08-26-2010 KC STAR'S ADLER DOES MASTERFUL PROFILE Eric Adler has been a senior feature reporter at the Kansas City Star since 1985. A graduate of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism, he has won numerous journalism awards during his career, and is a guest lecturer at KU's School of Journalism. Adler has a passion for journalism that has resulted in a National Headliner Award, the Missouri Lifestyle Journalism Award and top honors from the National Association of Sunday and Features Editors. Whether the current Star series "Saving 17,000 Kids" about the challenges facing the Kansas City schools wins a ton of awards or not (it will), his interview with an eighth grade student (8/26) is absolutely riveting journalism. Adler sat down with eighth grade student Tyra Watts, 14, and simply let her answer his questions in her own voice with no attempt to clean up her grammar: "I been in a whole bunch of fights. I still do fight, ’cause I feel like this: I play it like, I match the ’hood with the school. If it’s mine, it’s mine, and it’s not yours. Respect gotta come two ways. It don’t jump off the porch. Respect gotta come two ways. You respect me? I respect you. If you give me no respect, then I guess you get none either." Watts talked candidly about school and her strong feelings about each of her classes. She concluded the interview by saying she wants to be a pediatrician. The interview should be mandatory reading in every J-school in the country.
08-26-2010 RESOURCES TO BE WONDERFUL "One of the greatest frustrations I have with The Star is that is has the journalistic resources to be a wonderful paper and yet wallows in pathetic mediocrity.Rick Alm, Julius Karash, Diane Carroll, Melodee Blobaum were awesome journalists and yet they're gone, and their talent was often squandered, ignored and underemployed. "If one wants evidence of Fannin's besotted favoritism, the fact that these people are gone while so many duds remain stands as mute evidence.Were I responsible for such a legacy I think I'd want to be loaded too. "Sympathies and kudos to those who remain and try to commit acts of journalism under the regime of people vastly inferior in talent and creativity.Seeing the occasional glitter of journalistic brilliance only makes one yearn even more to be able to go out in the morning and find an honest newspaper in the driveway." --John Altevogt
ALTEVOGT "Let the blogging world know that John Altevogt speaks solely from deep-seated emotion -- never reason or illumination. Although he was not a Star employee, as such, he can be lumped, for all practical purposes, in the ranks of "disgruntled former Kansas City Star employees." "Altevogt wrote a bi-weekly, op-ed column from November 1998 to December 1999, when The Star dropped him. Ever since, he has hated The Star and takes every occasion to slam the paper. He doesn't even know most of the people he criticizes. He makes a show of holding up some former reporters for praise only to position them as martyrs at the hands of The Ruthless Killer known as The Kansas City Star." ----Jim Fitzpatrick Former reporter and assistant city editor, The Star
08-27-2010 ALTEVOGT RESPONDS "That's not true Jim.As usual, your facts are all wrong and you're simply a shill for those in power.I hated The Star long before I wrote for it.Indeed, I came to Rich Hood's attention writing a scathing critique of it.He liked the style and hired me.I was delighted when it came to an end.Rich Hood and I still touch base and it was a pleasure working with him. He was a great editor and before that a great investigative journalist in a bureau you destroyed.After that I was given my own radio show and other writing opportunities and dumped them all. "However, I can understand why you're critical of my comments since you're exactly the kind of editor I had in mind with my comments.You and the gutless WYCO bureau you created have been repeated targets of my comments.You took one of the best investigative bureaus The Star had ever had and turned it into a gutless mish mash of happy chat and sycophantic PR for Marinovich and the UG.When Nicely retired from under your tutelage he went right to work for Marinovich and didn't even change his style.After that you castrated a very talented Mark Weibe and turned him into a stooge for the UG.Roy Teicher at The Kansan kicked your butt from one end of the county to the other with virtually no resources and when Marinovich turned on him and tried to destroy his paper you did nothing to defend a real journalist." ---John Altevogt
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