Jul 09 2009
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Jul 08 2009
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The key to vibrant, successful journalism, [Arianna Huffington] said, is “getting away from the notion that truth is found by splitting the difference between the two sides, that there is always truth to both sides.” Huffington argues that establishment journalism is failing due to “the idea that good journalism is about presenting both sides without a voice — without any passion.” The outlets that continue to adhere to that “obsolete” model “are paying a price.”
[Dan Froomkin, HuffPo’s new hire] — who has written extensively about how passion-free, “both-sides-are-equally-valid” journalism is the primary affliction of the profession — echoes that view: “The key challenge is to present an alternative to the ‘splitting the difference’ culture that has infested traditional media.”
— From a column by Salon’s Glenn Greenwald found here. Agree quite a bit.
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Slate: "Why Cinema's Weekly Office Tallies Don't Matter"
A great column by Zachary Pincus-Roth that I can’t recommend enough.
Jul 07 2009
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This is far more entertaining than the flow chart I have above my desk right now: “How the Newsroom Really Works.” (Although if there would have been a way to add in the immortal line “Sensitive thugs, they all need hugs”…)
(via fek)
Jul 06 2009
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“ [Writing] feels difficult to me a lot. Which doesn’t mean I don’t love it and I’m not pulled to it on a daily, nightly, insomniac basis. Your point about it being very hard work is a good one. It’s tremendously hard work. Yes, I love arranging the words and having them fall on the ear the right way and you know you’re not quite there and you’re redoing it and redoing it and there’s a wonderful thrill to it. But it is hard. It’s a job of tremendous anxiety for me.
— Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Strout enunciating why writing is so damn hard, in Newsweek.com’s “Author’s Roundtable” (see here for the full transcript).
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Beck and his superfriends covering Velvet Underground?? I’m in.
The above is part of Beck’s Record Club side project, which ”promises a series of installments in which the man and a bunch of buddies ducking into the studio sans rehearsal and knocking out a cover version of an entire album,” according to Stereogum (link to “Superfriends” opening mine, natch). They’re warming up the effort in taking on the Velevet Underground’s seminal “Velvet Underground & Nico” disc. Above is their version of “Femme Fatale.”
As someone love the Velvets, this is like catnip to me.
Jun 24 2009
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My favorite part of President Obama’s press conference yesterday was when he answered one of Chuck Todd’s pesky questions with, “I know everybody here is on a 24-hour news cycle. I’m not.” I am totally using this in all my interactions: A vague, general, perhaps bullshit yet still portentous and wise sense that you are the only person in the room, or even the planet, who understands the big picture.
If you can pull this off, you can get away with anything. Disagreements with your boss? Arguments with your spouse? Caught cheating on your taxes? You don’t understand. I see the big picture; you don’t, you can’t. In 15 years, you’ll grow to see I am right. Thus, please let me continue to strangle this drifter until you ultimately come around to fathoming the foresight of my actions.
I am not saying that President Obama is wrong. (I don’t think he is … but what the hell do I know?) I am just saying that “I know you’re on a 24-hour news cycle. I’m not” is going to be my response any time anyone questions anything I do, pretty much from now on.
Leitch, as always, is a much wiser man than I.
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“ To run for president requires a steady diet of crackpot stew: start with borderline narcissism, add a bit of Messiah complex, stir in a dollop of paranoia and blend with delusions of grandeur.
Jun 23 2009
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“ A conversation with Rahm [Emmanuel] can be as little as 30 seconds,” says CNN commentator Paul Begala, who worked with Emanuel in the Clinton White House. “He calls, drops a few F-bombs, makes his point and hangs up.
— And this is another edition of why I aspire to be Rahm Emmanuel when I grow up. Via an excellent Howard Kurtz column today on how Emmanuel plays nicely with the press.
Jun 22 2009
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I got goosebumps from the beautiful trailer for HBO’s “The Pacific” miniseries, which many will rightly see as a sequel to “Band of Brothers” (the two share many of the main players behind the scenes).
Here’s a 2001 interview I did with Bruce C. McKenna, who penned three episodes for “Brothers” and I believe is serving as the 2010 miniseries’ chief writer.
