Preakness 2025 Results

 Journalism has won the 150th Preakness Stakes.  It was an extremely tight far turn into homestretch. I am happy nobody was hurt, but I think there might be an inquiry although the winner wasn't really affected. Michael McCarthy was trainer for his second Preakness win.  Umberto Rispoli is the jockey.

The results will stand despite the tightness at the top of the stretch.  

Journalism seemed completely out of it, but he was much the best horse as he caught Gosger at the wire.  Sandman came in third.  The time was 1:55.47.

The race via NBC Sports:

Blood Horse

It's Probably True

Fox News propagandist Roger Ailes is being sued for sexual harassment.

It isn't like he is centerfold material. Given the way women are sexualized on that network, it comes as no shock.

But Fox isn't alone.

I get really disgusted at the various cable "news" organizations employing what is in fact sex discrimination against women journalists and/or hosts by forcing them into sleeveless dresses, dresses that look like cocktail dresses rather than professional work wardrobes, ruinous high heels, even the showing of cleavage. Meanwhile, the men are dressed professionally in conservative dress with suits and ties. There is no attempt to sexualize the men. This is clear sex discrimination in dress codes. The news is not porn, and women should not be forced into porn-style attire. The women in these organizations should sue.

Getting back to the suit in question, Carlson's allegations are pretty damning.

I didn't know Carlson had been a Miss America. She held the title in 1989. This probably won her the title. She is a very good violinist. By not knowing about her beauty pageant past, you can tell I don't closely follow beauty pageants believing as I do they are relics of a sexist past.

Big-Time FUBAR at Rolling Stone Magazine

It seems the sensational article about the alleged University of Virginia rapes at a fraternity house is chock full of holes, and the reporter of the article chastised for not treating the alleged victim's story about a gang rape with some healthy skepticism.

At least the thing wasn't completely made up out of whole cloth--at least not yet.

Could the whole thing be another Jayson Blair or Stephen Glass situation? I am sure we will find out.

Lots of red flags in the article:

Instead, Erdely’s story, published Nov. 19 to a thunderous and mostly positive reaction, appears to have been fatally defective. Major details, including the name of the fraternity in question, are in dispute or have been exposed as false. Jackie’s allies have distanced themselves from her and from Rolling Stone’s story.

And so, too, has Rolling Stone. The magazine backed away from the story Friday and placed the onus for its defects on Jackie. “In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced,” wrote managing editor Will Dana in “A Note to Our Readers” posted on the magazine’s Web site. (The magazine did not return calls for further comment.)

He also wrote, ”Because of the sensitive nature of Jackie’s story, we decided to honor her request not to contact the man she claimed orchestrated the attack on her nor any of the men she claimed participated in the attack for fear of retaliation against her.”

The fraternity has taken issue with its depiction in the article.

Goodbye and Good Riddance

While today we think of Nelson Mandela as someone who was truly great, we are also treated with the resignation of a true blue bottom feeder posing as a "journalist."

You don't have to be a Sarah Palin fan to find Martin Bashir one of the most despicable excuses for a journalist who has ever come down the pike.

He rode on the coattails of the unstable Diana, Princess of Wales, when she gave that utterly incomprehensible interview with Panorama back in 1995. Her rehearsed answers trashed her estranged husband, cast doubts on whether he was fit to be king thus creating an unnecessary crisis for the monarchy, and her paranoia and mental instability were there for all the world to see. She upset the people she claimed to care most of all, her sons. All the while, Bashir was lapping it up, for it was dollar signs and fame for him from now on, no matter the means.

It got much worse, if that is possible, with the character assassination he did on Michael Jackson. There was no excuse for his constant insinuations that Jackson was a child molester because he was a naive individual who loved children and even invited the kids to "sleep on his bed." Of course, he said he slept on the floor while the kids hogged the bed, and that there were cameras all over Neverland to prevent any kind of wrongdoing, but why have that little truth interfere with a good molestation story? That shitty "documentary" is said to have emotionally broken the already fragile Jackson, and Bashir was only sorry after the King of Pop died.

Even then he didn't apologize for his innuendo; he merely said he never saw anything indicating wrongdoing with kids by MJ and that he thought he was a great entertainer. A day late and a dollar short.

Bashir shouldn't be hired anywhere, but somebody somewhere will pick him up like a dog picks up fleas.

TV Changed Forever That Day

As far as I am concerned, the quality of the JFK assassination coverage--despite the usual factual mistakes and the somewhat primitive presentation--is the gold standard by which all broadcast journalism today should be judged.

Of course everything is instantaneous and 24/7 today, but even something as horrendous as 9/11 does not compare in news coverage quality with the JFK assassination. Today's broadcast journalists are simply not in the same league as those who worked for the networks in the early 1960s, many of whom became "legendary."

You were not told what to think in those days. The journalists did their jobs under total chaos, and you were not treated like an idiot.

Oh, how I miss them. I have been watching CBS's 1963 coverage of the assassination rather than NBC's because I think it was better done. How I miss those journalists who have now passed from the scene: Walter Cronkite, Charles Collingwood (my favorite one of all), Harry Reasoner, Mike Wallace, George Herman, Winston Burdett, Daniel Schorr, Nelson Benton, Robert Trout, Robert Pierpoint, and others whose names escape me at the moment. Those who are still alive are way up there in years including Marvin Kalb, Roger Mudd, Dan Rather, and Richard C Hottelet (the last of the original "Murrow's Boys" who is still alive at this writing at 96). We will never see that great a group again.

The coverage changed television forever:

The seminal event took place at the dawn of a brave new media world. Only two months before the assassination, television's three broadcast networks expanded their nightly newscasts from 15 to 30 minutes. Working with film rather than instant video, correspondents in Texas expected to cover Kennedy's visit via carefully prepared segments on their evening broadcasts.

Instead, they scrambled -- and often struggled -- to cover a heart-wrenching story as it unfolded.

Robert MacNeil, then the White House correspondent for NBC, was on the media bus with the presidential motorcade when shots were heard in Dealey Plaza. He yelled for the driver to stop and bolted outside.

"The air was filled with the most intense sound of collective screaming," he recalls. "It was like nothing I ever heard before."

MacNeil also believes he had a brush with the assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, at the Texas School Book Depository.

Obituaries: Helen Thomas

Pioneer female journalist Helen Thomas, long a fixture on the White House press scene and somebody who asked questions politicians, especially U.S. presidents, often didn't want to answer, has died at the age of 92:

When President George H.W. Bush announced that the defense budget would remain the same after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disappearance of communism in Europe, she succinctly asked, “Who’s the enemy?”

“I respect the office of the presidency,” she told Ann McFeatters for a 2006 profile in Ms. magazine, “but I never worship at the shrines of our public servants. They owe us the truth.”

Ms. Thomas had a number of scoops, including her exclusive interviews with Martha Mitchell, which helped expose some aspects of the Watergate scandal. Mitchell, the wife of Attorney General John Mitchell, told Thomas in late-night phone calls that she had seen a Nixon campaign strategy book that included plans for Watergate-style operations. Thomas also broke the story that Nixon’s speechwriters were working on a resignation address that he would give the next day.

Her strength was her indefatigable pursuit of hard news, the bread-and-butter staple of the wire services. She arrived at work every morning before dawn and accompanied presidents on overseas trips. She was the only female print reporter to accompany Nixon on his historic visit to China, and later, in her 70s and 80s, she often outdistanced younger reporters on arduous around-the-world travels.

Leave the Sleeveless Outfits at Home

This columnist may be a "conservative," but I agree with her regarding the trend on cable television to have female reporters and commentators show a little bit of arm or leg or high heels or whatever in order to get ratings or whatever they are trying to do. It demeans the journalistic profession and is actually a distraction from what is being said. Not to mention it is sexist as hell.

The worst offender is an MSNBC talking head with the unfortunate name of Krystal Ball. She thinks she is the hottest piece of shit who ever walked the earth, but she looks and acts like a bimbo on television. She might have a decent I.Q., but the sleeveless outfits and her generally vain demeanor kill whatever she is trying to say. Besides, her bare arms aren't that good anyway, pregnant or not, and apparently she is right now. The arms just aren't that good. The producers need to make her wear a conservative outfit and maybe I and many others will pay attention to her. Right now whenever I see her on Lawrence O'Donnell's program, I just change the channel. You don't see the male commentators she appears with in shitty outfits.

More Cronkite

Walter Cronkite was celebrated, but not for his more significant moments, such as his remarks about the mess in Vietnam, while Tim Russert was celebrated for being what the current journalistic mob, particularly in the Beltway, do, which is not journalism.

To be fair, though, Russert's premature death was a horrible shock to everybody, and he appeared to be a genuinely good person, a contrast to the hatchet man persona he displayed on Meet the Press. Cronkite lived to a ripe old age and was active until shortly before he died. And one should bear in mind Russert, unlike Cronkite, was NOT a journalist anyway; he started out as a political hack. The fact political operatives like him, George Stephanopolous, Chris Matthews, and Joe Scarborough are even given a forum at all when true journalists are ignored should tell us all how far media standards have fallen. It's now all about infotainment, not about information.
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No sooner is Cronkite's body cold than somebody is wanting to cash in writing a "tell-all" book writing about how mean he was and was never around his children.

Miscellaneous News.

Warren Jeffs, so-called polygamist, got what he deserved today.
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That asshole Michael Vick has been charged with torturing and killing dogs.

These are state, rather than federal, charges.

He should get double what he dished out to the dogs.

I can say the same for that asshole who burned and stabbed a poor dog, who died ten days later. The bastard is on trial for animal cruelty.

Sure that ass wouldn't hurt his own dog, sure:

In court Tuesday, two veterinarians testified for the prosecution, using grisly photographs to help describe how Mercy was burned over 60 percent of her body and to show her two puncture wounds.

Mr. Wyde, however, contended that the prosecution's case is weak. He said some of the witnesses should not be believed because they were influenced to come forward by reward money. In addition, Mr. Wyde said, other potential suspects were ignored by police.

Sandra Brown, Mr. Brown's mother, would not talk about her son's case Tuesday. But she issued a written statement declaring that he would never torture or kill his own dog. She described how he cared for several pets, including two other dogs, two cats and a snake.

"My son lived in an apartment and would call me and ask if he could bring his dogs over to run around my back yard because they have been in the apartment all day," Ms. Brown said.

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It is True the Italian government dropped its civil suit against former Getty curator Marion.
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Keith Olbermann is smart, even brilliant, when it comes to his career, but it is hype in the extreme to compare him with Edward R. Murrow.
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Smith Watch.

Smith's death was a classic case of perfect timing.

Unfortunately, the Astronut Attempted Murder Case had to take a backseat to more important matters such as this.

But in truth, it raises more serious questions about the state of journalism today:

What makes this of more than passing interest is that serious American journalism is in the process of transforming itself into a new, hybrid news medium that combines traditional print and broadcast with a more purposefully articulated online presence. One of the latter's most seductive attributes is its ability to gauge readers' appetites for a particular story on a minute-to-minute basis. What you get is something like the familiar television ratings — though constantly updated, if you choose to treat them that way.

It's all about ratings. Smith, like Jayne Mansfield, knew how to promote herself, whether for good or for bad. That was true even in death.

The twist here is that the internet was front and center in keeping this death in the headlines.