>> i just wonder, do you like this? >> i enjoy skiing. thank you very much. >> and senator lee made some brief comments. this is what we do. but poor drew, very few people actually want to talk to him. >> $64 million raised over three years. >> thank you so much. >> and none of the money has gone to any veterans. >> don't turn your camera on me, okay? >> if you have any other questions, send them to her e-mail. >> when our camera found james reynolds jr., he gave us a single finger salute. >> thank you very much. >> i have to ask you about the money, though. that doesn't answer any of the questions about the money that they're -- that's it? >> do you notice a pattern? one california official tried running into the ladies' room. see what happened. >> do you know a convicted felon that runs one of those clinics? despite the facts that there have been complaints registered about him? >> and he broke the v.a. scandal wide open. >> that's the v.a.'s director, sharon hillman. who on monday, literally sped from our cameras. >> we all know how that turned out for her. there's a pattern, one we're proud to have on our program and across cnn. it's a rare occasion drew is welcomed in washington, d.c. we're very proud of him and his team. congratulations on winning the award, drew. [ applause ] >> drew griffin. there you are. your award, your check. >> thank you very much. what an honor, and it is rare to come to this town and not only be welcomed, but applauded. it's quite odd. and in fact, to be perfectly honest with you, i want to read you a quote from a senior staff person that didn't agree with the judges about our work. and sent this note to cnn after, i won't say if it's a her or him, but one wrote this letter about a piece in which the member was featured. this piece is the most shocking thing i've heard in years. it's a complete piece of trash. idiotic would be a charitable description of this piece of filth. i want to thank jeff zucker, anderson, "ac 360" producers, never getting tired of our filth on the air. and i want to thank sam feaist, who has to morning after morning answer the phone call from a p.o.'d member. thank you. and as anybody knows in tv, nothing that goes on the air goes on the air without a team behind it. there's no one person that puts stuff on the air. so, i want to thank our small but mighty investigative team. patricia decarlo. and david fitzpatrick, the lead producer on this series, that we continue, and continue to call "congress for sale." thank you very much. >> our award winners come from a variety of backgrounds. but it's the evolution of digital that binds our work together as journalists. tonight, we take a few moments to consider the influence advancing technology has. joining us to share his thoughts, gabriel schneider, editor of "the new republic." welcome. [ applause ] >> hello. i want to thank sandy johnson and the national press foundation for inviting me to speak. and congratulations to the award winners. my name is gabriel schneider, and i'm an optimist in the future of journalism. many of you are no doubt reaching for your phone right now. maybe you have an instant review of the speech to tweet. go ahead. it's a brave new world. or maybe you're texting a clever emoji combination to the person next to you. go ahead, we've all been there. and in some ways, journalism never changes. but yes, we know this magical device in your hands connects people in ways that were utter science fiction a mere two decades ago. but we're unsure whether it's a good thing or not for this craft we celebrate tonight. there are a lot of doubts whether journalism can survive, but i say of course it can. because it must. a vibrant press is vital to democracy. but the revenue streams that pay for that public service have been totally undone by the super computers in our pockets and purses. we know the pains of restructurings, pains, and layof layoffs. so, why am i an optimist? because they've uncovered vast new opportunities and audiences for the kind of journalism we cherish. now, journalism is just getting started. people like coates, klein, and carr, have used the new possibilities of the internet to shine light into the systems that shape politics, economy, culture, and even our own industry. mr. carr was instrumental to move it to the way it is today. and of course, there are great challenges. and just because the printing press is giving way to pixels, it must not mean that our values change. it's the thinking that matters not the form in which it's conveyed. and "the new republic" has been going through some changes. we may be a little more vertical and integrated, who knows? but our teams are busy making magazines, websites, and social media that our founder outlined 100 years ago. he said, it's to be radically progressive. a journal of opinion which seeks to meet the challenge of a new time. i couldn't agree more. if our founder sat down today to find the best way to achieve this mission, they wouldn't have picked a print magazine. they were smart people. they couldn't have ignored the digital publication possibilities. and they would want to welcome into our fold readers and writers that reflect the american experience today. in the endless pursuit of america's promise, it's always had to improve itself. today, the question we must ask, what should "the new republic" be in its next 100 years? it will be the home for ambitious journalism, what will change, how we go about delivering it. first, our opportunity to advance ideas will be digital. and as we move from being a magazine that happens to have a website to a digital media site that happens to have a magazine, we will have our staff working together in teams made up of editors, writers and designers, deciding the best way to deliver each story. the very first words in our very first issue were, "the new republic", frankly, is an experiment. and that's how we're working right now. in new york and d.c., it feels like an experiment. it's tough, bracing, and sometimes we'll screw up. but we're conducting it for a reason, we believe in great journalism. it's the pursuit of truth, and this recent revolution in human interaction is not reversing. and the pace will likely increase in five years' time. if we stick to our values and passion, i'm pretty sure we can commit some pretty great acts of journalism. and that's why i'm an optimist. thank you. [ applause ] >> thank you, gabriel. i appreciate your support of the npf. there's another person i would like to recognize tonight. bob myers. after 21 years -- [ applause ] >> of leading the national press foundation, developing hundreds of programs, he's leaving the foundation for greener fields, or should i say turf? when i heard about bob's plan to retire, i could not fathom what he wanted to do other than going to the office every day. and then i learned, his leaving us is simply a scheme to attend more baseball games. i know that's hard to believe. and so, i have come to recognize this. and it is tonight that we recognize the distinguished accomplishments of bob myers. he's dedicated his career to making thousands upon thousands of journalists better, including many of us in this room. so, bob, on behalf of all of us, thank you for your leadership and for building the national press foundation into the strong organization we know today, and that we celebrate tonight. so, to get you started on this new adventure, we have some awesome seats for you at a nationals game this year. [ applause ] thank you so much, bob. >> thank you, heather. the seats are in there? and spring training starts this week, so -- [ applause ] >> so, thank all of you, and thank you, heather for this wonderful recognition. it's going to be a lot of fun for me and my wife and child, and we are very, very grateful. just briefly, i joined npf after years as a reporter, editor, and fellowship director. journalists learn by asking questions, and often, people don't like being asked questions. reporters in any medium can be pushy, insistent, and at least in my case, badly dressed. so, this is why we did at npf. in our one-hour segment, we would stop speakers and go to q and a. so speakers and journalists could chat. we added multiple sessions on american journalism practice. and had sessions where ways of covering a topic were discussed. we always make a point of selecting journalists that clearly show in their applications they want to learn. and whose editors and producers want that for them, too. we do constant evaluations so the staff can tell how we're accomplishing our goals. we seek to stay on top of the news, and also get ahead of the news. the topics can be anything from politics to welfare, children, retirement, to measles and vaccinations. the idea is to provide information the public needs, understand the issues, and help make journalists better. for me, the last two decades have been a really great ride, and one for which i'm deeply grateful to the npf board, and all of you here tonight for supporting our efforts. i want to extend a note of appreciation to the wonderful npf staff, and sandy johnson for helping make this transition so smooth, and to express the excitement i feel in seeing the changes she's bringing about. the show of recognition and appreciation this evening means so much to me, my wife, and our son. thank you all very much. [ applause ] i've been given the honor of introducing gilbert bylawn. tonight's winner of the editor of the year award for his coverage of events in ferguson, missouri. the bradley, the most prestigious award for an editor in the country. his passing this past year saddens and diminishes us all. here's a brief video of gilbert's work, and then we'll meet him. >> ferguson, missouri, was unknown to many people previous to last august 9th. when our staff responded to the shooting, we found this story was going to be huge for the country, but also very important for us here. >> the protest in ferguson was like a band-aid being ripped out of st. louis. now, we're dealing with the tensions out in the open. >> you had the daily uncertainty of how big the live news events would be. whether an afternoon's rally or protest that was peaceful would turn into a violent encounter with police late at tight. >> our staff was working night and day, in difficult circumstances, surviving assaults. people criticizing our reporting. neverthele nevertheless, we did outstanding journalism. >> now that the tear gas canisters aren't being launched, buildings aren't being burned anymore, the issues of distrust are still with us today, not only in st. louis. >> problems like court reform, poverty, lack of political representation, issues we'll continue to delve into. >> he was everything you would want in a newsroom leader at a time like this. a cheerleader, helped to keep people pumped up. he was a good sounding board when we had issues that came up, and we needed to talk through them with someone. >> he's done pretty much everything that needs to be done in the newsroom. risen through the ranks, with great credibility and the deepest of journalistic integrity. >> he checked in with me a lot, the kind of questions you expect from someone that trusted you. >> this is an important role for our regional newspaper to step up on a story with national and international significance, with great journalism. [ applause ] >> and this. >> before i make a few remarks about ferguson, i would like to acknowledge my family here, my wife and daughter, with some family and friends. [ applause ] i'd also like to acknowledge our company for giving us the resources and latitude and equipment and the patience for us to do our jobs and doing journalism under a great deal of stress. i have a few remarks i'd like to read. our coverage began as a local story of a fatal shooting inin august afternoon. but later gave rise to looting, burning, and violent unrest that shocked the nation and our hometown. a metro area of almost 3 million people became burnished as #ferguson for much of the nation. the images became a powerful national wakeup call. and fixing national scrutiny on long-festering problems. issues involving the criminal justice problem. race relations, disenfranchisement, and ferguson is no outlier. the award tonight is recognition for every journalist and writer in the "post-dispatch" newsroom. the journalists are forever change e changed. their professionalism showed the best of journalism. and they donned bullet-proof vests, tear gas masks, and were assaulted in the streets. one photographer was chased out of a backyard at gunpoint. ferguson established how newspapers are realtime news providers. our community has relied on journalists for the last six months. they are the heroes tonight. the violent unrest has subsided, but continues to roil. and phone calls, e-mails, and social media, we've been subject to racist and vile language. the slings and arrows came from all people and political persuasions. some said they could cancel their subscriptions if we continued to cover ferguson on the front page because for them, the story was over. but to continue to cover it, it has validated the essentiality of a vibrant news media. ferguson has reaffirmed our vital role to tell human stories, seek facts, investigate, and hold public institutions accountable. that work will endoure for year in the newsroom. and the journalists will remain indispensabl indispensable. i accept this award. thank you very much. [ applause ] >> thank you. this year, it's my honor to present the chairman's citation to brian krebs. author of the "new york times" best seller, "spam nation." he's shown that one journalist can have an impact across an entire industry by upholding the highest standards of reporting. he's a pioneer covering crime and conflict in cyber space. while facing threats as a result of his on the ground coverage. ladies and gentlemen, it's my pleasure to introduce you to mr. brian krebs. [ applause ] >> all right. wow. well, thank you very much, heather. as heather said, my name is brian krebs, and i'm a recovering journalist. i want to thank, seriously, the national press foundation for this award. it is a great honor. and it's hugely humbling, particularly since two of the last three recipients of this award were "washington post" writers, and pulitzer award winners. anthony shadeed, winning two pulitzers for his reporting in the middle east, for which he gave his life. and culbert king, as well, has done some great work. and prior to my getting a real job at the "washington post," i was a copy aid for four or five years. i delivered these guys' mail and faxes on a day-to-day basis. so, it's incredible and kind of surreal for me to be up here. and another reason, i'm really excited about accepting this award, it's a big score for independent journalists. [ applause ] >> the absolute hardest thing about being independent, especially if you go from being at a major newsroom, is making that phone call to an important person, important organization and saying, yeah, it's just me. and they go, oh, what news organization? it's just me. sorry about that. that takes a little getting used to. but probably the most rewarding aspect of being on your own is, you don't have to chase to story that everybody else is chasing. you get the time and the space to really chase the stories that matter. and if you're lucky enough, you get other reporters to chase your stories. ever since i left the "post," i worked hard to convince some of my more dissatisfied or disillusioned colleagues to go out on their own, and really, i've watched some of my best friends in different newsrooms having to take unpaid furloughs to keep their jobs. having to do a lot less with more. having to be assigned or re-assigned to more advertising-friendly beats. and they're asking to focus on doing stories that attract a lot more eyeballs and clicks than actual, real journalism. the biggest reason i'm excited about this award, it gives me a bigger megaphone to be sort of the main independent reporter guy. and to push that message out there. which is, if you have a deep knowledge of what you do, if you have a niche, and you love what you do, and you're passionate about that, you should really consider going independent. and you will almost certainly work harder. thank you. you will almost certainly work harder than you have ever worked before. but i think you'll probably be happier. probably be wealthier, and still be producing fantastic journalism, if you're doing it right. so, here's my open invitation to all of you out there. if you're thought about going independent, doing your own thing. maybe you're not really sure. shoot me a note to my website, i'm more than happy to talk with any of you about the failures, successes, all of it. and once again, i want to thank the npf for having me here, and for this wonderful honor. i want to thank my amazing business manager, aka mrs. krebs, who has had to put up with an unbelievable amount of crap over the last five years. and i want to thank you all for having me here. [ applause ] >> our next award is for excellence in online journalism, presented this year to recode. it features smart commentary and top-notch reporting on a constantly changing topic. accepting the award tonight, reporter amy schott. [ applause ] >> well, thank you very much. my maim is amy schott, and i'm a senior editor for recode. my bosses wish they could be here, but they couldn't make it. it's one of six conferences they'll be hosting around the country, and they are very important because they help us pay the bills. it's only been a year, since the recode team broke away from the wa"wall street journal," to for our own organization. aside from breaking tech news, we spend a lot of time on features and long-form journalism. that may seem a little bit weird, but they're among the most popular stories on our site. last year, we published several weeklong series on american cities, and plan to do more this year. one was a memorable story on the cuddle puddles of birmingham, and one that became the unofficial brothel of ces. we want to thank nbc and cbs, and nbc is an unofficial investor of recode. we're all working on it. the entire recode team is thrilled that our work caught the attention of the national press foundation, and >> we're proud to recognize the successes of news organizations that have embraced the digitsal landscape. and so that's why we're pleased to announce tonight the development of a new series of digital first journalism awards to continue and better honor those who make the best use of technology and innovation to make journalism better. so we'll be announcing more about this new series of awards in the coming year. our next award is the feddy. given to journalism that shows the impact of federal rules and regulations on local communities. tonight's recipient is thomas frank of usa today. for his series showing how defective parts and unsafe aircraft are concealed from the public and government regulators. please welcome thomas frank. >> i'm one of the last ones. the good news is that i'm from "usa today" so i'll be brief. isn't that a great line? i would like to take credit for it. i heard it 15 years ago. actually, i think new harth trade marked it. but it's also as much as i want to use that, it's inapplicable to me because i'm from the usa today investigative team. so what i really should say is get comfortable, folks. i won this award that was 17,000 words. i'm saying that not to show off personally but to make the point that the paper that a lot of you may know is doing some serious law firm, hard hitting investigative journalism. and i'm really grateful to the foundation for recognizing that and i'm more grateful and proud to be working with an incredible team of people starting with my editor and a really creative group of people that do terrific stuff online who are, i think, the only guys here with really long hair. so keith carter and rich and jerry and maureen link is so good that she got another job and shannon green and terry burn. i encourage you to go to the website. we have a link to the investigations. it's next to the kardashian video gallery. actually it's not. but it's gratifying to know that when i got into this business 30 years ago, people said well, you know, stay away from ganet whatever you do. they would say go to the good chains like times mirror and knight ridder. we all know how that story ended. and so i encourage all of you to understand what's going on at usa today is that as we try to struggle our way through like every other news journalism -- news organization, we've done something really, really impressive. and that is made a real commitment to hard hitting investigative ground breaking journalism. and i'm grateful for that. thank you to the foundation. >> ladies and gentlemen, knight kiplinger, chairman and editor in chief of kiplinger publications. >> good evening. i'm from the kiplinger letter and i will be briefer. i'm knight kiplinger and, no, i'm not related in any way to those other knights. john s. and james l. knight. wish i were but i'm not. our honoree this evening is the first kiplinger awardee in many years who has never worked as a professional journalist. but paradoxically, he is one of the most influential figures, some would say the most influential figure in journalism today. in the forefront of a movement to totally reshape the journalism profession, to adapt it to the new realities of the digital age, alberto barredwin can thb transformtive force because beneath the guise of lawyer, a up into publisher, and a foundation executive, there beats the heart of a journalist. while he was never a professional journalist, he was once a darn good student journalist. when he was editor of the university paper in 1965 his senior year. when a bus load of wesleyan university students went down to alabama from connecticut that spring for the montgomery to selma march, alberto deputized six of his fellow students to call him at the argus with their firsthand accounts. he gave each of them a dime to place a collect call from a pay phone. now for the younger of you here tonight, ask somebody older at the table what a collect call was and a pay phone. he told his fellow students, when you are arrested, not if, but when you are arrested, don't use this dime to call your parents, your lawyer or the dean. call me. that's a tough editor. a few nights later he sat by the phone with four empty pages in his layout for the next day's argus. he waited and waited and then the collect calls started coming in with vivid first person accounts of police attacks on the peaceful marchers. we had one guy, he recalls, who is being beaten while he was on the phone in a phone booth. ask someone else at your table what a phone booth is. well, alberto filled those four empty pages of the wesleyan university argus that night scooping the papers in connecticut that had already gone to press. after an experience like that, why didn't alberto choose journalism for a career? well, he had other ideas for helping his fellow man. as a peace corps veer and then an attorney working in legal aid, community activism and connecticut state government. but the siren song of publishing called to him. and he ended up in senior management first at the "hartford courant" then at long island "newsday" and finally, the "miami herald." as a publisher, he was passionate about editorial quality, community engagement and connecting with the readers. on his watch of the harold, the paper won numerous prizes and was reportedly the first paper in america to list reporters' e-mail addresses in the story. adds as good a publisher he was, it was the leadership of the james l. knight foundation that made him such a force in mernl journalism today. for the past ten years, he has remade this foundation to become the leading supporter and funder and cheerleader for journalistic innovation. to create new techniques and new business models for the news media to better serve the public. as he said in a recent interview, his mission is "not to save newspapers or save television news or radio news, but how to figure out how to meet information needs in every way possible." so the knight foundation funds new ventures to help journalists use the internet to find citizens sources for their reporting and research. to sustain new nonprofit news organizations like propublica, to create privacy protecting methods for whistle blowers to contact journalists online with safety. and to create a comprehensive data base of donors to federal campaigns across america. the knight foundation is also a major funneleder of new media training for print and broadcast journalists. this is a mission that we at the kiplinger foundation also support. through the kiplinger program for mid career journalists at ohio state university. it's all about teaching old dogs and some young dogs some valuable new tricks. as a profile in fast company magazine recently said, by reinventing the knight foundation, alberto helped reinvent the news. it is for these contributions creative and, yes, financial, that the national press foundation this evening bestows bonn this visionary leader the wm kiplinger award for lifetime contributions to journalism. ladies and gentlemen, alberto ebardwin. >> thank you. i think i have died and gone to heaven. i don't deserve that generous introduction but thank you for it. congratulations to all the other winners to night, particularly my friend gilbert bayone for the extraordinary work that you always could have done and n. dallas and lots of other places and happen to have been there in the right place at the right time and across multiple media platforms as we say these days. great job. i was actually surprised when sandy johnson called and told me about this award since most of the winners in the past have been editors, have been journalists. abe rosenthal at the paper i grew up with or gene roberts, one of the great knight ridder editors and to be in the company of al newharth and katherine graham is the very definition of an honor. of course, i'm not sure if this will actually get me any props at home, there was a family story that began when our son who is now first amendment counsel at hufrt, not that his father is too proud to mention him, but he was then a reporter for the associated press and he was stuck on a story and he called and said i need to talk about something else and he mentioned he was stuck on this story. she said why don't you call your father, thinking that, you know, we were both in the same business. and he said, mom, pop is a lawyer who runs a newspaper. i'm a reporter. i don't pretend to be a journalist. i never have. but i do admit to a life long passion for journalism and for free expression, a fascination with point of view and a faith in the wisdom of a well informed crowd. i have something else in common with my distinguished predecessors and manufacture you here tonight. and with w.m. kiplinger himself and certainly with jack knight. we all grew up and became successful in a print oriented, principle's driven hierarchical world. we enjoyed few competitors, a highly profitable business and a public service mission to inform. yet in the space of about ten years, newspapers went from cash cow monopolies to struggling to make a profit so they could continue to serve. as always, chaos for some is opportunity for others to inform, to reach, rouse the people so they can determine their own interest. across the country i see a lot of fear in news rooms. we work with many, many of them. but this really should be a howard beal moment for journalism in america. i'm mad as hell and i'm not going to take it anymore. in his rant, when he ended that way, beal said he doesn't know the solution but he knows he's not going to sit around and mope. he's mad as hell. and so should you be. so should we be. because the best of self governance, the best self governance is just not possible without an informed citizenry and an informed citizenry is impossible without good journalism. my view of the future of journalism starts with a simple observation. this new digital age of communication all around us in our pockets and in our wrists is profoundly changing our economy, our communities and our lives. and if you care about journalism, you have to care about technology. because that's how you'll find your audience, reading, viewing, listening, commenting, producing and distributing news. journalists and news people must care about the devices people use about, how they will use them, and about how they will value the information. you can wring your hands and pray for time to freeze so "the new republic" will never change and the times picayune will return to full print or you can look with hope and good will as the current leadership works to find a way that fits the times. as so often is the case, you have two choices. you can curse the darkness or light the candle. at night we choose to light. we're mad as hell and we're doing something about it. i'd like to tell you a little bit about values matter, training matters, so we maintain programs with scores of journalism schools as you see on the slides. and they're deans, fellowships, knight chairs, new degrees, training in person and online. we funded hundreds, literally hundreds of media experiments from prototypes for real time news to open source community engagement platforms. we've turned to mit's media lab in the pugh research center to help us understand how people use information technology. we don't pretend to have a magic bullet. instead, we work with journalists who care about the present and the future. we funded news organizations whose missions day in and day out is to do outstanding journalism like texas tribune and the voice of san diego. in the short term, we've also given breathing space to 27 online news sites around the country by funding 15% of their annual budgets. they have to survive. we financed tech incubators at the "philadelphia enquirer" and "boston globe," tools such as document cloud by staffers from "the new york times" and right now we're in the middle of a project to create a new open source community platform with "the washington post," "the new york times" and mosilla. we're still experimenting. the slide that's up now shows how we moved to more and smaller projects from left to right. the chart represents more than about $90 million in active grants during this four year period of time. ch is a drop in the bucket compared to what google, microsoft, or facebook might spend on development. and sure i wish news companies that spent their buckets on r & d when we were make 20g% or 30% profit, but that was then and this is now. and we should be as mad as hell and fighting -- figuring out what to do next. two of the people who do that, who helped me do that are here tonight. and i'd like to recognize them. our director of journalism program and marty baron, the chairman of our adviser journalism advisory committee. [ applause ] most news rooms, sadly, are not particularly experimental. what you heard tonight, i wish were common. i think it's extraordinary. i congratulate the other winners again. if you don't experiment, you can wave your future good-bye. if you are experimenting, please do more, push your boundaries and let us know what you're learning. have an open mind and remembering the true north star of journalism, fair, accurate search for truth. that hasn't changed. thank you. >> thank you. we want to thank our dinner committee and our co-chairs. [ applause ] >> i'm going to take forever. nothing this important gets done without the work of a lot of people and so i want to start by thanking all of you for being here tonight. come on. sandy johnson has done amazing things goen get this dinner off the ground. so as co-clair with amus, i'd like to thank the dinner committee for all of their hard work and please hold your applause until we recognize all the members. and then please if you're on the committee, stand when i mention your name. jeffrey burnbaum, simple instruction. peter tachury, thomas davidson, kathy guest, kevin goldberg, imani green, green group, matt howler, raymond karens, rob kirkro, shawn mcbride, tamara m rachlt rlocheck. >> bob, thank you. now that i've given bob all of the hard names, i would like to thank six more people, andy polanski, joe anna snyder, andrew shorts, jeffrey smith, greg saily, rob starter, rob has a fan base here. sally squires, susan swan, john wellcould the and julie triallo with yahoo. i also want to make a shoutout to julie and three weeks ago welcomed a new child into this world and made the dinner tonight. julie, thank you. on behalf of bob and i, thank you to everyone on the dinner committee. thank you to all of us for answering our calls. thank you. [ ablaus ] [ applause ] >> thank you. the fruit of the dinner committee's work provides a largest source of unrestricted funds for training for journalists. this year we're going to abu dabi to look at health issues. in december we'll go to south africa to learn the latest on tb and diabetes, thanks in part to elie lily. we'll educate journalists on retirement issues in our 11th retirement program funded by prudential. in every program, we're adding an element of digital story telling or toolbox training to keep our journalists abreast of the digital wave. we have a slast webanars coming up to make use of our brand new studio. we'll look at the latest research on addiction, we'll bring in experts to explain the uproar over vaccinations and the measles outbreak thanks to bayer, we'll pri a full day of training on digital tools in our studio. now i'd like you to meet the hard-working npf staff. linda topfelt, programs director. [ applause ] >> studio and program manager. rei reina levine. and jessica jean francois. your diligent dpont on this year's dinner details. [ applause ] we're making great use of use of our studio which opened in october. you can use it, too. it's available for commercial rental. >> picture yourself here. we produce video content every week from this studio. thanks to a generous gift from evelyn y. davis. you can rent this state of the art video studio, produce your own high quality video for your website, news letters, for your affiliates. bring your content alive just as we are doing at npf. our studios are a few blocks away on connecticut avenue in the heart of d.c. there's a brochure for npf studio works on your place setting. take it home and contact us for rental information. studio at national press.org. [ applause ] >> ladies and gentlemen, kevin goldberg, fletcher, heeled & hildrej and vice chair of the national press foundation. >> thank you. hang in, there folks. we have a couple afterwards left. you're not going to want to miss them. the word captivating is one i'd rarely use whether describing writing about energy policy and issues. but that's before i read twilight of the grid, a project of bloomberg news which takes a hard look at issues facing our nation's energy grid. it grabs from you the start, noting that, well, the grid hasn't changed much since thomas edison invented the light bulb but it's also doomed to on sow less ens. read on and you'll see why the judges were so enthusiastic about their choice of the journalists of bloomberg news as the winners of the 2015 thomas stokes award for energy writing. >> thanks very much. thanks particularly to the judges and to the national press foundation. if i woke up in a dream five years ago and thought i was being honored by a national news organization for writing about utilities, i would have killed myself. i am a storyteller and my view is what's the story there? well, it's an amazing story. i'm old enough, i spent many of my years on the washington journal and i was in the san francisco bureau in the 1980s when the mccall brothers were buying up cell phone tower rights and then we saw the first cell phone. it was the size of a suitcase. everyone said, who the hell wants one of those? and now every second grader in america has one. i have the privilege of interviewing george mitchell who is the grandfather of fracking and for 25 years everybody said nobody will ever be able to squeeze oil and gas out of those tight geoformations and george mitchell got the recipe right and essentially changed the energy world. this is where we stand at this moment in my opinion in our opinion on the utility paradigm. we've reached this crossing and tipping point where suddenly there's this coalesce ens of things that were sooner than we recognize will change the entire world in the way that we see the world and the way we see the energy world. we're lucky at bloomberg news because we have all these really smart beat reporters who every day go out and write these incredible stories about stuff that's breaking. and what we finally did was we saw the connections. walmart is going to solarize all of the stores by 2020. verizon is solarizing 1,000 data centers. in this we understood that there were winners but who are the losers? and we recognize that the losers potentially could be the utility industry. and this is phenomenal. this is the most interesting thing that has happened since thomas edison invented the grid. so what we did is took the helicopter up 5,000 feet and began to seat connections. and then we discovered this report from the utility industry themselves who said in a candid moment, we look like the airline industry in the telecom industry in 1975 and remember what happened to them. so this is our story. if you want to go online and read it, i think we've done a pretty good job of looking forward. you know, i go home and i tell my family oh, my god, i'm writing about energy. and it's the most interesting thing in the world. they go, get another life. but it is. it's a story of the next decade. you know, hats off to my colleagues and my editors for doing this. thank you very much. [ applause ] [ speaking french ] even those who don't speak a word of french have become familiar with this phrase in recent weeks after the january 7th terrorist attack at the offices of the french magazine left 12 people dead. all because of some pictures, right? of course not. because political cartoons are so much more. in part because of the strong and effective message they can convey to anyone in an instant. a strong and infective message describeds the cartoons of clay bennett who has drawn five cartoons a week since joining the snaf late 2007. his work is clean, concise, and to the point. simple to understand but not simple. our judge's panel saw elegant simplicity in clay bennett's work, clear drawings, clear messages. bennett's style is disarming and charming with a strong bite underneath. his humor is subtle and witty. ladies and gentlemen, it's an horror to present the winner of the national press foundation's 2015 clifford k. and james t. baron award for cartooning to mr. clay bennett. >> thank you very much for that. first off, let me thank the national press foundation for this wonderful recognition of my work. i feel very honored if not a little out of place to be included in such a distinguished group of journalists. maybe i'll seem more dignified if only by association. now next i should confess that i always get a little bit nervous on occasions like this. i think my anxiety all stems from this experience i had when i was asked to speak before the texas press association in 2002. now here's drama ttization of work. i guess i was expecting a group of liberal reporters and editors. i knew it was texas. it was the tex press association. instead, i was faced with a room full of very conservative newspaper publishers from across the lone star state. now undeterred by the demographics of the group, i went ahead with my plan. after a short intro, the lights went down. and, let's see here, the lights went down. to have a typical, you know, sort of liberal cartoon slide show. well, when the presentation was over 20 minutes later and the lights were turned back up, half the audience was gone. i mean, it was pretty humbling if not down right humiliating experience. i think even an optimist who still would have seen the room as half full might have been discouraged. the only comment i got afterwards that even came close to being a compliment was from one of the publishers said, well, that took guts. and i'll take that as a compliment. now my nerves aside, i'm pretty sure nothing like that will happen tonight. you guys, this is d.c. after all. right? and you guys are a tolerant crowd. beside, we have blocked all the exits. so with that in mind, let's get this show on the road. so i've been a cartoonist for as long as i can remember. and i've been opinionated for as long as anyone else can remember. so it seemed only natural that i would pursue a career in editorial cartooning. i chose this career path in the early 1970s during the heyday of the art form. and like most cartoonists of my generation, i tried my best to emulate the artist who's dominated the profession at the time. but unlike many of my contemporaries, i just wasn't talented enough to do it. i had to fashion a drawing style that was more suited to my modest abilities. as an artist. now ironically, it was my limitations as a cartoonist, not my skills as one that would determine the drawing style that would come to define my work. my approach to cartooning was also shaped more by weaknesses than by my strengths. character tour, for instance. i have never considered myself to be a very strong caricaturist. you would think that would discourage someone from pursuing a career virtually driven by the arlt of caricature, but i wasn't going to let a little thing like not being able to capture someone's likeness keep me down. i had to figure out ways to work around them. eliminating them altogether seemed like a good solution. so at times i would find ways to criticize public officials without depicting them at all. eight cans, yes. but still, there are times when this job just seems to demand that you draw a caricature. on those days, i just do the best i can. now sometimes it works out all right. by the way, the guy batting is president obama and, yes, i do know he's left-handed. but he bats right. he throws left, bats right. now other times you can put in a well placed label that will clear up any confusion on your subject matter. that's when newt was contributing to the annie gti-g rights people. most of the time i avoid drawing caricatures by addressing broader issues in my work. another signature is the visual nature of my work. with artistic influence that's range from the new yorker cartoons of charles adam and the animated cartoons of warner brothers to the work of european and latin cartoonists, i always had an affinity of cartoons with few or no words. now i may have followed this same path because i just love the visual purity and universal appeal of wordless cartoons. or maybe i just went this route because i can't spell. but regardless of the region, the fact of the matter remains, the fewer words i include, the less chance i have of misspelling one. now like this one, for instance. i only had to spellcheck three words in this cartoon. and this one, no words at all. chance of misspelling zero. so once i developed a style that avoids the caricatures i can't draw and once i devised an approach that eliminates the words i can't spell, i had to kind of establish a general tone to my cartoons. now when i was -- here, too now here, too, i faced an obstacle. you see, when i was first breaking into this business, there seemed to be two types of cartoonists in this field. those who went for the jugular and those who went for the funny bone. the only problem was i didn't really seem to comfortably fit into either school of cartooning. i've always had strong views. but i never thought of myself as being shrill or malicious. and even though i have a sense of humor, you know, i'm not all that

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