Contributor Profiles

A 1972 graduate of Columbia College, Stan Crock began his journalism career the following year, working nights for The Associated Press in Chicago while finishing his master’s degree in journalism from Northwestern. He then went to The Palm Beach Post (Florida) to cover courts and government. Intrigued by the law, he attended Columbia Law School, graduating in 1977. He was a Stone’s Scholar in recognition of academic achievement, but decided not to take the bar exams or  practice, opting instead for a journalism career. His lawyer wife likes to say he never passed the bar, but because he never took it, it’s a perfect lawyer’s statement: absolutely true and utterly misleading. Stan, nevertheless, clerked for U.S. District Judge Gus J. Solomon in Portland, Oregon.

In 1978, he went to work for The Wall Street Journal’s Washington Bureau and covered regulatory agencies. He wrote about insider trading, corporate raiders, and the AT&T breakup.

After four years, he went to work for a now-defunct consulting firm and within a year took a job as Regulatory News Editor of McGraw-Hill World News in Washington, working exclusively for Business Week. When Business Week formed a separate bureau in 1986, he became News Editor. He supervised 10 reporters who covered financial regulation, telecommunications, legal and social issues, labor, urban affairs, transportation, science, technology, environment, energy, and agriculture.

Well-rounded career

In 1995, he was named Chief Diplomatic Correspondent, covering not only the State Department, but also the Pentagon, National Security Council, and the defense industry. He also wrote a semi-monthly column, Affairs of State, for Business Week Online. He has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, Court TV, CNNfn, CSPAN, White House Chronicles, Fox News, and National Public Radio’s To the Point, On Point, and Here and Now.  His articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, New Republic, World Affairs Journal, Northwestern Journal of International Affairs, Investopedia, and TheStreet.com.

After getting laid off in 2005 in the first of many rounds of layoffs at Business Week, Stan created an editorial function for the Public Service North America unit at Accenture, a technology consulting firm. As Senior Editorial Director, he wrote or edited proposals for federal civilian and defense customers, as well as for state, local, commercial, and non-profit clients. After getting laid off in a restructuring, he moved to consulting firm McKinsey & Co., where he served as Senior Communications Specialist. He later became Lead Writer for Abt Associates' International Health Division, which helps developing countries fight HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases and adopt family planning, nutrition, and other health-related best practices. In mid-2018, he switched to the Marketing and Communications unit, where he is a Strategic Communications Lead, writing for Abt's website, conducting media outreach, and providing writing mentoring.

In February 2017 Stan wrote a hard-hitting, well-documented analysis of President Donald Trump’s war with the media, which can be found here. In December 2018, he wrote another analysis, this time taking issue with Canadian media pundit Conrad Black’s positive assessment of Trump’s presidency in a 2018 biography Black wrote on Trump titled, Donald J. Trump: A President Like No Other. (In May 2019, an obviously gratified Trump granted Black a presidential pardon on two criminal convictions from a decade earlier for obstruction of justice and wire fraud.)

In October 2019, Stan displayed his journalistic versatility with a colorful 15,000-word biography on Clark Abt, chock full of fascinating details about the life and career of a brilliant, iconoclastic American business entrepreneur who had been flying under the public radar for most of his nine decades on this planet. Those wishing to communicate with Stan are encouraged to forward their metaphorical pitchforks and halos to stancrock@gmail.com.