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| Diane Rehm - photo by Ralph Alswang |
By contributor Donna Shor
At the Roast and Toast for NPR/WAMU talk show host Diane Rehm, broadcaster Juan Williams ―now at Fox News―riffed on his very public ouster from NPR, saying “Everyone in this room knows where I don’t work!”.
Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer, founder of the Public Broadcasting Caucus, relished repeating the New Hampshire gaffe of Congresswoman Michele Bachmann―not a fan of public broadcasting―when she praised the state for their “patriotic” Revolutionary War towns, Lexington and Concord, temporarily relocating them from Massachusetts.
Diane was given the Excellence in Journalism Award by the American News Women’s Club, who hosted the gala at the National Press Club. Roger Mudd emceed, Claire Sanders Swift was chair, and Pamela (Pamela’s Punch) Sorensen co-chaired.
Ream, who began at WAMU as a volunteer in 1973, now has an international following of 2 million listeners; but not without heartache. She lost her voice for a time with a vocal cord malady, recovering it by hard work, painful injections of botox in her neck, and the aid of speech therapist Susan Miller, who attended the gala.
