Posted 8:28 PM by Gene

THE SUPERMANNING OF AMERICA continues apace with the "populist" (aw-how-cute) notion that if we cover our cemeteries with as many Christmas goo-gaws as we cover our houses we show respect for the dead. This being the Paper of Re-CORD it burps, "The seasonal proliferation also reflects a broader emotional acceptance of memorials in the culture blahblahblah." To me this is an unhealthy fixation, and it makes Mickey Mouse dolls and Hello Kittys of our beloved, and it's a discomfiting reminder that in real ways we worship death (witness NO SNITCHIN'!!!!!!!!!!, or the Paper's immortal cri-TIC A. O. with B. O.) Let us honor the dead without bells and whistles.

Posted 7:27 PM by Gene

With lots of primping and preening, one of the typically pink-hued-heavily-corrective-lensed types what revues architecture -- in this case for The Newsrag of the Zeitgeist -- ooohs and aaahs over this masterpiece by MR. STARCHITECT, the man who bequeathed leaky roofs to MIT. Oddly enough this is corporate headquarters for IAC -- the company BARRY DILLER!!!!! (formerly known as Jesus Christ) is breaking up. No note of that anywhere, but then this is just a newsrag, and they don't have to know these things. In fact it's better starchitect revuers don't know them, that way it won't detract from their raves.

Which comes first -- Barry's firing from his new improved firm or the first leak?

P. S.

"MIT IS AFTER OUR INSURANCE!!!!!!!!!!" [Visually arresting overemphasis added]

Look at it this way, Je -- Barry: you'll get more income for your firm.

P. P. S.



The godfather of starchitect revuers busy raving a new piece of construction.

Posted 4:37 PM by Gene

Well, ya got trouble my friend, right here in Music City -- trouble with a capital T and that rhymes with C and that stands for...

CHEATIN'!

Now why is this so rare in professional kolledge sport? Is it because the cheaters usually aren't caught?

OhOHHHHHHHHoh, it was a "poorly structured online course" and a "rogue tutor." How come it's only the little guys that make the big messes?

Posted 4:21 PM by Gene

Though buried on its Web site, this Paper of Re-CORD article ran just above the fold on its front page, speaking volumes of its lack of courage or news judgment. Forced to confront this we must confront the underlying story, which, when only a day old, seemed immortally tiresome. (That we must view it as another manifestation of ennui speaks of the utter mess our age is in.) The young woman being a SUMNERIAN we can expect Him to play tricks for profit, like revising His series to make cute, "non-judgmental" bromides on teen pregnancy; but the recent career free-fall of the SUMNERIAN's fearsomely exasperating older "sister" may prove that SUM's first instinct, the age-old skunk smell that any publicity is good publicity, just won't work, for publicity has made the older slut the show-biz equivalent of Typhoid Mary. One thing is clear: the national headache has just begun.

Posted 12:55 PM by Gene

"Someone asked me, 'Are we bankrupt?' " Chrysler chief Robert Nardelli told staff earlier this month, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal. "Technically, no. Operationally, yes. The only thing that keeps us from going into bankruptcy is the $10 billion investors entrusted us with."

What in God's name does THAT mean? And how long will it take the Three-Headed Dog's new thing to burn through $10 billion?

Posted 12:01 PM by Gene

"Even Hitler didn’t wake up going, ‘Let me do the most evil thing I can do today’. I think he woke up in the morning and using a twisted, backwards logic, he set out to do what he thought was ‘good’. Stuff like that just needs reprogramming.”

We would tell geniuses like the IMMORTAL WILL to stick to movies but then they do the same mental short-circuit there too -- only worse.

Posted 9:40 AM by Gene

OH oh:

Supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton's presidential candidacy are privately blaming aggressive campaigning by Bill Clinton for her recent decline in Iowa's pre-caucus polls.

In their opinion, the former president's strong defense of his wife pushes the contest for the Democratic nomination toward what Hillary Clinton wanted to avoid: a referendum on the Clinton administration, making her a symbol of the past rather than an agent of change.

Two for the price of one!

A footnote: Democrats close to Bill Clinton blame Mark Penn, Sen. Clinton's chief strategist, for her decline. They grumble that Penn, a professional pollster, relies too much on polls.

And how many airplanes and hotel rooms does HE freak out in?

Posted 9:26 AM by Gene

As a corporate and political communications consultant, I regularly fly at least 300,000 miles a year and stay in more than 100 hotel rooms.

FRANK LUNTZ PLEADS NOT GUILTY BY REASON OF INSANITY.

Posted 9:19 AM by Gene

Motto of the Day:

Professional football to a large degree is a gigantic beer-delivery mechanism.

Posted 8:00 PM by Gene

What a letdown: RASPUTIN's memoirs worth only $1.5 MILLION?

Looks like there's a new motto in the book biz: you can bore some of the people all of the time....

Posted 5:42 PM by Gene

What's the difference between commies and Belly Kisser except Belly Kisser may have the big bucks?

It's official -- Russia's the banana republic with oily bananas.

Posted 5:27 PM by Gene

Sarko -- a show-bizzy cynic?

Say it isn't so!

Posted 5:22 PM by Gene

BUGMEISTER STRIKES AGAIN!

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

The idea of having people who've foreclosed on their mortgages to pay rent to stay in them sounds like such a good idea Dubya, the Congress and K Street could think up 5,000 reasons against it.

Posted 5:02 PM by Gene

Seeing him a few minutes later waiting, unobtrusive and incognito, behind a pillar outside the Four Seasons for the parking valet to bring his car, it is easy to wonder whether, like Ali G and Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen himself is a fake and the real person is even further back in the shadows.

This devastating insight MUST be the LAST GRAF because these infernal hacks only know how to make such observations in the LAST GRAF.

(Via ASSPress)

Posted 3:44 PM by Gene

The nice thing about lawsuits from insurance-inspired medical disasters like this is that they subject Corporate America to more justified bad publicity -- and rile knee-jerk FREE EN-TER-PRISE con-SER-va-tives too.

That said we doubt CIGNA will suffer in rep or in currency.

Posted 2:42 PM by Gene

The Great Alaskan Boar and Rep. Moneybags Screwem have their own "expeditionary craft"!

To nowhere!

Posted 2:35 PM by Gene

Excellence in Home Video Technology:

Warner Confirms 'T3' Blu-ray Problems; Replacement Program Expected

'Goblet of Fire' Blu-ray Disc Replacement Details

'Blade Runner' Blu-ray Suffers Manufacturing Glitch [HooRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!!]

'Black Pearl' Blu-ray Disc Exchange Details Revealed [This was the one with the -- "framing issues."]

What hath Gods wrought?

(Via ShowBizData)

Posted 2:02 PM by Gene

Fun: Colinette and Gov. Huckleberry are having a food fight.

Who cares?

Posted 11:36 AM by Gene

Hey Drunken Slob! It's easy to make enemies with somebody when the SYNERGY isn't there anymore.

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 10:05 AM by Gene

Well! Who'd have thought Ross Perot II would have support from hookers?

Not I, said the little bird.

Posted 9:51 AM by Gene

Let me guess: Circuit City goes broke and Best Buy buys up its stores. That should help competition.

Posted 9:46 AM by Gene

An old matzoh factory on the Lower East Side is about to be turned into -- you guessed it -- CONDOS, and even the locals may not be that pleased (if this site is to be believed).

Honest Eddie, do you and your friends have to turn every last square inch of our downtowns into CONDOS and HIP joints?

"I hope they lose their shirts" indeed.

Posted 9:33 AM by Gene

How should a con-ser-va-tive news hack handle global warming?

More than 400 scientists challenge claims by former Vice President Al Gore and the United Nations about the threat of man-made global warming, a new Senate minority report says....

"I find the Doomsday picture Al Gore is painting — a six-meter sea level rise, 15 times the IPCC number — entirely without merit," said Dutch atmospheric scientist Hendrik Tennekes, one of the researchers quoted in the report by Republican staff of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. [Emphasis added]

The way a LIBERAL news hack would!

Posted 9:24 AM by Gene

Keep the cats in the stores!

(Within reason, of course.)

Posted 9:03 AM by Gene

There'll Always Be a Hollywood:

WGA winds down for the holidays
74% of Americans unaffected by work stoppage

Posted 8:55 AM by Gene

A eulogy for the once famous Mr. Capote, from a man likely to be once-famous himself, Mr. Vidal:

"Truman thought he was dealing with aristocracy, when all he was doing was having lunch with women who outlived their rich husbands."

Posted 8:51 AM by Gene

The Paper of Re-CORD is having another one of those self-serving "CAN YOU HEAR US?????" ETHICS fits. Screaming ETHICS is another way of justifying your further depradations of the public while engaging in a holier-than-thou game of PR. Any organization that screams ETHICS -- be it a newspaper, the medical research institute or Congress -- will do what IT wants to do. We should take outfits that scream ETHICS and throw them where they'd throw us -- down the sewer.

Posted 7:56 PM by Gene

The other day one of The Corner's inmates stomped his feet and screamed "UNBELIEVABLE!!!!!!!!!!" at a Paper of Re-CORD writer's suggestion that "the tedious and humiliating rigmarole of airport security" was "unjustified." Now the Harvard School of Public Health has said the same thing. Of course there are many reasons for the tedious and humiliating rigamarole, including a seven-letter plural proper noun that begins with a capital M and an eleven-letter singular common noun that begins with a lower-case b, and a four-letter acronym that begins in A and ends in U (and let us not forget a seven-letter plural common noun beloved of con-SER-va-tives that begins with a lower case p and ends with an $), but that we haven't had an incident in over six years may not mean the system is working, or that it's any good. There must be a better way, but so long as we have Dubyas and ossified airline execs and PC con-SER-va-tives there won't be any.

Posted 6:05 PM by Gene

Some university faculty members have started popping “smart” pills to enhance their mental energy and ability to work long hours.

Judging from our KOLLEDGES they need all the help they can get.

“It smells to me a lot like taking steroids for physical prowess.”

You're lucky you don't have drug testing.

Posted 5:56 PM by Gene

This is foolishness. The EDWARD R. MURROW and ERIC SEVAREID OF COMEDY use what, thirty or forty writers? We know how ED bombed at the Os-CARS® and ERIC bombed in Washington -- and we suspect both men partially winged it. With luck it could be a slow-motion case of stage fright palliated with a sizable dose of Valium.

By the way ED -- planning a repeat performance?

Posted 5:54 PM by Gene

AP NEWS ALERT!!!!!

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- The New Orleans City Council has approved the demolition of nearly 4,500 low-income housing units despite occasionally violent protests.

Why weren't these houses torn down two years ago whatever their historical significance?

Posted 5:33 PM by Gene

I HAVE HAD IT WITH MOVIE AD-BLURBISTS. Some months ago the hoity-toity cretinous A. O. with B. O. ran an article on Bonnie and Clyde that hypocritically concluded Bosley Crowther may have been right. Now an equal fraud at Stale.com says in so many words THE MASTERPIECE OF PHILIP K. DICK is vastly overrated. These SCHMUCKS (pardon my Chinese) want it both ways -- they want their names above the titles AND they want to show their supposedly iconoclastic erudition. They want to prove they can stand up like men even when they act as whores. I HAVE HAD IT with these X-markers having it so many ways they have none.

And I want someone to tell me this dimwit's "[T]his is still in many respects the film panned by Maslin and Kael" isn't the moral equivalent of the flatulent A. O.'s LAST GRAF.

Posted 5:29 PM by Gene

And the site of the department store massacre reopened. We're surprised given the DUBYA-OPRAH tenor of the age the store wasn't closed PERMANENTLY.

I HATE THIS AGE!

Posted 5:23 PM by Gene

Virginia Tech is starting a "Center for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention" where the school's massacre occurred (and natch, the ASSPress names the gunman -- and the gunman ONLY). With a moniker like that we'd be surprised if it didn't become an ultra-PC center for breast beating. Who knows? In time it could become so apologetic for what happened it could be named for the GUNMAN.

We'd expect nothing less too from a FOOTBALL FACTORY.

Posted 1:04 PM by Gene

ALL HAIL THE KING! ALL HAIL COL. ZELL!

Now when Trib goes broke NO ONE will know!

Posted 1:00 PM by Gene

Mr. My Business is My Business blows up:

Huckabee's radical candidacy broadly repudiates core Republican policies such as free trade, low taxes, THE ESSENTIAL LEGITIMACY OF AMERICA'S CORPORATE ENTITIES and the market system allocating wealth and opportunity. [Free-en-ter-prise-respecting overemphasis added]

Translation: Don't anyone touch MY corporate America -- especially when it's corrupt.

Posted 10:32 AM by Gene

Why do we think Sarko will become so preoccupied with his new toy that all thought of reform will fly out the window?

Posted 10:20 AM by Gene

The B. S. DEFENDERS and others who say all these complaints about violent entertainment are a smokescreen for enveloping NAZISM should have an easy time with this one, as they can always say an excess of green beans could have brought it on, or something.

Posted 10:15 AM by Gene

THE CONSPIRACY extrudes another one:

This latest version has G.I. JOE, which stands for Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity, as an international force of operatives set in Brussels.

Does that mean they fight for truth, justice, and the European Union way?

Posted 9:19 AM by Gene

"I'M SURE YOU'RE DELIGHTED TO DISCOVER THAT YOU EFFECTIVELY RUINED WHAT HAD OTHERWISE BEEN A REALLY NICE WEEK IN MY LIFE. GIVEN THE TONE OF YOUR WRITING, YOU'RE JUST THE KIND OF PERSON WHO WOULD TRULY TAKE PLEASURE IN SUCH A THING....IF YOU ARE SO JUVENILE AS TO FOI MY SCHEDULE AS A RESULT OF YOUR NOT GETTING MY STAFF TO CALL ME AWAY FROM MY FAMILY ON MY BIRTHDAY SO YOU CAN GET INFORMATION YOU COULD USE AGAINST ME IN A COLUMN, THEN DO IT!! I FRANKLY DON'T GIVE A RAT'S REAR AS TO YOUR REGARD FOR ME AS A PUBLIC OFFICIAL, BECAUSE YOU APPARENTLY WILL NEVER OVERCOME YOUR BOORISH BEHAVIOR TOWARD THOSE WHOSE OPINIONS YOU CANNOT CHALLENGE ON A RESPONSIBLE OR INTELLECTUAL BASIS!!!!!" [Salt-of-the-earth overemphasis added]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN!!!!!

Posted 9:04 AM by Gene

I think we can see why the Slashdottians would consider this good news:

Hardware: Toshiba Builds Ultra-Small Nuclear Reactor

Posted 8:51 AM by Gene

The Big V's colyumnist acts as a fuse for sticks of righteously angry WALTER WINCHELL-READING DYNAMITE!!!!!!!!!!

A colyumnist at the first defender of En-Ter-Tain-Ment, and a zillionaire half-truth-spreader who wears a hat to cover the holes in his head. What a choice.

(Via MediaBistro)

Posted 8:46 AM by Gene

AP NEWS ALERT!!!!!

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Commerce Department reports that the economy grew at a brisk 4.9 percent in the summer, unchanged from an estimate one month ago and the best showing in four years.

DOW 19,000!!!!!

Posted 8:36 AM by Gene

What a LOVELY place to spend a weekend!

In the gheeee-TOOOOOOOOOOOOO....

Posted 8:29 AM by Gene

Sniff, Connie's a crook, a fraud, a convict -- but he's a CONSERVATIVE...AND he's my FRIEND! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!

Shut up and put Ronny on Mt. Rushmore, EMM.

Posted 8:23 AM by Gene

CAPTION OF THE WEEK:



'DISAPPOINTING': President Bush and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shared a laugh yesterday at the Department of Energy. The House approved a $555 billion bill 272-142 to finish work on the Hill for the year. Mrs. Pelosi called it "the will of the Congress." (Getty Images)

NO COMMENT.

Posted 8:17 AM by Gene

Rah rah rah! Sis boom bah! Democrats! Democrats! Rah rah rah! YaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYY TEAM!!!!!

People will always deceive themselves into believing the unbiased observer, the notion of reporting without fear or favor, the newsman heroically above the fray, can be possible, but among advertisers, ambitions, huge salaries and power it is well-nigh impossible.

P. S. We still like that picture. How did such a cutie become so grasping and cold?

Posted 6:17 PM by Gene

And in other media stupidity:

A Charleston radio personality was suspended from his job for refusing to tone down his on-air excitement over former WVU head football coach Rich Rodriguez's decision to take the head job at the University of Michigan.

Coach Kidd, a Michigan native, co-hosts the morning talk show on Electric 102.7 FM. For the past couple days, he's dominated the show's content with his feelings on how Rodriguez's job change will be a boon to the Wolverines football program -- much to the dismay of listeners.

After playing the Wolverines' fight song for a fourth time this morning, Coach Kidd was yanked off the air.

We can think of a heck of a lot of things that should have gotten a few "radio personalities" yanked off the air, but didn't.

By the way, whatever happened to Drunken Slob?

(Via DetroitNews.com)

Posted 6:02 PM by Gene

ANOTHER thing for the P-Ulitzer winning hacks to obsess over:

Terrell Owens has a message for Jessica Simpson: Stay away.

The 27-year-old singer-actress has become Public Enemy No. 1 among Dallas Cowboys fans because of a link being made between her appearance at Sunday's game and the poor performance of her new boyfriend, quarterback Tony Romo.

Why just Dallas?

Posted 5:50 PM by Gene

NO!!!!! The Millionaires' Strike has apparently canceled -- THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARDS!!!!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!

(Via one of LALA's blogs -- and now IT copies ITS news from WARNER BROS. TELEVISION?!?)

Posted 5:24 PM by Gene

Shucks, that sitcommy Branson East theme park about a chaperone and cast albums is closing, meaning it will never be rebuilt.

But not to fret -- someone else is building a new theme park in LA -- about...Andrew Jackson?!?!?

Wouldn't closer to Dollywood help?

Posted 5:19 PM by Gene

Ooooops, Politico pans Joe -- uh, Charlie Wilson's War!

In a stunning epilogue to Sorkin’s original screenplay for “Charlie Wilson’s War,” the freewheeling congressman who helped the Afghan mujahedeen drive the Russians out of their homeland is relaxing at his Washington-area home several years after his covert op ended rather successfully.

Suddenly there’s a “BOOM,” and a “teeth-jarring explosion” is heard in the distance. Wilson runs out to his terrace, encountering a cloud of orange-black smoke — the Pentagon on fire.

His phone rings, and it’s his quirky CIA buddy who helped him with the Middle East mission, telling him to turn on the TV.

As the screen blacks out, the audience realizes it’s Sept. 11, 2001, and some of Wilson’s Islamic rebel allies in Afghanistan evolved into the terrorist group Al Qaeda.

Unfortunately, you won’t see this powerful ending in the new $75 million film version of “Charlie Wilson’s War,” starring Tom Hanks in the title role and opening nationwide on Friday.

It was dropped from the final 97-minute film, as was nearly a third of other scenes and dialogue found in the script’s original 143-page draft.

There are no overt, or even subtle, references to 9/11 anymore; the script’s dark tone has become much more upbeat.

Gosh, it must have been so tough for MR. SPAMALOT not to TELL THE TRUTH.

Anyone wanna GUE$$ why?

Posted 5:17 PM by Gene

Limits Imposed for NYC Flights

Who wants to bet this proves, shall we say, counterintuitive?

Posted 5:13 PM by Gene

MTV, Bruckheimer to Make Video Games

How can JERRY DRECKHEIMER make VIDEO GAMES -- WORSE?

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

Speaking of fix, Bugmeister has provided another reason not to buy Vista.

Posted 5:04 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Our Congressional lunkheads have "fixed" the AMT for a year, meaning they'll fix it again year after year, until they get around to "fixing" it, which will prove a fix worse than the AMT.

Posted 3:38 PM by Gene

Sen. Trent Lott retired from Congress late Tuesday with characteristic flair, making public with 16 minutes' notice that he would relinquish his seat when the Senate closed for business.

I don't think "flair" is the right word.

Oh well, now it's too late to say, "Bye Trent! Watch the door on your way out to the FORBES 400!"

Posted 1:19 PM by Gene

Viacom, Microsoft Strike 5-Year, $500M Ad Deal

EVIL shakes hands with EVIL.

Posted 12:45 PM by Gene

THE MOST RELIGIOUSLY INTOLERANT SECTOR OF AMERICAN LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!

[Tolerant overemphasis added]



What? We worry?

(Via WeeklyStandard.com)

Posted 10:40 AM by Gene

The Italians are getting into anime!

Isn't one anime-spewing country enough?

Posted 10:36 AM by Gene

The icons that stayed too long

You mean The S------s and R----T aren't on the list? I wonder why.

Posted 10:33 AM by Gene

"We treat all films the same. Ads will be seen by all audiences, including children...."

AND SO WILL YOUR MOVIE EXCRETIONS, DIMWIT. WHY ARE YOU EXERCISED OVER A LOUSY POSTER?

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

Speaking of, sounds as if "Can't Anyone Here Run This Rag" Stengel had trouble making up his mind.

And now he has "runner-ups" -- like The Miss America Pageant.

Posted 10:17 AM by Gene

Kristol, Krauthammer Are Out of Time

If every rag in America showed the door to all the columnists who've overstayed their welcomes....

Anyone for an increase in the unempoyment rate?

Posted 10:15 AM by Gene

U.S. banks have borrowed $20 billion from the Federal Reserve for 28 days at 4.65%, the Fed announced Wednesday. It was the first of several planned auctions of short-term credits to alleviate a liquidity crunch in credit markets.

And what is this supposed to mean, oh infinite seers of the Fed?

Posted 7:00 PM by Gene

SLIME plays SCROOGE:

The Man Who Started It All
Twenty-five years of John McLaughlin.
by Andrew Ferguson

BAH HUMBUG!

Posted 6:47 PM by Gene

We cannot know why the TWXSTERS ran this graphic with a story about South Africa's ruling party; alas, it seems more than apt, for the country and the continent.

Looking forward to 2009, then, South African politics will increasingly be dominated by one question: will the country's most popular politician be elected President, or convicted of corruption?

In Africa that sort of question too often answers itself.

Posted 5:16 PM by Gene

Speaking of movies -- can't I speak of something else? -- MS. TRAVERS (strangely enough) found this article that makes her beloved fillum biz look bad.

Of course the biz will "marginalize" actresses. What Hollywood woman can you name with looks and talent? In a way you can't blame the cretins for giving the little talent they've got as little exposure as possible. This is another way the biz admits maybe this isn't a megaplatinum age, Mogul's Friend contrariwise.

Posted 5:12 PM by Gene

The Forbeslist typist Lacey, ever looking for that big job in show-biz, approves of the late-night plug fests because they make politicians likable.

Here's another scribbler to join Mogul's Friend and those infernal movie obsessives on my S-LIST.

Posted 2:50 PM by Gene

Free Mike Vick!

Nice to know a few of his teammates have their -- loyalty. PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT!!!!!

Posted 1:57 PM by Gene

Speaking thereof, one of the Adams's dearest friends, Sen. Ossified Kleagle, is being eased from his rulership of the Senate Appropriations Committee, seeing as his age and infirmities are at the center of the great Congressional nervous breakdown.

Posted 1:54 PM by Gene

I've been wondering for years if culture and literacy are finite resources. I'd wager collectively we're no more literate than the generation of 1776. Those who were literate more far more advanced in their skills than any of us; read the brilliant epistles of John and Abigail Adams and weep. More people can read and write, but they can't do it as well.

Posted 1:11 PM by Gene

I'm willing to concede not reading to kids is a problem, but this is more a consequence of our increasingly every-man-for-himself socializing than anything else. The reason I get so agitated by "think" pieces like Caleb's and the movie X-markers' is that they fall into a pattern: show-offy whining, accompanied by no suggestions, and underlined with the unspoken belief that, for all its faults, our culture is BETTER THAN EVER!!!!! They've also become an analog of political reporting, and for that reason alone they STINK.

(Via BookStandard)

Posted 11:57 AM by Gene

Mogul's Friend reminds us that if a "supermassive black hole" shot forth a jet of "X-rays, gamma rays and electrons" at every idiot who writes about movies, zapping them to oblivion, our national sanity would improve -- and our movies would get immensely better.

Posted 9:51 AM by Gene

Castro: Won't Cling to Power Forever

Castro's thoughts about power and making way for younger leaders were similar to past comments, including those before he fell ill.

TRANSLATION: Castro WILL cling to power forever.

Posted 9:10 AM by Gene

And in more dithering blather, this from The New Yorker -- yes, The New Yorker -- Caleb extrudes 4,532 WORDS in a state of alarm over the tragic fact that PEOPLE ARE NOT READING!!!!!

We'd argue with people spending so much time before a monitor they're reading more than ever. No, it may not be the civilized behavior of Eustace Tilley cozying himself up in an easy chair with a book and his monocle, but it's reading. If it's people not reading the right things, one may ask, is it EHDYUKAYSHUN? Of course. But with 5 MILLION BOOKS IN PRINT every year maybe it's the books themselves too. A culture that can turn out 5 MILLION BOOKS A YEAR is not illiterate, though it may barely be literate. With so many books and so little time people may have other more pressing things to do. No, one could argue people are reading -- and writing -- TOO MUCH.

(Via several of the usual sources that engage in such posting)

Posted 9:03 AM by Gene

NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The Os-CARS® will have to do without -- BAD COMEDY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 8:14 AM by Gene

Proving that even Metro writers can live the life of Riley on their salaries, one of the intrepid gang who makes sure to litter the streets with their rag on my commute calls up a PRESS ETHICIST from POYN-TER, who makes a POYNT:

“Any time this type of publicity surrounds a news anchor, it is bad for all journalists,” said Poynter Institute broadcasting expert Al Tompkins, who has worked as a television media consultant for 30 years. “It affirms for viewers a belief that TV journalists are more TV than journalists.”...

But the perception that journalists — television reporters, in particular — lack credibility is simply not representative of the industry as a whole, Tompkins said.

“It’s just not true for the vast majority who go out and work hard,” he said. “It’s really sad that this is how people come to know people in TV newsrooms.”

Tell us about all that hard work, Al. Tell us about all the hard work weathermen do grinning and capering and telling bad jokes before the chroma key. Tell us about the hard work it takes for some Fred Flintstone to say coach is a drooling incompetent and must go. Tell us about the hard work standing in a Santa Claus suit or a monkey suit or a Wookiee uniform for the end-of-the-show laugh. Tell us about the hard work tracking down press conferences and copying the police blotter. Tell us about the hard work taking more time combing your hair than John Edwards. Tell us about the hard work being a PROFIT CENTER and a lead-in for Pat and Alex. If this is hard work, with those vastly inflated salaries I'd like some.

And this being Metro the story has no @#$%&* URL either!

P. S.

Consulting clients: ABC Owned and Operated Stations, Telemundo Television Stations; Meredith Television Stations; Scripps Howard Television, NBC owned and operation stations Promotions Directors; Stations; Hearst Argyle Television Stations; Gannett Television Stations; Griffin Communications; NBC Owned and Operated Stations; New York Times Television Stations; Cox Television; Cox Cable, Cox Washington DC Bureau, RUV TV (Iceland), Belo Television Stations; Freedom Newspapers of Florida, Freedom Newspapers of North Carolina, The Raleigh News & Observer, Shurz Broadcast stations, Radio and Television News Directors Association; RTNDA Canada; Radio and Television News Directors Foundation; The Ford Foundation; Hampton University, Kings University, Belmont University, Western Kentucky University, Middle Tennessee State University

Alabama Broadcasters Association; Arkansas Broadcasters Association; Oklahoma Broadcasters Association; Hawaii Association of Broadcasters; Texas Association of Broadcasters; Ohio AP Broadcasters Association; Pennsylvania Broadcasters Association; Illinois Broadcasters Association; Washington State Broadcasters Association; Georgia Broadcasters Association; Tennessee Broadcasters Association; Louisiana Broadcasters Association; New York State Broadcasters Association; West Virginia Broadcasters Association; Missouri Broadcasters Association; Virginia Broadcasters Association; North Carolina Broadcasters Association; South Carolina Association of Broadcasters; Wisconsin Broadcasters Association; Iowa Broadcasters Association;Oregon Broadcasters, North Carolina Press Association, Alaska Broadcasters Association, New Mexico Broadcasters Association

National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences -- NATAS (Pennsylvania); NATAS (Washington DC); NATAS (Miami); WMC-TV; WSB-TV; KXAS-TV; KHOU-TV; WNEM-TV; KPHO-TV; WEWS-TV; WPTV-TV; WESH-TV; WKMG-TV; WTVW-TV; WPBF-TV; WHO-TV; KWTV-TV; WZZM-TV; WNEP-TV; WTKR-TV; KTHV-TV; KCTV-TV; WGAL; WTVF; WSBT

Lots of HARD WORK ya got there, Al!

P. P. S.

From the mid-1970s to the present, newscasts have been fierce battlegrounds for viewer loyalty. Stations earn a substantial portion of their revenue from their newscasts and aggressively promote their news through the day. Popular syndicated entertainment programming leading into newscasts is used to deliver viewers to a station's news product, and a popular newscast, in turn, boosts ratings for an entire evening's programming. Stations peddle newscasts and newscasters with billboards and other local media. But when programming and promotional strategies fail, stations turn to high paid hired guns to deliver the audience.

These "news doctors", or news consultants, are blamed for most of the ills of TV news. As station owners added or expanded newscasts, or launched a new drive for market dominance, they have consistently turned from the expertise of their own managers to the expertise of consultants with a track record of ratings increases and a supposedly scientific approach. The best known consulting firm is Frank N. Magid and Associates, but there are dozens of others. For several tens of thousands of dollars these firms conduct viewer surveys and focus groups. The results--a vague indication of what a few viewers think they like--are used to rebuild newscasts from the ground up. Newscasts are made "marketable."

The gimmicks offered by consultants or newly hired news directors have usually included some combination of the following: News sets may be rebuilt to be more modern, homey, or just bigger than the competition's. Newscasters and reporters are often fired and replaced and if not, are always "remade" in appearance and on-air persona. Consultants maintain vast nationwide videotape files of news talent, and records of their respective ratings, to help clients find the perfect personalities. News directors and other managers are often replaced. Music, graphics, and other aesthetic elements are updated, sometimes requiring extravagant equipment upgrades.

Finally, a new format is usually adopted. The most grating of these, known as "happy talk" (usually under the "Eyewitness News" designation), has mercifully died away in most markets. At its height in the late 1970s, the format sacrificed the delivery of information for almost non-stop witty, sometimes prurient, banter between attractive, if cerebrally vacant, on-air personalties.

Other common formats, some still in evidence, include "Action News", with quick young reporters and barely edited video of the day's highly visual carnage, or "News Center", emphasizing reporting and relevance to viewers. Live news coverage, as stations acquire the technology, is invariably made the newscast's raison d'etre. This often puts reporters in ridiculous situations, filing live reports from long deserted locations, without the depth and quality a pre-produced report would provide. These trends evidence the emphasis on entertainment which has pervaded local and regional TV news.

Which may help explain....

P. P. P. S. MORE HARD WORK:

Philadelphia media personalities sometimes make the news themselves.

Howard Eskin. The hard-charging WIP/NBC10 sports reporter has often been in hot water; it really boiled over after his friendship with a woman who was later murdered by her husband.

Cecily Tynan. The Action News weathercaster left a nasty voice mail on the answering machine of her fiance's ex-wife - who released the tape.

Tom Burlington. The Fox29 anchor was taken off the air indefinitely after reportedly using the N-word during a news meeting.

Mike Missanelli. WIP fired the host after he roughed up a producer.

Sharon Reed. NBC10 dismissed the reporter/anchor after she reportedly threatened a colleague by e-mail.

Monica Malpass. The 6ABC anchor made headlines during her long-running divorce case.

John Bolaris. The weathercaster, who starts next month on Fox29, was a one-man gossip bonfire while at NBC10: reports of nightclub dustups, a celebrated romance with singer Lauren Hart, and a child with former NBC10 anchor Tiffany McElroy.

Jessica Savitch. The Kennett Square native became a star at KYW-TV before being hired away by NBC. Rumors of drug use peaked after a slurred on-air appearance in 1983. Less than a month later Savitch drowned when the car she was riding in plunged into a canal in Bucks County.

Sorry for such a lengthy post but when these POYNTER types get on their high horses....

P. S. On 5/31/2008: I found the URL -- on Yahoo!

Posted 8:02 PM by Gene

What happened with Madame BOOBS's brother sounds like a joke -- until you realize the joke's been told over and over in hundreds of cities and towns, to untold billions in losses, and then you realize the specialty of our elected leaders is unfunny comedy.

John F. Moeur, managing editor of the Daily Herald in Roanoke Rapids, said the city gave Parton the keys to the theater, literally and figuratively.

"It was a sweetheart deal," said Moeur, whose newspaper apologized to readers for failing to investigate the contract when it was signed.

And what highway-development robbery would be complete without the help of a FRRRRRRRRRRRREE PRRRRRRRRRRRESS?

Posted 7:50 PM by Gene

Led by Europe, international donors on Monday pledged $7.4 billion over three years to help Palestinians as new peace talks begin with Israel, yet old Mideast fights over disputed land and freedom of movement shadowed the largest show of support for the Palestinians in more than a decade.

TRANSLATION: If THIS bribe doesn't help....

World leaders at the conference urged Israel to ease limits on Palestinian movement in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, following up on a warning from the World Bank that without an easing of the sweeping physical and administrative restrictions donors may be wasting their money.

NO COMMENT.

Posted 7:12 PM by Gene

One of the CHEAP CHANNEL gang has a BRILLIANT idea: it's buying radio stations in BULGARIA!

Are you sure you should do that? In Bulgaria they know ALL ABOUT totalitarianism.

(Via another R&R story -- the site with NO @#$%&* LINKS!)

Posted 5:43 PM by Gene

From the American standpoint, the timing of the Russian fuel’s delivery couldn’t have been worse, coming just two weeks after the release of a United States intelligence estimate that concluded that Iran stopped its nuclear weapons program in 2003. The National Intelligence Estimate also concluded that Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007, undercutting a central tenet of the Bush administration’s basis for maintaining international pressure against Iran.

While administration officials maintain that the intelligence estimate does not mean that the United States and its allies should ease up the pressure against Iran, the practical consequence of the report has been to embolden Iran that China and Russia, two of the countries with perhaps the smallest appetite for tough sanctions, will not agree to a new round of tough sanctions at the United Nations. Russia’s decision to deliver fuel to Bushehr further emboldens Iran, several administration officials and European diplomats said privately. [LAST TWO GRAFS]

Hope you acrostics fans were right. Oh. Intelligence folks are right?

Posted 5:28 PM by Gene

FORTY-TWO YEARS LATER:

Investors Back Off Berkshire Hathaway
Andrew Farrell
Concerns mount that Warren Buffett's holding company might be overvalued.

GOD'S HEAVEN FORFEND!

Berkshire isn't easy to analyze because of its complexity and because Buffett communicates little with investors save for his appearance at Berkshire's annual meeting in May. Berkshire's quarterly 10-Q reports provide no detail on many of its non-insurance units. There's scant coverage of Berkshire on Wall Street because analysts typically want access to management.

TRANSLATION: How many SIVs lurk in His pantry?

P. S. He owns a chunk of Moody's, which has seen better days -- in no small part thanks to SIVs.

Posted 11:38 AM by Gene

“America help us, America help us.”

Heck if Dubya, in close (preferably, not-so-close) consultation with COLINETTE, feels it's okay to betray our friends, than it's okay.

Say -- maybe WAL-MART can set up business there!

Posted 11:07 AM by Gene

Blimey! England has Babbitts waving mortgages too!

"We are in a different world compared to previous housing downturns," said Shipside. "It is a world of international banking interdependencies, and a world in which the robustness of the U.K. housing market has never been tested."

TRANSLATION: When we financial types want to start a potential global depression we're the masters at concocting excuses.

Posted 10:38 AM by Gene

Dozens of striking film and TV writers are negotiating with venture capitalists to set up companies that would bypass the Hollywood studio system and reach consumers with video entertainment on the Web....

Three of the groups are working on ventures that would function much like United Artists, the production company created 80 years ago by Charlie Chaplin and other top stars who wanted to break free from the studios.

And what did someone named Richard A. Rowland say of THAT idea?

Posted 10:32 AM by Gene

We don't imagine Samantha Para will be invited to HARVEY WHINER's next wedding, being a mere mortal, but we can safely say she has more guts than several roomfuls of His wedding guests -- and at least two thousand GRAY-DONS.

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

We just hope BRIAN ROBBER and Jim Dolan didn't charge Their subscribers too much for the HARVEY WHINERS' wedding gifts.

Just a reasonable gouge.

Posted 10:25 AM by Gene

AP NEWS ALERT!!!!!

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Bush administration says the federal budget deficit would have been 69 percent higher than the $162.8 billion reported two months ago if the government had used the same accounting methods as private companies.

Now it's official -- we can't believe government numbers on ANYTHING!

Posted 9:18 AM by Gene

Saudi Arabia's Grand Exalted Poobah spares His rape victim, which we can be sure does not mean being a rape victim is no longer a crime there.

Posted 9:01 AM by Gene

PROFESSOR JOCELYN KIRSCH!

We'd say that's a laugh but we can't given some professors.

Posted 8:51 AM by Gene

TRANSLATION: Rep. Moneybomb is this year's model of Jug-Ears Perot, telling the "truth."

And let us not forget they're BOTH from Tex-ASS.

Posted 8:45 AM by Gene

THIS is what ADAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! paid him for! Effete Edelstein gets to write four rave reviews in one! Movies ARE better than ever!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 8:43 AM by Gene

When TIM RUT whines about how his noble calling ignored the steroid scandal, we can be certain it did it on purpose -- and that he WROTE IT on purpose.

(Via the usual Romy)

Posted 8:37 AM by Gene

A local anchorface assaults a cop!

I'd say seeing she works for SUMNER this is a brilliant career move!

Roll over, TOM SNYDER!

Posted 8:33 AM by Gene

AP NEWS ALERT!!!!!

The Commerce Department reports that the U.S. trade deficit declined 5.5 percent during the third quarter to $178.5 billion, the lowest level in two years.

WOW!!!!! That's DECLINING!!!!!

Posted 8:29 AM by Gene

Those Christian shootings were inspired by Columbine, apparently. They were in the neighborhood.

His parents released a statement last week apologizing for their son's crime and asking for forgiveness.

What if someone were human and refused to accept the apology?

It would also appear -- and we'd guess the Internet has helped out in this regard -- that the two Columbine scum have become heroes for psychos. Not altogether surprising given how thugs can be heroes to news hacks, and that these shootings are nothing if not about self-publicity.

Posted 8:22 AM by Gene

Ron Paul raises $6M in 24-hour 'money bomb'

And what will he do with the money once he fizzles in the primaries? Start a Society for the Investigation of Black Helicopters? Or an Association to Re-Establish the Gold Standard? Go for it, Ron!

Posted 8:19 AM by Gene

SLIME's concocting an A-TEAM movie.

STRIKE! STRIKE!! STRIKE UNTIL THERE'S NO ONE LEFT TO STRIKE!!!!!

Posted 8:12 AM by Gene

On the Brink of Synthetic Life

Researchers near ability to foster self-replicating life forms driven by completely artificial DNA.

Okay -- who wants to be God?

And of course a variation on the CYA word ETHICS appears around the sixth graf, meaning a science-fiction nightmare come true in a couple of hundred years.

Posted 8:09 AM by Gene

An outcry from students and faculty at Princeton University is rattling the campus here after a student who is leading a movement to instill conservative moral values among undergraduates was physically attacked Friday, beaten, and rendered unconscious in a rare incidence of violence within the Ivy League.

Move along, nothing to see here.

The incident is prompting an outcry from CONSERVATIVE students and faculty.... [Overemphasis added]

Bye!

P. S. at 5:18 p. m. We got SAM LITTLED -- and Ms. Travers disclosed it?!?!?

Posted 7:58 PM by Gene

Gangs ditch tattoos, go for college look



I think we can see why. That sort of look might not get you good grades.

Posted 7:44 PM by Gene

If Franco Zeffirelli believes something like WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!! The Jesus Slasher Movie is a "blasphemy", what does that say for all the idiot con-SER-va-tives who called it THE WORD OF GOD?

Posted 1:28 PM by Gene

Toby of The Tele-GRAWPH spends 3,064 WORDS wondering where Mr. Bee Movie's going to find new material.

The Tele-GRAWPH should worry about where it'll find new readers if it keeps worrying where the likes of Mr. Bee Movie will find new material.

Posted 12:32 PM by Gene

Perhaps no team comes off worse in the 409-page report than the Dodgers, who are portrayed as nearly top-to-bottom complicit in the steroid culture from roughly 1999 through 2004.

END OO PRY TAYLL AOWNED THUH TEAYM THAYN?

Posted 10:28 AM by Gene

Only in America's Heroin Capitol could a drug used to treat heroin addiction become almost as much of a problem as heroin.

Posted 10:19 AM by Gene

A regular on the BIG C gets huffy:

You've no doubt been told you're being alarmist and that despite China's rapid growth it's a small part of the world economy.

NOBODY QUITE UNDERSTOOD IN 1907 THAT THE U.S. WAS THE NEXT GREAT COUNTRY IN THE WORLD! THE U.S. WAS A DEBTOR NATION, WE WERE LAWLESS, WE HAD A HUGE CIVIL WAR AND PRESIDENTS WERE ASSASSINATED!! WE DIDN'T HAVE HUMAN RIGHTS!!! WE HAD MASSACRES, PEOPLE WOULD DEMONSTRATE AND THEY WOULD CALL THE ARMY AND THE PINKERTONS!!!! AS RECENTLY AS 1945, THE BRITISH STILL THOUGHT THEY WERE THE GREATEST COUNTRY IN THE WORLD AND THEY COULD PREVENT AMERICA FROM GROWING!!!!!!!!!! [Extremely knowledgeable overemphasis added]

Was there something in the water at Quantum Fund?

Posted 10:05 AM by Gene

We wonder if the news biz is starting to campaign for Oprah's boy. He has two big pluses: people hate HILLARY and he's got the politically correct race. Also he's superliberal AND he's Oprah's boy.

We got rhythm, we got music, we got OUR man -- who could ask for anything more?

Well, the people could -- seeing another election taken from their grasps by millionaire news hacks.

Posted 10:00 AM by Gene

YOU BOTH SAID IT.

Posted 9:56 AM by Gene

* The decades-long three-hour primetime window could shrink by one-third to just two hours a night.

Cut the comedy guys; the Millionaires' Strike merely postpones trashing your money for another season of junk TV. You'll be back as vigorously as before, rubbing our noses in your schmoozing.

Posted 9:44 AM by Gene

Two Congresspoops get married, meaning they intend to extend the line -- or if things don't work out they can start a lucrative lobbying firm, perhaps in show-biz -- or maybe they can join up with Sen. Mickey Mouse Protection Act.