Friday, September 25, 2009
The moral is: Don't listen to Nevius.
Chuck Nevius is a conservative, which means, among other things, bending over in front of the wealthy. So when Gap Founder Don Fisher wanted to pluck his art collection into a museum in the middle of the Presidio, and said to SF: jump!, Chuck said: how high?
Chuck's argument was of the concern-troll kind: if we don't do ask Don says, Chuck argued, his art collection will go to some other city, and we'll bite the "hands that feeds."
So we're glad to report that Chuck's concerns were totally overblown and unfounded, and that an excellent solution, nah, an even better solution, has been found: Fisher's art collection of modern art will go to the museum of Modern Art.
But that's way too out there, too out of the box, for Chuck to even think about that!
Hey, they don't pay front page columnists to have common sense, they pay them to push conservative propaganda, it's the Chron, what do you expect?
Chuck's argument was of the concern-troll kind: if we don't do ask Don says, Chuck argued, his art collection will go to some other city, and we'll bite the "hands that feeds."
So we're glad to report that Chuck's concerns were totally overblown and unfounded, and that an excellent solution, nah, an even better solution, has been found: Fisher's art collection of modern art will go to the museum of Modern Art.
But that's way too out there, too out of the box, for Chuck to even think about that!
Hey, they don't pay front page columnists to have common sense, they pay them to push conservative propaganda, it's the Chron, what do you expect?
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The Chron Has Its Finger on the Pulse on SF.
Bruce Jenkins is ready to follow the tracks of CW Nevius and move up from his sports perch to become a mainstream columnist. How do we know?
Tennis is the elegant dance of Evonne Goolagong and a sweet backhand volley by Stefan Edberg, but it's also a John McEnroe temper tantrum, a Connors crotch-grab, a transsexual player (Renee Richards), an openly gay champion (Martina Navratilova), and astonishingly nasty language from Ilie Nastase or Andre Agassi. It's a tradition of controversy...
First, Jenkins has it backwards: we forgave McEnroe's temper tantrums because of his delicate, subtle, humorous tennis style. McEnroe's whimsy was the counterpoint for the more powerful (and boring) Ivan Lendl.
But most importantly, look at what is the "good" side of tennis (Stefan Edberg, Goolagong) and what is the "bad" side: Martina Navratilova. Because she's gay. Being gay, in the same boat as astonishingly nasty language, crotch grabs and temper tantrums.
Jenkins is yet another close minded conservative columnist, so he must be ready for the A section!
Tennis is the elegant dance of Evonne Goolagong and a sweet backhand volley by Stefan Edberg, but it's also a John McEnroe temper tantrum, a Connors crotch-grab, a transsexual player (Renee Richards), an openly gay champion (Martina Navratilova), and astonishingly nasty language from Ilie Nastase or Andre Agassi. It's a tradition of controversy...
First, Jenkins has it backwards: we forgave McEnroe's temper tantrums because of his delicate, subtle, humorous tennis style. McEnroe's whimsy was the counterpoint for the more powerful (and boring) Ivan Lendl.
But most importantly, look at what is the "good" side of tennis (Stefan Edberg, Goolagong) and what is the "bad" side: Martina Navratilova. Because she's gay. Being gay, in the same boat as astonishingly nasty language, crotch grabs and temper tantrums.
Jenkins is yet another close minded conservative columnist, so he must be ready for the A section!
Saturday, September 12, 2009
The Chron and Its Unbiased Journalists.
There are political journalists at the Chron who are not Republican propagandists. Of course, they are no Democrat advocates either, or they'd be out of a job fast, but they manage to stay grounded. One such writer is Joe Garofoli, who will check stuff on factcheck.org and not eat the GOP propaganda whole.
What is he writing about today?
Third person in week drowns in Lake Berryessa.
That will teach him for not taking Sarah Palin seriously.
What is he writing about today?
Third person in week drowns in Lake Berryessa.
That will teach him for not taking Sarah Palin seriously.
Friday, September 11, 2009
The Fascinating Mind of Phil Bronstein, ctd.
This post as well is fascinating.
It's not fun to criticize Barack Obama anymore now that everyone's doing it.
For Bronstein, you print criticism of the President not because he's doing something wrong, but because you want to be out of sync with your peers, so as to be viewed as an independent thinker. Or a visionary. Or something. Fact-based criticism? Oh no, then everybody would criticize at the same time, we can't have that. Imaginary criticism is much better to go against the flow.
Phil then goes into satire, accusing the president of being an "educationist, deeply discriminating against dropouts like, well, me. We admit, it's kinda funny.
But the readers, so used to Phil's empty complaints against Obama, they don't get it.
bbklly: Mr. Bronstein, If I understand your rambling editorial, or whatever it was meant to be, because you were a dropout, the President should not encourage students to finish school and for him to do so is, in your opinion, the height of hypocrisy...
HCVisigoth: Funny thing is, Obama very explicitly said, "don't be blinded by the rap stars, musicians and reality TV stars who make it after dropping out. Odds are, you're not going to be one of those."...
mgoofy24: What a FAIL of an article. Bill Gates was only as successful as he is BECAUSE OF HIS SCHOOL!...
ncoak: pretty sure this article is tongue in cheek. if not, get ****ed, phil :)
And on and on. They can't tell it's tongue-in-cheek, and think it's yet another anti-Obama diatribe from Phil!
It's not fun to criticize Barack Obama anymore now that everyone's doing it.
For Bronstein, you print criticism of the President not because he's doing something wrong, but because you want to be out of sync with your peers, so as to be viewed as an independent thinker. Or a visionary. Or something. Fact-based criticism? Oh no, then everybody would criticize at the same time, we can't have that. Imaginary criticism is much better to go against the flow.
Phil then goes into satire, accusing the president of being an "educationist, deeply discriminating against dropouts like, well, me. We admit, it's kinda funny.
But the readers, so used to Phil's empty complaints against Obama, they don't get it.
bbklly: Mr. Bronstein, If I understand your rambling editorial, or whatever it was meant to be, because you were a dropout, the President should not encourage students to finish school and for him to do so is, in your opinion, the height of hypocrisy...
HCVisigoth: Funny thing is, Obama very explicitly said, "don't be blinded by the rap stars, musicians and reality TV stars who make it after dropping out. Odds are, you're not going to be one of those."...
mgoofy24: What a FAIL of an article. Bill Gates was only as successful as he is BECAUSE OF HIS SCHOOL!...
ncoak: pretty sure this article is tongue in cheek. if not, get ****ed, phil :)
And on and on. They can't tell it's tongue-in-cheek, and think it's yet another anti-Obama diatribe from Phil!
The Fascinating Mind of Phil Bronstein.
The good news is that the "experiment" is over: Phil's Monday column, when he feels like writing it, will be online. The bad news is that the on-line world will be even more polluted by yet another ill-informed and uneducated conservative pundit.
We admit being fascinated by Bronstein. Take this blog post, for instance, in which Bronstein French kisses John McCain.
But damn if John McCain didn't have a bunch of citizens at his Arizona health care reform town hall meeting yesterday behaving like the Mormon Tabernacle choir: polite, orderly and in key... Everyone in their seats; no signs, no riots.
A commenter ask, Phil are you speaking about this town hall: Sen. John McCain met with an angry crowd at a town-hall meeting about health care reform Wednesday, sometimes having to fight to talk and telling one woman who wouldn't stop yelling that she had to leave.
Ooops, but that would not be the first time that Phil irresponsibly panders for McCain. Back to Phil's post:
But here's John McCain: "It's not a public option, (it's) really the government option. Because it's the government-run health care system." Simple, right? Agree or disagree, that's as clear as the Arizona desert sky...His visual was a small and simple chart, not the high pyrotechnics or pig Latin knots of health care explication from President Obama on down where you need a slide rule and Stephen Hawking to figure out if you're still breathing.
So McCain makes a simplistic and disingenuous statement, that the government will run the health care system (it would only reform the insurance part of it), to scare people off. In my world, it's irresponsible. Phil, on the other hand, applauds. After years of urging Democrats to be bi-partisan with Bush, Phil claps when McCain attempts in bad faith to torpedo efforts to fix the system. Phil even says that McCain's provable lie is, wait for it, straight talk.
Obama says: "The earth revolves around the sun, but it's the rotation of the earth along its axis which, in the referential of the observer,..." STOP!, yells Bronstein, it's too complicated! McCain says "the sun turns around the earth." Bronstein goes: yeah, that's simple, that's good, that's mavericky for you to say, way to go, Senator.
And this guys was the editor of the paper!
We admit being fascinated by Bronstein. Take this blog post, for instance, in which Bronstein French kisses John McCain.
But damn if John McCain didn't have a bunch of citizens at his Arizona health care reform town hall meeting yesterday behaving like the Mormon Tabernacle choir: polite, orderly and in key... Everyone in their seats; no signs, no riots.
A commenter ask, Phil are you speaking about this town hall: Sen. John McCain met with an angry crowd at a town-hall meeting about health care reform Wednesday, sometimes having to fight to talk and telling one woman who wouldn't stop yelling that she had to leave.
Ooops, but that would not be the first time that Phil irresponsibly panders for McCain. Back to Phil's post:
But here's John McCain: "It's not a public option, (it's) really the government option. Because it's the government-run health care system." Simple, right? Agree or disagree, that's as clear as the Arizona desert sky...His visual was a small and simple chart, not the high pyrotechnics or pig Latin knots of health care explication from President Obama on down where you need a slide rule and Stephen Hawking to figure out if you're still breathing.
So McCain makes a simplistic and disingenuous statement, that the government will run the health care system (it would only reform the insurance part of it), to scare people off. In my world, it's irresponsible. Phil, on the other hand, applauds. After years of urging Democrats to be bi-partisan with Bush, Phil claps when McCain attempts in bad faith to torpedo efforts to fix the system. Phil even says that McCain's provable lie is, wait for it, straight talk.
Obama says: "The earth revolves around the sun, but it's the rotation of the earth along its axis which, in the referential of the observer,..." STOP!, yells Bronstein, it's too complicated! McCain says "the sun turns around the earth." Bronstein goes: yeah, that's simple, that's good, that's mavericky for you to say, way to go, Senator.
And this guys was the editor of the paper!
The Chron Condones Heckling the President
A Republican congressman does something that no one in the history of Congress has ever done, call the President a liar in front of the congress, and the Chron's reaction is...
you know, he got a point.
No one expected a town hall-style moment during President Obama's health care speech Wednesday night.
But when Republican Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina shouted "You lie!" after the president said that illegal immigrants would not be covered in any proposal, it was more than a breach of decorum. It spoke to the anxiety of many Americans about providing health care to people who are not in the United States legally - particularly at a time when more citizens and legal residents are losing health coverage.
For the Chron, you can do anything if you are a Republican.
you know, he got a point.
No one expected a town hall-style moment during President Obama's health care speech Wednesday night.
But when Republican Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina shouted "You lie!" after the president said that illegal immigrants would not be covered in any proposal, it was more than a breach of decorum. It spoke to the anxiety of many Americans about providing health care to people who are not in the United States legally - particularly at a time when more citizens and legal residents are losing health coverage.
For the Chron, you can do anything if you are a Republican.
