Once upon a time not so long ago, there was an idea: that some things in this world should be able to exist free from the influence of money—that these things should be done because of their own intrinsic value. You would be forgiven for scoffing at the notion that this idea was ever taken seriously at all.
Remember Martin Luther King, Jr., the oppressed Southern black man, the freedom fighter, the peacenik, who called for radical progressive civil rights and economic justice legislation, and who was smeared as a Communist? Today, pundits would like to remind you that he was, of course, a "conservative."
Tungsten is a mineral used in manufacturing everything from auto parts to pens to cell phones and computers. Some of the tungsten purchased by some of the world's most well-known companies is illegally mined and used to enrich FARC, a Colombian rebel army.
It's strange that national political races grow ever more expensive, and our national political discussion grows ever more atomized and partisan, at the same time that Congressional elections are less competitive than ever, by design. Why are we all yelling at each other when we should be yelling at gerrymandering?
A blogger for The New York Times has been requesting thousands of dollars in "expenses" and travel airfare from a public relations firm trying to get its clients covered in the Times, according to emails obtained by Gawker.
In the aftermath of the revelations about the NSA's secret spying programs, there is plenty of anger to go around. American citizens are pissed that they were spied on. European governments are pissed that they were spied on. Nobody, it seems, is happy with being spied on. So why is spying such an accepted institution?
Some people say that Edward Snowden is a hero because the secret NSA spying program that he exposed was ripe for abuse. Other people say Edward Snowden is a villain, because the program seemed to be well-run and lawful. Both of these positions are grounded in fantasy. Nobody knows whether the government's power was abused; it's a secret. That's the problem. That's the point.
Here's a story. In 2004, I was a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, covering television. In January of that year, I began looking into a story about political donations made by reporters, editors, anchors, executives and other employees at media companies.
Reclusive Hollywood rage-blogger Nikki Finke may or may not have been fired from her perch as editor of Deadline Hollywood. Her nemesis Sharon Waxman, over at the Wrap, says Finke has been canned by Mail.com founder Jay Penske after he became fed up with her bullying ways. Finke and Penske have both denied the story in general terms, though neither has stated unequivocally that Finke will remain in her current job. This morning, in an effort to rebut Waxman's story, Finke offered a rare glimpse inside her peculiar brand of journalistic thuggery.
All of this arrived Tuesday in a box so big I thought maybe someone was sending me a suffocated animal. I asked my boss John Cook if I could keep it and he said, "Do you even want it?" An iPod and a bottle of Moët? Yes, that is an instant Friday/living Mariah Carey song. Whatever. I was going to watch Soderberg's Liberace biopic, Behind the Candelabra, anyway (I wanna see Michael Douglas and Matt Damon fuck!). Now I'm gonna watch it in class, like Liberace would if he were alive today and used headphones for the sound on his TV. Anyway, this is the sort of shameless shit that networks do to try to buy positive coverage. We'll see if it works.
The shooting of nineteen innocent people, including two children, at a Mother's Day celebration in New Orleans yesterday was an act of violence only gaudy enough to hold the nation's attention momentarily. Shortly after the bodies were cleared, the FBI said they "have no indication the shooting was an act of terrorism. 'It’s strictly an act of street violence in New Orleans.'" At that, we were free to let our attention drift. In America, all villainy is not created equal.
In 1999, James Glassman and Kevin Hassett—two men with actual academic credentials—published the most hilariously wrong investment book of all time, entitled, quite hopefully, "Dow 36,000." (Highly recommended reading for humor value!) The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed on Dec. 31, 1999 at 11,497—but the authors, for a variety of reasons much too complicated for you to appreciate, postulated that it could hit 36,000 within "between three and five years."
Last night, Jodie Foster, a famous actress who has been a famous actress for many decades, stood on stage at a glittery Hollywood awards show being broadcast around the world, and, in a lengthy, self-glorifying speech, in front of a crowd of the world's most famous people, asked for.... privacy. Is Jodie Foster clinically insane?
The Masters of the Universe can be identified by their socks. Their millions of dollars, their vast power over commerce, and their socks, which must protrude four inches below the cuff of their suit pants when seated. Any greater length of sock exposure would indicate that the wearer was sitting with his legs crossed. The Masters of the Universe sit with both feet on the floor. These are the alpha dogs.
Twinkie maker Hostess pissed off a lot of reasonable people by not only cutting worker pay while leaving the CEO's pay untouched, but also giving executives $1.75 million in bonuses at the same time they are liquidating the company and laying off 15,000 workers. That's some brazen shit. More enraging is how typical such behavior is.
When news broke that Osama bin Laden had been killed by a team of Navy SEALS, the first thought of everyone in the media business, and of many curious Americans was: when can we get one of these heroes to tell his story? Well, now we have. And a lot of people want the government to crush him for it.
The Democratic convention, like the Republican convention, and every political convention, is a television event. That is, it is designed and intended expressly to satisfy the audience watching at home, on the screen. The media, gathered here on-site, does not so much "cover" a convention as news as we hold it up, turn it over in our hands, and remark on its qualities, like a bunch of Home Shopping Network hosts talking up a new snow globe.
All of the news on CNN this morning was about Hurricane Isaac. On NBC, too. And Fox News, for the most part. Yes, the storm has already screwed the Republican convention in so very many ways. But here today, in (sunny!) Tampa, as journalists stream into our media holding pen like so many wayward Katrina refugees, comes the final indignity: this pseudoevent threatens to be completely upstaged by a real event.
Last week, the blog world picked up an LA Times news story about a scientific study that had just been published in an academic journal, Communication, Culture and Critique. The title of the study: "Women (Not) Watching Women: Leisure Time, Television, and Implications for Televised Coverage of Women's Sports."
