The New Civil Rights Movement? - September 26, 2003
Times Watch for September 26, 2003
The New Civil Rights Movement?
Reporter
Steven Greenhouse lauds the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, a bus tour of legal
and illegal immigrants making protest stops in 100 cities to promote
immigrants rights. Greenhouse waits until the seventh paragraph of his
Thursday story before noting the drive concerns gaining legal status for illegal
immigrants: The riders hope for nothing less than to move immigrant rights,
especially gaining legal status for more than eight million illegal immigrants,
to the forefront of legislative and political debates.
Though the people that
would benefit arent even American citizens, the Times parallels this bus ride
with the civil rights movement in the South. Greenhouse gushes: Inspired by the
1961 freedom rides that sought to integrate buses in the South, the new ride
aims to turn immigrants' rights into a new civil rights movement. Later he
notes: The Congressional Black Caucus, the N.A.A.C.P., the Coalition of Black
Trade Unionists and other African-American groups back the ride. Not only do
those groups see it as a valuable tribute to the 1960's freedom rides and civil
rights movement, but they also recognize that the push for immigrants' rights
will help immigrants from Africa and the Caribbean.
He claims: Anti-immigrant
groups have denounced the ride, heckled the rallies and sent threatening e-mail
messages. So a group sent a threatening e-mail? If so, one would expect
Greenhouse to have details. Since he doesnt, the unsubstantiated allegation
comes off as a cheap shot against all who oppose illegal immigration (and who
arent necessarily anti-immigrant, as the Times would have it).
For more on the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride,
click here.
Civil Rights
|
Steven Greenhouse
|
Immigration
|
Race Issues
Ashcroft,
Bush, and the Beatniks
Dean Murphy takes time off the California recall
beat to visit the famous City Lights beatnik bookstore in San Francisco for
Thursdays Times. Murphy manages to invest the aging pre-hippie bohemians with
dissident allure in this bit on renowned Beat poet and City Lights founder
Lawrence Ferlinghetti: Yet in the era of George W. Bush and John Ashcroft, the
dissident Beat voices are enjoying a renaissance of sorts in antiwar strongholds
like San Francisco, and Mr. Ferlinghetti and City Lights are once again feeling
good about being simultaneously marginalized and essential.
For more on Dean Murphy's story,
click here.
Arts
|
John Ashcroft
|
California
|
Dean Murphy
|
Poetry
Stop
Jayson Memo Writer Promoted
Jonathan Landman, the Times metropolitan editor
(and author of the stop
Jayson
Blair memo) has been promoted. The Times
reports Landman will oversee long-term coverage of major news events and
reporting projects involving multiple newsroom departments. He will report to
Mr. Keller and Jill Abramson, managing editor for news gathering.
Also,
a story
from the Society of Professional Journalists convention notes Landmans claim
that top editors at the Times brushed aside warnings about Jayson Blairs
journalistic shortcomings, contradicting a principal finding [the
Siegal Report] of the papers investigation into the former reporters
actions.
Jayson Blair
|
Jonathan Landman
|
Siegal Report
