Until recently I was a freelance reporter for United Press International covering defense procurement and emerging security threats. My work was published on a daily basis as part of UPI’s premium news service for reprint in various publications including the Washington Times and the Middle East Times. Click here for samples.
I have also published longer format analysis pieces for UPI. Below are examples.
Analysis: AFRICOM mission prompts concern
By Steven Davy, UPI Correspondent
A Refugees International report suggests the Pentagon could overstep its authority with AFRICOM, while the Center for American Progress argued U.S. national security strategy should reject the trend toward militarizing foreign policy.
Click here for full story
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Interview: Gen. Peter Pace
By Steven Davy, UPI Correspondent
In a recent interview with United Press International, soon after assuming his new job as president and chief executive officer of SM&A Strategic Advisors Inc., Pace also defended the sometimes-slow process of change in the military.
In the interview, Pace defended himself against criticism that he wasn’t forthright enough about the situation in Iraq.
“I had multiple opportunities every week, every day with the secretary of defense, multiple times a week with the president, to advise them and the National Security Council and Congress on the things that I was hearing in the field and that my senior advisers would talk to me about,” Pace said.
Click here for full story.
PBS MediaShift
I am also a regular contributor to PBS MediaShift as a political correspondent. Below are some examples.
Can Posterous and Tumblr Boost Government Transparency?
by Steven Davy
If a present-day version of whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg was looking for a way to easily release important confidential information, he might find himself drawn to Posterous or its micro-blogging/lifestreaming competitor, Tumblr. These services have the potential to offer a new level of simplicity for releasing government information, and help open up the closed doors of Congress.
Beyond becoming tools for leaking information, experts also say these new platforms, which are easy to use and encourage brevity, could help change the way government communicates with citizens.
Click here for full story.
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Young Political Candidates Confronted by Digital Past on Facebook
by Steven Davy
Last spring Emanuel Pleitez, 26, ran for California’s 32nd Congressional seat in a special election to replace Hilda Solis, the new secretary of labor.
During the campaign, one of Pleitez’s opponents, California State Sen. Gil Cedillo, discovered photos from Pleitez’s Facebook profile that showed Pleitez hanging around with various women at parties. The Cedillo campaign used the photos as the basis for a mailer that was sent to homes in the district. The mailer presented Pleitez as a partier, drinker and womanizer, among other smears.
Pleitez admits the negative attack probably cost him some votes. However, instead of shying away from the photos, Pleitez said in a phone interview that he used the incident to reinforce the transparency of his campaign.
Click here for full story.
EJ Magazine
I have also published in Ej. A magazine publication from the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism at Michigan State University.
Hot Planets, Hot Spots
Why U.S. intelligence takes climate change seriously
By Steven Davy
The United States military and intelligence community have moved beyond debating the existence of global climate change and are planning for the worst. Alarming them is climate change’s potential to further destabilize fragile nations, causing mass migration and providing a breeding ground for widespread acceptance of extreme, potentially violent ideologies.
The change in climate caused by the burning of fossil fuels and by other human-related emissions has wide-ranging implications for U.S. national security interests over the next 20 years, Thomas Fingar, the chairman of the National Intelligence Council, told Congress last June.
Click here to read the full story.
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Army Green
A new study ties environmental concern to military success
by Steven Davy
At an unspecified foreign airfield, U.S. soldiers buried several drums containing hazardous liquids that eventually contaminated soil and groundwater. In Iraq, U.S. military trucks leaked fuel and dirty dish, laundry and bath water. Instead of cleaning it up, soldiers referred to the spills as “replenishing the oil wells.”
These are examples of the Army’s environmental footprint during long-term foreign deployments uncovered by a RAND Corp. study, “Green Warriors: Environmental Considerations in Army Contingency Operations.” It’s a footprint that can be the difference between winning local support and escalating an insurgency.
Click here for full story
WIKI-Media Project
In the Summer of 2008 I collaborated with four other graduate students at Michigan State University on a unique online wiki project. Despite having no face-to-face interaction, the five of us completed a multi-platform exposé on wind energy in the Great Lakes region through the use of Internet-based web-tools. We titled the project Great Lakes Wind and each of us contributed a section. I focused on education and wind energy and featured a professor at Western Michigan University who was single-handedly responsible for bringing a wind turbine to WMU. Here is an exerpt from the piece.
Dr. John Patten may be the director 
of Western Michigan’s University’s Center for Manufacturing Research but he’s been receiving a lot attention for what he refers to as an appliance on a pole.
In September 2007, Patten personally donated a forty foot direct-grid-connected wind turbine for installation at Western Michigan University’s College of Engineering and Applied Sciences. The wind turbine became the first one installed in the Kalamazoo area and one of only a few in the region.
Though Patten didn’t write a personal check for the turbine, he did use personal funds from his indirect cost account at WMU, which is left over money from his grant funded research.
Patten has been involved in the renewable energy movement since it began decades ago. With the generous gift he fulfilled a long time personal goal to demonstrate that at the end of the day he’d actually done something.
Click here to read more.
Previous Work
I have also worked as a freelance correspondent for the Kalamazoo Gazette covering politics, business and cultural news for Kalamazoo’s neighboring village of Mattawan.
Click here for samples.
