Investigations: Move Over 1%, Richest 0.01% Clean Up

Apparently, it sucks to be a one-percenter. That's because the richest one percent of people aren't getting wealthier as quickly as the really rich - the 0.1-percenters - not to mention the crazy, insane rich - the 0.01-percenters.

The eye-opening chart in this New York Times article tells the story. While incomes of the bottom 90 percent of American households have remained flat since 1913 (even falling since the 1970s after inflation), the top one percent have seen modest gains, earning about $1.3 million today (in real 2012 dollars), according to the World Top Incomes Database, which compiled the data for the New York Times story.

That's about double what they earned in 1913, according to the chart. (The exact amount they earned in 1913 wasn't immediately apparent in the story or database.)

Now for the really rich: the 0.1-percenters. These blessed individuals earn about $6 million today - up from about $2 million in 1913.

But that gain is still peanuts compared to the 0.01-percenters, whose household income has exploded from under $5 million in 1913 to $31 million today - a more than six-fold increase.

And to think of all the hatred spewed at the poor one-percenters.

UPDATE: On a related note, I just came across this interesting Bloomberg story on the huge and ever-widening gap between CEO and worker pay.

CEOs in the U.S. earned an estimated 20 times that of rank-and-file workers in the 1950s.

Today, that ratio has widened more than 10-fold to 204-to-1, the story reports amid a good discussion of stalled government attempts to get more transparency from corporations about executive compensation.

Investigations: MD's Book Says Pharma Suppresses Unflattering Drug Studies

Just saw this interesting Ted report on a book by UK MD Ben Goldacre's book Bad Pharma: How Drug Companies Mislead Doctors and Harm Patients.

Goldacre talks about how pharmaceutical companies conceal unflattering studies that show their drugs are ineffective. He said he was himself duped into prescribing medicine he says was ineffective to a patient after reading about positive research.

Later, he learned the "positive" results were from only a single study, while other studies were less flattering or had gone unpublished altogether.

The Ted item raises questions about evidence for five common medicines.

"Drugs are tested by the people who manufacture them, in poorly designed trials, on hopelessly small numbers of weird, unrepresentative patients, and analysed using techniques that are flawed by design, in such a way that they exaggerate the benefits of treatments," Goldacre writes in his book.

"We only ever see a distorted picture of any drug's true effects."

Awards: Go Behind-the-Scenes With Canada's Top Investigative Journalists and Stories

This just in: The Canadian Association of Journalists has put out the annual special awards edition of its magazine Media.

It's got first-person stories from some of Canada's leading journalists talking about how they did their award-winning stories.

Featured are the finalists in the latest CAJ and National Newspaper Awards.

It's a great primer for how to conduct a professional and impactful investigation -- besides simply offering some great storytelling.

Investigative Journalism: 2,776 Unauthorized Surveillance Incidents in 12 Months

So much for the Obama administration's assurances that its massive electronic snooping program is subject to extensive safeguards and oversight.

"Every now and then, there may be a mistake," said U.S. deputy attorney general James Cole in congressional testimony cited by the Washington Post.

Turns out "every now and then" actually means 2,776 incidents of unauthorized collection, storage, access or distribution of legally protected communications in the 12 months up to May 2012.

That's according to an internal audit by the U.S. National Security Agency. The Washington Post published this story on the audit, which was provided by ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Tools: Worried About the Edward Snowden Revelations? How to Protect Your Investigative Reporting

Concerned about protecting your confidential sources and communications after Edward Snowden's revelations about Big Brother snooping?

Just came across this interesting post on how to do just that from investigative journalist Dan Meredith of Radio Free Asia. Includes tools to conceal your web research, email, calls and files from prying eyes.

Be aware, of course, that using some anonymity tools can actually be a red flag for spies, themselves attracting attention. Do your own research!

Here's a good tipsheet from the Global Investigative Journalism Network on protecting your investigative reporting.

And on a related note, here's a 65-minute video of former MI5 intelligence officer Annie Machon talking about how spy agencies use and manipulate the media, hosted by the UK's Centre for Investigative Journalism.

Investigations: Canadian Forces Failing Injured and Ill Vets

Solid investigation here from The Ottawa Citizen on Canada's failing support program for injured and mentally ill vets.

A freeze on funds has left support units overwhelmed and unable to cope with the quickly growing demand for help from soldiers needing help after returning from Afghanistan, the story says.

"The army doesn't look after its injured soldiers," one severely injured Afghan vet said. "If I had worked at Walmart I would have been looked after better."

Awards: Two Nominations for Fukushima Fish Radiation Story

Congratulations to me! My story in Vancouver's Georgia Straight weekly on how the Fukushima nuclear disaster affected the Pacific fishery has gotten nominated for a Canadian Association of Journalists award for investigative reporting in the magazine category.

It was also nominated by the Western Magazine Awards for a prize in the environment category.

Thanks to Straight editors Charlie Smith and Martin Dunphy and publisher Dan McLeod for their unswerving support for investigative stories - one of Canada's last remaining bastions for this type of reporting.

Investigative Journalism: Mine Deals "Looting" Congo

Interesting in-depth report here from Bloomberg Markets Magazine on Dan Gertler.

The 38-year-old Israeli billionaire built a fortune out of Congo's vast mineral riches thanks to his close personal relationship with Congolese president Joseph Kabila and lucrative deals that let Gertler purchase resources below their value, the Bloomberg report says.

Meanwhile, Congo remains one of the world's poorest and most corrupt countries. Governance is so bad the International Monetary Fund cut off loans worth $225 million U.S. because a lack of transparency in mining deals, according to IMF official Antoinette Sayeh, who is cited in the story.

"Dan Gertler is essentially looting Congo at the expense of its people," Congolese mining watchdog rep Jean Pierre Muteba tells Bloomberg. 

Gertler dismisses such critics, saying he aims to help Congo as well as himself. "At the end of the day, yes, I'm looking to create a lot of wealth," he is quoted saying.

Resources: Wayback Machine

I've just come across this cool resource: the "Wayback Machine."

It's an amazing search engine that lets you look through billions of archived webpages going back to the ancient early days of the web in 1996.

It includes a blog, discussion forum, educational resources for kids interested in archiving pages of historic value and an archiving service. Also available are various web collections of pages on topics like Hurricane Katrina and pioneering websites.

Investigative Journalism: Fukushima Waste Being Stored at Playgrounds, Schools With Little Oversight

Here's a new one from the Fukushima file.

While Japan's government continues to struggle to deal with the Fukushima nuclear disaster, local communities are storing radioactive dirt, sludge and debris in playgrounds and other public places, according to this excellent Christian Science Monitor report.

In one city 150 miles north of Tokyo, groups of children played in a playground where hundreds of bags of the radioactive waste were stored a few feet underground in an unmarked, unfenced corner, the reporter discloses.

While government scientists assure that the risk of the radioactive isotopes in the waste seeping into the groundwater "quickly" is "low," there is no mention of an actual risk assessment or method used to calculate that risk.

And of course, local residents are flabbergasted. One found that at least 20 other such disposal sites in parks  and public spaces exist in his city alone. It's not clear if there's any monitoring of whether radioisotopes are leeching out, and officials even refuse to put up signs.

Across Fukushima prefecture, waste was being stored at 1,027 schools and 788 parks, according to the story, which says the sites are "scantily regulated."

Investigative Reporting: Regulators Ignore Autism Drug Side-Effects

The Toronto Star has published a troubling and well-done example of investigative reporting on autism and how regulators have mishandled oversight of drugs used on kids thought to have the ailment - some as young as 4.

The Star story, by David Bruser and Andrew Bailey, documents a pattern of serious, sometimes fatal health side-effects from the drugs, which have been largely ignored by government regulators.

The story is especially striking when read alongside a study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal in March that said the youngest children in a classroom are diagnosed with autism more frequently than older children, raising concerns that many schoolchildren are being misdiagnosed.

Resources: Your Journalism Reading List - Investigative and Otherwise

Good reading list here on online journalism for newbie and vet journalists alike at UK journalism prof Paul Bradshaw's Online Journalism Blog.

And here also on the same site is a great list of free ebooks on journalism, including on investigative reporting.

Among them is journalism prof Mark Lee Hunter's very interesting-looking 209-page The Global Casebook: An anthology for teachers and students of investigative journalism.

A companion to the UNESCO primer on investigative journalism that I blogged about in July, also written by Hunter, The Global Casebook features a fascinating list of dozens of investigative stories from around the world accompanied by notes about how each story was done and its impacts.

Investigative Journalism: YouTube's New I Files Channel

Just learned of a great new investigative journalism resource, thanks to CBC investigative guru (and one-time boss) Cecil Rosner's worthy blog Canadian Muckraking.

YouTube has launched an investigative reporting channel called The I Files, managed by the U.S. Center for Investigative Reporting. Ten videos are already up, and future content will come from a pile of international sources, including The New York Times, the BBC and Al-Jazeera.

The channel was announced just a week ago and already has 1,700 subscribers. Scratch that -- just noticed it's now 1,701 since I started writing this!

U.S. Prison System: ProPublica Compiles the Best Investigative Journalism

The U.S. has the world's most people in prisons per capita. How did it happen? A mix of private-prison lobbying, harsh sentencing, limited rehabilitation options, nightmarish isolation conditions that make many unable to cope once they're out, a powerful bail bonding industry -- the list goes on.

In "Land of the Free," investigative outfit ProPublica provides a great list of leading-edge investigative journalism about the U.S. prison system.

The stories cover everything from the sky-high U.S. incarceration rate to New York prison guards encouraging prisoner violence, sexual abuse in prisons and the fast-growing use of isolation units in so-called super-max prisons.

Resources: Primer on Investigative Journalism

Interesting investigative journalism primer here from UNESCO. The 88-page e-book covers the basics -- from organizing your information to dealing with sources and presenting your results.

Awards: Grantham Prize Rewards Investigative Journalism on Climate Change-Driven Deforestation

The Salt Lake Tribune documented climate change-driven deforestation in the U.S. in this interesting eight-part series - a great model for investigative journalism about the environment. 


The series has now picked up a lucrative $75,000 Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment.

Three other investigative reporting projects - a book, a documentary film and a multi-media story - won $5,000 awards of special merit. Read more here. Congrats to the winners.

Investigative Journalism: Ideas for Covering the Quebec Student Demos

Check out Bilbo Poynter's new biweekly online column, Stories Undone, all about investigative journalism in Canada on This Magazine's website.

His first column explores ideas for better in-depth investigative reporting on the Quebec student demonstrations against Premier Jean Charest's proposed massive tuition fee hike.

Bilbo is executive director and co-founder of the Canadian Centre for Investigative Reporting (of which I have the privilege of being president of the board).

Investigative Journalism: How Obama Plays a Personal Role in Okaying Assassinations

U.S. President Barack Obama's unprecedented and gruesome role in approving the killing of every suspected Al Qaeda militant is investigated in detail in this interesting example of investigative reporting in The New York Times.

One of the revelations: Obama has the final say in each assassination at "nominations" meetings - held each week or so with over 100 national security staff to decide who will die next.

Also, when death counts from the huge number of military strikes are released to the public, any male of military age is automatically deemed to be a militant. And presto: Virtually no civilians are thus being killed in the drone attacks.

The assassination campaign has had another bonus for Obama, who was critical of the Guantanamo detention facility in Cuba during his election campaign. No detainees!

Investigative Journalism 2.0: IPaidABribe.com

Just discovered this great site about corruption stories in India: IPaidABribe.com. Created by the Bangalore-based Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy, it harnesses citizen participation to collect stories of corruption and attempted corruption, including details to give a broader picture of the problem and to help the group press for change.

Investigative Journalism: Grim Conditions at Chinese Plant Behind Steve Jobs's Success

The late Steve Jobs was eulogized for building the world's biggest tech firm, but there's been less attention to the workers in China who helped Apple accomplish the feat.

Here's an example of investigative journalism published in The Telegraph of London last year about the grim conditions in the main Chinese plant building most of those nifty iPads.