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Phillips Foundation Announces Journalism Fellowships for 2003

POTOMAC, Md., May 14, 2003 -- The Phillips Foundation today announced the winners of its tenth annual journalism fellowship awards. Tim Carney, a reporter for Evans & Novak and a columnist for Brainwash, Mario Fantini, a communications consultant for the World Bank in La Paz, Bolivia, Mike Porath, a producer for The New York Times on the Web, and Evelina Shmukler, a reporter for Dow Jones Newswires in London, captured $50,000 full-time fellowships. Paul Crespo, a columnist for The Miami Herald, Brett Decker, a member of the editorial board of The Washington Times, and Andrea Seton Kirk, a freelance journalist and Middle East correspondent for Inside the Vatican magazine, won $25,000 part-time fellowships. Mark Stricherz, a freelance journalist in Washington, D.C., received a special $6,000 Alumni Fund Award. The full-time and part-time fellowships are for year-long writing projects. The Alumni Fund Award is for one magazine-length article. 

The fellowship winners were introduced during an awards dinner last night at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Robert D. Novak served as guest speaker at the dinner, where he was presented with The Phillips Foundation’s 2003 Lifetime Achievement Award. 

Carney, 24, will devote his fellowship to a study of how some big businesses work with government regulators to stifle competition. His project title is “Regulatory Robber Barons.” Porath, 27, will examine how Saudi Arabia has failed to prepare its youth for a world in which tolerance and innovation are necessary for economic success in a project titled, “Pulling Up the Roots of Terrorism: The Struggle for Reform in Saudi Arabia.” Shmukler, 26, will do an in-depth analysis of “Pyramid Scheme: The Pitfalls and Possibilities of U.S. Economic Aid to Egypt.” Crespo, 38, will explore “Dueling Allegiances: The Impact of 9-11 on Multiculturalism and Patriotism in America.” Decker, 32, will focus on the growing terrorist threat in countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia and The Philippines in a project titled, “Terror’s Backyard: The New Threat to America from Southeast Asia.” Fantini, 34, will examine the cultural and political transformation of the State of Vermont from a conservative, Republican state to a liberal, Democratic one. Kirk, 27, will focus on “The Pontificate of John Paul II and the Administration of George W. Bush: Points of Convergence and Divergence in Social and Foreign Policy.” Stricherz, 32, will write a magazine-length article on the topic of “The Rise of Latte Liberals: How the Democrats Embraced Identity Politics and Abandoned their New Deal Base.” 

The Phillips Foundation, a non-profit organization founded in 1990, established its journalism fellowship program to advance the cause of objective journalism. The Foundation has awarded 38 fellowships since 1994 for journalism projects supportive of American culture and a free society. The fellowship program is open to working print journalists with less than five years of professional experience.