So What Am I? Chopped Liver?

I've an old conundrum that a Quaker Grandmother resolved for me the other day:

The 300th anniversary of Quakers in North Carolina

Yet many Friends are hesitant to trumpet our own triumphs as a religious society-consistent with the Quaker virtues of meekness, humility, and understatement-if not of honesty and integrity! But this is a week to be proud and tell our story, not only to each other, to the world as well. As the scripture enjoins: time to take the light out from under the bushel. As my mother was wont to say, "She who tooteth not her own horn, the same shall not be tooted!"

So, here's my toot (in most unQuakerlike language, cause I'm not a Quaker—only come from Quaker stock) to get their attention:

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RE: Finalists for 2007 EPpy Awards Announced

Dear Editor & Publisher:

I am so goddamned impressed that you would devote so much time to the new technology of electronic journalism, but retain the hoary and creaky medaeval conception of who is a "journalist." Nothing like falling outside the pigeonholes in a field that has yet to be defined.

Who am I?

You know, I am credited, in part, with breaking the story of how a cabal of Cato Institute "libertarians" tried to stealthily place 35 ballot measures in dozens of states, flying under the radar, and using techniques they'd honed back in the 1990s "Term Limits" campaigns, not realizing (like yourself) that the internet has changed the rules.

Don't believe me. Believe PBS: http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/238/hart-williams.html

Or, if you will, believe the BISC website "Who is Howie Rich?"

Hart Williams' narrative of deception on Howie Rich is one of the best investigative pieces available. Check out Unlimited Terms of Endearment XIX: Breaking News and this post about Howie Rich's entry to the New York Times and this post about how the media has ignored this story for some recent developments.

There are dozens and dozens more. But brevity and modesty prevent their further listing here.

Rich & F(r)iends lost 34 of 35 ballot initiatives , often tossed out by the courts for "pervasive fraud."

[A couple more stories just from THIS WEEK:

• Howard S. Rich
  
  
• Lawmakers move toward compromise on eminent domain ]
  

Where was the mighty New York TIMES? Nowhere, except for an unctuous piece on "Eminent Domain in Idaho" that was months behind the blogosphere, and fundamentally bought the propaganda of the scam artistes. (And no, I'm not claiming complete credit. A lot of bloggers unearthed significant chunks of this story, most especially the amazing Sandlapper at DailyKos). The "mainstream" media NEVER really caught on to the story, but in places LIKE Idaho, Howie's interference in what was perceived to be an IDAHO issue caused what should have been a "slam dunk" to go down to defeat by a margin of 3-1 (75%-25%).

Hell, my blog suggestion in July "New York CITY!!?!" from the old salsa commercial was a reality in opposition advertising by November, and had the Governor of Montana and a couple dozen Montana Democrats on the steps of the state capitol in August.

And that's a legitimate news question: What is a Manhattan Real Estate investor doing financing ballot initiatives in a dozen Western states, including the ENTIRE West Coast?

THAT, sir, is journalism and investigative reporting.

High Country News reporter Ray Ring won a (deserved) Polk Award for his work on the Howie Rich story.

[And note Mr. Ring's acknowledgement of my work. ... and this appreciation of BOTH efforts. ]

Ray Ring got the only audio interview of Howard Rich. I found the only photographs of Mr. Rich other than the single "official" photo on the Americans for Limited Government website. (One would think that a story that launched a thousand news articles would have had ONE enterprising news photographer getting a photograph of Howard "Hughes" Rich. Wouldn't you? Good lord.)

My pro bono journalism has received scant print attention, much praise in the blogosphere, and the utter cold shoulder from "print/electronic"hybrid media punditocracies like yours.

I'm SORRY that I jumped ahead of the evolutionary curve. I'm SORRY that I don't fit in any of your old medaeval pigeonholes. I'm SORRY Mr. Edison invented the light bulb, and that the quill pen has been outdistanced, but what the HELL are you doing by merely rubberstamping the thus-far absurd attempts of the old media to pretend to be new media?

And why am I consigned to limbo for having, possibly, effected one of the most stunning coups in journalism last year? The blogosphere's effect on the election was SO stunning, in fact, that, rather than acknowledge us, TIME Magazine (that old whore) came up with their "It's YOU" Person of the Year cover, as if to CONSCIOUSLY marginalize us. (Hmmm.)

No, goddam it, I read about your "nominations" for various prizes, and all I see is a bunch of sad-sack dinosaurs to whom you mistakenly ascribe warm-bloodedness.

I got news for you, pal: the age of Mammals has arrived. You can hatch all the leathery eggs you want, but I'm not going gently into that good night of obscurity after busting my ass on a story that the voters took to heart, and the national media utterly fucked up on.

So, yes, this is a protest: I will not be silenced. I will not be marginalized, and I will NOT be ignored. The high praise that the Rich gang left-handedly gave me* is mirrored in no wise by the "mainstream media" (and their camp followers, evidently, like yourself) who seem more than willing to admit that the Earth is a sphere, while maintaining at the same time that if you sail too far out, you'll fall off the edge.

You can't have it both ways. Shame on you.

Bests,

Hart Williams

"There's an arrogance in the scientific
community that they know better than
the average individual."

- Andrea Lafferty,
Traditional Values Coalition
NEW YORK TIMES 7-11-2004

[* I am the "Daily Kos" blogger referenced on Angry Left Exposed, was the target of an official smear campaign, and am fascinated that THEY admit by negation that I was extremely effective, but the brain-dead national media remained (and remain) for the most part in a deathlike torpor.

• http://www.angryleftexposed.com/profiles/kos.html
  
  
• http://www.hartwilliams.com/zug/InitiativeisaGoodThing.html
  
  
• http://nwrepublican.blogspot.com/2006/09/hart-williams-exposed.html (bowlderized)
  
  
• http://www.hartwilliams.com/zug/hart-williams-exposed.html (original)
  

So, how come I don't rate a mention, a nomination, etc.? I guess because I don't spend all my time in infantile self-aggrandizement, or endless self-promotion, self-nomination, or, as in YOUR case, don't "fit" into the "Old School" definition, even though, as in the case of new media, it is a hopelessly quaint and outrageously outmoded set of pigeonholes.

I am reminded of the first XRCO awards in 1984 (X-Rated Critics Organization) in which the founders minted endless "film" awards, while ignoring video almost entirely. The following year, there were only a couple of films that were even released, and the year after that, none at all were filmed or released. Try to be careful about setting up your blacksmith's shop outside that Henry Ford fellow's new manufacturing plant. The carriage trade might not be a growth industry.]

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Well, that'll win Friends and influence People.

Courage.