Educate and excite, inform and infuriate.
June 17th, 2008 — Advertising, Entertainment, Film, Media, Pop Culture
Say hello to my little friend: James McAvoy in Wanted
The Angelina Jolie-starring, Timur Bekmambetov-directed assassin thriller, Wanted (“Curve the bullet!”), has a restricted, or “red,” trailer, available for iTunes download and viewing in all three standard sizes and all three HD sizes.
June 17th, 2008 — Blogs, Media, Work
“I give you my journalistic integrity.”: David Gregory, NBC News
Salon.com‘s Glenn Greenwald recently covered a confession by Oregon sports columnist Dwight Jaynes, who writes for The Portland Tribune.
In the piece, Greenwald talks about a June 5th column by Jaynes, in which he revealed the way
bloggers “led [him] to alter [his] approach to the way [he] do[es] [his] job as a columnist, pushing [him] away from a philosophy [he] held dear for decades in this business.”
May 26th, 2008 — Controversy, Journalism, Media, Politics, TV
Liz Trotta, the FOX News contributor who joked, yesterday morning, that it would be good if “we” “knock off” Barack Obama, apologized for her comments, today, at the end (2:45 in) of a bit about Clinton’s RFK assassination statement clarification.
“I am so sorry about what happened yesterday and the lame attempt at humor,” said Trotta, in the patronizing tones of the E. 66th St. matron that she is. “I really just fell all over myself in making it appear that I wished Barack Obama harm, or any other candidate, for that matter. I sincerely regret it and apologize to anybody I have offended. It’s a very colorful political season, and many of us are making mistakes and saying things that we wish we hadn’t said.”
Thanks, Liz. We accept your apology, and perhaps the family of Barack Obama will, too.
Now, FOX, fire her.
May 26th, 2008 — Controversy, Media, Politics, TV
Absolutely hilarious: So, is FOX’s Liz Trotta cracking up?
“… and now we have what … uh … some are reading as a suggestion that somebody knock off Osama … um … uh … Obama …. Well, both, if we could (laughs).”
I expect anything from white people, particularly the ones I most suspect get some kind of ego boost, whether directly or indirectly, from racism.
So, I’m not outraged in the least by FOX News contributor Liz Trotta’s statement to co-host Eric Shawn, on Sunday, just before noon ET, that it would be good if “we” “knock off” both Osama bin Laden, alleged 9/11 mastermind, and Barack Obama, U.S. senator and candidate for President.
She was speaking about Hillary Clinton’s reference to Robert Kennedy’s assassination, last week, and the charge many made against Clinton that it was a veiled reference to Barack Obama. (That’s Trotta, former New York bureau chief of The Washington Times, above, laughing after she made her crack.)
May 16th, 2008 — Black Music, Controversy, Dance, Entertainment, Humor, Media, Music Video, Pop Culture, Satire, TV
Introducing the dance remix of Bill O’Reilly’s now notorious, “twenty years old” hissy fit, obviously just as NSFW as is Bill.
May 6th, 2008 — Controversy, Culture, Entertainment, Media, Politics, Race, Religion
Actually, no: Cartoonist Daryl Cagle underestimates white backlash
How has Oprah Winfrey’s standing with her overwhelmingly white audience been affected by her association with Barack Obama?
In her piece for The Root.com, “The Trouble With Transcending Race: Why the Double O’s are standing on shaky ground,” Majorie Valbrun expands on what most Black women probably long expected, even before Fordham professor Costas Panagopoulos’s Politico.com piece, which she quotes, below, made it explicit:
“Ten days after she went on the stump for Obama, Oprah’s favorability ratings dropped to 55 percent, the lowest level of favorability ever registered for Oprah in opinion surveys,” the article states. “Oprah’s negatives also spiked, with one in three respondents (33 percent) reporting unfavorable impressions of her.”
May 5th, 2008 — Advertising, Controversy, Design, Fashion, Magazines, Media, Photography, Pop Culture, Sex
Further proof that, especially planetarily, there’s no accounting for taste: The above ad, notes Boinkology, for Tom Ford Sunglasses, has been banned in Italy by that country’s Institute for Advertising Self-Discipline (IAP).
May 2nd, 2008 — Africa, Controversy, Journalism, Media, Politics, Race, Religion
Photo by ProtestShooter.com
“Hillary ain’t never been called a n-gger!”
Have you noticed that, of all Jeremiah Wright’s decontextualized quotes, this one has been completely dropped out of the mediated discussion of his statements?
When USA Today‘s Donna Leinwand, vice-president of the National Press Club, moderated the now-infamous Q&A with him on Monday, she asked him about Farrakhan, AIDS, “chickens coming home to roost,” etc., but not one question about this statement.
Why?
May 1st, 2008 — Controversy, Fashion, Internet, Media, Photography, Race
Twice as nice: Somebody’s pretending they run VOGUE
Thought I’d show faithful MEDIA ASSASSIN readers something that came through here last month.
On April 10, I received this. You can click on and read it:
April 29th, 2008 — Books, Controversy, Entertainment, Journalism, Media, Pop Culture, Race, Writing
Keepin’ it real unreal: Margaret “B. Jones” Seltzer gets into character
Who, exactly, is Margaret Seltzer? Empathic writer? Gangster wannabee? Estranged daughter? One-time aspiring eco-terrorist?
MEDIA ASSASSIN has obtained what appears to be the only known copy of a damning video that Margaret “B. Jones” Seltzer’s publisher, Riverhead/Penguin, buried last month, once the book documenting the author’s foster home-living, gangbanging, drug-running past—Love and Consequences: A Memoir of Hope and Survival, right—was revealed to be completely and totally fabricated.
The 10:10 video, shot and edited before she was exposed as a liar, may be the only existing footage of Seltzer in her full-on “hood” persona.
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