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I. F. “Izzy” Stone
“All governments lie,” said Izzy Stone, the ultimate unembedded reporter.
Stone launched his first independent publication at age 14 and later became
a reporter, editor, columnist, and powerful journalistic advocate for FDR’s
New Deal at the then-liberal New York Post. As Washington, D.C. editor
of The Nation, he exposed U.S. corporations doing business with Hitler’s
Germany. He was one of the first to sound the alarm about the Nazi holocaust,
and battled the National Press Club over its exclusion of African Americans.
Founded in 1953, I. F. Stone’s Weekly stood bravely against racial discrimination, Senator Joe McCarthy’s witch-hunting, and the lies propelling the
Vietnam War.
Izzy Stone has inspired generations of journalists and social-justice activists.
“In this age of corporation men, I am an independent capitalist, the owner of
my own enterprise . . . beholden to no one but my good readers,” Stone wrote
in 1963. A true independent, he wrote books that passionately supported the
birth of Israel, but strongly criticized its mistreatment of Palestinians. He
advocated peace and negotiations with Soviet Russia, while denouncing its
rulers. He despised racists, but defended their civil liberties—as he defended
everyone’s.
The Park Center for Independent Media
presents
the seventh annual
IZZY
AWARD
honoring
Naomi Klein
and
David Sirota
His books include Underground to Palestine, The Hidden History of the
Korean War, and Killings at Kent State. His collected writings appear in
The Best of I. F. Stone. Read more at the official website supervised by Izzy’s
son Jeremy, IFStone.org.
The Park Center for Independent Media, launched in 2008, studies
and educates about news outlets that create and distribute content
outside traditional corporate systems. We deeply appreciate the
support of the Park Foundation and of Jeremy Stone.
The inaugural Izzy Award was presented to AMY GOODMAN and
GLENN GREENWALD; 2009’s to JEREMY SCAHILL; 2010’s was shared
by ROBERT SCHEER and CITY LIMITS; 2011’s went to SHARIF ABDELKOUDDOUS and the CENTER FOR MEDIA AND DEMOCRACY; 2012’s
to MOTHER JONES; and last year we honored JOHN CARLOS FREY
and NICK TURSE. Also last year the first I. F. Stone Hall of Fame
members, GLENN GREENWALD and JEREMY SCAHILL, were inducted.
April 15, 2015
Emerson Suites, Ithaca College
The Izzy Award recognizes outstanding achievement
in independent media — journalism created outside
traditional corporate structures.
“Izzy” Stone
The award is named after I. F. “Izzy” Stone, the legendary
muckraker who for decades exposed government deceit
and assaults on civil rights and liberties, notably through
I. F. Stone’s Weekly (1953-71).
Tonight’s ceremony is dedicated to
the great indy journalist Danny Schechter (1942-2015).
Naomi Klein
David Sirota
In 2014 NAOMI KLEIN
published her landmark book
This Changes Everything:
Capitalism vs. The Climate,
and powerful columns in The
Nation and The Guardian on
topics from climate change
to racism and torture.
Maverick investigative
journalist DAVID SIROTA
published dozens of exposés
in 2014 on corruption in our
country’s $3 trillion pension
system. These abuses hurt
taxpayers and government
employees while rewarding
Wall Street firms that fatten
politicians’ campaign coffers.
Her work has generated global
discussion and debate, with
a New York Times reviewer
praising the book as “the most momentous and contentious
environmental book since [Rachel Carson’s seminal 1962 work]
Silent Spring.” Klein is also the author of The Shock Doctrine:
The Rise of Disaster Capitalism and No Logo: Taking Aim at the
Brand Bullies. She is a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at the
Nation Institute and board member of 350.org.
Of her work last year, the Izzy Award judges commented: “Few
journalists today take on the big issues as comprehensively and
fearlessly as Klein. She combines rigorous reporting, analysis,
history and global scope into a package that not only identifies
problems, but also illuminates successful activism and solutions.
That goes for her groundbreaking book on climate change and
for columns that brilliantly connect the dots – such as the intersection of climate justice and racial justice.”
Klein joins us amidst a whirlwind book tour of Europe, where she
has met with grassroots and official leaders on climate issues.
Later this year a documentary film inspired by This Changes
Everything, directed by her husband, Avi Lewis, will launch. It
brings Klein’s thesis to life through a connective thread of stories
from people living and working on the front lines of change to
address our broken political, economic, and environmental systems.
Sirota’s dogged reporting on
this rarely examined topic, first for PandoDaily and later for
International Business Times, shined a critical spotlight on
powerful officials of both major parties, from Chicago mayor
Rahm Emanuel to New Jersey governor Chris Christie. The
result: mainstream media attention, official investigations,
passage of legislation, and government reforms.
In one exposé headlined “The Wolf of Sesame Street,” Sirota
revealed that New York’s public TV station accepted a $3.5
million donation from a billionaire anti-pension activist to fund
coverage of the pension issue. The station was forced to return
the money; PBS’s ombudsman wrote of “ethical compromises
in funding arrangements” that “nobody really knew until Sirota
wrote about it.”
The Izzy Award judges wrote: “With his torrential coverage of
the pension story, David Sirota shows a remarkable ability to
make financial issues clear – clear enough to prompt action by
officials and news outlets from coast to coast.”
Izzy Award judges are JEFF COHEN, director of the Park Center
for Independent Media; LINDA JUE, director and executive editor
of the G. W. Williams Center for Independent Journalism; and
ROBERT W. McCHESNEY, University of Illinois professor and author.