Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

White supremacy is terrorism.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

This really is a full service blog.

Joe Lieberman disappointingly reemerged to remind us that he’s still alive.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

Let’s finish the job.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

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Reader Interactions

177Comments

  4. 4.

    Suffern ACE

    The front page of the NY Post this morning had pictures of the suspects. I have no idea where the pictures came from, but it might have been the same sources that was posting up random pictures of the crowd with cirlces of anyone carrying a backpack on Facebook yesterday.

    They’re just following twitter leads like we are these days.

  5. 5.

    sonofsamantha

    Why no mention of all the BJ fail? Such as yesterdays breathless ‘Boston police have bombing suspect in custody’ post.

    Stop pretending you are not part of the problem Cole. You can’t report on the smell of shit without smelling like shit yourself.

  6. 6.

    The Moar You Know

    I’ve been at this so long that I remember when the media folks used to bitch about a lack of accountability for blogs.

    So do I. Now they’re stripmining them daily in a frantic effort to conceal that they’ve fired all their reporters.

  7. 7.

    Gin & Tonic

    In a just world, John King would spend the rest of his life scrubbing toilets quietly, like Profumo.

  8. 8.

    JPL

    Great job JK!
    Did CNN leave their news anchors in Boston? I don’t have cable but they should consider keeping keep King and Wolf off the tube for a day or two.

  9. 9.

    PeakVT

    What struck me as weird was that John King apparently had a source personally. Is it normal, let alone a good idea, for a bobblehead to fancy themselves an ace reporter, too? I suppose a lot of sources would rather talk to John King, anchor, than to Joe Schmoe, reporter. But it doesn’t seem like a good idea.

  11. 11.

    Roger Moore

    I’ve been at this so long that I remember when the media folks used to bitch about a lack of accountability for blogs.

    I’m sure that if it had been a minor blogger who had started the rumor rather than a major news organization, there would be a lot more discussion about how we got it wrong. But since it was big, allegedly serious media, this will be just one more of those things that just happens, rather than a predictable result of actual people and organizations failing. Accountability is for little people, not for very serious media organizations.

  12. 12.

    beltane

    @Suffern ACE: The pictures on the front page of the NY Post were not of the suspects (there do not seem to be any true suspects as of yet) but of two innocent men, a HS track star of Morrocan descent and his track & field coach. For more on this travesty, read here: http://gregmitchellwriter.blogspot.com/2013/04/you-reddit-here.html

    Message to the media: Sleaze ruins lives.

    Whenever the day comes that Rupert Murdoch leaves this earth, I plan to celebrate crudely and raucously.

  13. 13.

    MattR

    @sonofsamantha:

    Such as yesterdays breathless ‘Boston police have bombing suspect in custody’ post.

    Can I get a link to that. I must’ve missed it while I was reading the “Depending on the news outlet authorities either have a picture of the likely bomber, his name, or they already have him in custody.” post.

  15. 15.

    The Dangerman

    Reporting an arrest prematurely is pretty bad; reporting that the suspects are “dark skinned” should end up with the reporter holding a termination letter in his/her hand. Shameful (even more so as they expressed that this information was inflammatory).

  16. 16.

    Face

    The front page of the NY Post this morning had pictures of the suspects two random high-school runners.

    Fixed. Deadspin is all over this travesty. Basically, NYP just picked 2 kids discussed on a Reddit forum and ran with it. Assholes.

    Edit: Looks like I was scooped by beltane. And both not HS students apparently. Innocents all the same, natch.

  20. 20.

    beltane

    @sonofsamantha: Maybe I’m mistaken but I do not believe that John Cole has the services of a multi-million dollar newsroom at his disposal. He reportedly once asked Tunch to do some copy-editing but Tunch’s price was too high.

  22. 22.

    quannlace

    I suppose it’s a reaction to yesterday’s bungling, but when I saw any of CNN’s coverage of the fertilizer factory fire in Texas, it seemed all they were doing were bitching about how the police would’t give them an exact count of those killed.

  23. 23.

    Violet

    This sort of wishful no-source reporting is why they get paid the big bucks. Nice job if you can get it.

  24. 24.

    MattR

    @raven: Yep. That was the one I read. Notice that I quoted about half of Tim F’s post in my initial comment :)

  26. 26.

    beltane

    @Omnes Omnibus: He made the decision to invest in puff pieces, like Zsa Zsa, instead of less glamorous gumshoe reporting. Maybe his next animal should be a bloodhound.

  27. 27.

    Redshirt

    Seriously: Does anyone have any realistic solutions to our media problem? I’ve become ever more convinced they ARE the problem.

    Without today’s media, for example, the Republicans would have no where near their level of influence.

  28. 28.

    taylormattd

    Yep. I believe it was Atrios who popularized “time for a blogger ethics panel”

  29. 29.

    Napoleon

    @Suffern ACE:

    I have no idea where the pictures came from, but it might have been the same sources that was posting up random pictures of the crowd with cirlces of anyone carrying a backpack on Facebook yesterday.

    They have nothing to do with who they are looking for. The one of them is a 17 YO local high school student who is on the track team and wants to run the marathon.

  30. 30.

    ricky

    I certainly hope the perpetrator(s), when he/she/they are caught, does not turn out to be a blogger.

  31. 31.

    Scott S.

    @beltane: You guys stop picking on sonofsamantha and his bizarre, impotent rage at Giant Evil Internet Villain Johncole, over something Sam probably doesn’t even remember anymore.

  32. 32.

    JPL

    We are all CNN.
    BTW, The FBI is holding a news conference at 5:00. I’m beginning to think they don’t even plan on releasing pictures today.

  34. 34.

    Suffern ACE

    @Face: that’s what I figured. I thought it was odd that the Post had access to photos no other paper on the news stand had. Unlike the last post that had nothing to do with big data, I assumed that the post used their own software. But it wouldn’t surprise me if they just went to Facebook.

  36. 36.

    MTiffany71

    I’ve been at this so long that I remember when the media folks used to bitch about a lack of accountability for blogs.

    Accountability is for the little people.

    Also, too; I have little doubt that Fox ‘News’ reporting an arrest is less an honest mistake and more about ginning up the frustrations of its viewers by making the investigation seem like it’s being weighed down by government bureaucracy and pesky rules, thus denying them the public and speedy retribution they’ve been led to believe is justice.

  37. 37.

    JCT

    OK, from someone who lived in NYC for 30 years — PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE POST. Ever.

    Really — I think being an actual journalist disqualifies you from working there.

  39. 39.

    aimai

    @JPL:

    If they have pictures they must want to exhaust every avenue before releasing them to the public–look how nuts people already are? All it takes is one vigilante to “think” he knows who is in the pictures and some innocent person can get very seriously hurt. They may need to crowd source this to get an ID but I don’t blame them at all for wanting to hold off as long as they can in case they can ID these guys without involving the dick tracey junior investigatory team.

  41. 41.

    Persia

    @beltane: If only we’d realize that it doesn’t really matter if we catch the people responsible; what’s important is to find brown people to catch.

    Jesus, no running event in the world isn’t full of people with backpacks.

  43. 43.

    Villago Delenda Est

    CNN has become a rank, fetid sewer. There was a time when they could legitimately get away with calling themselves “the most trusted name in news.”

    That assertion has been annihilated. At least Faux doesn’t even pretend anymore to be anything but a fascist propaganda outfit for natural serfs.

  44. 44.

    PeakVT

    @Redshirt: There don’t seem to be any realistic solutions. We all like free, and as long as we expect media outlets to survive primarily on advertising revenue, we won’t have any consistently good media outlets. We might get better reporting here and there, or better summaries of other people’s reporting here and there (MSNBC in the evening). But as long as media outlets have to chase businesses for money, then we won’t get anything consistently good.

  45. 45.

    Suffern ACE

    @JCT: Bah. It’s a morning ritual at the newstand while I wait to pay. There’s the post outrage of the day with pun and an exclamation point and it needs to be compared with the Daily News outrage of the day that also comes with a pun and an exclaimation point. You want your coffee with a muffin; I’ll have mine with an outrageous pun. Keeps the pounds off.

  48. 48.

    Trollhattan

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Can we substitute angry for mad?

    Thank you for considering my proposal.

    Also, too, is any large news organization managed by a news professional, or are they all run by beancounters and the politically connected now? Just curious.

  50. 50.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Redshirt:

    I don’t know. Does “wipe them out, all of them” fall into the realm of realistic?

    Until this society gets away from being economically based, I don’t see a change coming. The “bottom line” always seems to assert its power to the exclusion of any other possible value. Nothing is more important, nothing, than the almighty dollar. A medium that must, by the very nature of the society in which it operates, concern itself first and foremost with profit, is going to go whereever the money leads it, to the exclusion, again, of any other possible value.

  52. 52.

    Roger Moore

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    CNN has become a rank, fetid sewer. There was a time when they could legitimately get away with calling themselves “the most trusted name in news.”

    You notice that they aren’t calling themselves the most trustworthy name in news. They may still be the most trusted name, but that just shows how long it takes for reputation to catch up with reality.

  53. 53.

    Yutsano

    @Trollhattan: Angry Durf is Angry. But then again that mean Wr0ng way John Cole JUST. WON’T. STOP. POSTING!! So he feels the duty, that he has chosen to accept, to defeat that former Republican!

  55. 55.

    Davis X. Machina

    @Suffern ACE: From The Critic

    New York Post Editor: “Now, if you want to work here at the New York Post, you must know that we insert the following words into every headline: headless, nude, sewage, and governor. For instance, ‘Subway Fares Raised’ becomes ‘Headless Governor Found Nude in Subway Sewage’.”
    Miranda Tompkins;“What about the fares?”
    New York Post Editor: “You’re fired.”

  64. 64.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    @Redshirt:

    Seriously: Does anyone have any realistic solutions to our media problem?

    I would very much like to invite the leading members of our Fourth Estate to a little French Revolution Historical Re-enactment party, with them cast in the headliner roles (as it were), but that isn’t very realistic now, is it?

  65. 65.

    Chris

    @MTiffany71:

    I have little doubt that Fox ‘News’ reporting an arrest is less an honest mistake and more about ginning up the frustrations of its viewers

    This.

    I said yesterday that I suspected the “dark skinned male” part had been completely pulled out of someone’s ass because it fit the preconceived stereotype of certain people.

  66. 66.

    Tone in DC

    @beltane:

    CNN blows more goats than Mickey Kaus.

    Just sayin’.

    Hope the car owners in Chi town have good insurance. Apparently, a water main from the early 20th century broke. But hey… infrastructure? We don’t need no steenking infrastructure!

  67. 67.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Tone in DC:

    Ah, such a lovely day for a sinkhole to swallow a Buick or two. Or three.

    But, we can’t spend a dime on infrastructure because some poor might derive some marginal benefit from it.

  69. 69.

    Tone in DC

    @ranchandsyrup:

    I guess the thugs in question went after a water main, and kicked its 100 year old ass. Too bad the main wasn’t armed, per the NRA’s guidelines.

  72. 72.

    Trollhattan

    @Yutsano:

    Yup, angry but in this case, I view the anger as a second-order symptom of underlying madness and the refusal to take its meds. Lots and lots of meds. A whole piefull.

  75. 75.

    the Conster

    Jon Stewart nailed it. He said CNN is the human centipede of news, because they spent a whole hour shitting in its own mouth. Doesn’t get worse than that. Also, Buzzfeed being useful.

  76. 76.

    MattR

    If we are going off topic, LZ Granderson has a pretty good piece up on ESPN about how there is never a “right time” for the first gay football player to come out (or really any civil rights milestone). It is more about having the right person stepping forward.

  77. 77.

    Lee

    Seriously: Does anyone have any realistic solutions to our media problem? I’ve become ever more convinced they ARE the problem.

    I have seriously pondered this recently (even before the bombing). I’m not sure we can solve the problem. I think whatever the solution is we have to evolve to it naturally.

    I can almost see something like each agency in the government has its own news feeds that people subscribe to. ‘Breaking News’ would come directly from the appropriate agencies. Journalism would then revert back to more of an investigative type.

    The big change would have to be actual government transparency.

  80. 80.

    ? Martin

    @Redshirt:

    Seriously: Does anyone have any realistic solutions to our media problem? I’ve become ever more convinced they ARE the problem.

    Prohibit advertising around news segments. They’re all shit because they’re chasing eyeballs rather than the truth.

    Course, I don’t know how to pay for news under that scenario, but that would solve it.

  81. 81.

    raven

    They wouldn’t fuck this up again?

    On Wednesday, a law enforcement official who is being regularly briefed on the investigation told CNN’s Susan Candiotti that images showing two men near the marathon finish line were being circulated to state and federal law enforcement agencies. The source described the men as “possible suspects.”

    But a source told CNN’s Deb Feyerick on Thursday that those individuals are no longer of high interest to investigators.

  82. 82.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Redshirt:

    I’d say the only place they’re vulnerable, save for Second Amendment Remedies, which are the specialties of those delightful wingtards.

    The bottom line is (there’s that expression again) they need to have responsibility rammed up their assess, because King in particular is a smug shit who is just screaming, ala Sean Hannity, to have a Louisville Slugger delivered upside the head.

  83. 83.

    Trollhattan

    @raven:

    Ever seen a ommercial chicken factory? That’s a LOT o’ chickens what require rogering. Evidently, CNN’s up to the task.

    Can I get a “cluck”?

  85. 85.

    JPL

    @raven: I read that dozens of pictures were sent with some people circled. It appears that the only one used was the dark skinned one.

  87. 87.

    Calouste

    @Redshirt:

    It’s not exactly recent. You might have noticed the surprise in some of the US media that Thatcher is still so reviled in the UK that “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead” made the top of the iTunes chart. No one who has lived within reach of UK media for more than a few months in the 1980s could have missed how hated she was, not by everyone, but by a significant, vocal, minority. The American correspondents who did live in the UK during the 1980s, and whose job it was to follow the British media, just choose not to report on it.

  89. 89.

    ricky

    Yes, the poor media will never pick on the unaccountable blogosphere after this debacle.

    And to celebrate, lets take a gander at how the blogosphere has handled a subsequent event, the fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas.

    Lawyers, Guns, and Money’s Erik Loomis pronounced “60 -70 people have died” and tutted “Yes, that’s right, a fertilizer plant was placed in a neighborhood…”

    Crook’s and Liar’s Susie Madrak quickly picked up on this, saying this was…”the horrific results of three decades of deficit hawkery, which weakened the regulatory infrastructure of this country….Let’s start with the lax zoning requirements, which allowed such a high-risk enterprise smack dab in the middle of a residential neighborhood.”

    Of course Loomis covered his behind by saying: “or a neighborhood grew up around a chemical plant.” Ms. M. over at C&L didn’t bother to find out which came first, the plant chicken or the neighborhhod egg, over even if both might have preceded the three decades of deficit hawkery.

    Mr. Loomis found cause lurking the the status of Texas as a non-Union State. Ms. Madrak faulted EPA, OSHA, and the Texas Environmental Agency, none of which seems to have been called out to inspect any problem at the plant by the workers or anyone in neighborhood it is smack in the middle of since 2006.

    Ms. Madrak let us know in uncertain terms: “So remember: This tragedy was completely preventable.”

    Like the Boston case, if which an arrest was made before law enforcement even identified a suspect, we don’t yet know what caused the explosion in West. Just that bloggers say it was completely preventable.

  91. 91.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @raven:

    The answer to Yutsano’s question at the top of the thread is “not only no, but fuck no!”

  92. 92.

    JPL

    haha.. According to the Wash. Post, Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) said Thursday that he hired Paul Kevin Curtis to perform as Elvis at an engagement party.

  94. 94.

    GregB

    This just in, CNN reporter John King has contracted bird flu due to repeated chicken fucking?

    We are waiting on confirmation.

  97. 97.

    Gin & Tonic

    @JPL: Turns out the kid in the NYP photo is from Revere. That’s where the Saudi guy who was Monday’s brown suspect du jour is from, too. Coincidence? Of course not. Let’s just bomb Revere and be done with it. Can’t be too careful, you know?

  98. 98.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    @? Martin:

    Prohibit advertising around news segments. They’re all shit because they’re chasing eyeballs rather than the truth.

    I think they’d be able to work around that in various ways. Ultimately “news consumers” will have to solve the problem on the demand side by leaving the conventional news outlets to die off from a lack of viewers as they gravitate towards somebody else with higher standards and better quality content, but that is going to be a long, slow change, if it ever happens at all.

    “News consumers” are getting the quality of product that they collectively deserve. We’ll get better product when we collectively decide we deserve better and act on that sentiment.

  99. 99.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @ricky:

    Um, no, the bloggers are saying that placing a fertilizer plant in the middle of a residential neighborhood (or allowing a residential neighborhood to be built around a fertilizer plant) gave us a casualty count far higher than it might have been if the fertilizer plant was not in close proximity to a residential neighborhood.

    The cause of the explosion was not specified by either blogger…only the foreseeable consequences of having such a facility near a residential neighborhood.

  101. 101.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Bomb Revere? Why? We didn’t bomb Saudi Arabia when the vast majority of those who participated in the 9/11 attacks were from Saudi Arabia…we went after Afghanistan and Iraq!

    No, we need to bomb Fargo, or Bakersfield, or Anacortes.

  103. 103.

    YellowJournalism

    @JPL:

    haha.. According to the Wash. Post, Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) said Thursday that he hired Paul Kevin Curtis to perform as Elvis at an engagement party.

    I assume he did that because he doesn’t like his friends and family.

  107. 107.

    MattR

    @ricky: I won’t get into the misleading quoting or lack of links so we can read the source material ourselves. But I just want to know how exactly it would be covering his butt for Loomis to follow “Yes, that’s right, a fertilizer plant was placed in a neighborhood.” with “Or a neighborhood grew up around a fertilizer plant.”. Which came first is largely irrelevant since either order is an indication of weak zoning laws and poor foresight.

  109. 109.

    Shinobi

    Seriously, this week would have been utterly unbearable if it weren’t for the Daily Show’s coverage of media stupidity and of course The Onion.

  110. 110.

    ChrisNYC

    Please stop talking about this. You are soooo setting up another round of stories from the media about the media —

    “Did we really screw up the Boston reporting? A closer look”;

    “What the media got right in Boston,” and

    “John King: His gutsy plan to move on from the Boston disaster and become the king of US news”

  111. 111.

    Redshirt

    Did anyone watch the Boston bombing coverage on ESPN? From what I’ve read, they were better than all the “news” channels. Can anyone confirm this?

    If true, it confirms a running opinion here (and elsewhere) that sports TV news is a more serious endeavor nowadays than regular TV news. And that cable comedy shows cover the issues in more depth and nuance than “the news”.

    And if that’s true, what’s the implication?

  112. 112.

    JoyfulA

    @Face: We had a talk show host who ranted and raved over people using that term, when when what they should have been saying was “Gypped,” according to him. Completely naive and straight-faced, no snark at all.

  113. 113.

    danimal

    CNN, a once-trusted news source, has been chasing Fox for way too long. I’m talking more about the ration of news to commentary, which is absurd. Give me enough facts and I can interpret the news, thank you very much. I can’t help but believe there is a market for straight, long-form news without ideological bias. The Fox model, with lots of partisan shouting and an ideological filter on EVERYTHING, is simply annoying and noisy. MSNBC is a mixed bag, with occasional forays into actual journalism surrounded by Ed Schultz.

  119. 119.

    Trollhattan

    @Redshirt:

    I remember “back in the day” the yeoman’s job Al Michaels did with Loma Prieta earthquake coverage. A couple years later, the Oakland firestorm was first covered during a Niners game (also from Candlestick, what is it with that place?) Even further back was the Munich Olympics kidnapping coverage, also first handled by the sports crew.

    I know it’s not universal but the play-by-play guys often have the skills to rise to the occasion and importantly, report what they see rather than what they think they might possibly, kinda, wanna see.

  120. 120.

    Suffern ACE

    @JoyfulA: Ugh. I hate that. Those words aren’t interchangeable. Yeah, they’re both offensive, but they should be used correctly if they are to be used at all.

  121. 121.

    MattR

    @Redshirt:

    If true, it confirms a running opinion here (and elsewhere) that sports TV news is a more serious endeavor nowadays than regular TV news

    I used to believe that, but then I actually started paying attention to sports news and it is just as bad as the rest. It is just that their mistakes are meaningless in the grand scheme of things so they don’t get called on it. That and the sports audience seems to want all the latest gossip even if it is just rumor.

    As an example, pretty much every single initial report of a player signing a contract has incorrect details about the contract.

    (EDIT: I will admit that when sports channels have to cover real news, they do a pretty good job. But I think that is because they know they are out of their comfort zone and act extra careful not to screw it up)

  122. 122.

    The Moar You Know

    Did anyone watch the Boston bombing coverage on ESPN? From what I’ve read, they were better than all the “news” channels. Can anyone confirm this?

    @Redshirt: No, but it would not surprise me in the slightest.

    You see, ESPN has viewers who will crucify the network for failing to provide them with factual information. So ESPN does such things as fact checking, multiple sources, and follow-up – things which I have not seen a major news organization do since the late 1980s.

  125. 125.

    TooManyJens

    @MattR: Sports journalists are the ones who collectively failed to check out Manti Te’o’s dead girlfriend. Though I guess that doesn’t necessarily mean they aren’t better than regular journalists — that’s a pretty low bar on average.

  126. 126.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @sonofsamantha:

    You are an imbecile. First of all, it was not John Cole, it was Tim F who posted. Secondly, the first word in his post is a qualifier: “Apparently.” Thirdly, the next sentence begins “Depending on the news outlet,” and lastly, Tim F acknowledged “No doubt more to come soon.”

    He was sharing WHAT WAS ACTUALLY BEING REPORTED by supposedly reliable news outlets.

    That’s it. His entire post is in the box below. Hardly “breathless.”

    Imbecile (you, not Tim F).

    Apparently the Lord & Taylor store had a surveillance camera facing the bomb site. Depending on the news outlet authorities either have a picture of the likely bomber, his name, or they already have him in custody. No doubt more to come soon.

  127. 127.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    @Redshirt:

    If true, it confirms a running opinion here (and elsewhere) that sports TV news is a more serious endeavor nowadays than regular TV news

    Annecdotally speaking, my impression is that in the sports news business there is still a price to be paid for conspicuous failure. You can screw up a few times, especially when it comes to matters of opinion rather than fact, but do it enough times and somebody better will replace you. The “hard news” MSM has the same structural problem that so many of our other failed institutions have, which is that the people running it are legacies and when they fail, they only fail upward, not downwards.

  128. 128.

    The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge

    I can’t believe that the cable news channels are still in business after the way they’ve gone downhill in the last 12 years. Of course, they were 90% down that hill to begin with—I really have no desire for 24/7 bloviating to fill up the schedule….

    Still, it’s gotten much worse. On September 11th, I actually turned to CNN to find out what was happening (something that would never enter my mind today.) Of course, I was a little punchy, and my attention would wander; I’d look back and see Aaron Brown on the screen, say to myself: “How did I get on Channel 5?”. and switch around the dial till I was back at CNN, and go: “Huh! What’s Aaron Brown doing on CNN?” I went through this process like four times! There’s something surreal about seeing one of your local news guys on national TV.

    I notice he didn’t last long. The bobbleheads they have now are all the reason I need not to watch. I can tell you this, Aaron Brown would never have pulled this kind of shit.

  129. 129.

    Mike E

    @Redshirt: Yep, it was my source for updates during the HOLY SHIT thread Cole put up that day. They definitely stood out and, I must say, so did Inside Edition during about 15 minutes of their tabloid show yesterday–including a nice run down of CNN’s misery (plus comparison to other outlets) that hit it then quit, moving onto red carpet matters and cleavage.

  130. 130.

    Trollhattan

    @MattR:

    I separate “sports talk” and the game-day studio teams from the sports announcers. The first group don’t do anything beyond fill what would otherwise be dead air time, which when you think of it, is precisely the job description for 24-hour newsies.

    The announcers have to observe, report and interpret in real time. There’s a skill set required that’s well beyond the usual good hair and unbottoned blouse “back in the studio.”

  131. 131.

    Grumpy Code Monkey

    @ricky:

    Lawyers, Guns, and Money’s Erik Loomis pronounced “60 -70 people have died” and tutted “Yes, that’s right, a fertilizer plant was placed in a neighborhood…”

    Let’s provide a little context, shall we?

    as of the most recent reports, 60-70 people have died, a nursing home has caved in, and every house within a 4 block radius was destroyed. Hopefully, it is not this bad. Yes, that’s right, a fertilizer plant was placed in a neighborhood.

    Emphasis added. For the casualty count, he was going by what the news was reporting at the time.

    And he is not exaggerating about the proximity of the plant to the neighborhood; it is literally no more than a few blocks from the bulk of the houses. Don’t believe me, bring up Google Maps for West, TX 76691, and look for the middle school; the fertilizer plant is maybe eight hundred or so feet to the northeast.

    Not a mile. Not even a half mile. Not even a quarter mile.

    I don’t know which was built first, but it really doesn’t matter; one or the other should never have been approved based on what was already there. That’s a failure on a number of levels, not the least of which is basic common sense. I’d have to look up relevant state, county, and local building codes and regulations to see if such stupidity isn’t explicitly disallowed, but knowing my state, it probably isn’t. There should have been a several-mile-wide no-build zone around the plant, because everyone knows what large quantities of ammonium nitrate can do, and has known for at least a couple of decades now.

    As for the cause of the fire and subsequent explosion, nobody knows yet, and yeah, people should be taken to task for “knowing” the causes there. If they have evidence that this plant was regularly in violation of OSHA or other safety standards, present it.

  132. 132.

    gene108

    @scav:

    All but three of the 45 senators who torpedoed gun control measures in Congress on Wednesday have received money from firearms lobbyists

    From the link.

    If I can do my ‘rthmatic right, that means 55 Senators voted in favor of background checks.

    I guess a winning majority doesn’t mean what it used to mean, when I was growing up.

  133. 133.

    Suffern ACE

    @ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Sports reporting appears to be more honest because the most important aspect of it is done publicly. All that other stuff about contracts, trade rumors, and the like, is related to the game, but not actually the important thing, which is public. That’s why reporters can get away with looking the other way at, say, Barry Bonds expanding head and Roger Clemon’s sudden revival at 35 and no one cares really that they missed a big behind the scenes story.

    All of the reporters are reporting on the same public event and therefore, they would check each other rather quickly if they were wrong. I’m sure back in the days when radio was the dominant instant broadcast medium, some announcer could announce a different game and result than was actually taking place so that fans could risk waking up in the morning and find that instead of winning 4-3, their team lost 3-0. But that error would be unlikely.

  135. 135.

    Mnemosyne

    @Trollhattan:

    I know it’s not universal but the play-by-play guys often have the skills to rise to the occasion and importantly, report what they see rather than what they think they might possibly, kinda, wanna see.

    I think this is really what it is — it’s not sports reporters in general, it’s the play-by-play guys, because they’re good at reacting to events, waiting for new information to come in, etc. It’s what they do when they call a game.

    I mean, no, Harry Caray probably wouldn’t have been able to manage it, but it makes sense that people who are used to constantly updating people on sporting events as they happen would also be good at constantly updating people on news events.

  137. 137.

    gene108

    @Trollhattan:

    I separate “sports talk” and the game-day studio teams from the sports announcers.

    In the Philadelphia market the “sports talk” guys are usually ex-sports journalists or former players.

    YMMV in other media markets.

    The former journalists are pretty good about working sources and making sure they have their facts as straight as possible before leading the audience into the hypothetical world of “who should the Eagele’s draft?”, “why on Earth have the Sixers not cut ties to Bynum” and other pressing topics of the day.

    There is speculation, but all of it is reality based stuff you’d talk about anyway regarding potential trades, why a free agent would want to come here, etc.

    I think one thing that keeps sports reporters honest is a significant subset of the fanbase that is (a) as knowledgeable or more knowledgeable about the topic than the reporter and (b) those guys aren’t going to keep quiet over reporters BS’ing their way through a piece.

  138. 138.

    ranchandsyrup

    Thing I read today that disturbed me but made sense:

    real beastiality aficionados fuck shaved orangutans, which is how the world got Donald Trump.

  139. 139.

    MattR

    @Trollhattan: @Suffern ACE: I’m not sure what it says that I never even considered coverage of the actual sporting events when I was thinking about sports journalism.

    You are both right for the most part, but you still sometimes see coverage of a game colored by preexisting narratives that the media wants to continue.

    @raven: I’m a techie and don’t pay too much attention to the business side of things. Maybe I should start.

  140. 140.

    ranchandsyrup

    @Trollhattan: You like Grant Napear? Hung out with him a few times.

    Down here in SD they’re turning the better sports talk station into a quasi-right wing operation. Hired J.D. Hayworth to talk sports and veer into criticism of the left whenever possible. Hired back a guy they fired for calling a woman sideline reporter a sasquatch who also works for the local newspaper’s online TV channel and is owned by a right winger.

  142. 142.

    maya

    I blame ‘austerity’. Because of that many major media news outlets have had to furlough fact checkers and limit reporter’s check boxes to just: Body count, perp skin tone and X ing which point in the media circle jerk they sourced their info from.

  145. 145.

    Roger Moore

    @Trollhattan:

    I know it’s not universal but the play-by-play guys often have the skills to rise to the occasion and importantly, report what they see rather than what they think they might possibly, kinda, wanna see.

    I wonder how much of that is that their primary job is to report on exciting events in real time. There’s a real difference between reporting on regular news and breaking news, and most reporters get a lot more practice reporting regular news. Sports play-by-play is basically all breaking news, so it gives play-by-play announcers a lot more practice at exactly the skills they need when their coverage is interrupted by non-sports breaking news.

  147. 147.

    Trollhattan

    @ranchandsyrup:

    Napear gets a 60:40 from me on annoying:competent–he’s still too New York for Sac (even after all these years). OTOH I lurve Gary Gerould, to the point I prefer the radio for play-by-play while watching the games on my teevee machine (even though the time delays don’t match). It’s clear the players love him as well, and treat him with a lot of respect.

    How did you meet Napear?

  150. 150.

    Trollhattan

    @Roger Moore:

    I think you’ve summed it up perfectly. Sports is “breaking news” delivered in real time, while actual breaking news stories are a pretty small percentage of what reporters report. Even then, it’s usually standing in front of an incident site, after tne incident already occurred or worse, outside a building where something is occurring, “reporting live” because the station has to justify the expense of their mobile truck and microwave feed.

    And as Gene108 points out, sports fans will chew your feet off at the ankles for screwing up a play call or analysis.

  151. 151.

    ranchandsyrup

    @Trollhattan: He’s a friend of a friend. My wife is a sacto person so we hang out up there from time to time. Nice guy. He loves that town. Last year when he thought the Kings were moving to Anaheim, he was bummed and talked a lot about what Sactown means to him.

  152. 152.

    Ted & Hellen

    It’s hilarious to watch PC BJ bots here try to pretend there is no reason to possibly, maybe, perhaps, just kind of, almost ever sort of have a reason to entertain the slight notion that terrorist acts might be, just possibly, perpetrated by brown skinned Muslim types because that has never happened before, at least not on any significant scale except for, you know, 9/11.

  153. 153.

    Another Halocene Human

    Just finished FBI livestream. Looks like after finding the bombers the FBI and BPD might want to find their leakers and give them a little unpaid vacation.

  154. 154.

    Trollhattan

    @ranchandsyrup:

    Good to hear. I believe him when he says he loves the place–he and Jerry Reynolds were literally in tears at the end of our first of now three last game in Sac, ever. They weren’t faking it.

    Can you tell we’re pretty much drama’d out here?

  161. 161.

    Trollhattan

    @Mr Stagger Lee:

    Don’t actually have a beef with Seattle because I grew up listening to Sonics games on the radio. Held onto my dual allegiance until inevitably they met the Kings in the playoffs and I had to choose.

    Clay Bennett, however….

  164. 164.

    Darkrose

    @Trollhattan: I felt really, really bad for the Kings fans. They deserve a franchise run by people who actually give a shit and are willing to spend some of their own money instead of expecting taxpayers to pick up the whole tab.

  167. 167.

    Lurking Canadian

    @Redshirt: It’s not realistic, but here’s a proposal. The broadcast spectrum is a public resource. You want to have access to it, you need to meet professional standards for process, accuracy an so on.

    Screw up too much, you can “broadcast” from a soapbox on the corner, but you can’t squat on public property anymore and we’ll let somebody else try.

    Now, this would never work: I have thought of at least three likely failure modes while typing, but it’s the ethic I wish would take hold.

  175. 175.

    ricky

    @MattR:
    @Grumpy Code Monkey:

    Sorry it has taken me a while to get back.

    It does make a difference if the plant was placed in a neighborhood or the neighborhood grew up around the plant. It makes a difference when each occured. It also makes a difference if the plant is really surrounded by a neighborhood. The Google map Grumpy Code Monkey referred to of West, Texas, shows this is clearly not the case. You will find the plant on the north end of town, along a railroad track, with open land surrounding one side of it. It was built in the early 1960’s, a period which well predates the “three decades of deficit hawkery” lamented by one blogger. My guess is (and I am careful to say it is a guess) the residential construction to the west followed the plant, and that facilities like the school and nursing home were comparatively recent additions that were allowed, not because of lax zoning, but because most people in rural towns don’t see fertilizer facilities as a large threat. Cole talked the other day about how rare terrorist attacks are. How often do fertilizer plants explode?

    If one wants to assert that lax zoning caused the tragedy you would have to show other similar agriculturally based fertilizer plants located in farming communities are better located due to what you would call strong zoning or ample foresight.

    What is proper land use surrounding such plants? What is the appropriate set back distance? Grumpy Code Monkey says there should be a several mile “no-build-zone.” What that means is that no such facility can ever be built in anything other than a rural area, yet must be located within the jurisdiction of a governmental body with the authority to enforce such restrictions. Maybe Fantasyland, USA?

    Neither blogger asserted anything in their finding of facts which indicates they have a clue. Nor was it known, at the time they posted, how many deaths and injuries were suffered by people or if they were based on where they lived in proximity to the plant. They are simply reporting as if their biases will be proven true, which means they are as prone to error as corporate media types busting to broadcast from sources in order to be “first.” Which is the point of this post and its sly suggestion that bloggers were unfairly criticized. The latter point prompted my comment.

    But if you want to get at the key point of the nonsense, it is the assertion by Crooks and Liars that this tragedy due to lax zoning, lack of unions, or a weak regulatory state “was completely preventable.” I suggest you look at Toulouse, France, 2001. By the way, many in the the French media, since they didn’t have bad zoning laws, close neighborhoods, weak unions, or weak regulations to blame, found some other bias to hit upon. They blamed terrorists. Muslims to be more precise. Dark skinned people. And they were wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AZF_(factory)

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