Yesterday, I got home from the office, turned on Tucker on MSNBC, and was surprised to see wall-to-wall coverage of the Anna Nicole Smith hearing.
Now I am not gonna say that hearing was the most embarassing or inappropriate thing to ever happen in the American judicial system, as I have heard of Dred Scott, to speak nothing of the fact that OJ Simpson is still a free man.
But it was awful. That judge is a disgrace, those lawyers should be taken out behind the courthouse and beaten (yes, I am advocating violence), and it was just a disgrace. The only sympathetic character in the whole bunch was Kato Kaelin Larry Birkhead, the bubble-headed blonde boyfriend of the bimbo.
Make this long national nightmare go away, please.
Elvis Elvisberg
Is low-quality judging really that uncommon?
Judges are sometimes arbitrary and capricious chiefs of their little fiefdoms, who like to make rulings that demonstrate their power over other humans, and to hear themselves emit noises. Thoughts from people who deal with them?
That said, this Anna Nicole Smith judge does seem to be an unusually strange, intolerable little fellow.
dmbeaster
That judge was highly unusual. He was playing it totally for the camera, and apparently is angling for some sort of entertainment deal. Maybe in that circumstance many others would, too, but he was particularly bufoonish.
The whole thing was cartoonish, and he made sure of it.
I have actually done one of these cases — relatives fighting over who get to bury the dead — its not a rare circumstance. In California, there are mechanical rules on who gets to make the call so there is not much grounds for making a dispute, although I have no idea what Florida law is like. If it is anything like the bollixed election code circa 2000, I imagine its pretty bad.
It’s odd to see someone make a decision as if the standard is “what is in the best interests of the dead person?”
chopper
anna nicole who-now?
dreggas
Well DUH. I mean when the local news touts the “court hearing” the day before as “explosive” you know damn well it’s going to be an embarassment to say the least.
Walker
The real question: is this worse than simply airing Tucker would have been?
Perry Como
The media is all over it.
Andrew
No.
This has been another edition of simple answers to simple questions.
Paddy O'Shea
Why would anyone want to watch crap like that?
Tucker Carlson, what an obscenity!
Bruce Moomaw
Remember when we thought 9-11 was going to change everything forever?
Andrew
Forever was about 5 months, dude.
Badtux
And in other news, Britney Speares is still bald.
That is all.
– Badtux the Snarky Penguin
jake
No worries. Some other overhyped twit is bound to do something stupid and ANS will be so last Tuesday.
BTW, I think Zombie Santa Claus should have gotten the body. Just think of the mayhem he could wreak if you stuck his brain in there.
Paddy O'Shea
Anna Nicole Smith’s rotting week old dead body decided that enough was enough, and that she needed to get to the shopping mall right away. The clothes she had been wearing these last few days were entirely inappropriate to one of her importance, and a drop of an exciting new perfume certainly wouldn’t do any harm, either.
First she went to the lingerie department to inquire about a new thong. But when she approached the counter the young woman working there began screaming in apparent terror, and then passed out cold, banging her head on several display items on the way down to the floor.
“That’s funny,” thought Anna Nicole Smith’s body. “You’d think she’d seen a ghost!”
Next she went to the make-up counter, but the result was quite similar. An overweight and exceedingly effeminite man shrieked in a terribly high pitched voice, and then slumped to the floor like a sack of so much runny lard.
“I must remember to discuss the service here with the management,” Anna Nicole Smith’s body noted to itself.
Finally she decided it was high time to get to the perfume section and see if she couldn’t find a proper scent for a woman in her delicate condition. But when she got there all she found were several bodies lying atop one another like trees that had collapsed as one in a strong gale.
Anna Nicole Smith’s body was now quite distraught. Where could she turn to find comfort amid all these disturbing developments? Suddenly she felt a light tapping on her shoulder. She turned to see who it was.
“Hi! I’m Tucker Carlson. Can I interest you in oral sex?”
CaseyL
Ratings sweep!
Has the MSM’s obsession with WWJ (White Women in Jeopardy) finally plumbed the most abyssal depths possible, with this necrophilic probe into ANS’ rotting pulchritude?
No! They still haven’t found that girl who vanished from a tropical island! Tune in next week, for an exciting update on Natalie Holloway, on Old Bone[r]s ‘R Rising!
Andrew
You’re telling me that Zombie Santa Clause wasn’t already controlling Anna Nichol Smith’s body?
John Cole
Hey- I like Tucker Carlson.
I don’t agree with everything he says, and I can understand why he pisses some of you off, but compared to all the other talkikng heads, he is pretty entertaining and fair.
Not to mention, other than Olberman, Carlson is the only one of all of them who I think actually believes what heis saying.
ThymeZone
John, it will surprise you to know that I am actually your friend.
As a friend, may I suggest? Change the channel and watch something else. Just because some asses put it on tv doesn’t make it a “national nightmare.”
How important is the Anna Nicole crap? Who watches it?
Let’s all just turn it off. “Power” on your remote, if the channel selector isn’t working.
ThymeZone
Oh, and I totally disagree about Carlson.
I don’t think he’s fair, and I don’t like him.
He has been fair on occasion, and that’s fine, but I’m a pretty good listener, and I know talking points when I hear them.
I have no use for talking points. I have no use for a tv show that pimps talking points. I hang around here because you guys don’t pimp talking points.
Carlson pimps talking points. Bzzt, change the channel.
RSA
This is me, too. My first thought on hearing the news was along the lines of, “I thought she was killed by OJ a long time ago. . .” Clueless on pop culture.
stickler
I dunno about Tucker!. I think he can be sort of reasonable, but he sure likes repeating GOP talking points.
And that God-forsaken bow tie. Nothing good ever comes from wearing a bow tie. Never.
Plus, he can’t dance for shite.
Krista
Fair enough. But there’s just something about him that’s so….so….slap-worthy!
Gex
Not to mention the travesty that is the fact that the Anna Nicole Smith story has dominated the news cycle for so long. Sure, cover it for a day after she died. Maybe on your entertainment segments cover some of the ongoing drama. But to spend hours upon hours covering every minute detail is just disgusting.
jake
Hey now, they don’t just focus on white women. Jon Bennet [sp?] Ramsey wasn’t a woman. Neither was Amy Smart at the time of her kidnapping. [/snark]
At the risk of sounding crass I can’t believe Natalee Holloway still gets a mention in the news. At the very least I wish they would run some stats about violence against women with these stories and/or stats about missing adults in general. Otherwise it sinks to the level of titilation pretty damn quickly.
Question: Did you write necrophilic probe to give us a major case horripilations or was that an accident?
Paddy O'Shea
Anna Nicole Smith’s rotted week old corpse awoke the next morning refreshed from a delightful sleep. The funny little man in the bowtie had actually proven to be quite a masterful cunnilinguist, and the pleasure she had derived from the experience raised had her spirits and energized her in a way she had not felt for years.
Paul Wartenberg
It’s either this or Bald Britney.
This is the true scandal of our days: the tabloidization of our media to where we have the newschannels obsessing over a dead blonde or a shaved blonde, meanwhile we’ve got military hospitals falling apart, we’ve got an insane out-of-touch White House about two steps away from launching a THIRD war using an army already stretched thin and undersupplied, we’ve got crises with our health care and our job security, and for the love of all that’s holy the Duke basketball team might not make the NCAA 65… uh wait ignore that. Damn ESPN…!
Paul Wartenberg
The problem isn’t that we don’t want to watch it. We don’t. We’d love to turn the TV off or go watch our TiVo recording of the last Heroes episode. The problem is that the newsmedia is obsessing over this while there are 193 MORE IMPORTANT STORIES (White House corruption, White House incompetence, Walter Reed Rathouse, chloride bombs in Iraq, helicopters being shot down, lord knows how many other stories) OUT THERE THAT THE MEDIA IS IGNORING.
I’ve got people around me wondering why the media is obsessing over a dead blonde and a shaved blonde when there’s a war on and there’s so much screwed up stuff that we all have to contend with. Nobody’s snickering or joking about all this. We’re getting sick of it, the media’s lack of seriousness.
demimondian
The most important news of the year, thank you.
The Other Steve
The only impression I get from Tucker is he’s young and naive, and doesn’t understand how the world works.
But the Anna Nicole coverage was probably more entertaining than watching Chris matthews on hardball ponder whether Obama and Clinton had killed their campaigns already.
Pb
Tucker Carlson is an idiotic, ignorant, sheltered, overprivileged moron, and that’s the only reason why he might actually believe what he’s saying from time to time. And of course his show is by no means ‘fair’. I’d go through a transcript (any transcript) of his ‘show’ and point it all out, but I’ve got better things to do, like flossing my cat. I did enjoy watching his show (back when it was ‘The Situation’) when Rachel Maddow was on it regularly, though, that was at least entertaining from time to time–and Max Kellerman was pretty cool too. But once the format shifted from the occasional honest debate and discussion to right-wing hackery, gratuitous attacks, and misinformation, I tuned out.
CaseyL
I chose my words very carefully, I did.
I hardly ever turn on my TV, so I’ve escaped most of this latest example of How The MSM Is Making Us Stupid. But at work they’ve put up flatscreen TVs in the elevator lobbies, with a CNN feed inset. And I swear, every time I’m waiting for an elevator, there’s a Breaking News thingie about Smith. It makes me want to re-enact the 1984 MacIntosh ad.
On the plus side, I’m taking the stairs more often.
Pb
Heh. Guess who Tucker Carlson had as his guest the other day to pimp the latest un-American lies and nonsense, fresh from the neo-con bizarro world… and guess what Tucker didn’t ask him about, or challenge him on… yeah, anything. Pretty entertaining and fair.
Rome Again
One thing I can count on with Tucker Carlson… if he says something I agree with, everything else that comes out of his mouth for the next month will be reprehensible to me.
He’s about as reliable as a stopped clock to me. I refuse to watch him unless I got involved in something and forgot where I put the remote.
DougJ
Surprised? Why?
Pb
Oh, and regarding the “wall-to-wall coverage of the Anna Nicole Smith hearing”–you get three guesses as to who is likely behind that particular programming decision to run a sensationalistic, overblown legal cat-fight live on MS-NBC to the point of pre-empting their regular programming–and the first two don’t count.
The Other Steve
I am forming a new group. We are called the Super Victory Caucus. Our mission is to defend, Truth, Justice and the American Way!
Obviously this makes us better than Frank Gaffney’s little group.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
This judge’s ruling was a victory for freedom. Our judicial system is proof that the Islamofascist menace has not yet overwhelmed us. Why can’t you people see that as encouraging news?
Punchy
If you guys want to see embarrassing, you just got to read about this
Mr. Cole, if this doesn’t solidify your disgust and dismay with your ilk, nothing will. Seriously, why do conservatives just WANT to be known as ignorant?
dslak
The fact that some low-level judge was allowed to make this decision rather than the President simply shows how vulnerable we are to the terrorists. We need some kind of law that eliminates the courts and places all judicial authority in the executive, so that we don’t have to put up with silly farces like “trials” and “judicial review.”
Jane Finch
On Larry King last night, Barbara Walters (of all people) expressed similar disgust at the ANS coverage and dismissed it as “tabloid”. In her next breath, she defended her obsession with Britney as completely different in that her wall to wall coverage was somehow going to help save a young woman with a “promising career” (obviously BW doesn’t know that BS peaked in her late teens).
You have to love cable “journalism”…Iraq, ANS, it’s all the same to them.
Punchy
Heh.
The Other Steve
The women who single handidly destroyed television journalism, turning it into tabloid tripe… is complaining about tabloid tripe?
This is clear evidence that God does have a sense of humor.
Pug
I believe that judges should not cry in the court room. That’s just something I believe.
Defendants can cry and victims can cry, but not judges.
Fe E
Krista ays:
Back in my adolescent days we refered to that as having a “punch me” aura.
Speaking of Punch(y); wow, the Conservopedia, I’d like to say I was shocked, but, well, you know….
Cyrus
I read somewhere a theory — a Carl Hiaasen novel, maybe; it would be appropriate — that all major problems in America’s recent history blossomed in Florida at some stage, due to the geriatrics, unique politics, importance of tourism, dangerous natural environment, proximity to Cuba, and who knows what else. I don’t know exactly how serious the theory was, but half the actual Watergate burglars were Cuban-Americans from Miami, so it’s not a recent phenomenon…
Zifnab
The dude wears a bowtie at thirty years old on a nationally syndicated cable TV show. He is the quintessential kid-who-got-beat-up-in-middle-school.
Beyond that, he’s a slightly less inflamatory Glenn Beck. I mean, his entire show is for shock value. Its just a list of Karlson’s pet-peeves for the day. “Why is Barak Obama blacker than me?” “Someone should stand up and say that natural disasters are probably a bad thing.” “Look! Anna Nicole boobies and hairless Britney Spears!” “Conservatives are to happiness as Liberals are to stinky poo. Am I being too partisan?” Quick, we’ve got another half dozen of these innane non-stories to bust through in the next fifteen minutes.
Andrew
I would like to see a pundit bloodsport championship. Joe Scarborough versus Hannity, etc.
Tucker could be the ring girl.
Justin
I think the Anna Nicole trial is more newsworthy than Tucker’s show. MSNBC did the right thing.
Zombie Santa Claus
Exactly. Justice would be much quicker if the Justice Department just dispensed it. Especially in terrorism cases and high-profile celebrity cases. What’s the point of delaying justice for the innocent and the guilty?
Andrew
One man is Judge, Jury, AND Executioner.
mrmobi
But Anna Nicole had tits! And Britney doesn’t wear panties!
What’s the matter with you people?
On a heartbreaking note, last night HBO aired “Ghosts of Abu Ghraib.”
The last words of the show, which recounts the abuses documented with digital cameras, were: “all of the inmates of Abu Ghraib present during these events were released without charge.”
At least one 51 year old man was tortured to death during those events, and the highest-ranking officer to be disciplined was Janice Karpinsky, the facility commander.
The official story is that a “few bad apples” went crazy.
Shame on all of us for letting this happen.
dreggas
I caught clips of this farce last night before going to sleep and wanted to bang my head against the wall. Was the judge trying out for a spot in a new courtroom drama? I mean bloody hell. Of course the tagline for the story was “is he looking for a tv deal” since, according to the “news” he had been farming a tape of himself out to various studios. They had an interview with the judge on the people’s court who said it best. Save the auditions for auditioning and act like a professional in the court room. Un-fucking-believable.
leefranke
Today’s reading assignement is this long interview.
Hugh Hewitt get slapped around by a general on his own show.
Trust me it is worth every minute you spend on it.
Patrick
As someone who has a lot, a LOT, of experience in low level and high level court rooms, this was nothing that surprising, although a bit unusual. I think the camera had a lot to do with causing/revealing this quirky judge.
I’ve seen a lot terrible decisions where appropriate decorum was observed at all times.
Ultimately, the judge made the right decision and that should be the only focus.
Sstarr
So, we banned “beclowned” but allow:
Misplaced priorities, I say!
Zombie Santa Claus
And the police, too. Don’t forget them! Under the Executive Justice Act, policemen can determine the sentence and carry it out on the spot. (Did I mention we’re expanding capital punishment to include just about everything? That oughtta deter a lot of evildoers, as Bush would say.)
Punchy
Wow. Republican talking point after talking point shot down. Debunked, then eviscerated, then mocked. That General is bad-ass. He must have cut off H-squared in mid-sentence at least a dozen times. Didn’t even have to wait to know what crap Dub-H was about to spew.
It’s refreshing knowing that at least some of our military recognizes what a fool our President is…
Bubblegum Tate
Conservapedia is the fucking funniest thing of the (still young) year. And the great thing is, it’s just getting warmed up–imagine how utterly hilarious some of the entry pages are going to be!
Bubblegum Tate
Yes, but according to Hugh and his buddy Mark Steyn the general is woefully uninformed about Iran because he didn’t read a book that Hugh likes, therefore the vicious rhetorical beating Odom issued to baby Hughey didn’t actually happen!
dreggas
And crap I can’t see it because it is blocked here at work.
gus
I think Tucker is a smarmy self-satisfied prick. But I do give him props for not being a Bushbot. If I’m not mistaken he’s the one who told the Bush mocking Karla Fay Tucker (is that the right name?) story. And he called Karen Hughes out on a lie that Bush told.
Richard 23
Tucker is a moderate to liberal. His show is on the leftist outlet MSNBC after all.
It’s amazing how much the “reality based” community hyperventilates over the slightest deviation from their echo chamber narrative. It just goes to show how ‘open minded’ and ‘tolerant’ they really are in their totalitarianism.
If only Tucker would say “Bush Lied People Died” and “No Blood for Oil” and “911 Was an Inside Job.” Then the kook left might consider overlooking the bow tie.
Andrew
I don’t think that Judge Dredd needs any police.
Zombie Santa Claus
True enough. In the words of Judge Dre, “Fuck Tha Police.”