%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%  Editorial Board of CBS Incident Committee  %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

                      Thursday, December 22, 1994   (No. 22)

===============================================================================
Table of Contents                                                # of Lines
===============================================================================
1. The Letter From Lin Huang, National Coordinator ......................... 12 
2. My recollections of the CBS Lunch Meeting and its Preparations .......... 41
==============================================================================
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1. The Letter From Lin Huang, National Coordinator ......................... 12 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear CSS and those who supported us in the past five months:

The turbulent year of 1995 has come to an close. In the past year, there were 
a lot of things to be learnt, pondered, and remembered. First of all, we have 
witnessed the unprecedented event in the history of Chinese-American unfolding
just before our very own eyes, that a traditionally silent minority, some 
times is ironically called "model minority", finally stand up and speak for 
themselves, and won. 

Here, we would like extend our sincerely thanks to all of you who have 
participated in various stages of our five months long march, for your 
valuable contributions in manpower and finance. Today, we have received 
roughly $3,000 donations from over 100 individuals. CBS-IC are processing 
the reimbursement requests from our members, for their communication and 
traveling cost. The remaining funds will be used for future operations to 
protect CSS's Civil Rights here in the States.

Without each and everyone of your support, we could not do anything. It was 
your widespread outrage and actions, it was your each and every single 
protest letter, phone/fax call and signature which made the difference. 
Remember, there is no Savior to save us. 

United, we can and should make a difference!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. My recollections of the CBS Lunch Meeting and its Preparations .......... 41
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Xiao Dong

Part I.  Preparations for the Meeting
=====================================
Since the May 19th program aired by the CBS Evening News implying that
ordinary Chinese in the US are potential foreign spies, many protest
letters had been sent to the CBS. Initially, the CBS did not take our
protest as any different from other protests that are staged every other
day against the American media. This is a free country, there is no
censorship, and people are human. Mistakes are unavoidable.

On June 1, a reply letter signed by Mr. Venardos, Vice President of the
CBS News, was sent to many protesters. The CBS Incident Committee
(CBS-IC) was formed earlier on May 28, by Mr. Huang Lin and the members
of the current IFCSS leadership (6th term), Mr. Luo Ning and Mr. Liu
Chengyan. Huang Lin invited me to join the work from the net and I
accepted, since I was very upset about the program and I fully realized
that a single person's protest would not have any real effect.

How I joined the fight
----------------------
Initially, I didn't know that the CBS-IC was a separate entity from the
IFCSS, but later found that out. It just suited me well.As we all know,
the Chinese government has branded the IFCSS as a counter-revolutionary
organization. But I am always a law-abiding individual. I am not, and
do not wish to be a counter-revolutionary in China. I am not, and do not
wish to be a spy in the US. Therefore I don't want to be linked with the
IFCSS just as well as I do not want to be linked with any foreign spies.
On the other hand, I deeply appreciate the works that the IFCSS has done
for the Chinese scholars and students in the US although I am not a
beneficiary of the IFCSS' most successful work, the Chinese Students
Protection Act. As most of us, I always wish the Chinese government
could be more reasonable one day and work with the IFCSS in their
services for the Chinese community in the US. 

The CBS-IC started work based on Mr. Venardos' letter to Mr. Shi Heping,
the 5th term Vice President of the IFCSS. It was a standard letter with
very tough wording, some of which the CBS VP was going to deny that he
had ever written in the upcoming luncheon and, after being shown his
own signature, to claim that he did not remember ever written them. But
this was the letter that actually shut most people up, thinking that we
had already become "the mice crossing street" because some of us were
convicted to be mice by the CBS, the authority in American news media
and by Ms. Connie Chung, the authority on Chinese Americans. Among
CBS-IC members, the feeling was different. This letter prompted us to
do a wide range of investigations, studies and discussions, which
resulted in a letter to the CBS Vice President. It was sent in
late-July, after almost one and half months hard work and hundreds of
revisions. During the drafting process, the Committee of 100, a
prominent Chinese American organization with famous members such as
Yo-yo Ma, L.M. Pei and Chang-Lin Tien printed on their official
stationaries, and which was also very concerned about the news segment,
had offered one of the major revisions. It had 5 major versions. The
final form was version 5.40. Huang Lin and I were almost worn out in
the last few days before sending the letter out, since we were managing
the revisions. 

Although the research and letter writing process was exhausting, it was
the turning point of the whole effort. The real truth we had gotten from
our research not only encouraged ourselves but also won us an array of
supporters. If the CBS report had been true then we would have much less
ground to fight. Only with our solid results, could we persuade many
organizations to firmly side with us. Only with the truth in hand, could
we later on have had U.S. Commission of Civil Rights to support us, and
made CBS aware that they had done a report on totally false information.
It is very crucial for reputable organizations such as OCA, C100 and
many others to make their decisions.

Mi Mi's work
-------------
I can't put it in words how much I appreciated Huang Lin's work. He had
not only done huge amount of creative, research, secretarial and
coordinating work, but also had to withstand tremendous pressures came
from all sides and directions, not all of them friendly. Pressures
included those applied by myself. Sometimes I would send him mails or
call him every other hour to inquire if he had done this or that. And
on a few occasions I had fierce debates with him. I dealt only with him
plus no more than 20 CBS-IC members while drafting the letter, but Huang
Lin had to deal with 80 CBS-IC members, thousands of mailing list (fcbs-l)
subscribers which he was the manager, several major organizations, a
number of news reporters who would just break into his phone conversations
through NYNEX operators, and also the IFCSS operations since he accepted
the post of Chair of the Civil Rights Committee. After the letter was sent
out, we had worked on many fronts, including communications with the US
Commission on Civil Rights, the Federal Communications Commission, the
Naval Institute Press (publisher of the little black book that the CBS
report based on), and mostly, with the Defense Intelligence Agency and
Mr. Eftimiades, the interviewee and author of the little black book. I
contacted Mr. Eftimiades, who claimed to be an expert in China affairs,
and later was discredited by his employer, the Defense Intelligence Agency.
During the CBS meeting, Connie Chung told me that "that is not what he
told us". And she told me that Mr. Eftimiades refused to take their phone
calls and cut his phone lines.  He did the same to CBS-IC. In the process
of trying to contact Mr. Eftimiades, we had sought help from Mr. Chong-Pin
Lin, who wrote a forward for Mr. Eftimiades' little black book and obviously
a friend of Mr.Eftimiades'. However this Mr. Lin Chong-Pin, of American
Enterprise Institute, refused to help us in contacting Mr. Eftimiades, and
furthermore, behind our backs this Mr. Lin told Mr. Eftimiades not to
communicate with us.  This is by Mr. Eftimiades' own account!

Huang Lin contacted the CBS about its response to our letter. Mr. Venardos
reply was that it was in their attorney's hands to "evaluate the costs".
It was interesting because we did not mention any attempt to bring them to
court. 

We are invited for a luncheon
-----------------------------
In early September, we received a reply from CBS, which invited us to a
luncheon. The invitation was circulated within CBS-IC and everyone of our
members was asked to volunteer to go. I originally did not intend to go
since Florida is quite far away from New York and it would take working
days. However I was convinced by several of our members that I should go
there since I played a major role in our research and investigations about
the CBS report and the little black book it based on. I personally didn't
mind going since I felt strongly about this ridiculous program. Finally
Huang Lin assembled those who volunteered. There were five of us: Huang
Lin, Luo Ning representing the IFCSS, Ray Wang of SUNY at Binghamton,
Shuping Lu of NYU. Frank Chen of Columbia also volunteered but was off
the network at the time.  Due to some communication gaps Frank's name was
not in the fax that Huang Lin sent to the CBS, which confirmed that we
were going and suggested the date to be set on September 19, a Monday,
one week after CBS' invitation. We could not delay it further because we
had fought for so long and also because one week after that it was the
official begining of the O.J. Simpson trial. We didn't want to get in the
way of their busy reports on that front.

However, everyone might remember what happened on Sunday, September 18.
The US almost invaded Haiti! Our meeting was postponed, quite reasonably,
by the CBS. But in the meantime, the CBS- IC members had done an intensive
preparation for the meeting. We discussed and planned tactics and strategies,
discussed and wrote down a list of demands, designed CBS positions and
prepared responses.  We designed a list of questions for the CBS people,
and prepared statements and planed how to proceed during the meeting. I
called the CBS and found out that five organizations were invited. IFCSS
and CBS-IC were the two among the five. Committee of 100 was added by
Huang Lin, and OCA had been in close contact with Huang Lin since late
August. Therefore we only had to coordinate with the last organization.
On October 11, the CBS faxed Huang Lin the a list of invited guests for
the meeting. Five were our CBS-IC members, including Luo Ning, who also
represented the IFCSS; one from the Committee of 100; one from the
Organization of Chinese Americans; and one representing 5 universities in
Boston area, Ms. Li Yingying, whom we didn't have contact before. Huang
Lin quickly sent a emergency call to locate Ms. Li, and got contact with
her within hours and briefed her our work. She subsequently joined the
CBS-IC.

Up to the Tuesday before the meeting, fairly speaking none of us had
expected too much.  Huang Lin kept on telling everyone that the offer of
a meeting with us was good enough for us to celebrate. He also had been
contacting with numerous parties, even some friends in the media, for
suggestions, and none of them were optimistic about the outcome. Air
apology was very rare event.   However, Ray Wang had located a very
sympathetic media friend. According to Ray Wang, CBS had much more to
worry about. We should press hard and go for it.  The next thing was how
to persuade all the parties to unify for our strongest demand. 

One Week before the meeting
---------------------------
Before the meeting date, various participants representing members of the
invited organizations held four tele-conferences to form a uniform
strategy and consistent demands. We needed to have one voice. Everyone
had his or her own opinions about this report, but if we didn't coordinate,
the CBS would not know what exactly our demands were. In fact this was
part of their tactic for the meeting, which I would mention later.

The last week before the luncheon were full of events. Since so many
organizations were involved, and each organization had its own internal
opinion pools and suggestions, the opinions were quite diversified. At
some points there were even suggestions to postpone the meeting for more
bargaining chips.  After extensive discussions, we finally agreed to
choose Ms. Ginny Gong, National President of the Organization of Chinese
Americans, as our spokesperson during the meeting. She was quite good in
verbal expressions. We agreed to demand on-air and also written apology
from the CBS. Our original plan was basically that Ginny Gong speak for
all of us in the begining of the meeting, make a statement, quote some
examples of the mistakes in the CBS report and the damages it caused,
and then layout our demands.

We then drafted a statement for Ginny, including a list of 12 major
mistakes that the CBS had made, for her to pick one or two to use, and
a list of our demands. In the second tele-conference on the Monday
evening before the meeting, Ginny apparently felt that we had more grasp
on the facts and figures, so she proposed that she introduce Huang Lin
to present the data. Later in the discussion among the CBS-IC members,
we decided that Luo Ning would speak for the IFCSS, Huang Lin would speak
for the CBS-IC for our work and the wide support among the Chinese
communities and individuals around the world, and I would present the
figures and set the nature of this particular segment.

The weekend before the meeting
-------------------------------
On Sunday, the CBS-IC members who would go to the meeting had a gathering
in Huang Lin's residence, Frank, Shuping, Yingying, Huang Lin and I were
present. Ray Wang spoke through speakerphone since he couldn't make it to
NYC on Sunday. I arrived in New York on Saturday and went to Huang Lin's
residence early Sunday morning. Yingying made a special trip from Boston,
arriving Sunday noon time and had to go back to Boston in the evening.
We discussed strategies, went through tons of documents and voiced our
personal opinions, again in order to get a unified voice. Nobody dictated,
but we reached consensus by discussions. Shuping was also a CND member,
so she volunteered to record the meeting and prepare for a special CND
report. Frank prepared to bring a video camera, unfortunately he did not
get in the meeting probably because of a little incident that alarmed the
CBS.

The incident was when it was decided to bring a lawyer to the meeting to
show our strength and the Committee of 100 notified the CBS sometime on
Monday. This alarmed the CBS, which in turn sent a strong worded fax
saying that there was no more space prepared for extra persons. We then
prepared to sacrifice one of our members to get one lawyer in. Finally
the president of the Asian Pacific American Bar Association went there
without the invitation and the CBS agreed to let her in, but they
blocked Frank, who also went to the meeting site.

Luo Ning arrived at Huang Lin's residence late on Sunday. He stayed and
worked on the issue full day on Monday, and also made contacts with the
news media who were very interested in our story. During the Monday
evening tele-conference, a New York Times reporter tried to break in
Huang Lin's phone line through the phone operator. When the operator
informed Huang Lin that the reporter would like to break in, many tele-
conference participants were shocked and thought the reporter was
listening in during our discussion! Huang Lin had to explain. This
reporter was the one who finally wrote the news report about us on New
York Times, Sunday, National Section, page 36 (the last page of the
section).  The reporter had followed every step of our work since May,
 who brought a photographer to one of our preparation sessions at NYU,
where Huang Lin, Lu Shuping, Luo ning and I were present.

The NYT story was one of our major achievements since it was the most
detailed printed media coverage on this incident on a national newspaper.
As Huang Lin commented later on, it would serve both as a monument of our
victory and a deterrence for any future spy dirt diggers, since everyone
of us knew whenever a researcher wanted to retrieve information from
newspaper archives, he/she would read this piece of history for sure.
Regarding to the five month long constant "harassment" from the media
reporters, Huang Lin said later on that this effort was well paid off.

Part II.  The Day of the Meeting
================================
10:30am, New York City
----------------------
Tuesday is the meeting/luncheon date.  The time was 12:30pm. We went to
the Committee of 100 Headquarters first, around 10:30am, since their site
is close to the CBS Headquarter.

I borrowed a car and drove into the city. We met on the street where the
CBS was. Ray Wang, Lu Shuping, Li Yingying, Luo Ning, Huang Lin and I
packed into to a car and headed to the Committee 100 Headquarter. The
sign outside Committee of 100 Headquarters was "China Institute". There
we met with Ginny Gong, Kung-Lee Wang and David Lee. Kung-Lee Wang is the
executive director of Committee 100, and David is the program manager.                                        
11am, C-100 Headquarters
------------------------
We sat around the table and had the final strategy session.  Ginny read
her prepared statement, filled in blanks where Luo Ning and Huang Lin
would be introduced. Everything else had been decided in previous tele-
conferences so there were no extensive discussions again on our demands.
Our plan was that Ginny Gong made an opening statement and we layout the
error and nature of the CBS report, then it came back to Ginny to put our
demand on the table. The rest would depend on how the meeting went. After
the brief meeting, we headed to the CBS building, which was almost at the
west end of 57 Street.

12:30pm, CBS Headquarters
-------------------------
The President of Asian Pacific American Bar Association, Sylvia Chin, was
already there. I went to park the car so I was the last one to get into the
front reception area. The CBS receptionist gave me a name tag. Frank was 
there but couldn't get in.  We agreed with the CBS personnel that he'd 
be let in when the luncheon was finished and we were supposed to join a tour 
around the broadcast area. It turned out that the luncheon took about 2-3
hours. Frank therefore left before we came out.

Because of discussion with this CBS guy and Frank, Luo Ning and I went inside
the last. There were many people around the reception area.  It felt like a
hotel, except that people could not just walk in without a name tag. We went
around to the left, going into a narrow corridor.  The broadcast area, as I
later learned, was the big corridor straight ahead from the front doors. I'm
not sure what the "luncheon room" was really for. It looked like a small empty
meeting room. Across the corridor it was the security room, with all the
monitors and people sitting in front of them.  The major CBS meeting
participants were already there, standing in a line, shaking hands with
everyone. President of CBS News Eric Ober stood in front. Next to him was
their attorney, the big vice president, and the other faces I couldn't link
to their names I learned only later on. The president looked like a very kind
old man, medium build, face glowing with healthy red, and a mustache.  He
looked like about 60 years old to me. I thought he had Irish blood but he said
he was Jewish later on. Connie Chung came in the last, after we all got in and
started to chat. She was smaller than I perceived on TV, about 5 feet tall and
fairly thin. She walked in and shook hands with her president and other
executives first because they were still forming this official "welcome line"
at the door. Then she went around shook hands with everyone and introduced
herself.  I thought among those in the room she was the one who the least
needed introduction.

The luncheon room
-----------------
Mr. Ober, the president, asked everyone to sit. He sat at the head of the
table (or the end of the table, since the room is not a formal dinning room).
I went around to the other side and sat myself in. Connie Chung came around
later and sat on my side. The waiter came and asked me first what I'd like,
since I was the closest to the kitchen.

************************************************************************
   |
   |  Entrance
   |
   |
   |        ____________________________________________________________
   |       |                                                           |
   |       |                   Ober (president)                        |
   |       |                                                           |
   |       |     CBS attorney   _____________   Venardos (vp)          |
   |       |_                   |           |                          |
                    CBS staff   |           |   Yingying Li            |
          door                  |           |                          |
   |                CBS staff   |           |   Anderson (producer)    |
   |       |-                   |           |                          |
   |       |            Mi Mi   |           |   Connie Chung           |
   |       |                    |           |                          |_
   |       |         Ray Wang   |           |   Dong Xiao              
   |       |                    |           |                           Kitchen
   |       |         Luo Ning   |           |   Alter (foreign editor)   
   |       |                    |           |                           _
   |       |        Suping Lu   |           |   Ginny Gong (OCA)       |
   |       |                    |___________|                          |
   |       |                                                           |
   |       |              K.L Wang (C100)  Sylvia Chin (APABA)         |
   |       |                                                           |
   |       |                             ________                      |
   |       |                            | TV Set |                     |
   |       |                            |        |                     |
   |       |-----------------------------------------------------------|

*************************************************************************

I ordered grilled fish. But later after watching the broadcast video tape
again, I completely lost my appetite, and couldn't eat the food. I only had
some canned oranges in the salad that I found sweet.

The luncheon
------------
Mr. Ober began his statement by saying "Certainly I do apologize." Certainly
this was a little bit surprise to us since we did not expect that he would do
it right away. But it added to our anxieties that it might be the most we
could get, a verbal apology to nine of us, and how could us make it known to
the public? However, the mood of us were little bit easier after this
announcement, since he did it in front of our audio recorders. (We discussed
very extensively before the luncheon if we should bring in the tape recorders
and video cameras. We thought the video cameras were probably too provocative,
so we finally settled down for tape recorders, and decided to put them right
on the table).  Mr. Ober announced the luncheon plan. He proposed that we all
watch a series of 5 news segments about China (May 19th segment is one of them)
before lunch. Then everyone of us express our opinions. Their strategy was
clear.  They were going to show the news programs, let us express our anger,
then finish up by saying that the programs were fine and they've done nothing
wrong!

Most of our participants agreed to this format.So the Foreign Editor, Mr. Allen
Alter turned on the TV set. There were five segments, a few minutes each. I
remembered that they were featured on the annual MFN issues, the economic
reforms, human rights violations, TAM reviews, the dissidents, etc. I lost my
appetite when that outrageous segment went on screen again, which was the 4th.
The waiters were serving salad and drinks.

Our statement
-------------
When the tape was finished, Ober invited everyone to talk. There was no format.
We all looked at Ginny Gong, and she started the prepared statement. She
started by introducing herself, K.L. Wang,and Luo Ning as IFCSS representative
then passed on to Luo Ning. Luo Ning briefly described the IFCSS. I remembered
Luo Ning basically stated that the IFCSS is an organization for the Chinese
students and scholars in the US, and also an organization that carries the
banner of the 1989 democratic movement in China; it was founded in 1989; etc.
Then Luo Ning introduced Huang Lin as the National Coordinator of the CBS-IC.
Huang Lin described CBS-IC and it's work, and introduced every member on our
side, Ray Wang, Lu Shuping, Li Yingying and me. I thought it dragged too long
in this part because there was nothing substantial yet. Then it went back to
Ginny Gong and she continued to talk about the news segment.

Ginny indicated that the report was erroneous and hysterical, that it would be
an understatement that the Chinese community was shocked and astonished. The
most unusual part was what she said: "and if possible to make it even worse,
you had Connie Chung deliver this so called news which lent false credence to
your yellow journalism." Connie Chung was fumed by this comment. She later
accused Ginny of using "racist terms" because of the use of "yellow journalism".
It was very funny when we later talked about it on the dinner table.

Introducing research results
----------------------------
Then Ginny introduced Huang Lin again for discussion of our extensive research
of the report. Huang Lin passed it to me as we planed. I started by pointing
out that, out of 5 news segments they just showed, 4 others are basically
inside China and about Chinese government. The one we are upset about is the
ONLY one that showed Chinese Americans and Chinese visitors in the US. That was
why no one was upset about the other 4 segments. We were not upset about CBS's
criticisms on the Chinese government.  We were upset about the CBS allegations
against us Chinese in the US as being spies!

Out of 12 major errors we had prepared to discuss, I had decided to use only
one example. The CBS report alleged that this was the biggest spy network in
America and it's such a threat, but the only data they provided was that one in
eight illegal export cases involves China. I pointed out that there were only a
few percent of the illegal exports involving China. And this was comparable to
other American allies which were also spying on the US. When I mentioned this,
the CBS people become very attentive. They obviously did not expect this result.
Connie Chung interrupted and asked me what exactly the percentage is. I said it
was 3%, and she wrote it down on her notebook. I spelled out why 3% and 13%
(one in eight) was different. 3% was like a background noise. Everyone was
spying on everyone else. China was no bigger in industrial espionage than
Germany or Japan on America . Therefore this so called biggest spy network
implying that all of us could be spies was totally nonsense. 

I also made it very clear that we had also pinpointed the errors that gave
them the 13% figure from the same source. So we knew where they made the
distortion and falsification. Anyone who does research knows that it was not
very convincing when one provided a different set of data to debate another
set of data. The convincing argument came when one was able to reproduce the
error to show how the mistakes (in this case distortions) were made. 

On top of all these, I indicated that amongst those convicted illegal export
cases, there were non-Chinese Americans, such as the European Americans,
involved. People worked for the Chinese government were not exclusively ethnic
Chinese! However the CBS showed a group of Chinese visitors arriving the US
and pointed fingers ONLY to us as possible spies. It was clearly racism. So I
concluded that the report was distorted, falsified and racist. Then I passed
it to Ginny Gong again. She then laid our demands on the table as planed. "We
expect the CBS to act responsibly and make efforts to undo the damage done on
public television by publicly apologizing on the air and in writing."

Free exchanges
--------------
No one was able to debate our research. Our strategy was not to argue with them
about details, and apparently it was their strategy too. But our results were
solid. Ray Wang pointed out that the broadcast was an insult to Chinese
community. Luo Ning, Huang Lin and Yingying Li all expressed concerns we had
discussed.

Luo Ning mentioned that CBS is a very credible news organization among the
Chinese, in reporting the news about Chinese and China. The CBS (and Dan Rather)
was in TAM Square during 1989 student movement.  The VP Mr. Venardos proudly
announced that he was there too.  However, Luo Ning said that this report was
like a stab in the back.

I made an emphasis on psychological stress that the "spy" report had placed on
the Chinese community. There were many rumors about people being fired after
the broadcast. Those who were fired are only a few, but the stress and scare
had put a burden on everyone in our community. This was in fact a base for a
legal fight. We just hoped that we did not have to go that far.

Mr. Ober asked that there is one thing he doesn't understand, that why the
Chinese community is having problems with CBS choosing Connie Chung to do the
report.  Luo Ning and others answered that it is because Connie Chung was
supposed to understand the Chinese community, and that she has the credibility
in the American public, about affairs in the Chinese community. 

Ginny Gong read a message expressed some paranoia from an individual after
watching the CBS report. She also mentioned that the CBS has written to OCA
saying that one story would not make much of a difference!  At this point
Connie Chung demands to see this letter from CBS.  Obviously she couldn't
believe that her colleagues said publicly that her story wouldn't make any
difference!  K.L. Wang produced the letter, written by the VP, Mr. Venardos. 
Connie Chung read it and immediately stated that she is "totally against it".
On the end of the table, the VP claimed that he didn't remember about the
letter, which bore his signature. And Mr. Ober, the president, shook his head.

Connie Chung then started her talk by attacking Ginny Gong's mocking her and
her report as "yellow journalism". Then she started to read some apparently
prepared text basically explaining that all her reports were anti-Chinese
government, and that she had no intention to attack the Chinese community. She
said to Ray that she chose words carefully and what she did was for the
Chinese. She said for instance she used the word "reluctant" for those alleged
spies. She also said that the report did not mean to be an insult to the
Chinese community.  I pointed out again that she might have that intention to
criticize the Chinese government for this series of segments but this
particular segment was different from the other four!

At this time lunch was served. Huang Lin mentioned that, CBS even did not know
the position of Defense Intelligence Agency regarding this problem He then
mentioned his communication with DIA about Eftimiades, and the reply letter he
got from DIA. In the letter, DIA indicated very clearly that Mr. Eftimiades was
not a China expert. Connie Chung said that "that is not what he told us". I
asked Connie Chung to put it in writing and told her that we have not finished
with this person. She said Mr. Eftimiades did not answer CBS phone calls. Tom
Anderson told everyone that Mr. Eftimiades had changed his phone number three
times, so CBS lost contact with him completely. Apparently he went into hiding.

When almost everyone had done speaking and eating, desert was served and Mr.
Ober started to speak. As I knew from the beginning, he started reading some
prepared text basically saying that if the CBS offended anyone, he was sorry.
But the program was accurate, and there was nothing wrong.   He said he was
sorry that  people get such perceptions.  He added that CBS had always striven
for truths and worked with Chinese community. I interrupted him and said that
was why this particular report was so damaging, because their past
professionalism had given them the credibility and people, 12 million viewers
nationwide, believed whatever they said, including the suspicion that there
were spy suspects in planeloads of Chinese visitors and inside Chinese American
community. He said that there was no distortion of the report.I asked how would
he explain the data. I said I was a scientist, and I knew how people manipulate
data. He got angry and claimed that he was a journalist and journalists were
smart too.

At one point, he claimed that the CBS would be sorry to lose the Chinese 
audience, but implied that they didn't care that much if the Chinese boycott
their programs. And the American public were not affected by their report. I
was very upset by the implication that the Chinese population didn't matter.
To counter that kind of arrogance, I asked how many people have to come out to
convince him that their news segment had a negative impact. We both raised our
voices. After the encounter, Ginny Gong spoke up to ease up the tension, then
lay out our demands once again on the table. K.L. Wang reminded her to set a
deadline for CBS to respond, as we had planed. Obviously Mr. Ober had already
changed his mind by then. He had realized that we were genuinely upset about
the segment, instead of just some activists who protested in every occasion as
they had often experienced with other more vocal ethnic groups.

Mr. Ober said he couldn't take a deadline, but that there would be a very
prompt answer, "maybe in two hours, maybe this week". In fact in the letter he
had written to us, it mentioned "our luncheon today", indicating that the
letter was actually written the same day, but dated one day later to decide
what exactly to be done on air on top of written apology.

After the luncheon, I talked to Mr. Ober and apologized about my mentioning of
myself as a scientist. I said I was proud of being a scientist but it didn't
imply that I looked down on other professions. He became very friendly,
accepted my apology and we took some pictures together and he keep offering to
shake hands with me (at least four or five times before we finally said
good-bye in the lounge). I got one print from Mi Mi but still waiting for
prints from other cameras. I didn't take a camera myself. After the lunch there
were continued conversations about the segment. Mr. Ober said he is Jewish and
graduated from an ivy league school which had quotas for Jewish students. He
understood discrimination, which is exactly our deep concern is about. 

Touring around CBS broadcast hall
---------------------------------
When I walked outside the room, I saw Connie Chung again and I smiled to her.
She replied with a very reluctant smile. She was the most unhappy one after
the luncheon. Apparently she also felt what her boss was going to do.

A few of us, accompanied by the Foreign Editor, Mr. Allen Alter, went to the
CBS broadcast room, where Dan Rather and Connie Chung make the daily report. 
We all walk up and took pictures in their positions. :-)

That was the time when the Gulf crisis was still hanging around. They had a 
special setup with the map of Gulf countries, apparently prepared for a war.
The foreign editor said to me that most Chinese are reluctant to speak out, so
it is difficult to communicate. I told him there is the IFCSS, and it's leaders
are not afraid of anyone otherwise they will not take that job. It is just so
ironic that some people out of nowhere criticize the IFCSS leadership as "close
to CCP". Remember IFCSS has been labeld as the counter-revolutionary by the CCP.
I just hope that we have an organization that works for our own interest, as the
IFCSS does on the CBS incident. I don't give it a damn if it is communist or
counter-communist. My only problem, though, is that I personally don't want to
be either communist, or counter-communist. If the IFCSS is not that political,
then I'd be able to contribute. And then of course "non-political" are taking
it's own share of attacks because it is "what the CCP wanted". I resent the
politics involved. And I am happy that CBS-IC was started "non-political".

Outside the CBS building
------------------------
We went out after the tour, and stood in front of the glass doors of the CBS
building, discussing about the meeting. It was about 3-4pm in the afternoon
already. Suddenly, Someone said "Dan Rather", we all turned around and saw Dan
Rather walked into the building looking down.  I offered my hand to him so he
had to turn and shake my hand. Then he started to chat with us. We told him we
just came out from a meeting with his boss, and we admire his reports in TAM
Square in 1989. He was happy and proud of that. He said he has written a book:
"The Camera Only Clicks Once." He said there was a chapter about his experience
covering Tiananmen Square in 1989. We all said we would get the book when it's
out.  We then took pictures together, by Li Yingying and Lu Shuping's cameras.
I am still waiting for viewing them with great anticipation.
  
Acknowledgement
===============
My memory is fading fast.  I can only remember events, but sometimes 
not the time sequence.  I can still remember many things said, but sometimes 
couldn't remember who said what.  In writing this recollection,  Mi Mi
had offered revisions to the text, and Shuping went back to listen to the
tape she has recorded to refresh my memory.  Ray Wang also helped me to
recall how each event happened.  This is a personal recollection, in my
personal perspective. So hope it is not taken as a history text.  :-)

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%   Editor of CBS Incident Committee: Miao Ye                     %
%      Sign on/off at listserv@ifcss.org, with mailbody as:       %
%        sub fcbs-l Firstname Lastname, or signoff fcbs-l         %
%      Post at fcbs-l@ifcss.org                                   %
%      Anonymous ftp at  ifcss.org:/ifcss/Legal/cbs               %
%   $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$   %
%   $ Please support our common cause by                      $   %
%   $ making your contribution payable to                     $   %
%   $ IFCSS/CBS Incident Fund, and mail it to                 $   %
%   $    Mr. Frank Chen / CBSIC                               $   %
%   $    361 Ogden Avenue,                                    $   %
%   $    Jersey City, NJ 07307                                $   %
%   $Thank you for your pledge, and we will make a difference!$   %
%   $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$   %
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%