Posted 7:38 PM by Gene

Great -- now Teddy Fatso may write a book!

Getting enough ghostwriters on this project may require a new government agency.

Posted 7:10 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: In OJ's latest tiff with the law, there are jerks on both sides.

Posted 5:30 PM by Gene

I look up The Wizard of Oz' ghosted million-word snoozathon on Amazon.com -- and what do I get for recommendations?



and




P. S. at 7:15 p.m. JonBoy's plugging it -- with a cover picture of The Wiz smiling! Must be thinking of those daily speaking engagements.

And he's included "an exclusive book [SIC] excerpt"! The coffee tables deserve a good day's sleep.

Posted 4:33 PM by Gene

In other news about the untruthfulness of numbers, as has been widely reported KERNGERSHWIN HAMMERSTEIN and ELVIS! Sillerman won't report the B. O. for their new two-hour-plus Carol Burnett monster-movie sketch. Plainly they're thinking this may not be the megasmash they boasted it would be; you can hear them grinding their teeth over Ben Brantley. We wonder why they're bothering; we suspect Branson East's B. O. numbers are as cooked as THE CONSPIRACY's -- more so, as they may not account for all the discounts from tourista groups and last-minute buyers at TKTS. Most likely such secrecy won't do any good since as this story notes the MIKE RIEDELS will sniff the numbers down -- and with their added snide commentary they could make this damage-control activity look even worse than it is.

Some industry watchers carry their concerns one step further: They worry that without the business angle provided by the weekly receipts, legit coverage overall might become more marginalized, relegated to websites and the occasional article aimed at a dedicated fringe, as is now the case with opera and ballet.

Isn't that what follows it now?

Posted 4:22 PM by Gene

"THE NATION'S DOORMAT"!

Happy birthday, McPAPER!

(Via the usual Romy)

Posted 4:10 PM by Gene

North Koreans in Syria?

I thought we ditched that "Axis of Evil" gag! I thought they were our friends now!

Posted 3:55 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: This is now officially the world's tallest-ugliest building -- and please interview us, and we expect you won't tell any secrets, as we know you guys only tell secrets of conservatives and Republicans.

P. S. It's worked already -- 196 press rele -- NEWS STORIES thus far!

Posted 3:29 PM by Gene

TV industry could be 'toast', News Corp boss warns

SLIME! Why don't You SELL? It'll pay for the Journals.

"Our knee jerk reaction to dismiss user generated video content [on sites such as YouTube] as crap, or blogs as unauthoritative....

Just because it's knee-jerk doesn't mean it isn't right.

"The world has changed. Our goal has not."

The goal: TOTAL DOMINATION.

Posted 3:25 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: It's HALF-A-MILLION time at the WaPost!

Posted 11:32 AM by Gene

WHO just left the government?

Was there a big banner in the room reading "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED"?

Posted 9:56 AM by Gene

The Wizard of Oz knocks Dubya!

Hey Wiz, you were there for a while -- why didn't you do something? Or were your magical powers depleted?

Although he also knocks Denny "The Realtor" and Snidely Whiplash, which at this point rather seems like tired old CW.

"I have no doubt that the Communist Party of China can maintain an authoritarian, quasi-capitalist, relatively prosperous regime for a time. But without the political safety valve of the democratic process, I doubt the long-term success of such a regime," he writes.

Is somebody leaking the good parts to goose sales for a million-word ghosted snoozeathon?

Posted 9:49 AM by Gene

ESPNCORP'S IN FRANKENFOOD!

Another favor for our SPONSORS?

Posted 9:46 AM by Gene

So! The next time you're in an air terminal for hours awaiting a plane, thank GE BANCORP!

Posted 9:42 AM by Gene

Say, this is good news: Our high-tech dweebs not only sell the technology to China to censor its people, they give it the wherewithal to launch cyberwars against other nations!

Dweebs! Take a bow!

Posted 9:37 AM by Gene

DOW 36,000 assumes the Thinker mode and calls forth a heavy question:

Will Congress move to increase copyright protection for fashion designs? Should it?

Posted 9:34 AM by Gene

The Catholic Church is spending $190 million for an ugly new cathedral in Oakland, money that could have paid for a lot of sex-abuse settlements.

Just kidding!

Posted 9:24 AM by Gene

A friend of Democrats (aka "one person close to the Times") leaks a number to THE UNIVERSE'S LEADING AD-TRADE RAG: Rudy got the same discount as GEORGE.

As we said yesterday, the time has come to make this sort of ad pricing transparent. No one is served by this rigmarole, and the ad buyers should know better (although when it comes to throwing their money around they usually don't).

Posted 5:42 PM by Gene

Miss Ventura County Controversey Gets Gooooood!

Spelling at PEOPLE WARNER gets BAAAAAAD!

Too many layoffs, King Richard?

Posted 5:31 PM by Gene

Hey! If I can get away with it ONCE....

Posted 5:26 PM by Gene

Bzum-Bzum-Bzum, father of THE GREATEST COMIC NOVELIST IN HISTORY, who became an Honorary Liberal by saying the war in Iraq was a "catastrophe", now says we should stick the "catastrophe" out.

And in The Playp -- CORNER Jo-NAH waxes philosophical over Luke and Leia. Another deep day in the puddle-shallow world of National Review.

Posted 11:00 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Papa told his son, "George, there's money to be made in China -- big money. And you won't have to make speeches -- or have these DAN @#$%&* RATHERS bother you. Do it, son. It's all in the family."

Posted 10:34 AM by Gene

Chickenland, aka Spain, is having trouble devising words for its previously wordless national anthem.

We submit our own respectful idea:

Ooooo-sa-ma über alles....

And if they don't like the "über alles" they can always translate it into French.

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

Also in the celluloid bubble of Toronto a reviewer says his fellow reviewers basically don't know what they're talking about, which wouldn't be the first time -- nor the last.

(Via ArtsJournal)

Posted 9:44 AM by Gene

Whether or not The Paper of Re-CORD did a favor for Mr. Soros (as WALTER WINCHELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and Ol' Democrat is an ADJECTIVE! allege) it wouldn't hurt the business to make ad sales more transparent. Maybe the time should come, in short, where the rate cards MEAN something. If we can't believe the rate cards why should we believe what they help finance?

Posted 9:39 AM by Gene

Former President Bill Clinton will make his third appearance on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Thursday, Sept. 20.

Romy! Since when are anchorpoops permitted sidekicks?

Posted 9:18 AM by Gene

Elsewhere in the hermetic Toronto-based world of critically-acclaimed movies no one wants to see, some outfit with the oxymoronic name of ThinkFilm is bowing its head before the Seattle anarchists of '99, and shortly Charlize's press agents will have another excuse to get their client into the papers for uglifying herself.

WHY WON'T THESE IDIOTS MAKE GOOD MOVIES?

Posted 9:13 AM by Gene

Toronto festival films hot, deals not

TRANSLATION: This is a SUPERMEGAPLATINUM AGE for CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED MOVIES that NO ONE WANTS TO SEE.

Posted 9:11 AM by Gene

The Best of Useless News is becoming even bester with two new lists -- "one of historically black colleges and universities, and the other of highly ranked colleges that are still relatively easy to get into"!

Why do we need lists OR The Best of Useless News?

Posted 8:54 AM by Gene

If, as is now being alleged, little Madeleine was given an overdose of sleeping pills, it poses the question -- why would any parents give sleeping pills to a three-year-old?

Posted 8:49 AM by Gene

Well! Our spiffily-managed financial institutions aren't the only ones getting "emergency loans"!

How many Babbitts reside in Merrie Olde Englande?

Posted 6:54 AM by Gene

Will Friedwald, the Mort "Badde" Goode of today's CD booklets, oohs and aahs over the masterpieces of forty years ago as he ponders some act that is getting all the chords and nuances right to recreate the body of work of the sacred Beatles, which unfortunately conjures the notion that a lot of that "classic" music helped set up today's noxious situation where we're reduced to ghost bands -- isn't that what you should call them, Mr. CD Booklet? You've done enough big-band anthologies -- and no future classics can possibly emerge today, unless another Mort "Badde" Goode is there to excuse them away, as is too likely.

Posted 7:47 PM by Gene

And as it moves closer to commemorating that blessed anniversary, USAOKAY!!!!! (with a little help from greedy CEOs) makes golf sound like NASCAR -- in other words, even MORE boring.

Posted 5:58 PM by Gene

Up in the air, JUNIOR BIRDMEN....

$1.3 million is a steal -- especially if you can steal some of it from the taxpayer!

Posted 5:45 PM by Gene

Something to make NRO editors and fanciers of big-bucks hypocrisy and high-voltage plugs happy.

A NEUHARTHISM OF THE WEEK AWARD to ANOTHER JUSTLY ANONYMOUS ASSPRESSER!

AND A SPECIAL NEUHARTHISM AWARD TO THE MESS FOR TRYING AND FAILING WITH A EUPHEMISM!

Posted 5:40 PM by Gene

With its humongous anniversary approaching, USAOKAY!!!!! attempts to plug a book -- in a humorous vein:

I once wrote an article about Garrison Keillor's live weekly radio show, A Prairie Home Companion, and in an attempt at Keillor-like humor, datelined the story from the town that exists only in his imagination: Lake Wobegon, Minn.

TRANSLATION: Unfunny squared.

His best sentences offer a twist at the end: "Evelyn was an insomniac so when they say she died in her sleep, you have to question that."

What'd I say?

Posted 5:36 PM by Gene

$100 MILLION!!!!!

That's CHEATING!!!!!

I'd like to see American CEOs impose that kind of punishment.

Now how much of it will they actually pay?

Posted 5:34 PM by Gene

And in another demonstration in the continued excellence of the...product for the popcorn restaurants:

TV SHOW, NOT MOVIE, TOPS VIDEO SALES CHART

Posted 5:32 PM by Gene

Six of one: Overcooked McBurgers and stale fries.

Half-a-dozen of the other: one-slice "hoagies".

Wal-Mart can't catch a break, can it.

Posted 1:32 PM by Gene

Somebody's cloned Astro Boy!!!!!

The human race is KAPUT!

Somebody's cloned A PRESS RELEASE too!

Posted 1:17 PM by Gene

Hey con-SER-va-tives! Look who dropped in for tea!

And in "a striking cerise dress" too!

Posted 1:12 PM by Gene

The NFL, Formula One -- is ANY sport immune to spying?

Posted 1:08 PM by Gene

The Wizard of Oz failed to foresee the subprime meltdown!

Get into your balloon, Wiz -- and fly away!

Posted 1:01 PM by Gene

JonBoy runs a press release for some fringe "Catholic" outfit that just appointed a female social director, and she sounds a though she hasn't touched a Bible for a while -- but does have a subscription to National Journal:

Are you pro-choice?
We go to back to the primacy of conscience. We stress the formation of conscience in moral matters, such as the pro-life/pro-choice debate. No one is excluded from the table in the Ecumenical Catholic Communion. Jesus never turned anyone away at the table, so neither do we. We feel it’s our responsibility to help people make responsible choices, but that no single person can dictate what God’s will is.

Do you work for somebody's campaign? You've brought the art of saying nothing to perfection!

Posted 12:47 PM by Gene

WALTER WINCHELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, the late radio star, has apparently gotten His true believers into a tizz because The Pa-per of Re-CORD gave a HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE discount to MoveOn for its temper tantrum!!!!! But according to a few people at one con-SER-va-tive blog huge discounts are the norm, and anyone who'd pay the full rate card is an ass. Who knows -- maybe MoveOn paid too much!

SHUT UP, WALTER WINCHELL!!!!!

Posted 9:35 AM by Gene

The Mexicans are cutting our cocaine supply?

Let's see if they can cut our demand, sighhhhhhhhhh.

Posted 8:55 AM by Gene

Oops, I don't think con-SER-va-tives like Sen. Law-and-Order.

Posted 8:47 AM by Gene

Speaking of the BIG WASTE of BANDWIDTH:

L.A. Block Renamed Larry King Square

I could think of a few culverts that were more deserving.

Posted 8:25 AM by Gene

Sniff sniff, the TWXSTERS are cutting back on ANDERSON's live face time! Boo-hoo!

Do they cut back his salary?

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 8:23 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Cracking down on youth gangs creates lots of NO SNITCHIN'!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, so now we're going to play nicey-nice and hope all the candy hearts and teddy bears keep the kids from emptying their guns. Lotsa luck.

Posted 8:11 AM by Gene

Even Manhattan, the capitol of outrageous housing prices, is feeling the housing bust!

Now we'll never hear the end of it.

Posted 5:32 PM by Gene

Who can we trust less: Democrats for hiding under MoveOn's stupid newspaper ad, or a Republican mouthpiece for creating an excuse for partisan propaganda?

Posted 5:29 PM by Gene

I guess it's back to YOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! Anybody out there?????

Posted 5:14 PM by Gene

And in the TWXSTERS' list of the top 10 most polluted cities, two are in China, two in India and four in the remnants of the Soviet Union, meaning there's a lot more dirty stuff ready to export.

Posted 5:11 PM by Gene

Mattel's boss says he's "sorry" -- but probably not sorry enough that his company's a wholly owned subsid of China, Inc.

What'll it be next time, Bob? Radioactive plastic parts?

Posted 5:07 PM by Gene

The weird ways of fast food:

As Burger King becomes the latest fast feeder to join the Better Business Bureau's Children's Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative, it's introducing a new product: raw apples cut to look like french fries and served in a box that it calls the Frypod. The catch is, they aren't fried and there's no sugar added.

Meantime the Mick raises its dividend by 50 percent because a lot of people won't eat apple fries. How did such an undeserving company become so successful?

Posted 2:07 PM by Gene

AP NEWS ALERT!!!!!

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Senate Democratic leaders reject the call by the top U.S. general in Iraq for a reduction of as many as 30,000 U.S. troops in Iraq by next summer, saying it does not go far enough.

Definitely not! Let's pull ALL of them out -- and THEN SOME!

Posted 1:40 PM by Gene

The dimwit money manager Mr. Fisher who advertises all the time on Forbeslist.com -- often through his annoying spokespoop Mr. TEUFEL -- says the subprime disaster is "no big deal", which we can definitively take as a contrary indicator.

Posted 1:37 PM by Gene

Florida State -- a football factory and par-TY skool -- got a big gift from Chainsaw Al -- and it's ashamed!

Not ashamed enough to give back the money. There are limits to kolledge morality.

Posted 11:21 AM by Gene

When is a presidential campaign adviser not an adviser?

When your name is JFK Lincoln and his Zbig!

Posted 11:20 AM by Gene

THE EDWARD R. MURROW OF COMEDY IS AGAIN DOING THE OS-CARS®!!!!!

THIS CALLS FOR INTERVENTION FROM A PRESS ETHICIST!!!!!

Posted 9:38 AM by Gene

MORE COMEDY IN NEWS: The Babbitt who owns StinkyInky Publishing Co. wants to drape the Tower of Babble with a movie ad -- and the press E-THI-CISTS are FURIOUS:

[J]ournalism ethicist Bob Steele of the Poynter Institute said the proposed deal should raise questions for reporters at The Inquirer and Daily News and for readers as well.

"Why do you need to take a time-honored buil-DING that houses two reputable pa-PERS and wrap it up and turn it into some kind of animated...CHARACTER?" Steele asked. "Is it strictly being done to make...MONEY? Are times that...BAD?" [Concerned jernalistic overemphasis added]

The hacks have been selling for show-biz for decades and NOW they get mad. I guess that's the meaning of jernalism e-thi-CIST.

(Via the usual Romy, where else)

Posted 7:18 PM by Gene

And despite the best efforts of WHORVIS COMMUNICATIONS to convince us otherwise, Guess-Who's still funding mass evacuations to the land of the 72 virgins. Better still:

Not one person identified by the United States and the United Nations as a terror financier has been prosecuted by the Saudis, Levey says.

ALSO:

U.S. officials say they are equally frustrated with what they call the empty promises of Pakistan to go after al Qaeda's sanctuaries in their country....

When asked whether the U.S. can trust his country, Ambassador Akram said, "Well, if the U.S. doesn’t trust Pakistan, how can Pakistan be an ally of the U.S.?"

WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE....

Posted 7:08 PM by Gene

THE ELEPHANT TALKS: The ASSPress shows the first stirrings of life within its tens of thousands of withered brains by giving the faintest credence to the notion that the Col. Tom Parkers of Holy Cockroachland may have made Elvis's video from old movies. If Elvis isn't dead it's unlikely he's very alive. Meantime, obligated to act as a megaphone for quote machines, the ASSPress carts out the usual self-appointed experts who wouldn't know the difference.

Posted 6:40 PM by Gene

The Casino on the Potomac (aka the Kennedy Center) has named its annual Show-Biz HHonorees, and the choices are about as you'd expect; if there isn't anything as egregious as MS. BOOBS, it's still proof that all those fundraisers love nothing more than a good night of schmoozing. So we get a comedian, and a couple of pop stars, and a man being honored for making TAXI DR -- for being one of the greatest direc-TORS of all time, and in what passes as a nod to culture some left-handed piano player. If someone asked the idiot in charge of the Kennedy Center what his Show-Biz HHonors program would be like in twenty-five years he'd yell, "NO COMMENT!!!!!" -- and rush off for more fundraising.

To be sure, it is nothing new for such clowns not to know what they're doing; after all, people like the Knopfs made their own mistakes as publishers. There's one difference though; at the Kennedy Center, they're proud of it.

Posted 5:43 PM by Gene

I fear Ezra Klein is a KLUMPH! KLUMPH! knee-jerk, but yes, the stock market isn't the whole economy, even when GEKKO KUDLOW thinks it.

Posted 5:39 PM by Gene

Surprise: social-work programs are "inherently liberal."

Further surprise: a right-wing group says it.

Further further surprise: The people in charge of the profession think by yelling "A CROCK OF BALONEY" and doing the ostrich routine they'll make the criticism go away -- very shrewd thinking.

Posted 5:33 PM by Gene

Another immortal motto from Little Malc:

A hated government does not long survive.
--Seneca

I don't know; ours has been working at it for decades.

Posted 5:25 PM by Gene

There are many columnists of whom we could say, "Haven't you been writing for too long?" Like Bob Novak, Mr. My Business is My Business, Frank "Stroke" Rich, and Anna. Anna seems to prepare for a column by filling herself up with her most visceral dislikes (and you know what those are), and then venting her spleen -- through the filter of that gooey non-judgmental prose that makes her so sanctimonious and laughable at the same time. And we agree that our intelligence folks are probably as incompetent now as then, that too many people are concentrating on the real estate, and putting up the worst looking kind -- but dammit a typist like this makes you disagree with even her most valid points. And six years later it's still a hole in the ground, a much better looking hole in the ground, and that's a tribute to our lack of guts, something Anna may not find so disagreeable.

Posted 5:14 PM by Gene

Is it impossible to build an an ensemble of beautiful and powerful buildings in New York anymore?

The answer -- coming from Dubai, from Beijing, from the newly-cleared plots of every European capital, and from the journals of the cri-TICS who praise every last high-rising pile of steel-and-glass junk -- is a resounding and unquenchable YES.

Posted 5:07 PM by Gene

We gotta get out NOWNOWNOWNOWNOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But first let's observe a moment of silence.

Posted 1:58 PM by Gene

Joe "We Have Nothing to Fear" Biden, "Sandy" Dodd, JFK Lincoln, Boobs McKeating, Hill -- that's a lot of hot air for one day.

"ARE WE GOING TO CONTINUE TO INVEST AMERICAN BLOOD AND TREASURE AT THE SAME RATE WE'RE DOING NOW?!?!? FOR WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?" [Force-of-right overemphasis added]

Aw, c'mon Hole-in-the-Bagel, you SURE you don't want to run?



He wants you to.

Posted 1:51 PM by Gene

A little less tap-dancing at Atlanta's airport!

Posted 1:42 PM by Gene

Our favorite PR man Rog has seen another movie with "an endless 'ick' factor":

Independent filmmaking is not supposed to be marked by a complete abandonment of taste, sensibility and propriety.

No, only the big boys are allowed to countenance that. Come to think it, aren't the "independents"...oh, never mind.

Posted 1:37 PM by Gene

"These groups have of course been around for a long time. But what people discovered with them is that they're incredibly rough and rigidly ideological," says Diaa Rashwan, an expert on political Islam at the Al Ahram Center for Strategic and International Studies in Cairo. "Their methods weren't about winning people over, being with them, but imposing upon them. No people in the world like that."

Oh, so now they discover it. So why does Hosni the Thug still have to get out his police?

Posted 1:27 PM by Gene

"To many voters, the political calculations of both parties are offensive to the spirit of Bob La Follette."

We suspect throwing a tantrum like these people in Wisconsin might get a little under his skin too.

Posted 1:19 PM by Gene

As we said, a PR SMASH.

Posted 1:17 PM by Gene

FLASH!!!!! WALTER WINCHELL'S GIVING UP HIS RADIO SHOW!!!!!!!!!!

Until 1. He needs the money and 2. he needs the exposure. 10, 9, 8....

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 12:28 PM by Gene

The Real Message: We're Screwed!!!!!!!!!! [Greg-style overemphasis added]

The Real Message: TNR's sorta-kinda happy we'd be screwed.

Posted 11:51 AM by Gene

AP NEWS ALERT!!!!!

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke says the U.S. and other countries must work together to fix a skewed pattern of trade and investment around the globe, a move that would help worldwide economic stability.

Is it me or are these NEWS ALERTS!!!!! getting more and more -- obvious?

Posted 10:20 AM by Gene

No, I have not forgotten, but at some point we must let this recede into the past. If we don't we become just like the British, who moan and cry every time the sacred Di's anniversary pops up. The further we obsess the more we're prone to idiot conspiracy theories too. I would doubt there was much commemoration on Pearl Harbor Day in 1947, and though the awful deed of 9/11 killed several thousands, Pearl Harbor commenced a war that killed nearly half-a-million of our soldiers. Let us remember, then, but let us not get psychiatric about it.

P. S. at 5:51 p.m. Somebody named Pollowitz all but confirms my suspicion, and apparently is still in a heavy daze that people didn't obsess over Pearl Harbor in 1947, or that Harry Truman didn't burst into tears upon the remembrance -- as Dubya might.

Posted 9:39 AM by Gene

"Today" viewership has dropped 6.2% since Vieira's arrival

BRING BACK LUCY VAN PELT!

Posted 9:08 PM by Gene

Clinton to Return $850,000 Raised by Hsu

I suppose this means we have a horse race, even though the gate hasn't rolled onto the track yet. Heck they're betting enough.

Posted 7:26 PM by Gene

The repudiation of LEGENDARY WELCH continues: Today Sprint Nextel settled a big age-discrimination suit. What brought it on? Old LEGENDARY's system of "forced ranking", which proved so valuable and effective "some corporations have abandoned the system"!

Goodbye, LEGENDARY, and GET LOST!

Posted 6:43 PM by Gene

We cringe to say this: Gen. Petraeus's testimony was predictable (and we pray accurate), as was the grandstanding show around it. So please forgive us for finding this continuing national example of cultural roadkill far more interesting. Of course we're as tired of hearing about YOU-KNOW-WHO as anyone, and much of the comment is received opinion grossly amplified; who wouldn't dislike this great talent after years of in-your-face? But we must admit to a fascination in seeing so many moved to sneering; and yet we must further say YOU-KNOW-WHO should not be the true recipient of this long drawn-out raspberry; it's the SUMNERS and LEGENDARY DAVISES and the SUGAR DADDIES OF MADAVE who made it possible in the first place, and despite all the putative scorn this is why we say the event was a flat out unmitigated PR SMASH, because it was a success for THEM.

Posted 6:39 PM by Gene

An Achilles' heel acted up today:

Feelings ran high, as some antiwar hecklers chanted “Generals lie, children die,” before Representative Ike Skelton, the Missouri Democrat who heads the armed services panel, decreed, “Out they go!” and warned that anyone else who disrupted the hearing would be prosecuted. But there were further disruptions, with at least one screaming demonstrator hustled out of the room as General Petraeus praised the American troops in Iraq as “a new greatest generation.”

Posted 5:26 PM by Gene

As a Lower East Side neighborhood gets transformed from a place "where residents can still be seen hanging their laundry to dry on clotheslines on buildings" to a place where HIP zillionaire overrated show-biz has-beens start HIP strip clubs that get lots of attention from every HIP rag and HIP PARIS-style parasite, the neighborhood is not amused.

Posted 5:00 PM by Gene

Hey King Richard, if MY company owned TMZ.com I wouldn't feel so sanguine either.

Still, being a likable titan can be a burden. Parsons won’t walk down the street anymore. He can’t. “People come up to you just ragging you out,” he says. “My cable thing went out, I didn’t get my magazine, I moved my AOL forwarding thing, whatever they say!”

Well why don't you fix it for them, Kingie?

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 4:56 PM by Gene

"Top Stories" Juxtaposition of the Day in USAOKAY!!!!!.com:

5 guilty in Chicago mob trial

Craig files to rescind guilty plea

Posted 2:24 PM by Gene

How bad WAS the play, Jonathan Franzen?

I practically came out of Embedded ready to join the Republican Party.

Posted 1:27 PM by Gene

And another!

Posted 1:13 PM by Gene

Another attendee at SUMNER's "music" awards makes a brilliant career move!

Posted 1:08 PM by Gene

One more instance of Corporate America's well-known desire to Do Its Part: Fast-food giants cluster their joints around poor neighborhoods and make the locals fat.

I'd love to hear a con-SER-va-tive's excuse for this one.

Posted 12:59 PM by Gene

Jane Wyman, Ronald Reagan's first wife, has died. She must have had some real sense because she never spoke of their divorce, and for a reason:

"It's not because I'm bitter or because I don't agree with him politically. I've always been a registered Republican. But it's bad taste to talk about ex-husbands and ex-wives, that's all. Also, I don't know a damn thing about politics."

That makes her a darned sight better than your typical modern-day sex simulator. We could use a little more of her tact in this Webified age.

Posted 12:18 PM by Gene

A PINCH-SUMNER POLL reveals an incredible truth: that Congresspoops may not be as good as soldiers in fighting a war.

Posted 12:10 PM by Gene

Bob Novak would dare to even imply there might be one instance where we'd trust Congresspoops on ethics?

Posted 12:06 PM by Gene

America's league of U. S. Mints -- uh, broadcasters battles to prevent Web transmissions over the air:

"While our friends at Intel, Google and Microsoft may find system errors, computer glitches and dropped calls tolerable, broadcasters do not," said NAB Chairman Alan Frank, president of Post-Newsweek Stations, in a statement

Hey look at it this way, Alan: people might decide not to watch your junky programming -- which may be a business advantage.

Posted 9:15 AM by Gene

ESPNCorp Network News has the giggles!

Pardon us, but the news biz is not that funny.

“This is not good for the brand,” said Andrew Tyndall, a B&C contributing editor and publisher of the Tyndall Report, which analyzes television news. “This is an example of how the new rules apply, especially when it comes to bloopers. The things that spread like wildfire are the bloopers, not excellence.” [Emphasis added]

Who says network TV news is about excellence?

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 9:10 AM by Gene

Jonny Hairshirt started at USAOKAY!!!!!

Now we know where he got his...excellence!

Thanks AGAIN, SOB!

Posted 9:08 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: This "disaster" was an eyeball-rolling PR SMASH.

Posted 9:06 AM by Gene

This will definitely help our rep:

Chevron promotes oil industry with videogame

And this will definitely help someone else's rep:

The Economist Intelligence Unit, The Economist Group’s research arm, provided the content, and acted as an advertising partner for the game.

“I think we are an increasingly important part of the media landscape in the [United States] and Chevron wants to partner with people who have influential readers,” said Paul Rossi, Publisher, North America, The Economist.

The publication has previously worked with Chevron to supply data and content for its “Will You Join Us” campaign.

“Chevron came to us with a communications problem and we came back to them with a set of ideas how to engage our readers to solve that communications problem,” said Justin Hendrix, PR manager, Americas at The Economist.

Where's all the talk of ethics when you need it?

Posted 4:38 PM by Gene

Just what we need -- a P&G Comedy Hour!

There's enough about its products to inspire mirth, but we're sure there's much more mirth (unintentional) in the advertising and marketing departments -- and even more in the CEO's office.

We're also sure that, at its core, a company that has inflicted more junk culture on us than any other has absolutely NO sense of humor.

Posted 4:30 PM by Gene

Great! Now we can medicalize politics. When political differences derive from the brain's chemistry we have the perfect excuse to devise drugs or therapies to alter the imbalance to conform to whatever the ruling ideology wants. Enough people of both stripes believe the opinions of their opponents constitute a crime; now all we need are some egghead quacks to affirm it. Our politics reeks with the psychiatrist's office as it is.

Posted 2:45 PM by Gene

Perhaps the notion of machines becoming smart enough to rule man is "grounded as much in science fiction as science." But few ever dreamed of the atomic bomb either.

And with so many all but sleeping with their computers and cell phones and iPods we're already quite accustomed to it.

Posted 1:19 PM by Gene

Col. Zell's soon-to-be underlings may think it's wonderful that "an appearance on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show' ha[s] widened his path into the world of pop culture", but let's wait and see when people make fun of President Oprah, or President Obama Oprah, or when they start asking questions of who's in charge at the White House. The world of pop culture may not look so good then.

A special campaign-edition NEUHARTHISM OF THE WEEK AWARD to JOHN and CHRISTI!

Posted 9:46 AM by Gene

"We don't make movies to win prizes."

But it sure does help when you have to put all those endorsements above the title.

Posted 9:22 AM by Gene

Now that we're a breeding ground for holy cockroaches, now Di-land's PM proposes to limit immigration.

I guess it's not just we Americans who are clueless.

Meantime one of the nation's leading holy men has changed his mind about how many virgins can fit on the head of a pin.

Posted 9:15 AM by Gene

Last four grafs:

But Asad Durrani, a retired chief of Pakistan's powerful spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence bureau, said it would take more than military intervention to capture al-Qaeda leaders.

Durrani said U.S. bombing campaigns along the Afghan-Pakistani border had thoroughly alienated civilians who otherwise might help root out al-Qaeda commanders. "The first instinct you Americans have is military power -- dropping bombs," he said. "This was absolutely 100 percent guaranteed not to succeed, and it's continued that way for the past six years."

He said it would take a concentrated, methodical approach to find bin Laden and his deputies, relying on human intelligence and simple detective work.

"If they are there, sit back, be patient," Durrani advised. "The good hunter hunts on foot."

TRANSLATION: We'll never find them. FURTHER TRANSLATION: When do the Dems start up again with their POLICE ACTION routine? FURTHER TRANSLATION: He helped these guys hide too. FURTHER TRANSLATION: "Experts" are to terrorism what PAUL DRECK is to the movie biz.

P. S. SURPRISE!!!!!

Most Afghanistan Suicide Bombers Trained in Pakistan

Posted 9:09 AM by Gene

Now that the Great White Hope is retiring from the Senate look for him to make big bucks as MR. ETHANOL -- something he couldn't do before because it wasn't ethical.

Posted 8:42 AM by Gene

This sort of thing makes us fulminate, and we really didn't want to post on it, but an AUGUST NEWS ORGANIZATION LIKE THE ASSPRESS that can euphemize here can euphemize anywhere.

Posted 8:40 AM by Gene

That DAPOST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!'s recorded...SOUND ad-blurbists are able to ascertain 40 MASTERPIECES before they're released indicates they're a little too close to PR types...or maybe that we have too many people typing on show-biz.