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From the President's Desk
February 2009
To Tell The Truth
by Russell Wild

News flash: Barack Obama, although once having served on the board of an anti-poverty group with Bill Ayers, never once hugged, hoisted beers with, or attended a Koran study group with the former radical. Sarah Palin, as it turns out, although she can't see the Dark Continent from her house, apparently does know that Africa is more than an individual country.

Our recent national election proved to be a boiling, peppery stew of exaggerations, innuendos and lies, cooked up in the blogosphere, and spread throughout the Internet, chain emails, talk radio, and at times other sources that really should know better.

Democracy itself is threatened by the public's (and sometimes the media's) inability to tell fantasy from reality, falsehood from fact. And that is no exaggeration. Where do we—the freelance writing corps—come into this picture? We can—we must—take seriously our commitment to our careers as journalists, remembering always that quality nonfiction writing is, above and beyond all else, nonfiction. At the annual ASJA conference this year, as in years past, ASJA will be naming its award-winners for excellence in nonfiction writing. Consider the ASJA Awards a partial antidote to the innuendo-and-lies crisis facing the Western World.

The awards will be given this year on Friday morning, April 24, immediately following a business meeting, in which Executive Director Alexandra Owens and I will provide a snapshot of ASJA's current financial health, the direction of the organization and other matters pertinent to ASJA. The dual-purpose meeting starts up at 8:20 and goes till 10:00. a sit-down breakfast is included in your Friday conference fee. Awards Committee co-chairs Linda Marsa and Barbara DeMarco-Barrett tell me that the submissions this year are plentiful and excellent, and that the committee members are having a hell of a time selecting winners. Of course, they are looking not only for journalistic integrity, but presentation with pizzazz, as well.

Please make sure you join me and Alex, Linda and Barbara, the Awards Committee, and the awards recipients on Friday morning. It will be a fun event. And by attending, you may be helping, in a small and indirect way, to preserve democracy itself.

Between now and then, be truthful when you sit down at your keyboards, please. Read everything that crosses your desk with a bit of skepticism. Teach your children (and perhaps your parents) to do the very same. In addition, don't pass along unsubstantiated rumors to those on your email lists (check with Snopes.com), and feel free to gently admonish those who do.

Truth is a virtue...and that is a fact.

ASJA President Russell Wild, despite rumors circulating over the Internet, does not maintain homes in Rio and Monte Carlo. He lives, for better or worse, in Allentown, PA.