "Oh my God, will you look at her shoes?!"

On the flip side, the ultimate compliment women give each other is comprised of four little words: "I love your shoes."

But there's more! The varying degree of admiration is all in the delivery. Train your ears for these:

"I love your shoes" conveys a conspiratorial, rushing-to-the-defense-of-a-sister benevolence.

"I love your shoes" is a breathless testament to the coolness of the wearer, or could be more a statement that the wearer has met certain standards of taste where others usually fail.

"I love your shoes" is the natural reciprocation of female adulation and in some circles is considered a requirement before any conversation is allowed to continue. Lack of reciprocation in such situations could be grounds for at least a minor blow up.

‘I love your shoes" puts the focus on the shoes themselves and suggests that they, and not the wearer, deserve the credit for delivering themselves to said wearer thereby elevating her appearance for the day to a higher level. This is not the warmest incarnation.

Let us not forget the show stopper: delivered at ear-busting decibels, designed to shock your target and turn every head within a 12 foot radius. This visceral, primal scream of adoration for both wearer and shoes is articulated very slowly "I-LOVE-YOUR-SHOES!"

There’s your money shot, that’s the one you deliver at the second job interview, the one that goes out to your future mother-in-law, the one you give a cranky manager when every other attempt to cut ahead in line has failed and your crying baby won’t shut up.

Sometimes the show stopper can be truly honest and come as a complete surprise to both wearer and witnesser. Even I'll admit to spotting shoes so sumptuous, so beautiful, and so desirable that I've exploded with the simultaneous emotions of pure aesthetic delight, deep longing for a pair just like it, and stinging green envy that the wearer has them, you don’t and now it’ll be really lame to go out and buy the same exact pair. Drat!

The "great knowledge/great responsibility" part: Ladies, use this wisdom for good, not evil.

And gentlemen: observe and take note. But unless you want the female in question to suspect strongly you are gay – by the way, this will be the de facto assumption if you're at a screening of S&tC without having been dragged kicking and screaming by your girlfriend – limit the sharing of these secrets to your buddies.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the “600 Words” & “Pregunta del Dia” columns, and is also a Director at the Chicago-based United Neighborhood Organization. Her reporting and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of UNO. “600 words” is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

I'm not a terrorist

“Pregunta del Dia” by Esther J. Cepeda

“Pregunta del Dia” translates from Spanish into Question of the Day and today’s was delivered at 12:15 am this morning at the McDonald’s inside Chicago Union Station by a seemingly stone-cold-sober Cubs fan catching a snack before boarding a Metra train out to the ‘burbs.

After the blond-haired, blue-eyed young man let loose a string of vile expletives to his eating companions, then caught my icy glare for polluting our communal space with his negativity, he retaliated against my silent protest of his rude behavior by asking me the following:

Q. Do you have fun blowing up buildings, you ------- terrorist? Huh? You heard me, you ------- ---- terrorist!

A. How to reply?

My mouth dropped open and I smiled, 100% sure he was kidding. His mocking face followed by another string of even worse garbage set me straight.

I tried to lighten the mood with the platitude: “Would you talk like that in front of your mother?” Things devolved from there and after he reiterated today’s “pregunta,” with various vivid details added, my loud indignation had attracted one of Chicago’s finest who directed him and his posse to leave the station.

Let me back up. Twenty-four hours prior to the incident, I had decided to write for Friday about the ridiculous accusations made about Food Network star Rachel Ray’s Dunkin’ Donuts commercial being taken off the air. Conservative Filipina columnist Michelle Malkin, and other bloggers, said Rachel’s scarf looked like a keffiyeh reminiscent of those that some Middle Easterners wear. Malkin has dropped bombs like this on America’s dark-haired sweetheart over the last week: “many readers have e-mailed about, Dunkin Donuts’ spokeswoman Rachel Ray’s clueless sporting of a jihadi chic keffiyeh in a recent DD ad campaign. I’m hoping her hate couture choice was spurred more by ignorance than ideology.” Apparently Rachel would be a lot sweeter if her costume designer was less flamboyant.

Early Thursday I’d started my day at the Chicago Google offices munching on bagels with some of the smartest innovators in the world and brightest young business people in town at the Executives Club of Chicago’s New Leaders general meeting.

A few hours later I lunched at a fancy downtown restaurant with the leader of a multi-million dollar business. Later I hopped into a cab – the driver had greeted me warmly in a language I didn’t understand because he mistook me for a fellow Indian – on my way to a lecture at the Arts and Business Council of Chicago’s “Rise of the Cultural Consumer” program at the Alliance Française where I learned about the bright future of our society. I topped the night off with not one, but two, fancy parties with some of Chicago’s most influential young professionals. Shortly after midnight I was attacked because I quietly resisted someone’s foul language with a disapproving look.

For the first time in my Cinderella-story-book life, I was simply one of so many others who are looked at with suspicion because of the color of their hair, eyes, and skin. I was shamed in front of an instantly-alarmed crowd at a major Midwestern transportation hub by a dangerous federally-defined insult.

Informing my fellow midnight-snacker that I was born in the United States as I gathered my things – and as the policewoman started getting heavy on him – probably went unheard. Besides, I was too busy scurrying away to cry out of sight to enunciate properly.

Here’s my answer again: On behalf of myself, of good-lookin’-and-good-cookin’ multi-millionairess Rachel Ray, and on behalf of every other person in this country with dark hair, dark eyes, but no dark intentions: I am not a terrorist.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the “600 Words” & “Pregunta del Dia” columns, and is also a Director at the Chicago-based United Neighborhood Organization. Her reporting and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of UNO. “600 words” is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

John Lennon was no William Shatner

by Esther J. Cepeda

"Pregunta del Dia" translates to Question of the Day and today’s is a rumination from myself (I can do that y’know)

Q. Is Star Trek "God" and is William Shatner "Jesus?"

A. Yes you read that correctly, and no, I did not mean is Captain James T. Kirk "Jesus."

Allow me to set the dots and then I’ll connect them for you.

No, I’m not a heretic, it’s just that coincidences (events that coincide i.e., correspond exactly) this week have led me to wonder.

Not only did William Shatner, hereby referred to only as SHATNER, appear to me in the form of a direct mail piece sprung on me late at night in a tired stupor and as a four-color animatron as I purchased on-line, but so did "Star Trek"(which I hated, hated, hated as a child because it was boring to me and seemed to be always on TV on my lonely Saturday afternoons). This flowed from the mouths of two people I admire greatly within 24-hours of each other.

Thursday morning – at the top of the world – on the 66th floor of the Sears Tower in Chicago, John W. Rowe, 62, chairman and chief executive officer of Exelon Corporation at a meeting of the Executives Club of Chicago, talked about reducing carbon emissions by 2020 and invoked a Star Trek episode in which some-thing-or-other tried to eradicate the carbon-based life forms.

Friday morning Neil Steinberg, Chicago Sun-Times columnist, wrote about ex-Gov. George Ryan mis-quoting Lincoln by actually quoting someone who was playing Abraham Lincoln in an episode of…you guessed it.

The other obvious contender for such mythical status is "Star Wars" and its’ "force," (another pop-culture phenomenon I know nothing about) which is openly practiced as a multi-lingual, multi-cultural religion in some corners of the world, but: 1) Darth Vader doesn’t actually walk among us (James Earl Jones isn’t nearly that tall or intimidating) like SHATNER. And 2) SHATNER is, well…SHATNER!

How a show that accurately predicted the future -- today's realities -- and how Shatner can become one man-character-god, infused into my life in a billion different ways (my freshman AP biology teacher made our final "A nature example of the Prime Directive." I had no idea whatsoever what that even meant. I can’t believe I slid out with a "C.") is beyond comprehension. John Lennon once got himself in hot water for comparing his fame to Jesus. SHATNER has legions doing it for him (Oh yeah, just Google it).

I surrender. I have no answer to whether SHATNER is "the savior" but I’m going to paint him as the Virgin Guadalupe on black velvet just in case.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the “600 Words” & “Pregunta del Dia” columns, and is also a Director at the Chicago-based United Neighborhood Organization. Her reporting and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of UNO. “600 words” is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

Loving Lorena

"600 Words" by Esther J. Cepeda

Like Roosevelt Hicks longing for the same respect in business he finally got on the links of Pittsburgh in August Wilson’s play Radio Golf, I longed to roam the back nine.

Not as a pro, nah, just good enough to go out on a Saturday with rich white people and not make a fool of myself.

To me, like to many others, getting out on the green was the ultimate symbol of "making it." Never mind the satisfaction waltzing into private clubs previously closed off to women and minorities – the passage of time mostly took care of that – to me, gaining access to the venue of big money deals and long-lasting partnerships was the important part. I knew the very fabric of American business was forged out in the sun somewhere between the fifth and the twelfth hole, and I wanted in.

Alas, it wasn’t meant to be. Immediately after Tiger made golf accessible to just about anyone – heck if a "Cablinasian" could become a golf rock star, what would stop me from donning the silly shorts? – and I’d finally bought a set of golf clubs, fate stepped in. I shattered my wrist, and summer of 2004 passed without me making it to the driving range.

Leave it to me to be a Juana-come-lately.

It’s not enough that one of the top golfers in the world is a tiny woman who, as a child, fell and broke both wrists but somehow emerged with magical carpals. Not enough that this young Lorena Ochoa – all of 26 and just won the Sybase Classic for the third straight year on Sunday – is an international superstar and a national hero in Mexico. Yes, that country where the only white ball that gets around grass is made of leather and aimed at a net, and the only multi-millionaires golf.

Nope, my moment has passed because golf is on the outs.

In towns all over America dilapidated golf courses are being turned over to suburban mommies and their energetic broods who need a place to kick soccer balls between snacks. And just in time. After all, modern man is too devoted to family to spend endless hours perfecting his double-cross on an ocean of chemically treated, water-hogging, ecologically abominable turf. What sort of monster leaves his (or her) family at home and drives his SUV out to the suburbs to walk on sublime eco-terror? And in these economic times, who can afford it?

Not me and not a lot of people. According to the National Golf Foundation and the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association the total number of people who play has declined or remained flat each year since 2000, dropping to about 26 million from 30 million. The number who play 25 times a year or more fell about a third to 4.6 million in 2005 from 6.9 million in 2000, and those tee-ing up eight or more times a year is slipping as well. In my neck of the woods angry words and white, dimpled insults are being driven home as park districts struggle to placate residents fighting over what to do with thirsty, decaying golf courses.

It all adds up to me not discovering whether my wrist’s metal plate would help my fade. Never will I get to know my bogeys from my birdies, or my shambles from my scrambles. Seal a big money deal while swinging through the sweet spot? Not meant to be.

Farewell to my fairway fantasies, the great game shall never be mine. I guess I’ll just have to live out my golf glory on TV through the great Lorena. Not the same as mulligan-ing with money men, but it’ll do.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the “600 Words” & “Pregunta del Dia” columns, and is also a Director at the Chicago-based United Neighborhood Organization. Her reporting and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of UNO. “600 words” is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact eejaycee@600words.com

“We’re on a mission from God”

“Pregunta del Dia” translates into “Question of the Day,” and today’s question is from a young woman who preferred to remain nameless:

Q. Why are you doing this?

A. Like Jake and Elwood Blues, I’m on a mission.

Set aside Spanish-language media, Major League Baseball, Jennifer Lopez, Ugly Betty and George Lopez.

Do you watch news on TV? Ever looked on the op-ed pages of major American newspapers? Or watched political shows Sunday morning? Or checked out the covers of best-selling books at Borders? Take note: there’s a whole lot of white, and a good amount of black. But the brown barely exists.

When the whole “Will Barack Obama capture the Latino vote?” issue was hot, how many Latino op-ed contributors did you read in the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times? How many Hispanics did you see opining on “Meet the Press” or “Real Time?”

There are 45.5 million of us, according to the newest U.S. Census data – 15% of the population, projected to be 30% by 2050 – but we’re still largely invisible in the mainstream media. Do you think “The View” could get away with not having a black woman (or two?), how about any other major network entertainment or news show? Not happenin’, but there seems to be no problem with the stunning lack of brown.

Any idea how the “last in, first out” hiring/firing policies at major American newsrooms are affecting the historically low number of Hispanic journalists working in English-language media – most of whom are relegated to the status of “Hispanic/Immigration reporter,” few of whom ever decide what is considered “news?” Not pretty.

Is there any wonder that the overwhelming majority of news stories about Hispanics almost always paint us all out to be immigrants (possibly illegal at that), criminals, or – even worse – victims? The few “positive” news stories talk about our consumer buying power, and projected voting power (though that tide is turning).

I could go on, but I’d rather just spring into action. The internet and self-publishing are not the wave of the future, they are the reality of today. Rather than try to get a foothold on the traditional  media structures, I’m doing my own thing on the internet were all the cool kids hang, writing about everything and anything whether it’s “Hispanic” or not – just ‘cause I can.

Hope you’ll hang with me.

Post your comments on http://www.pregunta-del-dia.com and visit “600words.com” to read this week’s columns.

Esther J. Cepeda writes the “600 Words” & “Pregunta del Dia” columns, and is also a Director at the Chicago-based United Neighborhood Organization but her reporting and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of UNO. "Pregunta del Dia” is a registered trademark of EeJayCee, Inc., Copyright 2008. May be reprinted with permission, contact questions@pregunta-del-dia.com.