tagged w/ Baltimore Sun
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The most important thing about this story, other than the sleazy slimeball tactics of the Baltimore Sun's "TV Critic" David Zurawik, is my creation of a new word. "Ideoblogue." Enjoy.
http://www.examiner.com/node/38882056/friends_familyThe most important thing about this story, other than the sleazy slimeball tactics of... more
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Baltimore City Council candidate Adam Van Bavel is a City Paper Readers Poll "Best Do-Gooder". AVBforBCC is running as an Independent in District 10 in this November's election and he's also Baltimore's Most Interesting City Council candidate.Baltimore City Council candidate Adam Van Bavel is a City Paper Readers Poll... more
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FOX News shows own the top eleven ratings spots for cable news. Why are they so dominant? Could it be because there are more choices for lberals and democrats? They can watch MSNBC, CNBC, CNN, Headline News, etc. Fox News is the only Neo-Con Right Wing channel so they all flock to that one.FOX News shows own the top eleven ratings spots for cable news. Why are they so... more
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H.L. MENCKEN was a literary critic, an "iconoclastic observer" of American life. He was, writes Marion Rodgers in her introduction, neither right nor left but simply radical. "When every phrase must be examined for political correctness," she writes, "many find it impossible to enjoy Mencken without apology."
Mencken wrote most of his life for the Baltimore Sun. He wrote 30 books, most famously "The American Language"; "Notes on Democracy," published in 1926, was not well-received. The tone is beyond satire, almost caustic, like the guy at the bar who sidles up to you with bad news -- the guy you can't help thinking has a point. Mencken (who read a little too much Nietzsche) believed that democracy would inevitably be brought down by the mob -- "homo boobensis" and "homo vulgaris." Democracy is a beautiful pipe dream, he wrote, conceived by and for a superior breed of man, braver, more intelligent and possessing more character than the ordinary bloke, who could care less about freedom. The ordinary guy just wants to feel safe (from the Other). The ordinary, uneducated citizen is driven by fears and delusions, and he responds to politicians who promise him safety and security. "Out of the muck of their swinishness the typical American law-maker emerges," he wrote. "He is a man who has lied and dissembled, and a man who has crawled. He knows the taste of boot polish. . . . His public life is an endless series of evasions and false pretenses. He is willing to embrace any issue, however idiotic, that will get him votes. . . ."
Between the absurd (Mencken believed) electoral college and the politicians, democracy doesn't stand a chance. "It is incomparably idiotic, and hence incomparably amusing," he wrote. "How can any man be a democrat who is sincerely a democrat?"
Notes on Democracy
A New Edition
H.L. Mencken
Dissident Books: 206 pp., $14.95 paper
H.L. MENCKEN was a literary critic, an "iconoclastic observer" of American... more
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Current and former Los Angeles Times staffers have sued Sam Zell and the Tribune Co. over allegedly illegal and irresponsible actions since Zell's leveraged buyout of Tribune Co. last year.
The complaint, filed Tuesday in federal court in Los Angeles, alleges the structure of the buyout -- executed through an Employee Stock Ownership Plan -- and Zell's conduct have diminished the value of Tribune Co. in order to benefit himself and fellow board members.
Tribune Co. spokesman Gary Weitman said, "We have not seen the lawsuit and will decline comment."
Plaintiffs include Times auto critic Dan Neil and former Times staffers Corie Brown, Henry Weinstein, Myron Levin and Walter Roche Jr. along with Jack Nelson, the former Washington, D.C. bureau chief
The suit, which seek class-action status, alleges that through "destructive management and self-dealings," Zell and his co-fiduciaries have breached their fiduciary duties to the ESOP beneficiaries. It also alleges that Zell has de-funded employees retirement packages, raided the employee pension fund for more than $400 million, and eliminated more than a thousand Tribune Co. jobs at the Los Angeles Times, Baltimore Sun and Chicago Tribune.
In a news release, the plaintiffs said they do not seek to enrich themselves. "Rather, their announced intentions are: to protect Tribune Company's pension and retirement funds; to give the employee-owners a place at the table with regard to management of their assets; and to remove Zell and his cronies from the Tribune Company's board in order to save what is left of a still great news gathering operation," the announcement said.Current and former Los Angeles Times staffers have sued Sam Zell and the Tribune Co.... more
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The Chicago Sun-Times featured a front cover with all backwards lettering and an image of a caucasian group of residents with their backs turned to the camera, in what they call a start of a campaign to stop the killing of children in inner city Chicago. This came after a weekend in which 26 shooting incidences resulted in 9 deaths and dozens of injuries. As with everything else, this should have started earlier because children have been killing each other worldwide for the past 55 years, but other American newspapers should follow the lead of the Sun-Times and the Baltimore Sun.The Chicago Sun-Times featured a front cover with all backwards lettering and an image... more
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If you live in Coulmbia MD and have any information what so ever, please contact local police. I live in San Francisco and I'm getting all my information second hand through relatives. Police are still looking for the suspect. My nephew was 20 years old.If you live in Coulmbia MD and have any information what so ever, please contact local... more
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Richard Irwin, police blotter for the Baltimore Sun. How he gathers his stories, the affect it has on him and the significance of the Blotter in print media. Why the hell do they print these things anyway?Richard Irwin, police blotter for the Baltimore Sun. How he gathers his stories, the... more
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John McIntyre, assistant managing editor of the Baltimore Sun, ran slightly afoul of the evolving definition of a word that, as far as he knew, was just fine. He recounts:
An article came to the copy desk with a phrase about nattily
dressed people. And a couple of copy editors came to me wanting to change it to smartly dressed. Why? I asked. Natty is a perfectly innocuous word, usually applied, with some condescension, to people who wear bow ties.
No, they said; it means gross and dirty. Huh? I shrewdly asked.
And indeed, it seems that natty is a term that means different things to different generations. McIntyre was invited to visit urbandictionary.com, where among the many (different) defintinions, he found this:
Something gross, low-class or unclean. Originally meaning neat in apperance, the word natty ironically became its an antonym for itself over time, thanks in large part to its adoption by Rastafarian slang.
McIntyre is editing for a wide audience. Maybe a lot of people still recognize natty as having mostly positive connotations, but if the term is evolving and some people -- indeed, of some of the paper's younger editors -- react negatively to the term, then ok. He changed it.
Evolving English BlogJohn McIntyre, assistant managing editor of the Baltimore Sun, ran slightly afoul of... more
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