MediaWatch: August 1989
Table of Contents:
Revolving Door: Writing Reagan
Writing Reagan. Simon and Schuster has hired Robert Lindsey, West Coast Bureau Chief for The New York Times for over a decade, to help former President Ronald Reagan put together his memoirs. Lindsey wrote The Falcon and the Snowman in 1979 and a book last year on the Mormon murders for the same publisher. Reagan's book is expected sometime in 1991.
Riegle Service. Karolyn Wallace, a KABC-TV general assignment reporter for the past two years, is the new Press Secretary to Senator Don Riegle, a liberal Michigan Democrat. Before traveling to Los Angeles, Wallace spent four years as a reporter for WJRT-TV in Flint, Michigan.
Wallace replaces Mike Russell, Riegle's Press Secretary for nine years. Before coming to D.C. Russell worked as assignment manager for then ABC owned WXYZ-TV in Detroit. A few months ago Russell took the press job in the office of U.S. Representative Bill Ford (D-Mich.). Like Wallace, he also once worked for Flint's WJRT.
A Progressive Position. From 1972 to 1973 Robert Shapiro was a Fellow with the far-left Institute for Policy Studies. Now 16 years later Shapiro is back with a think tank. He's Vice President of the newly formed Progressive Policy Institute, a group founded by former Democratic Leadership Council officials. In between, Shapiro was Legislative Director for Senator Patrick Moynihan and spent four years as an U.S. News & World Report Associate Editor, a position he left last year to join the Dukakis campaign as Deputy Issues Director.
NBC's New York Law. NBC has appointed a new Executive Vice President and general counsel for the company: Richard Cotton, a long-time Washington lawyer. Cotton served as Executive Secretary to Carter's Health, Education and Welfare Secretary Joseph Califano until 1979 when he jumped to the Department of Energy as special counsel to Deputy Secretary John Sawhill.
From Cincinnati Post to D.C. Post. Claudia Winkler, a publications editor for the moderate to conservative American Enterprise Institute from 1975 to 1982, has been named chief editorial writer in Washington, D.C. for the Scripps-Howard newspaper chain. After writing Cincinnati Post editorials for two years, in 1985 the Scripps-Howard owned newspaper promoted her to editorial page editor, a position she held until this June.
Cable News to Senate News. Kristy Schantz, a writer for CNN's Headline News cable channel, has joined former Associated Press reporter Bill Ritz on Senator Herbert Kohl's staff. She's now working for Ritz as the Wisconsin Democrat's Deputy Press Secretary. Schantz spent two years in Atlanta during which time, the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call reported, she helped cover the Democratic National Convention.
