June 15, 2011

THE "GRAY LADY" DABBLES IN TABLOID CESSPOOL

  1. …That's what it seemed like to me the other day when I heard this on the news: "The New York Times reports that Huma Abedin (the wife of Rep. Anthony Weiner, the Democratic congressman from New York who is caught up in a scandal as the result of using his Twitter account to send images of himself in various stages of undress and trading private messages with members of the opposite sex) is in the early stages of pregnancy."
  2. …They seemed exclusive with the news on this; no one else had the information.
  3. …Later in print, the NYT said the pregnancy report was attributed to "three people with knowledge of the situation."
  4. …That sounded to me like the way the National Enquirer sources its news reports.
  5. …Not to be naïve but I was shock, shock, shocked that the highfalutin New York Times was becoming an accessory in the advancement of the seamy, steamy story. They usually step away from such tabloid distractions and report on more important things.
  6. …Their journalism has always had higher standards.
  7. …Maybe they need to sell more newspapers or get more "page views" on the Internet, could be.
  8. Weiner is from New York and everyone in the world seems to be weighing in on it, including Congress in Washington and his fellow politicians in New York, so I guess they think it has a certain amount of importance.
  9. …Now the latest is that he's taking a leave of absence from the House and going to Rehab (like Amy Winehouse - "They tried to make me go to rehab, I said 'No, no, no…'" - on Island Records, 2007 ) for psychological counseling.
  10. …I'd like to be a fly on the wall when he and Huma get together after that overseas trip with her boss, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who seems like a mother hen to her.
  11. Weiner seems very in tune with his own body.
  12. …He takes care of his own dirty laundry by taking it to the cleaners.
  13. …And even though Weiner seems in shape and "cut" in those semi-naked pictures he took of himself at the congressional gym through the mirror he does seem to show some slight love handles or that he might have a muffin top forming.
  14. …Nobody's perfect.
  15. CNN advertised its coverage of the New Hampshire Republican Presidential Debate on another television network: ABC. I know this has been done before for other programs on the cable network but it still seems a bit odd to run an ad over a competing news network's airwaves.
  16. …Maybe it's because cable doesn't have airwaves of its own.
  17. …. I guess if they pay enough money for it it doesn't matter to the New York news execs.
  18. SHAMELESS BID FOR OPRAH'S AUDIENCE. "From now on if you want a free trip to Australia you're going to have to ask 'Auntie Ellen,'" (as in DeGeneres) says a new promo that's running on NBC.
  19. …They show many shots of Oprah and Ellen together: embracing, being friendly and familiar with one another. I guess that's supposed to convince people that Ellen and Oprah are alike and that viewers should tune into Ellen's show now that Big Mama's gone.
  20. …Yes, everyone's scrambling to get a piece of Winfrey's afternoon audience now that she's retired her long-running program.
  21. …Everyone's asking who the next Oprah will be.
  22. …I doubt if it will be Ellen DeGeneres
  23. …Or Anderson Cooper
  24. …Or Katie Couric.
  25. The news about the "Palin document dump" (more than 24,000 pages of e-mails while she was governor of Alaska) reminded me of the WikiLeaks dumps (classified military documents about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). Remember them and that weird guy Julian Assange?
  26. …Actually there's a CNN special this week about it: "WikiWars: The Mission of Julian Assange," which analyzes the "lasting impact of the organization and its controversial founder."
  27. MOVIE: SUPER 8. Steven Spielberg executive produced it and the film has the distinctive Spielberg stamp: kids in suburbia, households, families, a mystery, gadgets. Directed by J.J. Abrams (Mission: Impossible III, Star Trek/2009; he created Lost and Alias for TV) it's a fun romp about a group of boys (and one girl: Dakota Fanning's sister Elle) in 1979 who are shooting an amateur zombie film for a festival and witness an enormous train wreck that causes strange things to happen in the fictional town of Lillian, Ohio.
  28. Super 8 refers to the film stock (8 millimeter) that was introduced by Kodak in 1965.
  29. …The kids were great and the film was fun but many things are not explained or followed up on.
  30. …There are a lot of loose ends.
  31. …The ending is a cheat. I was disappointed about that.
  32. …A lotta fuss over nothing.
  33. Prince William was dressed on Saturday like he was on his wedding day (Irish Guards scarlet tunic) but this time he had on one of those bearskin caps (barely recognizable, said NBC's Chapman Bell) and was on horseback. His steed was a grey charger named Wellesley.
  34. …The hat was pulled way down over his eyes, that's why it was hard to tell it was him. I don't understand how he could see where he was going in that getup.
  35. …And his wife, Kate Middleton, wore "a dramatic wide-brimmed hat" (Hello! magazine) for the Trooping the Colour ceremony, which marks the official birthday of Queen Elizabeth (85).
  36. …Those royals are something to watch.
  37. NOTICED. Prince William has inherited some of his father's (Prince Charles) characteristics. Upon getting out of the motorcar which brought William and Kate to a gala (Absolute Return for Kids/ARK) , Wills (as they affectionately call him over there) adjusted his bow tie more than once and tensed his neck and mouth while doing it. We've seen his pops do that many times, making sure he looks presentable, especially after disembarking a vehicle or doing a walk-up to meet a dignitary or someone.
  38. …Male royalty has its standards to keep up just like the proper women do.
  39. Mr. Big Stuff pointed out that new Today show host Ann Curry said, on her first day on the job since Meredith Vieira left, "I feel like Cinderella, Ann Curry aka Cinderella."
  40. …Why, did Vieira treat her like an evil stepsister?
  41. …Prior to her ascendance Curry had been the show's news reader since - are you ready for this? - 1997.
  42. …So she was waiting in the wings for 14 years.
  43. …She's already got an interview with President Obama, a job usually done by NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Wilson, er…Williams.
  44. …So she's on her way. I guess.
  45. JUST ASKING. When is Tom Hanks gonna stop doing movie roles that depict him as a dummy and a character who is much younger than he is in real life, and clumsy, like Jerry Lewis was in all of his Nutty Professor-type movie days?
  46. …Now it's "Larry Crowne," (opens July 1) in which he co-stars with Julia Roberts and plays a Navy vet who loses his job (at a big-box store/Can you imagine the laughs - NOT!) and goes back to school ("This is my first day of college," he says, like a simpleton) where Roberts's character (Mercedes Tainot) is a teacher.
  47. …Movie is directed by Hanks himself and was co-written by him and Nia Vardalos of My Big Fat Greek Wedding fame. Where's she been?
  48. MOVIE TAG LINE: "It's never too late for a second chance."
  49. …Why do we have to suffer through another pairing of America's favorites Hanks and Roberts? They just did Charlie Wilson's War back in 2007, and they always seem to appear at many of the same Hollywood events. Enough already.
  50. …Where do you go to throw up?" asks the Blonde Bombshell. (Occasional contributor to this column)
  51. JUST TO BACK-PEDDLE A BIT. That Meredith Vieira final show last week…The one where they dragged her around (led by Matt Lauer) the Today show set, backstage, through the NBC offices, downstairs, on to the plaza…all to the tune of Journey's Don't Stop Believin', which was lip-synched by every working stiff idiot along the way.
  52. Jen Chaney of The Washington Post called it "a mega-musical," and it was.
  53. …It was also Glee-ish, which is always saccharine.
  54. Vieira was exhausted at the end of it and shed a couple tears when asked about leaving the show.
  55. STOLEN… But the whole thing was a total rip-off of the video they did for Mary Hart for her last day on Entertainment Tonight. Mark Steines, her "co-anchor," took the hand of Dancing With the Stars's Cheryl Burke and gallivanted all over the CBS-distributed show offices and Hollywood lot lip-synching Pink's Raise Your Glass (LaFace Records, 2010) party anthem.
  56. …That video went viral. What doesn't nowadays?
  57. Vieira was only there for five years. God knows what they'll do when Matt Lauer leaves.
  58. …(I don't wanna be around for it.)
  59. WISE WORDS? "Whether you're sexting or tweeting, it's cheating," said Sherri Shepherd of "The View," in response to the Anthony Weiner scandal.
  60. God she's clever.
  61. Nancy O'Dell's (Mary Hart's Entertainment Tonight successor) hair hangs down like Pocohontas's pigtails, for crissakes.
  62. …What is it with these hair extensions? They've gotten out of control. Everybody knows nobody's got hair that long. It practically touches the anchor desk.
  63. TECHNOLOGY. Will I store my record collection and practically everything else I own in a cloud (a new way of storing content, including music, photos and documents, created with Apple's iWork software) . Plus all formats will automatically be integrated and synched up.
  64. CEO Steve Jobs talked about it last week at the Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco and called the iCloud the beginning of the post-PC world.
  65. Cisco Systems are already advertising for it on TV: They "verb" it up by saying, "Cloud With Confidence."
  66. (…"I've looked at clouds from Both Sides Now…" - Judy Collins, on Elektra Records, 1967.)
  67. JUST WONDERING. What sea creatures have noshed on Osama bin Laden since his weighted body was dumped in the North Arabian Sea? Has Charlie Tuna passed by?
  68. …One "expert" on TV said that because the body was wrapped in a sack that the fish can't get to it (protective covering?).
  69. …If that's the case it's good news. I was worried that I might have got some of his scraggly beard in my Red Lobster meal the other night. Ha Ha Ha
  70. I'VE HAD IT WITH… The current crop of young female singers who drag out songs and just sing syllables that they repeat over and over (with the obnoxious help of Auto-Tune). It's dumb and childish. Is this what music has come to?
  71. Rhianna's What's My Name: "Oh na na, what's my name…Oh na na, what's my name…" Katy Perry's Firework: "Make 'em go oh oh oh!…As you shoot across the sky-y-y…" Britney Spears's Til the World Ends: "Waoh oh oh oh oh oh oh…Waoh oh oh oh oh oh oh…" (Repeat).
  72. …Think they'll win any song-writing awards? (Probably) Should they? Hell no.
  73. Hanalie, dog in the neighborhood, seems to be overwhelmed (at times) by Bucky (or Buckeye, as owner Sally sometimes refers to him), a relative newcomer (feline) to the active household. Sometimes kitty lays in wait for Hanalie to come around the corner and then jumps out at her, startling the poor pooch.
  74. WUSSES THEY WERE. Donald Trump and Sarah Palin. A few weeks back in New York, Trump got all neighborhood-y and took her to a pizza joint around Times Square and they both ate it with a fork, of all things.
  75. …Picky Mr. Trump said he doesn't like eating the crust (afraid of gaining weight, too many carbs?) and uses his fork to eat just the sauce on the top.
  76. …Why even fool with it then?
  77. …Get your hands dirty for once in your life.
  78. …C'mon folks, man up about it.
  79. UH…Are You Man Enough? - The Four Tops, on ABC Records, 1973. From the movie, "Shaft in Africa."


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