NPR Journalist Simon ‘Parachutes In’ for San Diego Story : Media: The popular national public radio figure makes brief San Diego stop for a story on the border.

Scott Simon was handling the drudgery of a luncheon with the media rather well, considering he was operating on almost no sleep after a night along the border developing a story for “Weekend Edition,” the Saturday morning program he hosts for National Public Radio.

“The trick is not staying up all night--black coffee can take care of that--it is knowing what you’re doing,” said Simon, taking a gentle stab at himself for banging his knee against a highway divider during the previous night’s adventures.

Simon’s literate, stylish features have given him “almost a cult following among the Saturday morning leisure set,” according to the Christian Science Monitor. The weekly audience for the 5-year-old “Weekend Edition” has grown to more than a million, according to industry estimates.

The Monday luncheon with four members of the local press, designed to promote the 30th anniversary of KPBS-FM (89.5), was part of a whirlwind tour of San Diego for the 38-year-old journalist.

After lunch, it was off to the KPBS studios for an interview. Then he traded his wrinkled shirt for a double-breasted suit and acted as the guest of honor at a ceremony commemorating the anniversary of KPBS, the local public broadcasting affiliate. His duties included posing for pictures, shovel in hand, planting a tree and making small talk at a cocktail reception.

After the handshaking session, it was back to the border to try to collect more material for his story--”a look at the the extraordinary society that springs out of the countryside every night”--before returning to Washington to help put together Saturday’s program.

Simon sounded almost embarrassed to, as he put it, “parachute in” to San Diego to report on a story that is well covered here. It is part of the job he regrets, the inability to spend time in an area, to really soak up the atmosphere. He is in a new part of the world almost every week.

“When you parachute in, your own ignorance is a real factor, you do the best you can,” he said between bites of salad. But there are advantages. “In many ways, journalism is most effective when you are a stranger, when you adopt that viewpoint.”

The border story has always intrigued Simon, who spent many years covering the turmoil in Central America. In the past, he has done reports from along the border in Texas.

“It’s an important story that raises questions about our national identity,” Simon said, looking the person asking the question square in the eyes, while his hands played with the sugar dispenser on the table.

As he often does, he was able to find “puckish” elements in the people seeking a new life across the border. Humor, irreverence and a general uplifting tone are common elements of his work, perhaps reflecting the influence of his parents, comedian Ernie Simon and actress Patricia Lyons.

“I wasn’t prepared for the extraordinary wit of some of the people” along the border, Simon said. “One man said he just wanted to see Los Angeles.”

But the trip to San Diego was dictated by the invitation to participate in the KPBS anniversary activities as much as any story ideas.

Twice a year, Simon travels to public broadcasting affiliates, usually during fund-raising efforts. NPR is becoming more dependent on affiliates for financial input, which creates more of a symbiotic relationship between the network and the affiliates, which want to be more involved in the NPR decision making process.

“Our dues are becoming very expensive, while there are more possibilities for programming available to the stations,” Simon said.

That doesn’t bother Simon as much as NPR’s growing reliance on financing from corporations and foundations. It doesn’t create anything as overt as influence on news stories, but the involvement of corporations does encourage a “blockbuster mentality,” he said, a need to do big, exciting, high-profile stories so the sponsor feels it’s getting something for it’s money.

“We had plenty of money to cover the unraveling of communism in Europe,” Simon said. “But when we wanted to do something on health care in Harlem, there was no money available.”

If it wasn’t for NPR, Simon says he wouldn’t be in radio.

“NPR is the kind of journalism I always wanted to do--vivid, narrative and, when appropriate, stories with a literary bent,” he said.

If he wasn’t in radio, Simon believes he probably would be pursuing a religious vocation. As many of his listeners know, he’s a Quaker, a “member of the Society of Friends,” although he was raised Roman Catholic.

His religious beliefs rarely intrude on his stories, he said. But there is no separating his roots, who he is, from his role as journalist.

“My instinctive reaction to stories is as someone who grew up in Chicago. That stays,” he said.

His human side often emerges in his reporting. More than a reflection of his own beliefs, he feels it simply raises questions that all journalists should be asking on stories.

The example that emerges is coverage of the current Persian Gulf crisis.

“The defense reporters over there are infatuated with technology,” Simon said. “They leave some of the important, intrinsic moral questions behind.

“There is not enough skepticism. The question needs to be asked, how many civilians are they willing to kill?”

Simon has covered wars in El Salvador, Grenada and the Middle East. He believes reporters have a duty to make their audience understand the realities of war.

“I don’t think people understand what conventional war is anymore,” Simon said.

Simon has been with NPR for 13 years, earning two prestigious George F. Peabody awards for his radio essays. As an interviewer, he is often compared to Ted Koppel, while his easy-going descriptive style, reflecting his mid-eastern roots, reminds some of Garrison Keilor.

“Weekend Edition” has been on the air for five years, and, along with “All Things Considered” and “Morning Edition,” it has become a staple of NPR’s programming.

“I think we understand . . . people respond to parable, the narrative technique,” Simon said.

Simon’s topics for his radio essays range from the homey to the bizarre; his guests from the boy-next-door to world leaders.

“Sometimes there are hilarious swings in subjects,” he said. His favorite was segueing from a dog that played the piano to an interview with Ariel Sharon. Killing time between the two segments, he thought he made an embarrassing mistake, telling Sharon he was following the piano-playing dog.

Instead, Sharon was amused. Simon imitated Sharon’s reaction: “A dog played piano? I’d like to see this.”