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from Photographers Blog:
Adventures on the western frontier
North Dakota
By Shannon Stapleton
It had been a couple months since I traveled somewhere to cover an assignment and I have to admit I was really looking to get out of town.
So when I heard that the Reuters text operation was covering a story in Williston, North Dakota on the Bakken Oil boom I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to visit a place that I had never been before. That same day I picked up the month's edition of National Geographic and saw on the cover that one of my favorite photographers Eugene Richards had spent some time there this past summer. I was excited to embark on an adventure to the western frontier and see for myself this modern day gold rush.
I should have known that the average daily high temperature in March doesn't exceed 35 degrees Fahrenheit in western North Dakota with a wind that bites right through you. But I was getting out of town and having the opportunity to work on a story that had significant news value. So, on Monday I took a 6:30 am flight from New York to Minneapolis for a layover then on to the wild frontier of Williston, North Dakota. During the layover I noticed that I was the only guy wearing sunglasses and a North Face jacket. I was surrounded by burly guys in Carhartt work clothes waiting to head back to a place that I found was a home away from home that afforded these men the opportunity to provide for their families that most of them had left back in areas all over the United States. I arrived in Williston and the temperature was a balmy 23 degrees. I picked up my rent a car and drove to my "luxurious" weekly rental located right off the main drag of Highway 85.
That day I met our text reporter Ernest Scheyder and even after a long day of traveling was excited see the various oil drilling sites that were everywhere around the vast snow-covered wheat fields. About an hour into our venture a snow storm came out of nowhere and caught us a little off guard. It was blinding and thank God for the iPhone's GPS and Ernie's four wheel drive we made it back to the motel. Over the next few days I encountered several men and women that had very similar stories about coming to Williston for work in order to survive and make a better life for them and their families in such troubling financial times in our country. Other than the daunting task of finding an affordable place to live, the jobs were there and ripe for the picking. Experience was not required in some cases. Wal-Mart was advertising starting jobs at $17 an hour with benefits merely because they were having difficulty finding people to work for those low wages.
from Ian Bremmer:
The top 10 grudges in the G-20
The G-20 is no happy family. Comprised of 19 countries and the European Union, once the urgency of the financial crisis waned, so too did the level of collaboration among members. Unlike the cozier G-7 -- filled with likeminded nations -- the G-20 is a better representation of the true global balance of power … and the tensions therein. So where are the deepest fault lines in the G-20?
Below is a ranking* of the 10 worst bilateral relationships in the G20. Russia is in four of the worst, while China is in three (although Russia and China’s relationship is fine). Several countries are also in two of the worst relationships: the United States (with the two belligerents mentioned above), Japan, the UK and the EU.
from The Edgy Optimist:
The U.S. can’t afford a Chinese economic collapse
Is China about to collapse? That question has been front and center in the past weeks as the country completes its leadership transition and after the exposure of its various real estate bubbles during a widely watched 60 Minutes exposé this past weekend.
Concerns about soaring property prices throughout China are hardly new, but they have been given added weight by the government itself. Recognizing that a rapid implosion of the property market would disrupt economic growth, the central government recently announced far-reaching measures designed to dent the rampant speculation. Higher down payments, limiting the purchases of investment properties, and a capital gains tax on real estate transactions designed to make flipping properties less lucrative were included.
from Photographers Blog:
Of gain and loss (and the longest story I’ve ever done)
By Rick Wilking
In the summer of 2011, as a chapter in a broader two-year project on obesity in America, I started a photo story on an almost 300 pound teenager who was planning bariatric surgery as a last resort to lose weight.
When a photojournalist starts a project like this there is always a lot of doubt. How much time will it take? Over how long a period and with how many visits. Will the subjects (and their friends and families) get tired of having me around? Will they cooperate in giving me the access I need? Since it’s a medical story will the hospital and doctors involved cooperate too? And most importantly will the time investment from both my subjects and me produce quality images that convey a compelling story?
from Full Focus:
AIDS in Black America
Up to 44 percent of America's new HIV/AIDS infections are clustered in 12 major cities, including Chicago, Washington, New York and Los Angeles, CDC data show. Within these communities, HIV rates are highest among blacks, Hispanics, gay and bisexual men of all races. As researchers gather for the International AIDS Society's 2012 conference, photographer Mike Segar documents patients, their caretakers and peer educators from the African-American community.
from Photographers Blog:
Obesity in America
By Rick Wilking
Almost 2 years ago I started work on a photo documentary simply titled “Obesity in America.” It's a simple title but with complex subject matter.
Getting the access, the various permissions from individuals and institutions and working through the convoluted American HIPPA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) that protects patient privacy to extremes was quite a challenge. But trying to tell a story with this many layers and permutations was even tougher.
from Expert Zone:
Hillary Clinton’s farewell visit to Delhi: from prickly estrangement to empathetic divergence
(The views expressed in this column are the author's own and do not represent those of Reuters)
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will rank as the most accomplished, poised and successful woman politician in American history. She has pierced many glass ceilings with tenacity and grace. She almost made it to the White House and future sociologists and historians will be able to more objectively assess the misogyny index that still lurks deep within American society and its relevance in the Obama-Clinton Democratic party tussle. The U.S. demonstrated in late 2008 that it had evolved to a point where it could accept a coloured President but not a woman.
from Photographers Blog:
An American homeless family
By Lucy Nicholson
On her second day of camping near the coast north of Los Angeles, Benita Guzman lit a match, threw it on a pile of logs, and poured gasoline on top. As flames engulfed her hand and foot, her niece, Angelica Cervantes, rushed to throw sand over her. Benita thrust her burning hand into a pile of mud, and took a deep breath.
Camping’s not easy. It’s a whole lot rougher when you’re a pair of homeless single mothers trying to keep seven children fed, clothed, washed and in school.
from Bernd Debusmann:
Relax, America! Not everything is as dire as you think
The world is becoming ever more dangerous. Threats to the United States are multiple and complex. Just think of terrorists, rogue states, dangers arising from Middle East revolutions, cyber attacks, Iran's nuclear ambitions, the rising power of China. The list goes on.
It makes for a world "more unpredictable, more volatile and more dangerous," as Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has put it. According to polls, most of America's foreign policy elite thinks the world is as dangerous, or more dangerous than it was during the Cold War.
from John Lloyd:
Do we need a referendum on referendums?
Do we want those whom we elect to represent us, or channel us? To exercise their own judgment, or to be a simple conduit for the views of the majority of their electors?
It’s an old question, and the most famous answer to it, still much treasured by parliamentarians, is the one given by the Anglo-Irish political philosopher Edmund Burke to his electors in Bristol, England in 1774. An opponent vying for Burke’s seat had seemed to promise the Bristol voters (not numerous, in those days) that he would vote as they told him to.
