Archive for July, 2010

A story that won’t get promoted from the local news

Posted: July 13, 2010 by datechguy in local stuff, media, opinion/news
Tags: ,

There is a story at the Worcester Telegram that I suspect will never make it to the New York Times, Washington Post, Morning Joe or Memeorandom Here are the details:

Local gay activist Albert M. Toney III has been charged with sexually assaulting a 17-year-old youth last month in the locker room of the YMCA.

The 17-year-old told investigators he was standing in front of a fan in the locker room of the YMCA at 766 Main St. June 15 when Mr. Toney, who was nude, approached him from behind, grabbed his buttock and pressed himself up against him without his consent, according to a statement filed in court by police Sgt. John W. Lewis. Mr. Toney, a former Worcester police officer, then allegedly invited the 17-year-old to join him in the steam room.

A longtime gay activist and advocate for gay and lesbian youth, Mr. Toney is president of AK Consulting Services, an education/diversity training and consulting company.

He was active in the campaign for same-sex marriage rights in Massachusetts and was the first openly gay candidate to run for Worcester City Council.

Ok so we have a public figure, well known in the community, active in the same sex marriage fight and a “youth advocate” charged. Will this story be in any of the above venues? Will it make any papers beyond Worcester? Will there be a memeorandum thread? I think not, the media will not consider this more than a local story. However with a few edits of the Bold Text I can make it a newsworthy story, observe: My edited text is in Italics:

Local Catholic Priest Fr. Albert M. Toney III has been charged with sexually assaulting a 17-year-old youth last month in the locker room of his parish.

The 17-year-old told investigators he was standing in front of a fan in the locker room of his parish at 766 Main St. June 15 when Father Toney, who was nude, approached him from behind, grabbed his buttock and pressed himself up against him without his consent, according to a statement filed in court by police Sgt. John W. Lewis. Father Toney, a former Worcester police officer, then allegedly invited the 17-year-old to join him in the rectory.

A longtime local priest and advocate for catholic youth youth, Father Toney is president of AK Consulting Services, a Church run education, training and consulting company.

He was active in the campaign against same-sex marriage rights in Massachusetts and was the first Catholic Priest to run for Worcester City Council.

See? A few edits and Viola; A story worthy of the New York Times, and a memeorandum thread. Will this story get any media play without said edits? Oh sure, around the same day that Andrew Sullivan endorses Sarah Palin for president on the Chris Matthews show.

Update: the trick would also work If I replaced “Gay Activist” with “Tea party Activist”.

Update 2: Stacy picks it up at the Spectator Blog

George Stienbrenner is dead

Posted: July 13, 2010 by datechguy in baseball
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For all the nonsense Yankee fans put up with, in the end the Yankees won more titles with him than any other team during his era.

Baseball Crank has this to say:

Steinbrenner’s personality and legacy will be described as “complicated,” which is sort of true although the pieces are easy enough to stitch together into a coherent whole with some effort. My all-time favorite line was from Luis Polonia in 1989: “Steinbrenner is only interested in one thing, and I don’t know what it is.” At times, when the Yankees weren’t winning, it seemed that way. Nobody cared about winning more than Steinbrenner, and that of course was his greatest virtue as an owner; the Yankees made a lot of money under George, but he never saw the money as something to pocket separate and apart from winning, and as a fan there are few things you want more in your team owner. His signature move was signing Goose Gossage to be his closer immediately after Sparky Lyle won the Cy Young Award, an act of colossal baseball gluttony that turned out to be visionary; Sparky’s arm game out and he went, in Graig Nettles’ words, “from Cy Young to Syonara in one year,” while the Goose went on to have the prime of his Hall of Fame career in pinstripes.

David Pinto nails it:

I grew up a Yankees fan, before George took over. As someone who remembers the Yankees before the boss, I’ll say that George was a bastard, but he was our bastard. He restored a franchise laid low by poor management and changing rules on signing amateur players to a championship team again. As a fan at the time, I was happy to see that. He used the wealth of the Yankees to leverage free agency and won consecutive World Series trophies in the 1970s. He was a tough driving boss. He did not believe in vacations or time off. More than anything, he wanted to win, and constantly pushed the team to do so.

It should be noted, however, that the two great eras of the Steinbrenner years, the late 1970s and last 1990s came about due to George’s evil side. He was suspended from taking part in day to day operations after the 1974 seasons due to illegal contributions to Richard Nixon. That allowed Gabe Paul to put together a team that would win the pennant in 1976 without interference. Steinbrenner was again suspended in 1990, and would not control the team again until 1993. By that time, the front office had laid the foundation for the great teams of the late 1990s.

Baseball will not be the same without him, if nothing else he sure wasn’t boring.

A must read letter to the Washington Post

Posted: July 13, 2010 by datechguy in media, opinion/news
Tags: , , ,

If you want to understand the death of the MSM this letter from Peter Kenny and Glenn Dale really says it all:

I am grateful to Charles Krauthammer, as I’m sure many other readers are, for his July 9 op-ed column, “The selective modesty of Barack Obama,” because he mentioned a story that The Post, the New York Times and most of the “important” media have not reported: NASA Administrator Charles Bolden’s bizarre interview with al-Jazeera, in which he said Mr. Obama gave him the mission to “reach out to the Muslim world” and “help them feel good about their historic contribution to science and math and engineering.” Mr. Bolden also said he was asked to “re-inspire” children to do well in science and math. I suspect any halfway intelligent Muslim would be offended by such laughable condescension.

Apart from regretting such feel-good nonsense from a once-great space agency, I would ask The Post: How was this story not newsworthy? Didn’t Post editors realize that word of these inane statements would eventually reach the hordes of Post readers? And that some of them might wonder why The Post hasn’t reported it already?emphasis mine

Peter Kenny, Glenn Dale

Any Questions?

Here is an interesting question

Posted: July 13, 2010 by datechguy in elections, internet/free speech, opinion/news
Tags: , , , ,

…did the La Times decide that the story of the Nick Popaditch cartoon was a story because Rep Bob Filner joined the voices disproving it? Would they have ignored it as “right wing noise” otherwise?

Either way Michelle is right about the end result:

But instead of calling on the cartoonist to be fired, perhaps he deserves thanks — thanks for inadvertently creating an opportunity for the rest of us. It’s a moment not merely to complain about a boneheaded media slap, but to spread the word about Nick Popaditch.

Works for me. Lets see what happens on Memeorandum with this.

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