Report Rotten Editors

I don't normally like to slag people off on the internet, but infrequently I make an exception. In this case it is deserved. It's not so much directed - as far as I'm concerned - to the individuals here, although they they certainly deserve to be mentioned - but really the group that call themselves 'editors' need to go under the spotlight.

Many editors behave the way these individuals have behaved. They have excuses - lack of time, ADD etc. - but like other human beings, when work loads increase you adapt. You deal with stress. Set boundaries if you must. Ask people to bug you less, or come in to work earlier, or delegate the fine tuning of the small stuff to someone else. Most editors get into a rut of rude negligence at some point, and a lot of writers have gotten used to it, so it gets worse. Writers tend not to kick up a fuss - they leave that to the editors. And there is the very real risk (which I am taking here) that by saying, Humansdorp, we have a problem, up to here and no further, that editors will hold it against you. Why? because they can. It's easy to be spiteful, and so sometimes they are. Sometimes they're fair - depending on how much they need to get exactly what they want from whomever is offering it.

Most good editors are intelligent, practical people. So,though I am taking a risk exposing some that might not be, I'm counting on sanity prevailing. My confidence in that sanity is at an all time low. Don't blame me. I've sent 9000 words into the ether in the last week alone. It's like tossing a stone down a deep black well. It's like the next morning and I am still waiting by the well and I still haven't heard the stone (any of those words) hit bottom.

See, the thing is, once upon a time, editors were writers too. What happened guys? I think it is a real tragedy when editors hang up their keyboards and get bogged down in everyone elses stuff. But that's not the case with the two people in this story. Writers are getting a bum deal from the very people that are supposedly representing them. It's bad enough that in SA it has taken about 15 years to get word rates to rise 50 cents (from R1.50 to R2). Why do we have to struggle through a morass of virtual vines and briar patches that is an editor's attention - just to get our stories considered? If editors practised bit of time management and set aside an hour or two at the start of each day just to acknowledge and respond to what was in their inbox, it would go a long way to soothing and smoothing ruffled feathers. But no. Instead, it's a hit and miss thing, where the writer spends weeks, and hours, doing their thing, writing something, and then waiting weeks for an editors eyeball to chance upon their email. 5 seconds is what they'll give you: a 10 word answer to your 3000 word submission. That's still okay. I can accept that. What I don't accept is no answer, and then vitriol.

The Star has fallen

On 14/04 I sent a feeler email to The Star asking if they would be interested in a story on Korea. This was about a week before I went on the trip. At that stage I had three publications interested, and right now I can say one came good on the loose agreement, pending a meeting I'll hear the results of 2nd soon, and the third is still in play. The Star though was a different kettle of fish altogether. It took weeks and weeks and many emails just to get a response, but once I took them to task for their lack of communication, I got a flurry of hate mail in a single hour on a Friday afternoon. So they obviously are capable of sparing some time (and thought) when push comes to shove.

Anyway, let's go back in time, and cut to the chase of this sad as a bog tale. After numerous follow up emails to an initial offer for content, I received this answer on 15/05.

From: Carol Lazar
Sent: 15 May 2008 10:56 AM
To: Nick Van Der Leek
Subject: RE: heart & seoul

Yes Nick
I would really like a piece on Korea. We ahve never had anything on that country. I look forward to reading it. I'm delighted about GQ - it's a good magazine.
Cheers
Carol

Then I tried to narrow down what exactly they wanted me write, which took another two weeks. Eventually I annotated my emails as IMPORTANCE: HIGH to get their attention.

From: Nick Van Der Leek
Sent: 02 June 2008 02:17 PM
To: 'Carol Lazar'
Subject: Resuscitating A Stream
Importance: High

Hi Carol

I'd like to customise a story for The Star, and in order to do so I just need a ballpark brief of what you'd be interested in. This is obviously not an undertaking from your side to commit to publishing, just a suggestion.

Please provide a suggested word count, and number of pictures you'd like. Please also select which topic/s most suits your expectations:
1) Resuscitating a stream - how Seoul spent $200 million to remove a major traffic artery in order to give life to a 600 year old stream. Historical background, equipment used and construction process, implications for urban planning and development.
2) Surfing the Korean Wave - The American dream is so passé, the Korean wave is where it's at. The good, the bad and the unexpected - what living in Korea is all about, and what to expect if you make the move.
3) Where airports go to heaven (Incheon Airport).

Thanks Carol
Nick

In June now - and Carol once again took a few seconds to respond, and when she did it was positively, but with no indication really of what she wanted me to write. When I tried to establish this shortly afterwards (about 10 minutes) Carol changed her mind, saying they didn't want any material after all. After 6 weeks this lady has a moodswing! This was in response to an email from me asking if she could spend a little time letting me know exactly what she wanted me to do. By asking this Carol said I demonstrated a 'bad attitude'.

And not long after that, this email from Seoul.

Dear all,

Hi, I hope everything's going well with you guys after you're back from Seoul to your life. Today I have a bad news, not for you, but for us and those Western journalists who have done all the documentation required for July Tour application. The Seoul Metropolitan Government has recently cancelled the third round of Press Tour for Western journalists, which was scheduled for June 30-July 5. Tours for Asian journalists for the same timeframe are progressing smoothly, on the other hand. The Seoul MG argues that Seoul Selection's poor performance, or in other words, low output of Seoul articles by Western journalists in the first and second rounds, has resulted in the cancellation.

My colleagues and I are still recovering from the shock of the cancellation. But there are other victims—30 plus journalists who have applied for June 30-July 5, and Oct. 20-25 Seoul Tours respectively. We've already announced the cancellation for the third round Tour applicants. The Seoul MG says they would evaluate our performance in late August, by Seoul articles published by the first and second Tour participants. Then it will be decided whether Seoul MG would host the Oct. 20-25 Tour for Western journalists or not.

I don't mean to pressure you. Nor do I have any means to pressure you to write. But if you simply forgot to start on writing, or put it as low priority subject, please reconsider. By trying harder to get your writings published in established media, you would contribute to bringing your colleague journalists to Seoul in October. Thank you for reading.

Best wishes,
Kay Chung
Seoul Selection

Do you see the culpability here? I did. Hence:

Hi Carol

Just a reminder that as a result of your response - (citing my bad attitude - where I drew your attention to urgently wanting to offer a story after a press tour, after countless emails following your failure to even respond to half a dozen emails) and other editors like you, western journalists (over 30 of them) have now not been invited to Seoul. Asian journalists have been invited instead. I don't blame them - the western journos now appear to have a reputation for being lazy and disinterested (see email). When time allows I would like to contact your superior at IOL/INL and let them know your culpability in this, and also how it came about that you decided you weren't even interested in receiving freelance work. It's a case of spiteful egoism on your part at its worst - and this has had consequences for many other writers now. I also want to remind you that you took over 2 months to simply respond to a prior email, which indicates a pattern of negligence.

Have a super day

Nick


Guess who comes to the rescue? Brendan Seery, The Star's Open Ed editor who writes:

Nick:

I am one of Carol's Lazar's superiors at INL and, having seen your raving, out of touch with reality letter, I can only conclude she acted correctly in not wanting to have anything to do with you.

If you are anything resembling a journalist, you would realise:

1) The editor of a publication has the final say on what goes into that publication. In this case, Carol makes the calls for Saturday Star Travel.
2) That being the case, she also gives preference to copy generated by our own staffers and freelance writers she has worked with previously.
3) In addition, she would make a call based on whether a specific country or destination had been covered recently
4) Finally, she would decide on whether the piece offered was of sufficiently high quality to be used. (Judging by your immoderate and immature rantings, I would be loathe to use any of your copy myself)

You should also realise that an editor of a travel publication is under NO OBLIGATION to take freelance copy, particularly work that was not specifically commissioned by that publication.

For you to assert - and to copy to others - that Carol Lazar is lazy and unprofessional and has damaged the prospects of Western journalists being invited to South Korea (simply because she refused to take YOUR marvellous work) is not only idiotic but it is also defamatory.

If I were you, I would go off to a quiet place and try to get back to reality.

Regards

Brendan Seery
Executive Editor: Content
The Star
JOHANNESBURG

Hey Brendan

I hope you don't mind me putting your email on my blog. I think it will serve to show exactly what we are dealing with. Would you mind? I will also be sending it (your email) to Seoul so they can see the attitude of some editors. My gripe with you, Carol and others like you is that you are not even polite enough to respond to emails. Thus the point is not even reached where material is submitted. You seem not to have grasped this epithet of information. People like me (who you sneer at and appear to believe have no talent) go around the world, working very hard, and approach you, offer work to you on a silver platter, and you don't even have the manners to acknowledge the invitation. When I tried to impress on Carol that I'd appreciate an answer to a number of emails (an answer, not permission to write anything), she went back on an email she'd just sent citing she didn't like my 'attitude'.

It's frankly disgusting behaviour. I also don't believe you are Carol's superior based on your position in the paper, and having read the content you write. Carol is based in Cape Town and works for the Saturday Star. Even so, I would like to get hold of someone much higher up - I'm sure they would find your clique's behaviour appalling, and frankly, bad for business.

It's also amusing to hear you (who pontificate endlessly over the 'real' world of advertising), giving advice on reality.

Thanks
Nick

Now note contempt and sarcasm in Seery's response:

Nick:

It would be interesting to find out if you got on that trip based on your assurance to the organisers that you WOULD get copy placed in Satstar Travel..

You may do what you want with my response to you - it is an accurate relfection of the situation.

Just one last point before I consign this whole thing to the dustbin of history - it appears that Carol is not the only one who has rejected your work (you refer to editors...) so perhaps you should engage in a little introspection.

And, trust me my friend, I have forgotten more about real journalism (and reality) than you'll ever know.

Regards

Brendan

No Brendan. I've already published a story - on Korea - in X X [a finance magazine]. And actually, if Carol checks her records, she did express an interest in a story prior to the trip. There were no obligations in any direction, but there is such a thing as manners.

The bottom line lies in bad process and bad manners from editors who believe they know it all, and can learn nothing new - like Carol and yourself. Why is it easier to publish in magazines than newspapers these days? From your email it sounds like favoritism - using freelancers that you've used before. If that is the case, inform new freelancers that you are not interested, rather than ignoring them and stringing them along indefinitely. Having been published in [X] and with [Y] on board to pitch what I have offered them, I found your (collective) behaviour unbelievably egotistical. If someone puts a few hundred rand in your hands, would you throw it away? It sounds like it. Because freelancers potentially save publications a lot of extra expense doing what they do at their own recognizance. I suspect that since you don't write out the salary slips (a very real world enterprise) you don't particularly care about the value propositions involved for your company.

Speaking of value, I'm not sure if you are aware that the Olympics are in Beijing this year, and Seoul is about as far away from Beijing as Johannesburg is from Cape Town. Your publication (or staffers working there) might have stood a good chance to be invited to Seoul themselves, to assist in Seoul's broad scheme.

Sorry but it's too late to be conciliatory. I have already forwarded an extract out of your email to Seoul and many of those 30 journalists who have had their trips cancelled. Fortunately for you I also have the manners to remove Carol's name, and your publications name from the email.

Thanks for your permission to publish your email on my blog. I also have no problem defending my position. You might find it more difficult to rationalise your position though.
Brendan Seery to me show details 1:08 PM (3 hours ago)

Let me understand this correctly: we are the direct cause of the cancellation of trips for 30 journalists (one SA newspaper which had the temerity not to respond to you).

I wouldn't go near anything which requires logic if I were you

Not very nice are they? These are unfortunately the sort of people we have to deal with. It's quite simple. You send an email offering to provide something, and someone responds saying - wow, yay, that's nice, thanks, or nay. If yay, simply say: write something on this, make it so and so long and let's see. A fifth grader could tell you that. It's a shame that instead there is a lot of other stuff going on. Editors try to find out how you got on these tours (so that they can get themselves signed up), and when they don't, they guard the gates in the name of editorial excellence.

There are a bunch of emails that I haven't even included here that are riddled with spelling errors. Even when they try to convince you of their lexical expertise they spell presumptuous presumptious. Because the people behind these publications have become picky and fussy and pedantic - to their own ego's and whims rather than to an objective standard (as in the above) - everyone actually loses. In this case The Star lose the chance to have their own staff invited to the many other tours to Seoul that they'd envisaged (or similar tours). Seoul have even offered to provide advertising around any stories that are published. But what happens? Editors like these grandstand and show how powerful (and stupid) they can be. It's just bad business and bad manners.

I find that I've stopped reading certain publications and buying others based on the sort of people I know are working there, and the extent to which they are serving their own egos. It all makes sense though. The media as a whole is delusional, and now we can see why. There's a website titled REPORT ROTTEN NEIGHBOURS. I'm going to start a blog called REPORT ROTTEN EDITORS. Watch this space!

GP Drivers Are Dof

Not sure if it is my FS numberplate that incites 'obsessive verbysteek' but I have seen some of the craziest driving by GP cars. Recent example: Sunday I was driving up Glenhove at around midday, 80km/h and managed to slip through 3 consecutive traffic lights, with the third just turning amber as I went through. Even though I was driving quickly and efficiently I had a nutcase shagging my bumper, and then after the traffic light midway up Glenhove the oke puts his foot down...the silver golf passes my right rearview mirror by a few millimetres before he slots in right in front of me. Is heading towards a hospital, perhaps he forgot his wife at church, maybe his kid broke an ankle? 50 metres later the idiot peels off into MacDonalds, and parks at the drive-thru entrance. Now what, pray tell, is the point of that?

Interesting

Interesting scenario. Made a suggestion - I won't say where or to who - but this was immediately shot down (as is the trend it seems). 10 minutes later a bigshot emerges from upstairs - no email sent, he came down personally - and said to the same person I spoke to exactly what I said. Now it's happening. I guess I'm not as incredibly stupid as as a 2 cent coin after all.

Are You Dumb Enough to Still Eat at McDonald's (VOTE NOW POLL IS CLOSING)

Another Blogger, Anja Marret has touched on this subject today as well. Is obesity our fault or not?
In short, and I hope I don't take up too much of your time in putting this in the public space, here's the answer: yes, it is. You are what you eat. And if you keep eating junk food despite all the signals, all the brou ha ha, well then you're a silly creature for doing so.

At 35 I am far from the sleek demi-god I was at 24. A lot of that ios due to having precious little time to cook, and so taking the lazy route and eating junk food. I've banned McD's and KFC, but I still go to Steers. But the answer is to go shopping, buy fruit and vegetables and go to the trouble to cook. In short, it's effort. It's discipline. And if you want to lsoe weight, it's not nearly as easy as we think.

I saw a magazine cover recently that soothed: Lose weight - it's easier than you think. Actually, it's not. Especially for a guy in his thirties. To give you an idea, I lost 6-7 kilograms 2 years ago, but only because I trained and competed in an Ironman. And the weight only started to slip off after I changed my diet in addition to all that training. I caught a cold and then a follow up flu after the race (probably picked up on the long haul to Korea), so within 6 weeks had put back all the weight I'd lost. Heartbreaking.

Meanwhile, the press shifts blame from individuals to government to fast food joints. No. The road to buff starts with you.

Energy-dense, cheap food is partly to blame, the report says

Individuals can no longer be held responsible for obesity and government must act [NVDL: re-he-heheaallly] to stop Britain "sleepwalking" into a crisis, a report has concluded.
The largest ever UK study into obesity, backed by government and compiled by 250 experts, said excess weight was now the norm in our "obesogenic" society.

Dramatic and comprehensive action was required to stop the majority of us becoming obese by 2050, they said.

The government pledged to draw up a strategy to address the issue.

But the report authors admitted proof that any anti-obesity policy worked "was scant".

NVDL: It's gratifying to note that at least the majority of people who read this blog are getting wize and blocking McD completely from your diet. Keep it up guys.

Juan Smith Praises God After Stint in Sin Bin

Juan Smith is a hard as nails oke. He once worked as a bouncer in Bloemfontein, but his bread and butter is still moering people.

He's a good player, and he's a Cheetah, but I don't know why - it irks me when these guys (Danie Rossouw did it to when he was awarded Man of the Match) get airtime and the first thing they do is 'praise the Lord'. Can't you guys do that on hands and knees before you go to bed, you know, like, in private.

Posturing in Public

I think the reason there's this public display, with a bit of spluttering, is because they are not used to or comfortable with praise and adulation, they're used to the arena. And thus to deflect criticism, and calm their own nerves, they call on God for moral support (and support in the sense of a moral backbone).

It may make sense to them, but I really think platforming and broadcasting your beliefs ought to be more private, and more humble. And in the context of rugby, it doesn't quite work does it? It's not a game based on love, but toughness, and the ability to tough it out. I thought that much was obvious.

Grandstanding

Today on the way back from lunch we walked by three or four peculiar gentlemen dressed in white and green tartan collared shirts, standing at the curbside in Rosebank, but looking really out of place. As we stepped past, one of them said: "Can we share with you about our glorious God? Will you accept him as your saviour?" "Er...Let me think about that: NO!"

Church Currie Cup

I have a suggestion though: A Church Rugby League. Soccer has it's PSL and MVELA, we've got the Currie Cup and Super 14, but why stop there? With so many Christian rugby players in our own rugby teams (Boks like Habana, Smith and Roussouw, the Blue Bulls etc) and even the international players (remember the Tongan and Fijian Faithful?), what we really MUST see is a battle of the denominations. That way everyone can wear their Jesus is King t-shirts, and may the best player...er...I mean PRAYER win. There can be a special service after the game - after all the moering - for the man of the match and the various captain's to humbly give thanks for the source of their strength and superior strategy. Fans can applaud them or lay hands on them at the same time. Ah men brother.

Pope Back From The Dead (PICTURES)

From Timesnow.tv:
A picture taken of a bonfire at a service marking the 2nd anniversary of Pope John Paul II's passing away, contains what the Vatican is convinced of a likeness of the pontiff himself in the flames, raising his right hand in blessing.

NVDL: Re-he-he-heaaaaallly? (Jim Carrey voiceover.)

The fiery figure on the left side of the image is being hailed as Pope John Paul II, making an appearance from beyond the grave on his 2nd death anniversary; as it bears an eery likeness to the real-life image of the Pope taken back in 2001, seen on the right side of the image.

NVDL: Eeerie? Don't you mean windy?

Believers are convinced [NVDL: well that's what they do - believe and convince themselves and others...] that it's a reappearance from beyond the grave and the likeness has created quite a flutter all around. Details appeared on the Vatican News Service, a TV station in Rome, which specialises in religious news broadcasts.

NVDL: [Elton John voiceover]And it seems to me, you lived your lives like candles in the wind, never stopping to think, when the rains came down...

Who is Worse - Mbeki or Bush?

NVDL: It's a tough call. Bush pushed his country into a dumb war. Okay, probably his reasons were dumb, setting up a police station in Iraq to secure access to Iraqi oil was arguably not so dumb. Mbeki on the other hand is very soft on a national holocaust called AIDS. With over 5 million dead, I think it's no contest here, but I could be wrong. W. still has time to send a few more nuclear capable aircraft into US (and other) airpspace. Perhaps we shopuld hold off on answering this until we have the next South African President, who may well be the worst yet.

From The Guardian:
[Mbeki] behaves as if South Africa's Aids disaster is no such thing. It is as if another of his rivals for worst President, George Bush, were to pretend the Iraq war was a little local difficulty.

During Mbeki's first five-year term, he used to say, with the enthusiastic backing of his Health Minister, a doctor, that Aids was not a sexually transmitted disease and that the anti-retroviral drugs that have saved hundreds of thousands of lives around the world were poisonous. He also famously declared that he knew no one who has Aids.

Since then, Mbeki has been bludgeoned into grudgingly starting to have anti-retroviral drugs handed out. The government's official policy on Aids today is medically sound at last. But Mbeki continues to show an abject lack of leadership, indicating - as his firing of the Deputy Health Minister shows - that he is less than half-hearted in his commitment to the cause; that the great $64,000 question of South African politics - what the hell is going inside Mbeki's head on Aids? - remains unanswered. Because he is an otherwise eminently rational, intelligent man.

While Mbeki has battled with repression, the crisis has cried out for Diana-like theatrics. Mbeki should have gone out into the worst-affected areas and held the hands of Aids patients; he should have publicly celebrated the Lazarus-like return to life of people on the anti-retroviral programmes; above all, he should have gone out of his way to set people straight on Aids, to counter the ignorance and confusion he himself has sown, contributing immeasurably to the scale of the catastrophe.

Mandela, deep into his eighties, has done all of that and more. But out of Mbeki, not a peep. His tragically ludicrous Minister of Health continues to go about creating the impression that beetroot and garlic are as effective in countering the effects of the HIV virus as the anti-retroviral medication.

The one person in government who has had the courage implicitly to defy Mbeki both by pushing hard for the new government strategy on Aids - approved last March, when Tshabalala-Msimang was on sick leave, recovering from a liver transplant -and by showing active leadership on the matter was Madlala-Routledge. So much so that she has become a much respected figure in the global Aids community. As such, she was invited to attend an international conference in Madrid last June on the latest work in the search for an Aids vaccine.

I spoke to her last week in Cape Town, and she told me she accepted the invitation because of the opportunity it provided 'to make a strong case on behalf of the victims' to scientists and European parliamentarians who would be in attendance. She flew to Spain, but barely had she landed in Madrid than she received an order from Mbeki himself to fly straight back. Which she did, but this did not prevent Mbeki from firing her. The reason? That she had flown to Madrid without his permission.

Since then, the South African press has published an avalanche of reports on the alleged alcoholism and kleptomania of her former boss, Tshabalala-Msimang.

Under the front-page headline, 'Manto: a drunk and a thief', the top-selling Johannesburg Sunday Times claimed the Health Minister continued to booze after her transplant, and revealed that in the Seventies she was expelled from Botswana for stealing from patients at a hospital where she was a medical supervisor.

Beyond the office-holding ranks of the former heroes of the ANC's liberation struggle, the clamour has been insistent for the reinstatement of Madlala-Routledge and the firing of Tshabalala-Msimang. Mbeki's response, typical of the small-mindedness that defines him, has been to order the former Deputy Health Minister to repay the government for her trip to Madrid.

He seems oblivious to the callousness of the message he is sending in persisting with the buffoonish Tshabalala-Msimang, a drinking buddy of long-standing, in a ministerial post that Mandela would have considered the most critical in his government by far.

· John Carlin is writing a book on Mandela to be published by Penguin Press (US).

BBC admits new breaches of trust

The BBC has confirmed children's show Blue Peter broke guidelines in a vote to name its cat, as it revealed three other breaches of editorial rules. The cat was called Socks after staff changed the results of an online poll. Viewers wanted the cat named Cookie.

BBC 6 Music's head of programmes Ric Blaxill has resigned after two further instances of fictional competition winners on his station were revealed. Another rule breach concerned a film show on the Asian Network.

The BBC said a number of disciplinary proceedings had been undertaken.
From BBC.com

More on this riveting topic:
CRISIS HITS TV INDUSTRY
GMTV's phone-in boss steps down
PM wants TV row 'sorted out' fast
GMTV boss resigns over quiz row
ITV 'expects' phone-in criticism
'Tougher rules' for TV phone-ins
Record fine over TV quiz phone-in
Five in record Brainteaser fine
BBC COMPETITIONS CRISIS
BBC admits new breaches of trust
Producer fired over phone row
BBC sets up standards panel
Editorial leaders suspended
BBC suspends all competitions
Q&A: BBC's editorial lapses
Director general's key points

NVDL: Ladies and gentlemen, this is the sort of stuff making the news...

Kunstler: Shocked!

From kunstler.com:

>Kunstler doesn't pull any punches in this instalment. Easy guy! Waitaminute, then again, let 'em fly Jim.<

Shocked, shocked! Alan Greenspan's memoirs are being flogged across the airwaves, bandwidths and printing presses, and the cohort of those who comment on public affairs in these media are shocked by the Maestro's confessions -- first, that a housing bubble emerged out of his leadership in the banking sector, and second that the Iraq war is about oil. As usual, they're getting it all wrong -- about as wrong as Al himself got it. But that is the way of things in this age of cultural dissipation and gross cognitive dissonance.

Greenspan claims he had no idea that his cutting of interest rates to near zero would produce any irregularities in the US economy. Apparently he hadn't noticed that the Big Fund Boyz called him "Easy Al" for a reason. Or that when you introduce nearly free "money" (as in "available for lending") into a system of financial trade, the recognition of moral hazard tends to evaporate. As the nation's chief bank regulator, Greenspan also apparently failed to notice the upsurge in dodgy lending practices previously only seen among mafia loan sharks, drug dealers, or twelve-year-olds playing Monopoly.

But the really funny part of all this is that the media columnists are acting as though the American public got hoodwinked by Al. Which raises the question: just what the fuck was the public thinking when they bought half-million dollar houses on salaries under 60-K, taking out no-money-down, interest-optional balloon mortgages and other tricked-up contracts? The answer is: they walked into these arrangements with their eyes open because they thought they could get something for nothing.

They thought the trend of steeply rising house prices would continue indefinitely and enable them to wiggle free of any hazard by flipping their houses to an endless supply of greater fools who would be there waiting to turn the very same trick. And the smoothies downstream in the mortgage and banking rackets were no less guided by avarice when they cooked up their formulas for bundling half-baked mortgages into tranches of tradeable securities. Easy Al may have failed to notice what was going on here, but then so did everybody else from The Wall Street Journal to the Securities and Exchange Commission.

This, of course, represents an insidious psychology. It could only happen in a culture that has come off the rails mentally, so to speak, as ours has in the sense that nobody has any sense of consequence, neither the leaders nor those who affect to follow the leaders. The leading religion in America is not evangelical Christianity, it is the worship of unearned riches, and its golden rule is the belief that is is possible to get something for nothing. Its holy shrines are Las Vegas and Wall Street. (And, by the way, has anybody heard the evangelical Christians complain about Las Vegas? They complain about a lot of things, but are themselves among the greatest believers in unearned riches -- given their preference for prayer over earnest effort in the service of solving life's problems.)

No, the American public, including the cheerleaders in the media, have only themselves to blame for the bitter harvest now underway in the asset and credit markets. And thus it would be salutary thing for Baby Jeezus, or the forces of nature, or whatever powers guide the universe, to now kick the shit out of them, so to speak, financially, because that is exactly what the American public is full of, from top to bottom, from George W. Bush at his lonely desk on Pennsylvania Avenue to the pitiful, bankrupt householders of Orange County and Boca Raton.

Now, as to the shock of Al's revelation that the Iraq war is about oil -- the media and the public has got this all wrong, too. The logic here seems to be that because the Iraq war is about oil it is therefore unnecessary, optional, a mistake, an indulgence, something we should not dirty our hands in.

In fact, the Iraq war is not about oil, per se, so much as it is about America's behavior here at home, about the choices we make for how we live on this continent. None of those who complain most loudly about our military presence in Iraq have advanced any proposals for reforming how we live here -- and hence for our enslavement to oil, much of the world's remaining supply of which happens to be in the neighborhood of Iraq.

When these complainers start complaining about the ubiquitous acceptance of suburban sprawl and abject car-dependency -- and this includes the environmental boy scouts out there who want to get merit badges for buying hybrid cars -- then they will deserve to be taken seriously. Until then, the American people have got exactly the grinding war that they deserve. Let them whine about it all the way to the Nascar tracks, and let them console themselves with giant plastic bottles of Pepsi Cola and buckets of chicken raised on corn grown with oil byproducts.

On CBS's "60-Minutes" show last night, Greenspan, in his new role as a private sector economic consultant made predictions for the coming months in the US economy. He declared that the financial sector would get over the current credit squeeze as if it were a mild case of indigestion brought on by one too many fried won-tons at the all-you-can-eat buffet, a mere burp, allowing the public to move on to the crab Rangoon and a helping of General Tsao's chicken. This gets back to the previous point about the Iraq war and oil in particular. Al doesn't get it. CBS's sycophant reporters don't get it. Nobody gets it.

We are entering the zone of the long emergency in which the primary resource needed to run the industrial economies will become scarce, expensive, and profoundly destabilizing to markets and to normal life, such as it is known in this country. And the current problem in the markets is a reflection of the resource bankruptcy we are facing. Our problems are not about credit, they are about permanent insolvency.

In his old age, Alan Greenspan's face -- once darkly handsome in his youthful years as a jazz musician -- has taken on the strange appearance of a circus clown. Something about the way his lips have settled into a kind of thick fatuous smile, even when he is apparently not amused by anything. Is it one of God's clever little tricks to leave him looking like a clown in his valedictory years, or has his face just resolved into the perfect embodiment of leadership for a clown nation?

Leave Britney Alone!

LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE! - Click here for the most popular videos
Ag shame! Britney Spears is really bearing the brunt of a cold, cruel world. Leave her alone! But this is a world that works according to the philosophy that when you're hot you're hot, and when you're not you're not. Meanwhile, being 'hot' is predicated on being:
sexy
good looking
willing to show a lot of flesh (which naturally implies being young, slim, otherwise well endowed)

Britney, having recently become a mom is no longer sexy, having shaved her head she's (actually) not great looking - I still think she's attractive though, c'mon - and though she is willing to show off her bod, her bod's not the toned sex machine we're used to.

And it's frieaking tough to get into sex-machine shape once out of it. In the good ol' triathlete days, I too was a walking SM (he said modestly). Would I like to pull on that same skin once more? You bet? Doing so is another story. You have to work VERY hard. Heartbreak hard. And Britney now being a mommy, with all the emotional trauma that entails, well it makes it so much harder to get up and go.

I hope she's able to pick herself up. The world might be baying for her blood; I hope Britney's Survival Instincts kick in and she fights her way back. Will she? Can she put away the drugs and put aside all the negativity swooshing in from all sides? I'm holding thumbs that she can.

The crowd though, must be saying: 'gimme less (not more!).

But Britney, I for one feel for you. I'm bald, getting older and flabbier, and it's not fun when you start realising just how skin-deep the whole 'when you're hot you're hot' vibe is. It's painful, it says a lot about how fickle the crowd is.
People want popcorn and smut. Those who want a slightly more intellectual conversation are vastly outnumbered. Welcome to the desert of the real.

From Stuff.co.nz:

Chris Crocker's video, called Leave Britney Alone!, has had more than two million views since he posted it on YouTube yesterday.

In it, Crocker defends Britney's widely-criticised performance at the MTV Video Music Awards on Sunday, in which the troubled pop star appeared out of time and out of shape while miming the words to her new song Gimme More.

Crocker berates the media for their treatment of Britney since the awards show and says fans should be thankful she decided to perform.

"How f**king dare anyone out there make fun of Britney after all she's been through," Crocker said.

"She went through a divorce, she had two kids ... and now she's going through a custody battle. All you people care about is readers and making money off of her. She's a human.

"She hasn't performed on stage in years. Her song is called Gimme More for a reason - because all you people want is more, more, more, more, more ... leave her alone.

"You're lucky she even performed for you bastards. Leave Britney alone ... please."

I agree!: Name and shame offensive bloggers

06 May 2007
By David Bullard
(from www.sundaytimes.com - click on this post's title to link to his article)

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery then Fred Khumalo and I should feel very flattered indeed.

Every day there are 120000 new blog sites registered — a staggering 43 million a year. According to blog search engine Technorati, there are already 70 million blog sites registered worldwide. Admittedly the majority of the bloggers get bored rather quickly and don’t bother to update their sites, but that’s still 70 million people (higher than the population of the UK) who desperately want to be columnists.

It’s comforting to know that, should Fred or I decide to take a sabbatical, there’s no shortage of people available to hold the fort. The only snag is the quality, or lack of it.

Allow me to explain what I mean. I used to play air guitar with a band called Deep Purple. My playing was perfect, I had attitude and I even smashed my air guitar at the end of the number. The reason I played air guitar is that I couldn’t play real guitar very well so I was forced to dwell in this fantasy world where my guitar playing meant something only to me. I should point out that this was years ago when I was still young and foolish. These days I play air tenor saxophone, which is far more challenging.

Most blog sites are the air guitars of journalism. They’re cobbled together by people who wouldn’t stand a hope in hell of getting a job in journalism, mainly because they have very little to say. It’s rather sad how many people think the tedious minutiae of their lives will be of any interest to anyone else.

It’s even sadder when someone reads them.

Many bloggers prefer to remain anonymous and with good reason. The content of their sites is so moronic that even their best friends would disown them if they knew they were the authors. As with most things in life, something that costs nothing is usually worth nothing and that puzzles me. Are there really 70 million bloggers out there hoping that their writing talents will be recognised, or is this just another example of modern narcissism?

Unlike the world of newsprint, there are no rules out there in the blogosphere and that makes it a very confusing place for the consumer. I have no objection to reading my Sunday Times on the Internet because I know the content has been through the same process as the print edition. I do, however, object to some anonymous, scrofulous nerd pumping meaningless drivel into cyberspace at all hours of the day and night simply because he can’t find a girl to sleep with him. These are the sort of w ackos who gun down their fellow students at university. I visited a site the other day that was so hideously racist that it would have qualified its publisher for a long spell in prison if it had appeared in print. So what’s the difference? How come newspapers and magazines have to carry the names of their editors and publishers and watch their content and websites don’t? I’m told that it’s possible to track down the author of any offensive website and perhaps that’s what the government should be doing instead of looking at legislation to gag legitimate publications. Better still, maybe it’s time the print journalists named and shamed some of the more offensive anonymous bloggers and published their physical addresses. Then I can start a blog site called printrevenge.com and bore you all with the details.