NY Times Publisher Outlines Possible Threats to Press Freedom Under Trump
By Mel Laytner
AG Sulzberger, the publisher of The New York Times, issued a stark warning about the dangers that the incoming Trump administration could pose to press independence, describing methods used by authoritarian leaders worldwide to illustrate the risks.
Speaking to packed audience at the Silurians Press Club on Jan. 15, Sulzberger didn’t mince words.
“We’re in a period of prolonged and fairly intense democratic erosion,” he began, setting the stage for a critical conversation about the fragile state of press freedom.
Sulzberger outlined a troubling pattern in a wide-ranging conversation with Silurians past president Joe Berger, himself a former Times reporter and editor for 30 years.
Authoritarian leaders in democratic countries, Sulzberger said, cannot engage in overt censorship. Instead, they have adopted more subtle methods of undermining the press.
What is Art? A Journalist's Deep Dive Reveals the Absurdities of New York's Contemporary Art Scene
By Mel Laytner
What is art? Journalist Bianca Bosker tackled this question head-on, or more accurately, head-first, diving deep and emerging with "Get the Picture," a rollicking expose of New York’s contemporary art scene.
With sharp humor and sharper insights, Bosker shared her experiences in a wide-ranging conversation with the Silurians own Betsy Ashton, herself a successful artist, at the club’s Feb. 19 luncheon, catered, perhaps ironically, by the National Art Club.
“For most of my adult life, art and I were not on speaking terms,” Bosker said. Wandering through galleries and museums, she recalled she felt “at least two tattoos and a master’s degree away from figuring out” what she was seeing.
Selwyn Raab (L) and actor Michael Imperioli serve as consulting producer and executive producer, respectively, for American Godfathers.
Selwyn Raab, The Don of Mafia Reporters
Mafia chronicler to Best Selling author to Consulting Producer
By Joseph Berger
When Selwyn Raab as growing up on the clamorous streets of the Lower East Side in the late 1930s and early 1940s, he learned that in the nearby neighborhood of Little Italy there was a group of men called “the Mafia,” whose scary members would sell you fun stuff like fireworks and pot.
Later in the 1960s as an education reporter writing about corrupt school-construction contracts, he was told by school officials that, if the city cracked down on the Mafia gangsters who were behind the corruption, the city would never get the fish it needed for student cafeterias. Nor would the schools’ garbage get picked up.
“Everywhere you looked, there was Mob involvement, and nobody was doing anything about it,” Raab said during a phone interview in September.
A Silurian at the Met Museum of Art:
Chester Higgins, Jr.
Award winning photographer's fascination with Egypt
By Roberta Hershenson
One of the hottest art shows in town this winter was “Flight into Egypt: Black Artists and Ancient Egypt, 1876—Now,” which closed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Feb. 17. Critic Jason Farago, writing in the New York Times, called the show “winningly eclectic” and “beautifully designed,” while referring to Ancient Egypt as “an inspiration but also a lost dream” for the Black diaspora.
Photo by Betsy Kissam
Chester Higgins, Jr., flanked by his two pieces in the Met’s “Flight Into Egypt” exhibit: “My two images help celebrate the African presence in the ancient Egyptian civilization.”
Applications Now Open for Silurians' 80th Excellence in Journalism Awards
- We're the only awards program exclusively honoring local news coverage in the Metro area.
- Awards presented in 16 categories.
- Entry deadline:midnight Monday March 10, 2025.
