FEATURES
Loomis Chaffee Log
DECEMBER MARCH16,2,2015 2016
PAGE 3
After the Island: Interview with Alumni Laurie Perez ’89 by Sam Cox ’16 Editor-In-Chief
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aurie Perez ’89 is a reporter and news anchor who has worked at CBS and FOX stations in Washington State, South Carolina, Connecticut, and California. Perez started out covering general news and court and crime, eventually moving into political reporting, anchoring an evening newscast, and hosting a weekly Sunday morning political roundtable. She currently reports for CBS 2 in Los Angeles. Perez graduated from Tufts University and earned her Master’s degree in Journalism at Northwestern University. 1. What impact did your time at Loomis have on your career/ career aspirations? Loomis Chaffee teachers taught me how to learn - not for a grade or to fulfill a requirement but because learning as much as you can, about as many differ-
ent things as you can, can make your life more complete. As a journalist, it also makes it easier to do my job. When because I read a book or attended a lecture I know the history of a region, or the cultural significance of a situation, it adds layers to my stories and makes them better. Even more directly, when I was the Editorial Editor for The Log, I remember writing an article about the merits of the Work Job program. As you might imagine, my friends rolled their eyes at that one. It was my first time getting negative feedback about something I wrote, in a very public way. I don’t write opinion pieces anymore but in this age of instant and constant criticism on social media, that experience prepared me to stand by what I say and write. 2. What would you say to Loomis students who are looking towards a career in journalism/ broadcast? Stay on your toes! My career
has now turned into reporting on t-v and Twitter and Instagram and Snapchat and live-streaming on Facebook…whew. Technology is changing the way people get their news and you have to adapt where and how you present your stories. Someone who turns to Twitter for updates is not going to watch a two-minute video - but they will check out a 20-second summary and then, if they’re intrigued, might tune into the 6PM news. 3. What are some key components that being an anchor entails, and how does the job compare to other forms of journalism? As a news anchor you’re presenting the stories all the reporters have put together for that day -- serious stories, complicated stories, funny stories, sports features. It’s your job to introduce them in a way that helps viewers understand what they’re about to see. Compared to reporting where you dig for information,
perform interviews, and write the scripts, anchoring is taking the final product and selling it. 4. You covered both the Sandy Hook shooting and the San Bernardino attacks. How has that coverage shaped your views on the gun debate, if it has at all, and what was that experience like? As a journalist you keep your personal views out of the way you cover issues - but when you go home at night you can’t help but be affected by events like the Sandy Hook and San Bernardino shootings. It’s been heartbreaking and scary. After years now of interviewing Second Amendment scholars, police officers, victims, people who have guns, and people who hate them, it’s clear the debate over reform remains wrapped in personal and political complications. I’ve been writing gun debate stories since Columbine in 1999 and wouldn’t be surprised to still be covering it 15 years from now.
PHOTO COURTESY OF LAURIE PEREZ
Interview with Convocation Speaker: Suki Kim
by Milton Lee ’18 Contributor
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or over a decade, Suki Kim has traveled North Korea to report on the nation she believes remains an informational black hole to the international community. Kim is known for her extensive undercover documentation of the North Korean lifestyle. Sharing her experiences with the Loomis Chaffee community in the all school convocation on her work, Kim sought to explain the radically different North Korean mindset she had encountered, in the process
touching upon the true power of near absolute control over information. Stopping at the dining hall after her convocation presentation, Kim seems to possess a certain self-assuredness, gained perhaps from experience. Born in South Korea but educated in the US, Kim works as a journalist, writing for the New York Times, Slate, Washington Post, etc. The only known writer to have gone undercover into North Korea to experience and investigate life inside the isolated nation, Kim rose to national attention with her bestselling memoir, Without You, There is
No Us. Over a quick lunch and before her return to the road, the writer explains her call to journalism.
What drives you to journalism and especially investigative reporting? Well, it took over ten years to research and finally write the book; I travelled all around the region to cover the defectors – I went there five times. I looked in there for six months undercover and I needed to get to the core of the place, to understand it as much as I humanly could. It was pursuing a topic that I
Presidential Debates
by Robert Wang ’18 and Akash Chadalavada ’18 Contributor and Staf f Writer
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n any presidential election year, the airwaves and news headlines are dominated by the campaign coverage of Democratic and Republican candidates angling to be their party’s nominee. In this cacophony of negative advertisements, campaign speeches, and promises to fix any and all problems, the presidential debates serve as a platform on which candidates can directly address issues and questions. Oftentimes, these debates are considered to be dreary affairs, however, the influence that they can have on a campaign is unparalleled in the national audience and attention that they garner. For example, the first televised presidential debate in 1960 between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon is still cited as the reason for why Nixon lost – Nixon came across as sweaty and shifty while Kennedy came across as calm and poised.
As the popularity of these debates grew, so did their memorable moments. One of the most famous quips came in 1984, when voters were worried about Ronald Reagan’s age. During a debate, he diffused this concern by noting, “I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent’s youth and inexperience.” Reagan achieved
a landslide victory, winning 49 of 50 states, having clearly influenced the public through his poignant speech. In 1987, The Commission on Presidential Debates was established to ensure that debates, a permanent part of every general election, provide the best possible information to viewers and listeners. Its primary purpose is to sponsor and produce debates for the United States presidential and vice presidential candidates. While it would seem that the emotional gravitas, experience, and policy positions of presidential candidates would be the determining factors, it is usually a clever retort or oneliner or gaffe that is enshrined in the nation’s memory. Al Gore’s visible annoyance during his 2000 debate with George Bush, John McCain’s reference to Barack Obama as ‘that one’, and Rick Perry’s ‘ooops’ moment in a Republican Presidential debate in 2011 are all viewed as having contributed to their defeats. Typically, the Commission
one of America’s major broadcast news networks. Candidates then have a set period of time for responses and rebuttals. For the millennial generation which is more in tune with social media than network television, there is a steady diet of updates on Twitter and Facebook and other outlets – with instant reaction modeled by various tracking websites. For example, Nicholas Wells, Eric Chemi and Mark Fahey documented on CNBC that the increase in the number of Twitter followers for a candidate is a simple and telling statistic of the post-debate success of that candidate. Looking at the current presidential election, we see that the man who is attracting the most attention is Donald Trump, the republican frontrunner. Oftentimes disregarding the notion of political correctness, he has attracted widespread attention. His harsh policies on Muslims and immigration have sparked heated controversy and have often placed him under siege by other candidates. Trump has made back and forth attacks on nearly every other republican candidate, even going as far as blaming 9/11 on the brother of opposing candidate Jeb Bush. As for the Democratic party, there are currently only two major players: Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. In an age of instant gratification and limited attention span, as our counAP PHOTO/JOHN LOCHER on Presidential Detry is grappling with bates organizes three debates various domestic and foreign between the two primary party policy concerns, it is incumbent nominees – a domestic policy upon all of us to pay attention debate, a foreign policy debate to the presidential candidates and a general debate in a town and their solutions. Participathall setting where members ing actively in this wonderful of the audience offer up ques- democracy is a privilege that we tions. Candidates are asked need to cherish, so, let’s pay a questions by a moderator, who little attention to the presidenin recent years has come from tial debates this fall.
consider a desperately important in the contemporary world where violations against humanity is unsurpassed according to the UN. I really needed to understand that and deliver that world which has never been exposed to the outside world from the inside. I thought it was my duty to do that as a writer. It was unacceptable to not do it.
were the crème de la crème, and I thought there would be a gigantic difference. In fact, not much. The rest of the people, sure, have physically not much material-wise. No food, no electricity, nothing. So they’re dying of hunger, so yes, a huge difference that way, superficially. Lack of freedom. My students had zero freedom. No personal time, no individuality, constantHow did North Korea’s elite ly living in fear; on some level it compare with her commoners? was not that different.
Well, I come from families that were separated by the Korean War. I’m from South Korean origin and I think having seen the sorrow that had carried on in my family, I thought about millions of mothers and sons who were separated by that war, whose lives were forever never united, whose sorrow never got communicated; that generation died without their stories being told...It’s been seventy years, which means that generation died. Millions of people. I You know, I covered the deDo you have any personal con- needed to tell their story, and fectors for a long time, who do nection to reporting in North this was my way. In order to get come from um the bottom line Korea? to the truth of it, and deliver it. of the society; the kids I taught
Justice Antonin Scalia
by Gaurang Goel ’17 Business Manager
J
u s t ic e A nton i n S c a l i a was nominated by Ronald Reagan in 1986 and served the Supreme Court for nearly thirty years before his death on Saturday, February 13, 2016. The most important legacy that Scalia leaves behind is his theory that the Supreme Court should interpret the Constitution according to how the American people understand the Constitution and its amendments. In other words, he stood firmly against the idea of an evolving interpretation of the Constitution as he said that it’s an unprecedented burden to put on nine lawyers. Because of the burden of analyzing how the Constitution is growing and deciding what new rights it offers, he believed that the responsibility of a democracy must be placed on the voters, and thus only the voters should be allowed to change the Constitution by the amendment process. Using those principles, Justice Scalia ruled that burning the American f lag can be protected by free speech granted by the First Amendment. There’s no doubt he was a fierce patriot and had no sympathy of radicals who would burn the American flag, but he believed in the Constitution’s text more than anything else. Nonetheless, his choice of words and comments will dominate the general public’s perception of Scalia. In the samesex marriage case, his dissent deemed Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion “pretentious.” He also caused a stir when he said that he would rather hide his head in a bag than sign on to Justice Kennedy’s version of legal reason. Not to forget, his dissent also included words like “pure applesauce” and “jiggerypokery” showing both his uncompromising conservatism and his melodramatic flair. In
his dissent to affirmative action, Scalia remarked that black students might be happier and better suited in less selective schools with a slower track. He also spearheaded the majority opinion ruling against the state of California’s attempt to criminalize the sale of violent video games to minors. The American public clearly reacted differently to these two decisions. Robert George, a professor at Princeton University and a dear friend of Scalia, clarified that despite Scalia’s rough-andtumble play with his fellow jus-
AP PHOTO/PABLO MARTINEZ MONSIVAIS
tices, Scalia was able to maintain very good friendships. For example, his best friend Ruth Bader Ginsburg was his ideological opposite. They were old and dear friends from the time they served together on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia circuit and they admired each other greatly. They were known to frequently spent New Year’s Eve together. Whether you liked Scalia or not, for a man who contributed so much to the United States, one would assume the bi-partisan politics would halt to pay their respects. HA! What nonsense! Hardly five seconds lulled before Mitch McConnell, senate majority leader, promised to block any nominee sent by Barack Obama on
the grounds that with eleven months left in office he should leave the choice to the winner of the November general elections. Echoing some of the statements made by McConnell, Loomis Chaffee student Alex Rosenthal ’17 noted, “The next president will reflect the viewpoint of the majority of Americans and that president should do the nomination and not a lame duck president.” Regardless of the Republican sentiments in this quotation, both parties have had the same general ideal. Senator Joe Biden argued against the Supreme Court nomination in 1992 and claimed that President Bush should follow the practice of his predecessors and not appoint a nominee until after the November elections. Even President Obama favored the filibuster in 2005 against George W. Bush’s nominees. The Constitution is very clear on the issue that the president “shall” appoint a nominee and the senate must vote on that nominee. There is no ambiguity there; it doesn’t mention “should,” “could,” or “not in the last year of the term.” Lame-duck arguments are also irrelevant. Interestingly enough, Scalia was appointed 98-0 in the senate. This was so, not because they all agreed on his views, but because they agreed that he was a very qualified lawyer to sit on the bench of the Supreme Court - a perfect example of the senate abiding by the Constitution. The delay in appointing a new justice leaves many Supreme Court cases that are pending in risk of a 4-4 tie between the liberal and conservative judges. These cases range from abortion to immigration to affirmative action. Whatever happens now, the death of Judge Antonin Scalia marks an end of an era. If Obama’s nominee does get accepted, the nomination would establish the most liberal Supreme Court seen in decades.