Unsurprisingly, Illegal Deported for Armed Robbery Finds NYT in His Co

A criminal without legal status deported by US immigration officials is the subject of the latest pity party thrown by The New York Times. The Times seems to find it lamentable that this gang member and armed robber was deported from "his homeland" -- that would be the USA -- to Cambodia, the land of his birth (one he left when he was a 3-year-old). Why does the NYTimes bemoan the deportation of…

GMA Celebrates Britney's Crotch-Kicking Return

If Britney Spears wants to launch her grand return with a trite and tacky rough-sex pantomime, I suppose that's her business.  She's not known as a pop tart for nothing. What I do find noteworthy is the way GMA celebrated that bit of rough stuff, featuring it in its opening minutes. Even there, it's not ABC's descent into schlock that jumps out so much as the double standard.  Can you imagine the…

Matthews Picks Wrong Day To Mock Joe The Plumber on Ghostwriter

Note to Chris Matthews: when mocking someone for using a ghostwriter, it's best to avoid doing so on a day when Hillary Clinton is prominently in the news . . . On this evening's Hardball, Matthews went out of his way to mock Joe The Plumber for his use of a ghostwriter on his just-released book.  This on the day Hillary Clinton was in the headlines, having been named Barack Obama's Secretary of…

CBS Offers Tribute to Harvey Milk: ‘A Rebel With A Cause

On CBS’s Sunday Morning, host Charles Osgood teased a story on politician Harvey Milk, who was the first gay man elected to San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors in 1977: "The story of a rebel with a cause is being retold in the form of a just-released motion picture. And as it happens, the timing could hardly be more appropriate." The movie, starring left-wing actor Sean Penn, is set to come out…

Gregory Interview of Chabad Rabbi: Faith, Optimism in Face of Tragedy

Of all the genres of interviews, those conducted by the media with family and friends of victims of tragedy are among the most difficult and often least successful.  A remarkable exception to that rule comes in the form of the interview David Gregory conducted on this morning's Today show with Rabbi Shalom Paltiel, who was a friend of the Chabad couple murdered in Mombai and is a fellow member of…

Minn. Star Tribune Leaves Out Important Parts of U.S. Terror Recruitin

It reads like the lyrics of the song in West Side Story where the "Jets" gang members sing to Officer Krupke claiming they are just misunderstood kids, not punks and criminals. The Minneapolis Star Tribune takes this approach to the story of young male Somali refugees that have taken residence in Minneapolis who have decided to go back to Somalia to "visit." The suspicion is, though, that are…

Derrick Z's Recipe For A Depression

At this time of year, columns like Derrick Z. Jackson's of today condemning the materialism of the Christmas shopping season are as traditional as Budweiser's Clydesdale-drawn sleigh commercial.  And part of me is sympathetic with Jackson's call for people to spurn the malls and curtail their gift-giving budgets.  But this of all years, did the Boston Globe columnist consider the disastrous…

Smith Sad Mumbai Terrorists Missed Americans, Hit Indians

Is Harry Smith sad that the Mumbai terrorists missed their intended American and British targets and hit Indians?  Strange as it sounds, it's hard to interpret his remark of this morning otherwise.Smith was discussing the attacks on the Early Show with CBS terrorism expert Jere Van Dyk when he made his bizarre observation.

Obama Only Bright Spot In Bummer Of A NYT Thanksgiving Article

It's a good thing Barack Obama was elected.  Otherwise, the nation's glum Thanksgiving mood might have been downright funereal.  At least, that's the impression the New York Times gives in its decidedly downbeat article about the holiday."In Lean Times, Comfort in a Bountiful Meal" tells the story of people from coast to coast virtually weeping into their turkey and cranberry sauce.  Whether it's…

Entertainment Weekly Takes Heat out of Marriage

Marriage is not sexy.  That's the conclusion that readers might make after examining Entertainment Weekly's list of the "50 Sexiest Movies Ever."  Of the 50 movies on the list, 42 center on unmarried adult relationships.  Three of the relationships featured on the list occur between two women ("Kissing Jessica Stein," "Bound," and "Mulholland Drive"), one occurs between two men ("Yossi &…

Walters-Obama Odd Thanksgiving Message Exchange

Barbara Walters invites Great Leader to "give" Thanksgiving message to "the people."  Great Leader obliges: be inspired by . . . me. Check out the clip of Barbara Walters's interview of the Obamas, aired on GMA today, and tell me whether you find something off-putting in the way Walters poses what is, after all, a very banal question. And then there's the President-elect's self-centered answer…

YouTube's Double Standard On Protests

YouTube is promoting as its "citizen news report of the day" a video of an alleged attack on Greenpeace activists at a coal plant in Poland. There are two problems with the news judgment behind this video selection.First, both the initial report on the video and YouTube's description of it overstate what actually happened. Watch the video for yourself and see. Aside from some unjustifiable…

AP Finds Race Hustler to Say Obama Isn't The Cure

The Associated Press is worried that Americans might accidentally imagine that the elevation of Barack Obama to the presidency could make people think that blacks in America really can get ahead. The AP is so worried that it sought out a race hustler to deny that blacks can make it here no matter what happened on November 4. As the AP reports it, apparently young Kari Fulton "cringed" when…

Stop the Presses! AP's Important Story: Obama Had Corned Beef Sandwich

Ya gotta hand it to them. The Associated Press knows how to cut out all the extraneous background noise and get right to the important issues of the day. Barack Obama will surely be in the center of the vortex of some of the most important decisions in the world during the next four years and even his preparations for taking office are vitally important as a marker to what he might do in office.…