According to Pardo, in December García and Vilches, residents of the Eastern Cuba province of Holguín, were sanctioned for acts such as exchanging emails with Cuban writers abroad, considered “improper conduct of intellectuals [...] to the revolutionary process.” According to Luis Felipe Rojas, a Holguín poet, this all occurred following a “meeting and purge” at the National Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba, also known as UNEAC.

Writes Pardo:

Both writers were put through the same process used by communist regimes throughout the world, including meetings where they were encouraged to admit their “crimes” and criticize their own behavior. In fighting their dismissal, the two sanctioned writers did not assert their rights to free communication. To date, Vilches Proenza has remained silent, and Garcia Verdecia has said he was only offering intellectual critiques to strengthen the Cuban revolution.

Catching these men in their so-called counterrevolutionary acts was simplified by the fact that both depended on the writers union for their Internet access, which is both scarce and expensive on the island. The writers union operates its own cybercafé, open only to members, who pay hourly fees and must agree to abide by an ethics code. That code specifically bars visiting any web sites which might “represent a threat to socialist values.”

Until Tuesday, the writers union official site had not published anything about the case. It came to public attention, however, through Holguin poet Luis Felipe Rojas, who dared to post a report on his blog, Crossing the Barbed Wire.

Pardo, author of Lunes de Post-Revolución, is a member  of the “alternative Cuban blogosphere,” the growing network of bloggers that has gained world notoriety through Yoani Sánchez.

Access to the web in Cuba is limited to hotels, a few cyber cafes, embassies and public offices. Most of the dissident blogs are blocked inside the island, forcing bloggers to e-mail their texts to friends abroad who post them online.

In recent months, the Cuban regime, which has a long record of punishing dissidents, has engaged in different acts of repression against bloggers and writers. These have included the kidnapping and beating of Pardo, Sánchez and fellow blogger Claudia Cadelo, as well as the retaliatory erection of a wall on the yard of Convivencia magazine contributor Karina Gánvez Chiú.

CUBAN WRITERS FIRED FOR “IMPROPER USE” OF THE INTERNET [AllVoices]
In Times of Plague the Larger Specimens Will Die [AllVoices]


Photo of Verdecia and Proenza taken from an AllVoices post by Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo.

A few disclaimers: The Aughts were also the decade in which I penetrated the United States (2004) and became a closer observer of all things Latino, which makes this account necessarily slanted towards the second half of the decade. Also, here I use a subjective way of defining what is substantially Latino in terms of pop culture: not circumscribed to blood or last names, but rather like pornography—I know it when I see it. I don’t care if Perez Hilton‘s real name is Mario Lavandeira and he learned to speak Spanish before English: His cultural contributions (?) are not Latino in any relevant way.

Ok? Aquí vamos.

Political Penetration: Several Latinos rose to political prominence during the past decade (presidential hopeful Bill Richardson and disgraced Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, to name a few), but no event was more important than the induction of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. The Bronx-born judge crystallized the Aughts version of the Latino Dream—one in which a second-generation immigrant rose to the highest levels of power by means of her brain, not sports or artistic talent. Her cool temper during the predictably long and boring confirmation hearings turned one of her “controversial” statements into a motto some of us have taken to heart: When things get ugly, we can aspire to nothing better than being “wise Latinos.” (Latina magazine took it one step further, turning the phrase into a fundraising t-shirt What’s not wise about that?)

On the other side of political penetrations (that is, the failed ones), we cannot forget the day when Daddy Yankee—he, the libertarian lyricist of “Gasolina” (see below)—threw his support behind John McCain. The political debut of the Puerto Rican musician gave us the immortal words: “I’m a man on (sic) a few words, but with a lot of action, like I always said.” (Wherever he was, we presume, the late Cantinflas smiled.)

How to catch up if you missed it: The revolution will not be televised, menso. Just look around and you will see Latino political figures all around you — Mel Martinez, Ken Salazar, Bob Menendez, Linda Sanchez and her sister Loretta — the list goes on and on. With 16% of the population Latinos already are the largest minority in the country. (Here’s a prediction for the next decade: the press will finally catch up.)

Literary Penetration: Yes, after all these years, some still name drop Gabriel García-Márquez when a conversation turns literary. Yes, he remains the only Latino writer in Gringo eyes. Surprisingly though, the Aughts have seen an upset in the status quo: the Colombian writer has been overshadowed by Chilean phenomenon, Roberto Bolaño and his all-too-perfect myth (see “Bolaño Inc.”) With the early accolades of the likes of Susan Sontag, and the posthumous publication in English of his major novels The Savage Detectives and 2666, the late Bolaño (1953-2003) became the literary equivalent of a bomb that keeps redecorating the landscape years after it has exploded.

The other Latino literary phenomenon of the decade was homebred. More than ten years after his breakthrough collection of short stories Drown (1997), Dominican-American (born in Santo Domingo, moved to New Jersey at the age of 6) writer Junot Diaz took the world by storm with his Pulitzer prize-winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007). In her review for the Times, Michiko Kakutani exclaimed that the book was so original it could only be described as “Mario Vargas Llosa meets ‘Star Trek’ meets David Foster Wallace meets Kanye West.”

How to catch up: In the case of Bolaño, you can start by reading Jonathan Lethem‘s glowing review of 2666 (but be warned that Lethem swallowed the myth: Bolaño was no heroin addict), nor was one of his stories published by the New Yorker. In the case of Díaz, check out the story which Wao was based on here, or listen to this reading of “How to Date a Brown Girl (Black Girl, White Girl, or Halfie).” Most importantly, learn to say “ghettonerd.”

Musical Penetration: As mentioned before, anything would be better than Ricky Martin, so I guess we should be thankful for the great musical crossover of the decade: reggaetón. At times, the pan-Caribbean blend of reggae and hip-hop seemed to blast from every corner, car and bodega, particularly after the success of “Gasolina” by Daddy Yankee (2004-2005). Radios that played only reggaeton (and the more generic notion of “urban music”) were created, and by early 2009, academic essays on reggaeton deserved a serious anthology. According to its authors, reggaeton could also be the first truly transnational genre of music.

The other great crossover musical success of the decade (sorry, JLo—or whatever her name is at the time of this writing) was Shakira. During the summer of 2006, “Hips Don’t Lie” became a worldwide hit, the most played song on American radio during one week, and the hips of the title became the most famous since Elvis‘. What made Shakira’s story even more fascinating was her chameleon-like capabilities: by the end of the decade the unlikely South-American-born star was sounding, looking and behaving like any of the Anglo divas, to the point of being accused by many of taking her crossover too far by engaging in “Beyoncification” and refusing to give interviews in Spanish.

How to catch up: You’ve heard Shakira and that Daddy McCain guy. Why not explore Latin music that doesn’t get much radio play? Good Latin music needs no crossover. It is alive and well on the other side of the border. Like soccer. Just sayin’.

Diva Penetration: Can you say the name “Penélope” and not think of a certain Miss Cruz? At the time of this writing, the Spanish actress is burning through moviehouses with her sizzling performance in Broken Embraces and getting ready to follow it up with the musical Nine. Not bad for someone who started the decade with an awkward reprise of her Abre los ojos in Vanilla Sky (2001). (And let’s not mention that Tom Cruise liaison, please.) By 2008, she was shooting with Woody Allen and getting an Oscar for it, while dating Javier Bardem, the great Latino actor of the decade, who also won an Oscar for No Country for Old Men.

How to catch up: Go all the way back in the day and watch an 18 year old Penélope with Bardem in Jamón Jamón (1993).

Media Penetration: With the Latino population growing at a faster pace than any other minority, the big media revolution is still pending—an outlet or network of outlets that truly reflect the diversity of the Latino experience. Yet some benchmarks cannot be denied, particularly for Univisión: the network became one of the most-watched stations in the country, in 2007 it hosted the first presidential debate ever broadcast in Spanish, and “Sábado Gigante” continues to break the world record for longest running TV variety show.

Jorge Ramos, the network’s anchor, situated himself as the main contender in Latino media this side of María Hinojosa, who is beyond reach in so many ways. Ramos became the real crossover story of the Aughts for his presence in both Spanish and English media—a true success for a reporter who moved to the country at the age of 25. (Sorry, Rick Sanchez.) His (rather self-evident, it must be said) books cemented his aura of Latino spokesperson for Latinos and English-speakers, while his participation in the presidential debates of 2008 made him the target of an SNL spoof. Now that is penetration.

Another significant landmark this year: Chicano comedian George Lopez got a late night show on TBS, which may prove to be a more significant milestone for TV landscape than the hyped move of Jay Leno to prime-time.

And while television may have the big numbers, surprisingly, it’s the dying newspapers that seem to hold the political clutch: during the demonstrations for immigrants’ rights and while organizing a coalition to support Sonia Sotomayor, dailies like La Opinión and El Diario helped rally the troops to have Lou Dobbs removed from CNN. While neither Dobbs nor the network acknowledged that it was the grassroots Latino campaign that caused his ousting, his resignation is one of the great milestones for Latinos— the activists behind it claim it forever changed the way Latinos organize and defend themselves.

What you need to know: Perez Hilton is not Latino. Perez Hilton is not Latino. Perez Hilton is not Latino. Ditto for Mario Lopez.

José Simián is a producer at NY1 Noticias, where he hosts a literature and music interview segment. His writing has appeared in NY Daily News, Huffington Post, Sports Illustrated Latino and Billboard en Español. He will be writing the “Meet The Prensa” column for Mediaite.

The study found that only 645 out of 34,452 news stories appeared between February and August 2009 – that is, a mere 1.87% – contained substantial references to Hispanic/Latinos. To qualify as such, 25% of the story needed to center on the demographic group and its race/ethnicity/religion.

More important, the study affirms, is that even in those cases, the coverage is driven by events, not substantial portrayal of the Hispanic reality. The nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court informed 39% of the Hispanic news stories. Other significant subjects were the Mexican drug war (15%), the H1N1 flu outbreak (13%) and immigration (8.4%). As the debate over CNN’s “Latino in America” documentary showed, this is not a minor issue: the Hispanic community is extremely sensitive of the way it is portrayed in media. The fact that a significant portion of the coverage given to Hispanics centers on issues that are either criminal, sanitary or divisive in nature will not be overlooked by activists and politicians.

The study was conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, which reviews and codes 55 news outlets (newspapers, cable, broadcast television, websites and radio) Monday through Friday, as well as the Sunday papers.

Read the whole study here.

Lovato is the co-founder of Presente.org, a grassroots-meets-online organization for the advancement of Latinos, responsible for Basta Dobbs, the most notorious of the Latino grassroots organizations that demanded the firing of the anchor. The activists accused Dobbs of fueling anti-immigrant extremism, and CNN of double standard for profiting from hatred against Latinos while courting them with Latino talent and Latino-oriented programming.

Main points of contention for the campaign were Dobbs’ false assertions that illegal immigrants had caused an exponential rise in leprosy, and that this group also constituted one-third of the prisoners in federal jails. The Latino tide against Dobbs gained strength this year after a series of hate crimes in New York City and Long Island was attributed by activists to the anti-immigrant rhetoric of which he was the most visible face. The spark that finally lit the fire was the commentator’s participation in the “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” rally in September in Washington, DC. The event was organized by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), considered by some to be a hate group.

“We knew that CNN was divided by Lou Dobbs…We made a strategic decision to help the forces of good inside CNN.”

When the campaign against Dobbs was gaining momentum, CNN aired the four-hour documentary “Latino in America,” the most ambitious attempt by a network to date of painting the mosaic of the Latino experience. To many, this was a point of no return for the network: it was either for or against Latinos. According to its organizers, Basta Dobbs and other efforts gathered almost 150,000 signatures in less than two months.

As everybody knows by now, Dobbs resigned on air on Wednesday November 11, attributing his decision to the “winds of change” that had “begun buffeting this country,” while promising to engage in “constructive problem solving.” No specific mention of the Latino campaign against him was made. Dobbs’ resignation simply stated that he had “talked extensively” with Jon Klein, president of CNN/U.S., over the last months and that he had agreed to release him from his contract.

The following day, Klein gave interviews to NPR and the New York Times, saying that the decision was made after conversations held since the beginning of the year “about the overall positioning of the network and the need for him to remove opinion from his show.” Klein expressly denied that the move had been influenced by the Latino groups, even when he acknowledged meeting with Alex Nogales, of the National Hispanic Media Coalition, to discuss the controversy over Dobbs. According to him, it was a “routine meeting” of which Nogales came out “unsatisfied” and with no promises on his part. (Mr. Nogales did not return phone calls to comment on the meeting for this article.)

But the Latino activists disagree with this official version of Dobbs’ exit. They say they are aware it happened in part because of CNN’s drop in ratings and a change in the course of the network. That doesn’t diminish the fact, they say, that Mr. Klein knew he had a major problem in his hands with Mr. Dobbs opinions, and was facing an uphill battle against them. The movement, Lovato argues, was already spreading over Latin America to target CNN en Español, while here in the country they were ready to boycott the advertisers of the network. Here, he gives us his take on Dobbs sudden exit, CNN’s decision-making process and what it all says about Latino clout in this country.

>>>NEXT: Interview With Roberto Lovato: “You can’t have it both ways, CNN.”

Ian Kelly
Department Spokesman

Washington, DC

November 9, 2009

The U.S. government strongly deplores the assault on bloggers Yoani Sanchez, Orlando Luis Pardo, and Claudia Cadelo. On November 6, these three activists were forcibly detained by plain clothes security personnel and beaten while en route to a peaceful demonstration in Havana.

The President has proclaimed November 9 World Freedom Day. It is precisely this sort of repression and violence against the voices of freedom and reconciliation that World Freedom Day is meant to expose. We call on the Government of Cuba to ensure the full respect of the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all its citizens.

We have expressed to the Cuban government our deep concern with the assaults, and we are following up with inquiries to Yoani Sanchez, Orlando Luis Pardo, and Claudia Cadelo regarding their personal well-being and access to medical care.

Meanwhile, news of this statement and of the attack are predictably absent from the Cuban press. The websites of the Cuban News Agency, as well as those of official newspapers Granma and Juventud Rebelde, have no reports on Yoani Sánchez’s story.

Yoani Sánchez has resumed her activities. Her Twitter feed today reported she attended the meeting of the “Blogger Academy,” an independent center of teaching that gathers some 30 students. A post said she was recovering from her back injury, and that the Academy was “the best balm”:

We spoke to Yoani on Sunday night.

###

How are you, Yoani?

Well, I can’t say I’m fine, but I’m here.

I read the post where you narrate how you were kidnapped and beaten. Is there anything you want to add to it?

Well, a few hours ago I dictated a post through the phone — I imagine it’s already online. It’s a reflection on being a victim and the things that I didn’t say earlier.

One of the things that strikes me the most about this attack is that your blog is mainly about daily life in Cuba. You are not criticizing anybody in particular or making incendiary denouncements. Your posts are about simple things. It is shocking that the Cuban government can be afraid of that.

I don’t think they are afraid of me, because I’m just a little person that they can easily eliminate. What they are afraid of is the phenomenon of the alternative blogosphere, the phenomenon that more and more young people are projecting their voices: that is tremendously contagious. This is why they may be attempting to make a sort of ‘prevention,’ applying some sort of vaccine, so the blogger virus, the virus of opinions, does not spread. I don’t think their attack is against the person of Yoani Sánchez, but rather against the blogger phenomenon, a phenomenon of different opinions that is taking place in Cuba. They want to paralyze as many people as possible with a preventive strike.

“They don’t understand that these new phenomena can’t be fought with the old weapons of repression. They still haven’t understood the potential of the web.”

Has anything like this happened to you before? Were you followed or attacked?

In the two years I’ve been writing my blog, I’ve been living as if in one of those Saturday night films: people following me wherever I go. But until now they hadn’t interacted in a physical or violent way with me.

There was one precedent, however. During a rock concert, where some friends and I demanded the liberation of a musician, there was some sort of organized violence. But it was covered by the loud music and everything else going on at the concert. What happened [on Friday] was more direct, more aimed at the blogosphere. Those affected by this action were blogger Claudia Cadelo, blogger Orlando Luis Pardo and me. This shows that [those in the Government] are particularly stricken by the potential our words have through the Internet.

But that reasoning is flawed, too. Your work has received recognition outside of Cuba and it’s impossible to cut your access to the web. By attacking you, they might make you a greater figure than if they just ignored you.

Of course, but they are dunces. Their main problem is that they don’t understand that these new phenomena can’t be fought with the old weapons of repression. They still haven’t understood the potential of the web, and that these repressive measures do nothing but increase the number of hits on my blog. They haven’t understood very well what is it that the new technologies do, nor the different effects that repression causes when a blogger is attacked. So they are just employing the old methods of restraint, intimidation, and attempting to isolate you. But they actually produce the opposite effect.

In the post you wrote about the attack, you state that the actions of your kidnappers were motivated by the “the blustering terror of he who knows that his days are numbered.”

Yes, because when the arguments and the faith in a system are over, when the people stop believing in a certain political discourse, those who are in charge can only resort to violence and restraint. This is what we are seeing in Cuba now: the absence of any sort of argument, handling people through violence and fear. This is all we have left. There is no symbolical legacy, none the things that existed in the first years of the [revolutionary] process. Terror is the only thing that remains.

>>>NEXT: “I run towards the place where fear is born.”

CNN’s documentary “Latino in America” (no official online video as of this writing) debuted last week to great expectations, but so far the response from Latinos has been mostly negative, toward the special and its host Soledad O’Brien.

Take for instance the op-ed reaction by ColorLines magazine editor Daisy Hernández, published on El Diario last Monday. She claimed that “Latino in America” was not really about Latinos but “rather about the mythology that gringos have built on immigrants, seeing them as people who succeed without the help of their families, communities or the government.” She also saw CNN suggesting that the responsibility for the problems Latinos face resided in their families (as opposed to failures in policies or institutions). Finally, she criticized the piece because of what it could have done but didn’t, like, say, “to propose a review of the education system.” (No word on if this meant O’Brien should quit journalism and run for office.)

On Tuesday, it was the turn of Amherst College professor Ilan Stavans. The noted scholar started his analysis by dismissing O’Brien as “questionable” but not explaining why. Then, he accused CNN of everything from being “interested in attracting the Hispanic viewer” to being slow; from censorship for not airing a soundbite that attacked Lou Dobbs to forgetting that there were “thinking people this side of the television screen.” (His attacks on Lou Dobbs, as well as the campaign currently underway to have the anchor fired from CNN for his unfair attacks on immigrants are fair, but have nothing to do with the quality of “Latino in America.”)

Some went even further. If you have too much free time on your hands (and a fetish for incongruous rants), watch the YouTube video posted by stand-up comedian Mike Robles. There, he repeatedly calls O’Brien a “pendeja” for “exploiting” Latinos, and even uses a Hitler analogy by accusing the reporter of “using her knowledge” (of journalism? of Latinos?) in evil ways for not portraying the Latino experience in a more positive light (forward to 4:30). (Contrary to what you may think, Mr. Robles is not a noted scholar of Godwin’s Law.)

The common ground of these criticisms —which resemble some I heard from friends and colleagues— seems to be that the stories portrayed by O’Brien were not representative of the Latino experience. That, unless you consider ‘pendeja’ a serious argument, of course. And, without refuting in detail their assumptions and conclusions (most of which I disagree with), it must be noted that none of the mentioned commentators analyzed in detail the second part of the documentary, which was more susceptible of editorial criticism (such as ending the 4-hour saga with a man failing a test for the second time). This leads me to believe that they didn’t watch the whole show — just jumped to quick conclusions.

Let’s say it clear: “Latino in America” is not perfect, but it is a great work of television journalism. In four hours it covered a wide range of stories that represent a significant portion of the lives Latinos lead.

>>>NEXT: Inside “Latino In America”

Once the players finished the round of gentlemanly statements that define a tennis trophy ceremony, presenter Dick Enberg rushed to explain in morbid detail the prizes for the champion. But Del Potro seemed to have other things on his mind—who knows, perhaps glory may not be a Lexus convertible, after all.

“Can I speak in Spanish?” Del Potro said when the presenter finally paused for a second.

“Ah, sorry, we are running out of time here,” was Enberg’s cold response

As Enberg kept talking about money, Del Potro looked as if he was being punished instead of crowned.

“And now, the presentation of the championship trophy…” Enberg went on.

But the man who had just beaten the greatest tennis player of all time still had some energy left. Politely, he requested to speak in Spanish for the second time.

“Very quickly, in Spanish, he wants to say ‘hello’ to his friends here and in Argentina,” presenter Enberg patronizingly said.

“I want to thank my team—this would have been impossible to achieve without them”, Del Potro said. “To all the Argentineans here, and especially to my mother, my father, Julieta, my grandparents and all my friends and the people who have supported me: This is for you.”

And then he cried, as we normally do when we are allowed to express great emotions in our native tongue.

A champion should not have to beg for that.

The video: (fast forward to 3:20)

José Simián is a producer at NY1 Noticias, where he hosts a literature and music interview segment. His writing has appeared in NY Daily News, Huffington Post, Sports Illustrated Latino and Billboard en Español. He will be writing the “Meet The Prensa” column for Mediaite.

Rossana Rosado, publisher and CEO of one of the fastest growing newspapers in the country chooses her words carefully but not without passion. She is of course, talking about Sonia Sotomayor, whom her newspaper chose as one of its Remarkable Women for 2009 in May, right around the time her name was being mentioned as one of the most likely Supreme Court nominees. New York legislators Charles Schumer and Nydia Velázquez — the two politicians who championed Sotomayor’s candidacy — were at the banquet for the awards. Sotomayor was the main speaker at the event. El Diario published op-eds and editorials, rallied politicians and community leaders behind the Bronx-raised judge.

Yet Rosado won’t call it a campaign.

“What we did was to support the candidacy of a Latina who was super-qualified for that job,” she says. “The fact that she happened to be a Latina and happened to be a New Yorker was simply aligned with our mission.”

Rossado’s own mission, her ascendance to a powerful role in the Hispanic community of New York, was full of turns. Starting as a desk assistant for WCBS-AM in the early eighties while she was still a student at Pace, she soon realized she needed to take a different route to “rise through the newsroom.” That led her to become City Hall reporter with El Diario, producer with channel 11, and Vice President for Public Affairs at the Health and Hospitals Corporation of New York City. In 1995 she returned to the newspaper as Editor-in-Chief, becoming publisher four years later.

“It has been some incredible 25 years in New York media,” she says with a sigh of relief. Then she looks through the windows of her Brooklyn office, which offer an impressive sight of New York City — all river, bridges, projects and buildings that fill the horizon.

But what if it, instead of Sotomayor, the Supreme Court candidate had been a white Republican man?

“Well, it would have not been as aligned with our mission,” she says, letting out a laugh for the first time, before recovering her public New Yorker persona.

“I would like to think that we would have been supportive of any New York candidate for the Supreme Court.”

In a conversation with Mediaite’s “Meet The Prensa,” Rosado addressed the balance between advocacy for her readership and journalistic objectivity, the profile of her readership, and why Impremedia does not need a national Hispanic newspaper.

Watch here:

Rosado on local media: “As we have more and more choices in media, we as citizens still go to the most local media we have…I think that El Diario is one of those products that is severely local. It just resonates with people.”
Rosado on why there isn’t a national Hispanic newspaper: “Does there need to be? The Impremedia strategy is to put together existing papers that already have their [long-ingrained] roots in the community…to create a new brand is much more difficult… Do we need a USA Today model in Spanish? I don’t think so, no.”
Rosado on who reads El Diario: “I think in the past people have assumed that if someone is reading El Diario they don’t speak English. And clearly that’s not true.”
Rosado on the myth of journalistic objectivity: “There has long been a myth about journalistic objectivity. And in fact most journalists are not objective — and in fact most news organizations today are not objective…I think one of the reasons why the New York Post is so popular is that people know exactly what they’re getting and they’re very clear about where they’re coming from and what their editorial line is. And I think some other papers are ambivalent about who they are and what they stand for. We’ve always been very clear that we have a sense of mission toward our readership…I think what you strive for in journalism is balance and fairness, in other words, do you have both sides of the story? And I think that’s different from objectivity.”

It was the usual display of Hispanic pride, respect for the accomplished judge and her mother, and the reshaping of the American Dream.

Then NPR’s Tell Me More host Michel Martin asked what Gerson Borrero had to say.

“You’re a columnist, so I think you probably have a little bit more latitude in what you may say,” Martin said, a hint of irony slipping between her words.

“With all due respect to my esteemed colleagues, both of them…” Borrero said – and launched into one of his famous tirades.

Eighty seconds of ranting ensued, with Borrero calling the networks’ programming “ridiculous,” and denouncing “the suits” who ran them for not caring to “educate, illustrate and inform” Hispanics.

After being stopped by Michel to allow a reply from Univisión’s anchor María Elena Salinas, and Telemundo’s reporter Lori Montenegro, Borrero decided to abandon the conversation.

He felt he wasn’t given the chance to fully express his point of view.

Yet it was probably a good morning for Borrero, who seems to enjoy a good controversy as some enjoy a fine bottle of wine.

The Puerto-Rican-born New Yorker has been picking fights over Hispanic issues for decades, most notably when he lost a radio talk show after suggesting that three Hispanic Congressmen lacked political cojones (one of them was a woman, for whom he preferred the term “ovaries”); and when he resigned to the position of editor in chief of New York’s El Diario over a column on education reform in Cuba signed by Fidel Castro.

These days, Borrero is most recognized for his weekly appearances in NY1′s Inside City Hall, where he confronts Guardian Angels’ Curtis Sliwa, and his “Bajo Fuego” columns in El Diario. He has also recently added a new platform for his commentary with the Borrero Report.

In a conversation with Mediaite’s “Meet The Prensa,” Mr. Borrero addressed his position on the political status of Puerto Rico (“occupied”), his upbringing in the Bronx (“it made me tougher”), Fox News (“drive-by racists”), soap operas (“they make people stupid”), Hispanic radio (“full of Howard Stern wannabes”), and his insult-ridden journalistic style.

It was also the first time he addressed his NPR controversy on Univisión and Telemundo.

“As far as I am concerned, they could go out of business tomorrow,” he quipped.

Interview below:

Meet the Prensa #2: Gerson Borrero from josesimian on Vimeo

Consider the television networks. Univisión regularly has over 3 million viewers in prime time, competing neck and neck with the traditional broadcast networks. NBC’s Telemundo network, along with Azteca América and Univisión’s cable signals Telefutura and Galavisión, add millions of viewers to the mix. Yet their power comes mostly from soap operas, showbiz programs and sports—not news or political coverage.

The lack of a clear standardbearer is more dramatic in the Hispanic press. The largest circulations belong to Los Angeles’ La Opinión (92,289 on weekdays), Miami’s El Nuevo Herald (a spin-off of The Miami Herald, 71,318), and New York’s El Diario (52,780). But however influential these newspapers may be in their respective communities (El Diario‘s recent campaign for Sonia Sotomayor is a good example), their aim seems to be locally-oriented, and their journalistic and political clutch stops at the borders of their respective states. Countless other Spanish publications exist in the country, all following the same local, community-based structure.

This state of affairs may be due to the numerous national groups that fall under the Hispanic umbrella, each with its own slang and cultural references. Of the total Hispanics population living in the United States, 64% are of Mexican background and 9% are of Puerto Rican origins. From the remaining 27%, no country represents more than 3%. Furthermore, these Hispanic factions have gathered in different regions of the country. Thus, while the West and Southwest are largely dominated by Mexicans, Florida has traditionally had a Cuban majority, and New York a Puerto Rican one. From this perspective, then, a national Hispanic newspaper or magazine seems unlikely.

There is yet another obstacle for a unified high standard outlet: the language. As time goes by and Latino immigrants have children and grandchildren born in the United States, many of the new generations are more at ease with English than with Spanish. A 2007 study by the Pew Hispanic Center showed that, even when only 23% of Latino immigrants spoke English “very well,” nearly all Hispanic adults born in the United States to Hispanic parents were fluent in the language.

This language shift in Hispanics creates a paradox for media. Even when outlets can rely on a constantly growing audience due to immigration and a birth rate three times higher than that of general population, many of its potential readers and viewers switch to mainstream English media upon reaching a certain degree of English proficiency and cultural assimilation. Hence, Hispanic media is set to constantly lose some of its more sophisticated audience. In mainstream television, this may explain sticking to basic entertainment; in print, it favors basic coverage of local news, sports and —once again— showbiz. (It is not surprising that the only successful Latino magazine at the national level is People en Español.)

New media outlets are emerging to cater to the young bilingual or English-speaking Hispanic demographic. An interesting example is Guanabee, a growing pop culture website that attempts to give “a fresh glance into the world of Latino affairs without the sentimentality or stereotypes found in other media.” “The Spanish market is well saturated, but no one was talking to people like me about what it meant to be Latino in this country,” says co-founder Cindy Casares, a fifth-generation Mexican-American journalist. (Targeting the bilingual and bicultural Latinos has also been attempted by NBC’s bilingual Mun2 cable station, as well as Latino sections in newspapers like “Viva” in New York’s Daily News, and “Tempo” in the New York Post.)

Something else is missing in this conversation: media criticism. This column will be an effort to give a more detailed account of the achievements and challenges of Hispanic outlets; a modest attempt to bring this immense cobweb of newspapers, TV stations and websites to standards comparable to those of our Anglo-Saxon colleagues.

Mediaite readers, please meet the prensa.

(And while we’re at it, I’ll keep reading the New Yorker for inspiration.)

José Simián is a producer at NY1 Noticias, where he hosts a literature and music interview segment. His writing has appeared in NY Daily News, Huffington Post, Sports Illustrated Latino and Billboard en Español. He will be writing the “Meet The Prensa” column for Mediaite.