Arnold C. Brackman, A True Journalist

I've had a few folks ask recently where I became a journalist and who my role models were.

Well, quite truthfully, I was born a writer. But a man named Arnold C. Brackman - "Brack", whose picture always sits near me - made me into a journalist.

You may not know the name. But if you've seen the movie, "The Last Emperor", you know his work. His book of this name served as the basis for the Bertolucci movie.

Bravely, Brack also wrote about the Toyko War Crimes Trials, about how the U.S. and Britain were complicit in the overthrow of secular governments in places like Indonesia that served - just as we did in Iran and elsewhere - to usher in extreme Islamist factions and brought the deaths of millions in bloody actions such as East Timor.

He also wrote about "The Gold of Tutankhamen" and "The Dream of Troy".

A long-time foxhole journalist with United Press (before UPI and Moonie-ownership), an editor with the Christian Science Monitor, The Economist, and Week In Reviw for The New York Times - among others - I was so lucky this very accomplished man decided to teach.

Brack said many things to me - including, "Chase, you can write the bloody Bible for all I care but if you don't get it in on deadline, it's NOT going in!" He really made me stretch myself because in addition to other responsibilities, he would force me to write sports news for the newspaper (I hate sports with a passion - Brack loved the stuff; his theory was that if he could turn me into a decent sports writer, more would enjoy the sports).

But chief among the Brack-ism, I remember these two:

- "What the ... bloody hell is an investigative journalist? If you aren't investigating, you AREN'T a bloody journalist! So don't give me this nonsense about investigative anything."

-"You want a WHAT? A graduate degree in journalism? What the... look [with a twinkle in his eye] if you want to do a graduate in journalism, get yourself a 100 lb typewriter and a pair of handcuffs. Then I'll chain you to the bloody typewriter and you write for two years."

Brack believed that to be called "a hack" was actually a great compliment. Why? Because it meant you were writing hard and often.

When he died not long after I graduated - and after I told him there was no way I could possibly continue risking my neck and happiness as a journalist and he railed at me, saying he would not allow me to do this - it broke my heart. But those of us who loved him did what he had once said he wanted done upon his death.

We went to one of his favorite bars and hoisted a few. Probably the only time I've ever had three drinks in my life.

Just writing about him brings tears to me eyes.

So when you hear me rage against what passes for journalism, and when you hear me praise journalists like Greg Mitchell at Editor & Publisher and what Helen Thomas at her age has tried so hard to do at the White House, you will understand if you read this that my standards for good journalism were set extremely high. Because of Brack, I cannot lower them even when I'm surrounded by... well, press releases and propaganda masquerading as journalism.

With what has gone on here and in the world just in the last six years, we need journalists more than ever. And yet, as is always so when the need is so severe, we have a situation - with the Bushies, et al - where it is extremely difficult if not deadly for journalists to do their work.

Love you, Brack. Always will.