Eugene David
...The One-Minute Pundit

Saturday, July 31, 2004


OOOOH! The Sudanese cave -- to a PEACE OF PAPER!

The League of Nations is BACK?!?!?


PINCH! unearths some more of His heroes, including poster ARTISTES whose work "bear[s] an image of a Godzilla-size George W. Bush rampaging through Midtown skyscrapers above the directive 'Fight Back!'"

Unfortunately for PINCH! and the artistes, Godzilla did strike. He wore a beard. And I don't think he can be fought with posters.

P. S. Here is LE ART. No BUSH=HITLER -- yet. (Maybe PINCH! could have His scribblers praise THAT.)

P. P. S.



Thought I should bring this up now that PAPEROFRECORD.com is inflicting FULL-SCREEN POP-UPS on its surfers.


OH oh, bloggers have ARRIVED:

In 2004 the traditional chorus of complaints has swelled with a fresh set of high, piping voices. These were the bloggers, nearly a hundred of them, or so I heard, who were granted press credentials and workstations and who arrived in Boston and set to work with the earnest, insouciant enthusiasm of the hobbyist, which is their chief charm. From what I've gathered over the last few years, clicking randomly from one blog to another, it is the job of a blogger to record his every neural discharge, faithfully and minutely, leaving no thought unpublished, no matter how uninteresting. Bloggers think and think and think and scribble and scribble and scribble, and yet at the Democratic National Convention, perhaps for the first time in their lives, they found themselves in a situation where, by general acclamation, there was nothing to think about! They were not deterred for long, needless to say. They started to think about why there was nothing to think about, and that was all they needed. They were off. Graphomania reclaimed its throne.


Has anyone noticed that THEPAPEROFRECORD.com has gone the annoying full-screen pop-up route also?


NEWSWEEK POLL: DEMOCRATIC CONVENTION 2004 -- Kerry/Edwards Leads Bush/Cheney 52 to 44 Percent; Dems Receive Two-Point Margin Bounce in Two-Way Race, Four-Point Bounce in Three-Way Race

Repeat after us, America: it's better than nothing, it's better than nothing, it's better than nothing....

The everlovin' BOUNCES are within what these cranks love to call THE MARGIN OF ERROR -- in short, we have yet another survey meant to FOOL PEOPLE.


PROF and little are gleefully dancing (and exchanging notes) over DIP's "mis-step" with four Marines. Such incidents bother me because, whether the Marines like it or not, and whether they like HIM or not, DIP could be their boss. It behooves them to keep their mouths shut, otherwise if our soldiers become partisan, they lose authority; and as I've said before, a politicized military will be a factor if we ever fight a second Civil War -- which, given the way some people talk, is not entirely unlikely.


I wish I knew what STERNO's trying to say here. When you've worked half your career for Steve 'n' Gerry it must play mind games on you. Is STERNO saying DIP's honorable for campaigning on his 'Nam experience? Or dishonorable? Is STERNO trying to be ironic? Or isn't he? What are you saying, STERNO? Wish you were back at the pre-Warner "Time Inc."?


MORE INTREPID REPORTING FROM OMERTA:

If Sen. John F. Kerry gained ground among the uncommitted after four days of spectacle and urgent speeches at the Democratic convention in Boston, he had yet to seal the deal, a sample of undecided voters indicated Friday during interviews across the country.

The forceful tone of Kerry's acceptance speech — on points such as involving foreign allies in Iraq and protecting American jobs from outsourcing — made a strong impression on eight randomly selected registered voters.

Hey MERT! If you really want to decide the election you should quote ONE BLOGGER EXCLUSIVELY! I've an idea who you should start with.


KERRY FOR PRESIDENT (aka CURLEY'S [Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!] STOOGES) campaigns -- er, REPORTS A TIDAL WAVE OF REPUBLICANS IS SUPPORTING THE NOBLE DEMOCRATIC TICKET!!!!!

OR (NEXT-TO-LAST GRAF):

Clay Richards, assistant director of the Polling Institute at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, says Kerry is getting about 11 or 12 percent of the Republican vote in Pennsylvania and New Jersey while Bush is drawing 9 or 10 percent of his support from Democrats, not a statistically significant crossover [!!!!!!!!!!!].

AND CURLEY'S STOOGES REPORTED ON DIP'S ACCEPTANCE SPEECH WITH ESP.


NOW THE FORCES OF CATHOLIC REACTION BATTLE FEMINISM! BOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

PINCH! What are we going to DO about it? (I know: slant as usual.)

Friday, July 30, 2004


Here's why there's something slightly sickening about The Second Coming of Comden and Green: we may forgive youthful enthusiasm in youth, but it's hard to forgive it in fortysomethings who merely look like Comden and Green (or rather Comden and Oscar Levant, who played a Green-like figure in The Band Wagon). And the quite lyrical excerpt points to another problem:

Farmin' the land is the life for me

It calls me and I cain't say no

But I'd gladly forsake any shovel or rake

I'm in love with a wonderful hoe!

Oh, What [sic] beautiful corn! etc., etc., ETC.


It's very keeyute -- the kind of stuff Comden and Green could wiz off in a flash at a party with Lenny Bernstein. (The resemblance to "I Said Good Morning" is palpable, though not especially palatable.) But the Golden Age songwriters didn't get by on being keeyute. While The Second Coming of Comden and Green have evidently spent much of their career writing catch-as-catch-can chuckle lyrics to (no doubt) pastiche melodies, those long-deceased deathless masters had already written trunks full of songs, memorable songs, enduring songs. There is a difference between having connections and being inspired. Leaving aside that (as the article notes) the very industry structure that nurtured the Golden Age artists was dismantled long ago, neither Comden II and Green II nor any other would-be Broadway songwriter of our time will ever get anywhere because none of them has the slightest INSPIRATION.


Has anyone thought of compiling a list of the greatest pop-up-ad offenders and starting a boycott?


EXHIBIT 42,476 in "WHY NEWS HACKS CAN'T THINK":

Rove's Blunder
How Bush wrote Kerry's acceptance speech.


The Composite Candidate
Eight losers helped John Kerry write his acceptance speech.


We may assume, therefore, that EVERYBODY wrote the DIP's speech EXCEPT DIP.


In the old days, a statement like this by John "Rosemary Clooney is Square" Rockwell --

There is an obvious linkage between mass commercial art and politics, quite apart from individual actors and directors and pop musicians espousing a political view.

-- would have been carved into PAPER OF RECORD stone as the Word of G - PINCH, no further debate required. Still when he goes on to write,

But given the leftward tilt of Hollywood and our coastal cultural elites, the right has reason to complain that commercial television, films and music often advance a left-leaning political agenda.

we must recognize it as progress, however small, a grudging recognition that some people are, yes, right of THE PAPER OF RECORD.


HOW AD-BLURB COPYWRITERS WRITE: a "stunningly passionate acceptance speech" that was "awfully dull at times."

TOM!!!!! Can't you go back to writing how FOX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! is a threat to the republic with its steady stream of BRILLIANT NEW SERIES?


Another G000,000,000,000GLE News headline:

Arnold is governor of California


Miss America pageant axes talent routines

Last year, an all-time low 10.3 million viewers tuned in, marking a steady decline over the last few years.


It's all the same; I haven't watched since they fired Bert Parks.


A SHEEPISH CORRECTION: I referred to the orator of Gettysburg as "Edward Everett Horton." (No known relation.) STUPIDE!


Dubya will respond by waving the menu from Wang's Restaurant.


This typically G000,000,000,000GLE head sums it up:

Enter a Category


WELL, I sacrificed some sleep to watch P&G -- the Democratic Party roll out the NEW! IMPROVED!! DIPPITY-DO!!! It was a launch of staggering ineptitude: early on the looney left crowd seemed as completely bored as their audience, except when GEN. McCLELLAN stomped his feet and said we should get out of the QUAGMIRE!!!!!, or whatever he said; Sen. Morals had them clapping like frozen pancakes. Not even THE CLEANING LADY, full of LEGACY, could shake the crowd from its torpor; perhaps she was in another negotiation. After Lucas Spielberg's breathtakingly banal intro (with its expensively staged 8mm war footage) and MAX' exquisitely self-pitying downer the candidate launched into his imitation of Mr. Viagra's "Who Am I?" speech of '96. That senators cannot orate -- that virtually no politician can these days -- goes without saying (except among NEWS HACKS); but surely DIP could have said it in far less than the 55 minutes truncated to 42 because he was worried the BIG THREE would cut him off. Generations of school children studied the Gettysburg Address for a reason; the real lesson of that day in 1863, a lesson lost amidst the gas of newshackery and the Web and our age's infinite self-regard, is that Lincoln followed a "revered" speaker, Edward Everett, who eulogized for TWO HOURS, and whom the assembled dignitaries and flacks called BRILLIANT. (They virtually ignored Lincoln.) DIP would have spoken for two hours because he didn't know better. What he said I don't know, and I doubt he does either. Indeed the speech already languishes inert in history's landfill, and in short order so will the excesses and irrelevancies that cluttered it; the CPR on a hamster, the rock band, the marching up and down over 'Nam, the catwalk strutting of DIP's Sex and the City daughters, Bruce, THE SALUTE, the commuter-express delivery, "hair pollution," the f'in' balloon drop, all the manners of stupidity that mark this godawful age. A dead giveaway of its quality: JEFF GREENFIELD didn't exuberantly praise it.

Other than that, of course, it was

A BRILLIANT SPEECH.

Thursday, July 29, 2004


I didn't pay attention when Vir-GIN-ia first mentioned it, but it appears CURLEY'S (Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!) STOOGES have OUTDONE THEMSELVES: they've posted at least three stories reporting on DIP's speech IN THE PAST TENSE -- and HE HASN'T DELIVERED IT YET!!!!!



NYUK! NYUK! NYUK!


With ferocious defiance from a jail cell in Japan, chess legend Bobby Fischer has told authorities he is a German citizen with the documents to prove it, invoking his lineage to a German-born father in an attempt to stymie any U.S. extradition proceedings against him.

YOU CERTAINLY DO SOUND IT.

Under German law, anyone born before 1975 to a German father who was married at the time, is entitled to citizenship. And Germany's extradition treaties do not allow its citizens to be deported to face charges in other countries, German officials in Tokyo said.

I SMELL AN INTERNATIONAL INCIDENT!


A rare find at the Whitney: $800G in workers' pockets

They must have thought it was ART.

Given its rep for PC I'm surprised the Whit had the two arrested.


Another holy cockroach arrested!

Think you could do it, DIP?


KERRY FOR PRESIDENT (aka CURLEY'S [Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!] STOOGES) STEPS ON IT:

"Strength is more than tough words," he was to say in a speech for the Democratic National Convention. 
 
"We need to be looked up to and not just feared," the Massachusetts senator was to say in excerpts of his address obtained in advance by The Associated Press. "The future doesn't belong to fear; it belongs to freedom."


Hmmm, fear, future, freedom -- FRANCE!


The DOPE quit because he wanted to do DOPE!

Hey DOPE, you have the same set of priorities as EAR-BITER.


The last time John Kerry gave a speech this important, he was 27 years old and testifying against the Vietnam War.

Bill!  Bill KELLER!!!!!

He has spent weeks drafting and rewriting his speech in a longhand few aides can decipher, and has turned for help to two of John F. Kennedy's best-known speechwriters - Theodore C. Sorensen and Richard N. Goodwin - while relying more heavily on his top consultant, Robert Shrum, the author of Senator Edward M. Kennedy's most celebrated oratory.
 
Does that include, "IRAQ IS GEORGE BUSH'S VIETNAM, AND THIS COUNTRY NEEDS A NEW PRESIDENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"?

There have been plenty of unmemorable acceptance speeches, and some colossal duds - like George McGovern's 1972 "Come home, America" address, which came at 2 a.m., when most voters were asleep, and Walter F. Mondale's 1984 speech, in which he warned that both he and Ronald Reagan would raise taxes, saying: "He won't tell you. I just did."

"Unfortunately," observed Adam Walinsky, who was Robert Kennedy's speechwriter and coached Mr. Kerry on his 1971 testimony, "the ones that stick in the mind are the disasters."
 
Not to worry -- this should be A BRILLIANT SPEECH.


Kerry's vision is remarkably unremarkable

NONETHELESS, George "MY BUSINESS IS MY BUSINESS" Will, YOU will hog ESPNCorp Network's air and eructate that HE DELIVERED A BRILLIANT SPEECH TOO.


REV! delivered a BRILLIANT SPEECH too.

WILL YOU IDIOTS SHUT UP?!?!? You wouldn't know a brilliant speech if it hit you on the head with a metaphor.


OKAY, LEGENDARY C. DAVIS, YOU NOW HAVE PERMISSION TO THROW ALL YOUR COMPANY'S BACK CATALOG AND ANYTHING CLASSICAL AND JAZZ IN THE INCINERATOR -- ELVIS EXCEPTED.

(And after an embarrassing shoving match between the two "partners" he WILL run it.)

OR:

However, [FTC commissioner Mozelle] Thompson said the commission's investigation did not unearth enough evidence to block the venture and pointed out that "the growing clout among retailers may be enough to undermine" a collective power play by the major labels on the marketplace.

WISHFUL THINKING.


Another BRILLIANT...oh never mind.

DIP's boys have been at it for MONTHS. Don't worry DIP, YOU'LL BE BRILLIANT TOO.


Dubya shrugs his shoulders and picks anybody.

This is why he's in a dogfight.

Wednesday, July 28, 2004


SO, MRS. SUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGER's in the BIG-MEDIA BIZ. Doesn't that make you BIG MEDIA TOO, INST?


I am thinking of changing my blog design template this weekend; maybe that will attract two or three more hits a day. So for anyone who may actually read me more than on the spur of the Blogger.com moment, don't be startled.


OOPS:

Mickey is reduced to quoting cab drivers. Jonah is writing about his hotel....[T]he notion that being there has any real journalistic merit is preposterous. Next time, the bloggers should save the money and switch to C-Span.

Another example.


OKAY, okay, Sen. Obama said the right things last night (I'll give him credit), but I didn't get to hear them because I didn't want to be bored watching, and besides, when five million news hacks and ten zillion bloggers pull that "GREATEST SPEECH" gag you tend not to believe it by instinct.


It's official: the League of Arab Kleptocracies decides GENOCIDE IS NOT A PROBLEM.

AS IF!

The international furor over Darfur, where some 30,000 people have been killed in the last 18 months, has produced a backlash in the Arab world, where many suspect that the United States, Britain and their allies in Iraq have ulterior motives.

Hey Nima! You ought to get together with Tim Curry!


Another non-partisan non-sectarian non-side-taking NOBEL-WINNING organization TAKES THE RIGHT SIDE.



And whatever NEWS HACKS may say, the stick-out-like-a-sore-thumb presence of DIP's ads in so many "mainstream" news Web sites (and especially in contentious stories like this) makes one question their impartiality -- as if their impartiality needed questioning.


4-year-old takes a ride on airport conveyor belt

We all have such dreams; alas, most of us aren't four years old. (At least physically.)


Philippines summons Australian envoy over foreign minister's criticism

BUKBUKBUKBUKBUKBUKBUKBUKBUKBUKBADOKBADOKKKKK!!!!!


Fox News loves replaying video of Heinz Kerry-reporter spat

And NEWS HACKS love replaying QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


And how do we know the TOP BLOGS reinforce the CW? Because that flatulent pundit JEFF GREENFIELD "reads about a dozen blogs regularly" -- we can GUESS which ones -- and you KNOW he won't read something if it causes his constipation to flare up (although God knows his thinking is the equivalent).

And a big fat smooch to THE PROFESSOR for finding this; he was probably looking for his name.


PREDICTION: DIPPITY-DO does "A BRILLIANT JOB!!!!!!!!!!" whether he does or not.




Bloggers like PROF and STERNO and ANDY and BLEAT and the whole gang that thinks it'll LIVE FOREVER THROUGH TECHNOLOGY should consider the sad fate of so many CDs deteriorating in record collections everywhere. To be sure, it probably only affects a small fraction of all CDs ever sold, but by placing our cultural fate in something as impermanent as zeroes and ones we risk our culture vanishing without a trace. The Gutenberg Bible lives; Shakespeare's First Folio lives. They're on paper, a medium that can last for centuries and cannot be upgraded into oblivion. PROF and his stellar COMPANY can only live through upgrades, and eventually that white knight won't come to the rescue.


HEAD FOR THE HILLLLLLLLLLLLS!!!!!!!!!!

Time Warner Posts Lower Quarterly Profit


The cliches are coming thick and fast from the scribblers at and around the INFOMERCIAL! Now it's "SEN. OBAMA DID A BRILLIANT JOB!!!!!!!!!!" I recall back in THE YEAR OF THE WOMAN how CNN ran a puff piece on one of the shining stars of that year of reason and truth, how she would smile her way through the House with the infectious charm of her idealism. WELL! Guess who that idealist was? CYNTHIA "IIIII HAAAAAAAAATE JEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWS" McKINNEY! And she's COMING BACK! I wonder when SEN. OBAMA will display his bona fides. (Plus he comes from Illinois, so he'll have plenty of opportunity to get corrupted.)

BAAAAAAAAAAAD NEWS:

The buzz around Obama, who is favored to become the first black male Democratic senator, resembles that around another Illinois Senate candidate, Carol Mosely-[SIC]Braun....

PFFH-HH-HH!!!!!


An apparent loophole in National Collegiate Athletic Association eligibility regulations is leading an increasing number of top recruits to intentionally fail to graduate from high school so they can improve their chances of playing sooner in college.

I'm shocked! SHOCKED that this should happen in so simon-pure a realm as professional college sport!

Hey Dickie V! These athletes may be DUMB but they're not THAT dumb!


It's as simple as ABC: Preschool teachers should have a B.A.

Given the raging incompetence of so many K-12 teachers we may presume this is just another excuse to spread the wealth.


Of course we didn't pay ransom, we merely secured the release of a hostage.

Big difference between confirming or denying what everyone KNOWS you did.

Tuesday, July 27, 2004


More good news for America's CEOs:

Three dozen Athens restaurants fined for price-gouging

OR:

Charge it to my expense account!


OH WELL:

OH WELL: I was all enthused by the smart tactics of the Democrats on opening night, and then I find out almost no one watched it. No one even watched the ten o'clock hour, let alone what went before. A pity. This is too important an election to switch off.

"Almost no one watched it." I'll admit I've been guilty of that hyperbole myself; but judging as well as I can from Nielsen's statistical jibber jabber the three-network audience totaled 20 million, with addition millions doing the hip thing and watching on cable. Granted it's not 1952, and most of the people perhaps had their sets on for background noise, but this isn't chopped chicken liver (though Andy S.'s musings often are).


Techies Reshape 9/11 History

No thanks, I really don't want to see the WTC collapse ten million more times.


Officer's family finds closure; pain lingers

Today's the day for my NEWS HACKS' DICTIONARY! Closure is a figment of the news hack's imagination. For victims of violent crime, it's just another word. (But then for the NEWS HACK every entry in the Merriam-Webster's is just another word.)


Con-SER-va-tives will have a FIELD DAY with THIS one: MASS TRANSIT (at least this project) CAUSES TRAFFIC JAMS!

Mass transit might work better if it were privatized -- except that in the early 20th century it was, and then it was a sinkhole of corruption. Six of one....


Meantime on another high-flying cloud someone with aimless fingers types the notion that Sen. FATSO GLUB-GLUB is "LEGENDARY."

Typical NEWS-HACK BRAINLESSNESS:

Kennedy’s long record of liberal advocacy and his involvement in the 1969 Chappaquiddick incident that resulted in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, has [SIC] made him the villain of conservatives for four decades.

Let's REWORD THAT:

Kennedy’s involvement in the 1969 Chappaquiddick incident that resulted in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne has made him the villain of conservatives for four decades.

OR, an innocent woman's death is POLITICS. Proof most newshackery undergoes VIRTUALLY NO EDITING. And these jackasses wonder why their reps are below the used car pusher's?

P. S. DEFINITION ONE OF "LEGENDARY" IN THE NEWS HACKS' DICTIONARY:

Somebody who's been around a long time whom we like.


In a gushing press release from THE BLOOMY!!!!! (misspelled word corrected) one of P. R. MIKE'S intrepid publicists boasts that "A GALLUP ORGANIZATION POLL CONDUCTED JULY 8-11 FOUND THAT 56 PERCENT OF AMERICAN ADULTS HAD SEEN OR PLANNED TO SEE THE MOVIE, EITHER IN THEATERS OR ON VIDEO"!!!!!!!!!! But even the publicist admits only "12 million" have seen it -- or more accurately, there've been 12 million TICKETS SOLD to it (knowing movie fans and Democrats there are surely LOTS of repeat customers). 56 percent of American adults comes to what, 120 million people? NOT LIKELY. But then anything's possible when you're covering an INFOMERCIAL and have nothing else to do, except misspell words.


Ho-hum, THE PAPER OF RECORD isn't liberal again.

Not content for it to be fishwrapping, PINCH wants his paper to be THE SMELLIEST FISH.


Fear of Fraud

Hey Krug, that's why I don't read your column.

P. S. You're not the only one.


News hacks are the alchemists of our time; with words and guile and shamelessness they can alakazoom nothing into something, although when you try to touch the something it vanishes into thin air, leaving the reek of high salaries and toxic gas.  We aren't day one into THE FIRST INFOMERCIAL and already the idiots can detect STRATEGY and MOVEMENT and blahblahblah, all the while nothing happening, and nothing will.  The alchemy is best done by the likes of HOWELL, who has suddenly made a career of being a cross between THE GLIBERAL and MODO, albeit slightly more pompous.  But he is far from the only one, as witness VLADY's effort to turn Legacy's latest platitudes into THE SPEECH OF THE CENTURY, albeit an expression of depthless EEEEEEEEEVIL.  We should be happy we can never read all the alchemy that comes from such de facto nonexistent events, for the result would be an incurable headache, or a mind no longer on its tether.

Monday, July 26, 2004


The IDIOTS at USAOKAY! made a big mess for themselves by inviting THE YIN AND YANG OF SCREAMING PUNDITRY to write it commentaries. Apparently YIN has been disinvited for the Mike Kinsley of the right; but if YANG finds smooth sailing through THE McPAPER OF RECORD it won't be long before the wizards of Arlington will have to admit IT'S LIBERAL TOO. We'll be WATCHING.


Ancient Olympics had its own scandals

Did they have sponsors and a GE Bancorp?


I do not know what to think of the jug-eared deserter. Perhaps the North Koreans brainwashed him, entirely plausible; then again maybe he was a ne'er-do-well who cast his lot with tyrants. Possibly too he was a flat-out doofus. I do not know, and at this stage of the game I'm not compelled to care.


Why I will never succeed as a blogger: One of ANDY S.'s fans sums up in seventeen words why he supports THE DIP, so OF COURSE Andy spends 706 words saying 1. why he's not doing it and 2. why it's the honorable thing to do. (I'll presume, having not read his words, nor will I; melodrama's not my cup of tea.) In getting hits there's no substitute for verbiage, indeed for flat-out BLOVIATING, and I CANNOT VERBOSELY BLOVIATE. There are only so many seconds in the day.

P. S. In counting ANDY's words I discovered you can paste his invisible sentences into Word and IT CAN STILL COUNT THE WORDS! NEATO, BUGGY BILL! (Even better are the red and green squiggles that appear all over the pages! This is ART!)

P. P. S. I will not comment that in pasting ANDY's latest melodrama into Word only his headings and his admirer's comment are visible.


I'm tuning in through the OFFICIAL WEB SITE. The feed works very well except for occasional pops in the sound. As for the infomercial, it's what you'd exzzzzzzzzpect, with dorky music.


The good news is, when it comes to the Web, our politicians, as in so many endeavors, haven't a clue.

Then again, given our increasingly high-tech life, maybe it isn't such a good thing.


How many Web sites are offering "expanded multimedia" for an event hardly anyone's going to watch?


No sooner do I post something about Ken Auletta and the Sycophants than THE PAPER OF RECORD finds ANOTHER Master of the Universe (only this one's a woman, praise PINCH, so I guess we must call her a MSTER). Don't news hacks "kiss up" enough people with delusions of grandeur?


We're on a ROLLLLLLLL today at AdAge.com! First a story on LOWSY MAYS's favorite patron, P&G, introducing a dog food that makes puppies smarter! Puppies? How about some of the mangy mutts in Cincinnati who finance so much doggie-doo TV? And speaking of wasting money, THREE STORIES on how the owner of Six Flags made these FANTASTIC COMMERCIALS -- but they didn't help sales because its parks are in disrepair!

And the political parties waste zillions on infomercials! Hmmm.


"GOOG" = $36.25 BILLION!!!!!!!!!!
 
Translation:

$500 KAZILLION!!!!!!!!!!
 
Translation in two years:

DON'T ASK.


Talk about obsessive-compulsive syndrome : how can FOUR! COUNT 'EM! FOUR! political newspapers put out a combined sixteen days worth of "news" from THE DEMOCRATIC INFOMERCIAL? What will they be covering -- belly-button-lint formation?

OR:

"Sure, there's no real news at the convention,'' said John Fox Sullivan, the president and publisher of National Journal....

Yep, that's what they'll be covering.

Sunday, July 25, 2004


One of the idiot Capulets and Montagues who caused the Troubles has met his maker, and while most Christian churches do not have the equivalent of seventy-two Helen Thomases -- virgins one may hope so.


Today I was perusing excerpts from one of the great soundtracks of one of the truly great movie musicals ever -- Lucille Ball in Mame (pffh-hh-hh) -- when suddenly I thought of one of the great men of all time who produced it, the LEGENDARY funeral director and quasi-Mafioso Steve Ross, veritable founder and chairman of the quagmire now called Time Warner.  So I looked his name up in Google.  Of the first hundred entries only six have anything to do with him.  I then looked him up in Google Images.  Of the first hundred images only three show his face.  (Steven J. Ross [one of his aliases] in quotations didn't fare much better; I got 1,940 hits, and quite a few people share the name.)  Before Ken Auletta and the Sycophants make another hero of another Master of the Universe, we should ponder this one's fate, and how, in their eagerness to create empires surpassing those in their own minds, such Masters pulled the whole culture down with them, and left nothing but DROSS.

P. S.  I think Ross would be proud of the way Warner Music's marketed this album.  Rhino sold this as a "limited edition" release for $19.98 -- and then Warner "LICENSED" it to Collectors' Choice Music, which sells it for $12.95.  Is it any wonder people pirate CDs? 


The admission by THE PAPER OF RECORD's public 'editor' that his employer is LIBERAL is less earth-shattering than it would first appear.  We should remember that ombudspoops are essentially employed to deflect criticism of their rags and little else.  As I wrote over a year ago,

There's no difference between the Jack the Wizened Prune's ratings system and the powerless, self-serving ombudsmen at most newspapers; both are intended...to appease, and to create a fiction of responsible behavior, not to serve the public.

Anything ombudspoops say that might seem the slightest defensive should therefore be taken as mere spin.  The Public 'Editor' has no power at THE PAPER OF RECORD.  PINCH does, his real editors do, his reporters do.  THE PAPER OF RECORD employs hundreds of them.  The power still lies with THE INSTITUTION -- and with the HUNDREDS of OTHER INSTITUTIONS that repeat its word as GOSPEL.  Moreover one of PINCH's top factotums says THE PAPER OF RECORD isn't liberal; whether she's lying or truly believes it doesn't matter; the whole press business shares her discomforting position.  No, THE PAPER OF RECORD has changed precious none since L'Affaire Blair.  We can hardly expect much more change even if the package reads "Guaranteed Liberal or Your Money Back."


What if someone wins this snoozefest in the popular vote but loses in the Electoral College?

Will George "MY BUSINESS IS MY BUSINESS" Will bloviate on "the WISDOM of the Founders"?


Voters Are Very Settled, Intense and Partisan, and It's Only July

Just because you news hacks spend all your time with others screaming and cheering and stomping their feet for P. R. MIKE doesn't mean we're THAT angry.


Lucas gets 'Revenge' for next 'Star Wars' film

That's the problem with Lucas Spielberg: every time It makes a film It gets REVENGE.

Saturday, July 24, 2004


One other thing: the head of the Blogrolling Trust and his faithful sidekick STERNO have gushed about how BLOGGERS will bring some sort of NEW DIMENSION to the infomercials.  Yeah.  They'll get to see just like other news hacks tons of people in funny-looking clothes saying stupid things, and they'll know first-hand what melting from boredom in a FROZEN ZONE is like, and they too can write tons of placeholding malarkey about having to listen to tons of people in funny-looking clothes saying stupid things while melting from boredom in a FROZEN ZONE.


WHAT THE INFOMERCIALS ARE FOR:

DNC Media Availability   
 
BOSTON, July 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Frank Szollosi, 32, a DNC Platform Committeeman & Toledo City Councilman arrived in Boston Friday for a week of baseball & politics surrounding the Democratic National Convention.
 
Szollosi is available to provide on-site analysis on the battleground state of Ohio from Friday 7/23 through Friday 7/30 in Boston.
 
As a member of the DNC Platform Committee, Szollosi successfully fought for platform language to address the theme of balancing rights and responsibilities as Americans, as well as language that expresses Democrats' commitment to eliminating hunger.  He plans on lobbying Democratic leaders for additional Homeland Security money for cities -- to help prepare our local heroes: fire fighters, police and emergency responders.
 
As a third generation Democratic politician, Szollosi brings Presidential campaign experience with him to Boston.  In 2000 he served as the Gore/Lieberman -- Ohio Coordinated Campaign NW OH Field Director.  In 1996 he served on the Clinton-Gore Media Team at Squier, Knapp, Ochs Communications on Capitol Hill.  In 1992 he led George Washington University Students for Clinton to campaign during the fabled '92 NH primary.  He also brings gov't experience from work in the Clinton White House, Ohio Statehouse, and as a Press Secretary for Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur. 
 
Leaving behind the world famous Toledo Mud Hens for a few days, Szollosi will be at Fenway Park for the Red Sox-Yankees series.


Man Found Dead on Hospital Lounge Couch

The mother of all malpractice suits.


These games are about DOPING, these games are about ADVERTISING, these games are about BOONDOGGLING, these games are about SPYING.

Does anyone other than the news hacks who will plug THE GAMES to death believe they're about SPORT?


How on Earth the universe can be taken seriously when physicists such as Stephen Hawking can rethink black holes is one of the mysteries of the cosmos.

How on Earth gobbledygook-spouting SUPEREGGHEADS like Stephen Hawking can be taken seriously is one of the mysteries of the cosmos.


45% say Kerry should quit seat, poll indicates

A Republican poll. NewsMax!!!!!!!!!! should link to it.

You must see the Boston.com slide show (I can't link to that) which so eloquently states why holding these quadrennial infomercials (conventions) makes no sense.

Friday, July 23, 2004


From the same gov that's given us cargo planes that can't fly. (CAUTION: Curley's [Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!] STOOGES at work.)


Oh! I finally learned those are "random Zappa quotes" you run on your pages! Wasn't he the HOWARD STERN OF ROCK? EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!


NEWSMAX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! DOES IT AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:

MOORE SPEECH AT DEM CONVENTION GETTING ALL THE ATTENTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
He's not speaking AT the convention, he's speaking at a fringe event (although these being Dems, it isn't so fringe).  Chalk another one up for CARL LIMBURGER and his DREAD TRUTH TELLERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

P.. S. In fairness, Son of Dean for President says he's speaking AT the convention also, but unless the ground under Cambridge mysteriously moves P. R. MIKE and his gang nearer the Fleet Center I don't think he'll actually speak there.


PEPSICO'S UP TO NO GOOD: The other day I was in a pizza shop when I heard a Lay's ad similar to these knocking one of our local potato-chip brands, Herr's. (I remember it because PEPSICO'S idiots ran it on a crap-dispensing piece of radio junk that used to be a classical station.)  I'd bet in every corner of America PEPSICO's knocking local potato-chip brands, and using the likes of CHEAP CHANNEL and VIACON (both in billboards as well, lest we forget) to do it.  (Remember too it supported Hezbollah TV, so PEPSICO's capable of anything.)

Hmm, isn't that ENRON KEN's last name?


The composer is — reverent pause, please — Stephen Sondheim, whose name alone causes acolytes of the American musical to bow their heads.

Hey Ben, don't you have a temple in your dwelling, like most theater ad-blurb copywriters?

Best worship someone else after this masterwork.

Thursday, July 22, 2004


HEADS:

Mayor Richard Daley on Wednesday declined to answer questions about possible irregularities in a multimillion-dollar city garbage-cart contract detailed in a front-page Tribune report.

TAILS:

But Daley lashed out at the newspaper and another Tribune Co. subsidiary, the Chicago Cubs, for what he said was their failure to disclose a June 9 incident involving a falling piece of concrete at Wrigley Field.


ESPNCorpNetworkNews.com is an aggressively uninviting Web site, otherwise I'd have noticed far sooner this feature on the notion that a more male world is a more violent world. It sounds PC, but it makes sense.  Who wants to live in a world of one sex -- except terrorists?


Spain offers poll experts to Iraq

Why not send some CHICKENS!!!!!
 
Does WHORVIS COMMUNICATIONS run the SPANISH government TOO?


Back to FUN 'N' GAMES at Los Alamos!

Ehhhhhh, what came out today?


In the name of somebody called "Allah":

Relying on the cockpit recorder and flight data, the commission said terrorist-pilot Ziad Jarrah violently rocked the jet's wings and told another hijacker to block the door. With the sounds of fighting outside the cockpit, Jarrah asked, "Is that it? Shall we finish it off?"
 
Another hijacker, who wasn't identified, replied, "No, not yet. When they all come, we finish it off."
 
Jarrah then began pitching the nose of the plane up and down to throw passengers off balance.
 
Seconds later, a passenger who wasn't identified yelled, "In the cockpit! If we don't, we die!" And 16 seconds afterward, another passenger yelled, "Roll it!" Investigators previously have said they believe passengers tried to use a food cart to break the cockpit door.
 
Jarrah said, "Allah is the greatest! Allah is the greatest!", and he asked his fellow hijacker, "Is that it? I mean, shall we put it down?"
 
The other hijacker answered, "Yes, put it in, and pull it down."Roughly 90 seconds later, the jet rolled onto its back and crashed into a Pennsylvania field at more than 580 mph, killing everyone aboard.
 
The commission concluded that the hijackers remained at the controls of the plane, "but must have judged that the passengers were only seconds from overcoming them."
 
The commission said the hijackers' destination was Washington. It praised the courage of the passengers and said their struggle "saved the lives of countless others, and may have saved either the Capitol or the White House from destruction."
 
And one hopes where the hijackers are, there is no Allah.



The KOOK concedes!

Now back to being just another nutty Congressman.


The NEW, VASTLY IMPROVED, PRE-IP000,000,000 G000,000,000GLEBLOGGER has MORE CONVENIENCES to MAKE YOUR BLOGGING LIFE EASIER:

1. Try to paste something into an existing post and the cursor moves -- practically anywhere it wants to!

2. Post in E-Z-BLOGGER or HTML and you get more redundant links, hiccups and googaws than even the most EXPERIENCED blogger needs!


"(Fill-in-the-blank) May Hurt Bush Chances" seems to have replaced QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!! as the News Hacks' Hope of the Week. Witness this hed:

Jul 9, 2004
Will Lay Indictment Be a Drag on Bush Campaign?
Lost Angeles Times


Yep, I couldn't have put it better myself.


ONWARD AND UPWARD WITH THE ARTS (or, More CW from BW):

"A lot of writers are to the left of the Democrats."
 
You said it, Jonny.
 
Edmund White, who's now head of Princeton University's creative writing program, was the only artist I contacted who expressed concern about the relative uniformity of political views in the American artistic community. "In France, there are many respected writers on the right," he noted when I tracked him down by e-mail. "In America or England, it would almost be impossible to be a writer on the right."

OR:

He loved Big Brother.

P. S.:

Arthur Goldberg (no relation to Whoopi), a retired New York money manager and prominent contemporary art collector, paraphrases Marshall McLuhan in explaining why artists may have some unique political insights to offer. "McLuhan said that the difference between artists and the rest of us is that we go through life looking in the rearview mirror and artists go through life looking through the windshield," Goldberg says.

Most people usually clean their windshields.


British Worry That Drinking Has Gotten Out of Hand

One more sign there's no substitute for an empire.


I know little of Jerry Goldsmith other than that his schtick was dissonance -- you know a Goldsmith score by the rows and rows of threatening chords; call it Music to Remake Buck Rogers By -- but his death reminds us there was a time, before movies became better than ever and their soundtracks greatest-hits anthologies, when people knew film composers by name -- Steiner, Newman, Waxman, Korngold, Rosza, Herrmann, Raksin -- and they knew them because they wrote music that stood on its own count, away from the flickering of the movie house.  Thankfully the Beatles and Bob Dylan and the latest crapper ALWAYS trump that.


SUPERDUPERMEGAGIGABLOGGER discovers something I posted the day before.

Think you can lend me some of your 200 billion zillion quadrillion quintillion hits, SUPE?

Wednesday, July 21, 2004


"Our big brother."

Our two-inch-high corrupt chicken distant-cousin troublemaker.


[A]nalysts expressed concern about eBay's near-term growth prospects abroad and worried that the stock may have peaked.

You gotta love those Wall Street sales -- analysts; here eBay's stock's gone down eighteen points in the last month and NOW they're worried it MAY have peaked.

Send in the Alka-Seltzer.

P. S.  Make that twenty-two points.


Why we will still see hostages in the news media: because it means bad news for the Iraq campaign; because it means QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!!; because it means we can elect a DEMOCRAT TO THE WHITE HOUSE, and if we can keep it up we can keep DEMOCRATS IN THE WHITE HOUSE FOREVER.  And besides, NEWS HACKS ARE A THUG'S BEST FRIEND.

Just one thing: when DIPPITY-DO! wins the White House, doesn't Iraq become HIS problem?


Germans the big binge drinkers of Europe

They have a lot to get drunk over.


AN OPEN LETTER TO THE MARIE ANTOINETTES OF MU-SICK:

If you want to jump up and down and stomp your feet and bare your pearly-white caps in anger and tell the world GEORGE W. BUSH IS A NAZI, fine with me.  Remember this: every time you do so you flip the bird to those who may not agree with you.  You think it won't hurt your careers?  Whoopi would still be endorsing SlimFast if she'd just told a few mild jokes and ogled John Edwards's hair.  And it may not just be yourselves you're hurting.  The concert biz has seen better days; so everytime you call Michael Moore THE SAVIOR OF HUMANKIND you may well be providing fewer jobs for the roadies and ticket takers.  Ah, but what are they?  The scum of the earth!  Well, what about the people who work for the companies responsible for your moribund recording careers?  I don't mean the pimps in gold chains; they'll always have jobs.  I mean the people in the replicating plants who stamp the CDs and insert the liner books and tray cards; the people in the distribution side who move your product in and out of the warehouses; the managers and clerks in the ever dwindling realm of the record stores; the conscientious newbies looking to produce great albums for the reissue labels.  BMG and Sony Music say they'll fire 2,000 when they consummate their merger.  Want to add to that head count?    Keep talking!

I really don't think you give two hoots about the lowlifes who support your mammoth egos; they're someone to scream at when they give you twenty bottles of Perrier backstage instead of the contractually-agreed-upon 32.   But lowlifes have lives too -- not so gilded as yours, but they have families to support, and mortgages to pay off, and tuitions to finance, and you raging Marie Antoinettes don't help their cause one iota when you tell a vast chunk of your audience, STOP ATTENDING MY CONCERTS AND STOP BUYING MY RECORDS. They will do so -- and who knows, one day it may finally catch up to YOU.


My friend from CollegeBoard.org is back!  Listen, friend from CollegeBoard.org, if you want to use ANY quote of mine in a future SAT, you're more than welcome -- so long as I get remunerated.  Do you like my blog?  Please, tell a few friends about it.  I'm tired of getting three or four hits a day, and being cut off from the blogging world with the flip of a psychic switch.  Meantime, I'll try to think up a few more clever phrases so you'll keep coming back.  I do thank you!


When you're having trouble sleeping from all the guilt feelings aroused by the money you've made as THE GREATEST DOCUMENTARIAN OF ALL TIME, P. R. MIKE, here's a story that should put you in the land of pleasant dreams:

Officials raise estimate of death toll on lower WTC floors


Actual hed from CBS.Marketwatch.com:

10:56  U.S. will consider quotas on sock imports from China


WILL SANDY "WHATA" BURGLAR LOSE DIPPITY-DO! THE ELECTION?

He and the WHOOPSTER can't help.


From Oct. 28 to Nov. 15, at least one football game — major college or pro — will be televised each day. That includes Election Day.
 
OR:

[Knight] Commission chairman William Friday, president emeritus of the University of North Carolina, says the wall-to-wall TV proves "presidents haven't gotten ahold of the issue, which is driven by money and not academic concerns."

"The question is, is this an academic enterprise or are you running an entertainment enterprise? In these manifestations, it looks like entertainment."

Who said colleges were ever in the academic biz?


Berger says he made 'honest mistake'

Or was it a dishonest mistake?


Sen. Ossified Kleagle dictates a "book," and OMERTA slyly hints maybe it'll sell "1.2 million copies"!

Be careful, OMERTA, a couple of your colleagues decided to retire over just such boasting.

Tuesday, July 20, 2004


SUBWAY LAUNCHES MASSIVE CHILDHOOD OBESITY CAMPAIGN

This means they put only ONE slice of meat in now?


Bye BYE, BERGER!

(Sorry for the NEWSMAX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

P. S. Favorite NEWSMAX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Stupid Bias Moment:

Berger, as is usual in such cases, claimed he was withdrawing voluntarily.

How do you know?

P. P. S. Hey GREAT AND NOBLE SUPERDUPERGIGAMEGABLOGGER! You helped dump Whata Berger and you aren't POSTING?!?!?!?!?


Looks like the whole senior management's vamoosed from Oak Brook...'cause here comes
 
THE McDONALD'S® FUN TIMES ACTIVITY BOOK!!!!!

DID YOU KNOW?
The Olympic Games® started in Greece more than 2,500 years ago as a friendly competition and featured only one event -- a footrace. 
 
They may have to consider that again.
 
My friends need to get to the park for their events.  Can you help?
 
Has it been built?
 
Did you know? [SIC]
The 5 rings symbolizing the Olympic Games® represent the 5 major parts of the world participating -- North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Australia.
 
Golly gee! We thought they symbolized Coca-Cola®, John Hancock®, Kodak®, Panasonic® and MICKEY D'S®!!!!! -- the five partners of -- WHOOPS! We forgot Samsung®, Atos Origin®, Sports Illustrated®, Swatch®, Visa® and Xerox® -- the ELEVEN OFFICIAL PARTNERS OF THE OLYMPIC MOVEMENT®!  (Shouldn't there be ELEVEN RINGS?)
 
In this summer's 28th Olympic Games® [shouldn't that be THE GAMES OF THE XXVIII OLYMPIAD®?!?!?!?], there will be 10,500 athletes from 200 countries, participating in 28 sporting events.
 
And half-a-million security people, 100,000 executives, 200,000 broadcasters and news hacks -- and 30 spectators.
 
What has 18 legs and catches flies?
 
A McDonald's® at 11 p.m.
 
Why are basketball players such messy eaters?
 
Because on their salaries they can afford 30 maids.
 
And this will pass without comment: 
 
Ronald McD.®: Say, I don't think that's the way our events were supposed to end.

The Hamburglar®: Maybe not, but it sure was fun trying.

And expensive.

P. S. Contents of an actual tray liner handed out today at my local MICKEY D'S®:


Blue Cross® RiverRink™ Festival Pier at Penn's Landing


2001-2002 SEASON


OPEN THROUGH FEBRUARY 28, 2002


Get your 2 for 1 admission coupons in the McDonald's® Entertainment Value Center today!



OH oh, David Gergle says Whata Berger's not a crook.
 
Maybe he's not a crook, but given David Gergle's tastes, maybe he's not not a crook.


Looks like I'm back to one hit a day. What gives? It's almost as if someone shuts a switch off somewhere. ANYBODY OUT THERE?!?!?


QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!! STRIKES AGAIN:
 
One Bombing, Many Versions
Iraqis on the Street Quick to Blame U.S.
 
Translation: Overpaid U.S. News Hacks Quick to Quote Iraqis on the Street Quick to Blame U. S.
 
At least it was on page A12 this time.  


Figures:

Some observers said she was responding to protests in Manila calling for withdrawal of the troops. Also, questions have been raised about the legitimacy of her election as president in May. And an economic policy calling for higher taxes and reduced government spending made her vulnerable politically.

Question: why hasn't THE GREATEST BLOGGER OF THEM ALL mentioned this? Why is he devoting millions of words to Sandy "Whata" Berger stuffing papers down his pants?


Arafat demotes nephew in Gaza
 
Is it me or is the Pali government all about nepotism?


Pa.'s Rep. Greenwood considers quitting
 
Quitting?  Wouldn't he get better PR switching parties?
 
To complete the deal: he's becoming A LOBBYIST.
 
P. S. You can tell news hacks are happy when they start daydreaming of TAKING OVER THE HOUSE.


Ted Turner Humanizes Terrorists
 
Hate to say it, Dave, Ted has virtually nothing to do with "his" networks anymore.

Monday, July 19, 2004


A hero ain't even a SANDWICH in LALALand:
 
Disney executives have acknowledged they overpaid for [the ABC Family channel]. Critics, including former board vice chairman Roy E. Disney, say the deal shows Eisner's poor management skills.

Roy Disney and another former board member, Stanley Gold, approved the deal, but said they did so based on optimistic growth estimates from management.

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