All Work and No Play Makes Arianna a Rich Woman*

You know, I tend to defend the Huffington Post, despite the fire it's drawn lately over its content and lack of willingness to pay a lot of the people who supply it. My decision to continue contributing to the site is one I've explained more than once so I'm not going to bother going down that road again. You want to write for the site? Great. You think Arianna's a tyrannical modern-day plantation owner? Again, great -- don't give her your time and effort.

All of that said, in the immortal words of Ian Malcolm, "HuffPost High School" is one of the worst ideas in the long, sad history of bad ideas:

"It will join an ever-expanding constellation of topic sites that already includes religion, tech, parenting and divorce. But it will be unique in that it will be the only site produced by minors: Its editor, wunderkind Myles Miller, is only 17, and it will feature the work of teenage bloggers.

Meanwhile, Patch, the network of more than 800 hyperlocal news sites also overseen by AOL editor in chief Arianna Huffington, is also soliciting adolescent contributors from high schools — and even middle schools — as it seeks to recruit thousands of community bloggers.

The practice raises new questions of privacy and ethics. People share overly personal information and make fools of themselves on the web every day, but the impulsiveness of teenagers plus the visibility of Huffpo could be a uniquely combustible mixture. Should teenagers who can’t legally vote, drink or have sex be allowed to decide for themselves what to publish in a place where it could potentially be read by millions of people? What if a 15-year-old wants to write confessionally about having an abortion... or joke about smoking marijuana...? And what if that 15-year-old’s parent wants to have that posting deleted? And what if that parent is divorced, and his ex-spouse who shares custody gives her permission?"

That's Jeff Bercovici, the damn good -- and surprisingly well-paid -- media writer for Forbes, and he's pretty much dead-on. Adults making the informed decision to contribute to HuffPo is one thing; enlisting a bunch of 14-year-olds to write for you for free is something completely different. The kind of audacious arrogance that would make a company think it can get away with something like that is the sort of thing that could -- at least in a just world -- spell its undoing.

Although Arianna's on to something if her aim is to use this program to teach kids about journalism in the modern age.

Lesson #1: Get ready to starve.

*Sorry, Arianna. My pathetic need to prove how clever I am generally trumps my desire not to burn bridges. Nothin' but love.

Quote of the Day

"Forgot my Blackberry at home today -- does any News Corp staffer know my schedule for this afternoon?"

-- Arianna Huffington, via Twitter

A while back I threw out one of those endlessly ponderable questions having to do with the modern media. It basically went like this: "What do you do when a media outlet willfully refuses to do the right thing, when it flat-out ignores calls for it to behave in a respectable and scrupulous manner and laughs in the face of those making the demands?" Not surprisingly, the impetus for this debate was some kind of irresponsible horseshit or other that Fox News had pulled. For years Fox has operated above the rules that govern other news outlets; it's operated this way because it's owned by Rupert Murdoch, and Rupert Murdoch operates this way.

What's happening right now with Murdoch has been years in the making. It was always inevitable. The entire corporate culture of News Corp has been one of imperiousness since the very beginning, the belief that it and its people simply aren't required to adhere to the exhaustingly restrictive laws all those other poor suckers inexplicably submit to. They can do whatever they want and the awesome might of Murdoch and News Corp will protect them at all times. This kind of mad hubris, taken to its logical conclusion, will eventually result in your biting off a lot more than you can chew. Which is what Murdoch's people did -- in spades. They did it because the Murdoch ethos gave them tacit permission to.

What do you do when a media outlet refuses to play by the rules? Apparently, you wait for it to inevitably take the privilege it believes it's entitled to one step too far -- and then you bust it like a piñata.

Post Mortem

Well, that was fun while it lasted.

It's one thing for the mainstream media to wrap both hands around Andrew Breitbart and clutch his doughy white ass while they fellate him, only to suddenly have second thoughts when the act inevitably makes them feel all icky. That's what the mass media are there for: to be hopelessly out of touch with reality. When ABC News embraced Breitbart a while back, infamously announcing that he would be part of the network's mid-term election coverage, then had second thoughts upon being reminded that Breitbart had time and time again proven himself to be an unscrupulous tool, it almost didn't seem like that much of a shock. But while the traditional press may have looked at a guy like Breitbart and only seen his SEO status and Q Score -- and therefore his potential to help it reach that elusive red meat crowd -- you'd think that those within the new media sphere who are intimately familiar with the guy's modus operandi would've known to stay the hell away from him.

Case in point: The Huffington Post.

There's been a hell of a lot of indignation of late aimed at HuffPo for its decision to allow Andrew Breitbart a platform on the left from which to spew his anti-left invective. The argument is that letting Breitbart into one of Progressive America's most powerful media strongholds (I always imagine him being like the Terminator casually wandering into the rebel hideout, sending the dogs into a frenzy then pulling his phased plasma rifle and opening fire on the hapless humans) isn't simply a case of magnanimously allowing for a dissenting opinion or for honest dialogue between two highly polarized political camps; it's a case of giving one of the right's most shamelessly avowed con men -- a guy whose reputation for trafficking in lies and perpetuating hoaxes is irrefutably documented -- credibility as something other than the pompous bullshit artist and schoolyard bully he is. I wish I could argue with this, because I really do think we should try to move past the ridiculous left-vs.-right ethos, but given his track record there should be no abiding Andrew Breitbart -- not by anyone seeking to have a legitimate adversarial debate based on facts.

So, no, Breitbart never should've been welcomed as an above-the-fold Huffington Post contributor (regardless of the fact that he had a hand in creating the publication). That said, the decision by HuffPo to now rescind that above-the-fold status -- to basically allow him to post at the site, just without the raised profile -- is almost too absurd to even comprehend. Just yesterday HuffPo said it stood behind its decision to give Breitbart the kind of spotlight that other, lesser-known contributors would kill for -- but today it's announcing an institutional change of heart. Why? Supposedly because this morning Andrew Breitbart unleashed a vicious "ad hominem" attack on Van Jones in the Daily Caller; in other words, Andrew Breitbart did exactly what Andrew Breitbart does. Once again, it's not like the people at HuffPo couldn't have predicted that Breitbart would at some point say something that would offend their sensibilities; he's made an entire career out of doing that. To claim that he hadn't stepped over the line until this very morning is laughably stupid -- or entirely disingenuous, which is more likely. The fact is that HuffPo was besieged by a hellacious backlash in the wake of its decision to put Breitbart on the front page and, well, it caved.

But why?

Why would the Huffington Post even bother to put Breitbart on the front page -- where he could thumb his nose at those whose belief system he's sought to destroy -- knowing that there would be a revolt, then yank him when the inevitable revolt happened?

Because now all they've done is given Andrew Breitbart exactly what he wanted: the ability to shout to everyone throughout his own online empire that those arrogant liberals try to quash the opinions of anyone who disagrees with them.

By the way, Van Jones is a good friend of Arianna's -- and what have we learned is the one rule of writing for the Huffington Post? You don't insult Arianna's friends. Can you imagine if that's really what this is all about: a pissing match between two very rich new media titans? How fucking shameful and tragic would that be -- and how far removed is that kind of nonsense from the lives of rest of us, the little people who take sides between these two?

Net Brutality

Allen West is a freshman congressman from Florida. He's a Tea Party darling who, among other noteworthy achievements, retired from the Army after taking a shot at an Iraqi civilian in order to intimidate him, compared President Obama to Hitler and encouraged people to arm themselves against the government, and named as his chief of staff a far-right talk radio host whose lunatic rhetoric was connected with a credible threat that led police to lock down every single school in Broward County, Florida last November.

In other words, Allen West is a real peach.

So maybe it's not surprising that he sees the AOL-Huffington Post deal as the end of all life as we know it.

From Media Matters:

"You look out there, you see that AOL has purchased the Huffington Post. Now all of a sudden a very far left liberal blogger such as Arianna Huffington has a huge influence in the Internet world," he said. We cannot allow ourselves to be suppressed. We cannot allow them to take over the Internet."

Three things: First of all, Arianna Huffington just sold her wholly independent, "very far left liberal" blog to the most conservative, milquetoast internet media conglomerate in America -- and pocketed $315 million dollars for herself and her partners in the process. If that doesn't win her some street cred from the big business-fellating crowd, what the hell will?

Second, is there anything more comical than listening to a right-wing blowhard feign victimization at the hands of the supposed liberal juggernaut bent on quashing his or her views? The constant cries of "we will not be silenced or suppressed" from a group whose media bullhorn is positively deafening these days is the stuff of cheap farce. That said, the conspiratorial "encroaching threat" argument is one that's been used by the most unimaginative political talking heads on the right -- to great effect -- for the past few years, so it's not surprising a hack like West would bust it out.

Third, you wanna know why the conservative movement is losing the internet? Media Matters goes on to nail it: What has the avowed right got in terms of new media that's truly groundbreaking? Sure, it owns the talk radio medium and it's correct when it boasts that as of now progressives don't stand a chance of breaking its stranglehold -- and there's even an argument to be made that the left can't put a dent in Fox News's adamantium hull on television. But the internet is an entirely different beast; it's a place where innovation and imagination triumph and it's one that lends itself to the non-linear way the left and center-left tend to think. In much the same way that conservatives look down their noses at any attempt by progressives to match the success of, say, Rush Limbaugh, progressives can rightly claim that their political adversaries haven't even come close to smacking it out of the park on the internet the way HuffPo has. Yeah, there's Drudge, but that's almost 15 years old and it's barely evolved since its inception -- and there's no way in hell a major corporation of any kind would get near Breitbart with a pair of rubber gloves and a cattle prod.

Don't like what you see when you "look out there," congressman?

Maybe you need to take a harder look at who your audience is.

Assistant To the Assistant Quote of the Day (This Is As Good As It's Gonna Get Today)

"That's right, in a showdown between nonpartisan sanity and partisan madness, the traditional media have boldly decided to... not take a stand."

-- Arianna Huffington on the move by various mainstream press outlets to prohibit their employees from attending Jon Stewart's "Rally To Restore Sanity" on October 30th

Quote of the Day

"This is really a level of absurdity that we cannot concede to."

-- Arianna Huffington on MSNBC last night, referring to the possibility of allowing one man, Joe Lieberman, to hold genuine health care reform hostage

Honorable Mention for "Quote of the Day" goes to Cesca, who unleashed this gem:

"I have a serious question here: From now on, do we have to support the exact opposite of what we want in order to fake out Joe Lieberman? I mean, I know he sounds like Elmer Fudd, but now we have to outsmart him as if we're in a Bugs Bunny cartoon?

US: Public option!
LIEBERMAN: No public option!
US: No public option!
LIEBERMAN: Public option!
US: Thank you! ZOOM!"

Great Expectations

Given that it's been a year since the 2008 presidential election -- and the media, both traditional and new, understandably love marking somewhat arbitrary passages of time -- there's a whole lot of talk going on right now about what Barack Obama has accomplished versus what he's dropped the ball on in ostensibly spectacular fashion.

While I've backed Obama for the most part, I'm not a blind faith apologist for the man or his shortcomings as president, of which there are more than a few; my thought has always been that a fracturing support system among the smart people in this country who believe in the core ideals that someone like Obama stands for merely opens the door for the worst-case scenario (and you know damn well what that is). This doesn't mean that there should never be any accountability for the president we elected and expect to adhere to the promises made on the campaign trail; it just means that there's a reality that has to be accepted: that Obama was never going to be able to satisfy everyone, particularly not the far-left, and that splintering off and throwing a tantrum because your pet cause isn't being given the deference you believe it's due amounts to little more than shooting yourself in the foot.

Do I think Obama needs to step up and put his own foot down in a more forceful way on certain issues?

Yup, sure do.

Will I act like a petulant child if he doesn't accomplish every little thing I want him to?

No, of course not. That's unrealistic.

Two pieces, each of which examines the successes and failures of Obama since the election from a distinct angle, are what got me thinking of this. Take a look for yourself and make your own decision:

The Huffington Post: "The Audacity of Winning vs. the Timidity of Governing" by Arianna Huffington/11.3.09

Bob Cesca's Awesome Blog! Go!: The Curse of Not-Good-Enough/11.3.09

Related:

DXM: With Friends Like These.../8.21.09

Hot Air

If you're a half-intelligent viewer and you want a flawless example of how cable news organizations on the whole haven't just let you down, they've honest-to-Christ abandoned you, look no further than yesterday's wall-to-wall coverage of that patently ridiculous "balloon boy" story.

Much to her credit, Arianna Huffington hammered the hell out of MSNBC's Ed Schultz last night for his role in blowing a really stupid, thoroughly contrived reality TV-esque item way out of proportion.

The Huffington Post: A Funny Thing Happened On My Way To Talk About Afghanistan/10.15.09

Quote of the Week (Early Contender)

"In capitalism as envisioned by its leading lights, including Adam Smith and Alfred Marshall, you need a moral foundation in order for free markets to work. And when a company fails, it fails. It doesn't get bailed out using trillions of dollars of taxpayer money. What we have right now is Corporatism. It's welfare for the rich. It's the government picking winners and losers. It's Wall Street having their taxpayer-funded cake and eating it too. It's socialized losses and privatized gains."

-- Arianna Huffington in a piece that looks at Michael Moore's new movie, Capitalism: A Love Story

Bulls on Parade

A couple of days ago, while running on the treadmill at the gym, I looked up at one of the TVs hanging against the wall and noticed that disgraced CNBC buffoon Jim Cramer is still up to his old tricks. Apparently, ostensible hurdles like reality, a complete lack of any credibility, and public humiliation at the hands of Jon Stewart haven't been enough to discourage Cramer from getting right back on his high horse -- because he's once again jumping around like a circus clown on meth, touting the end of the bear market and the new running of the bulls on Wall Street.

Unfortunately, he's not the only one pushing this, pardon the pun, bullshit right now.

And if you find it criminally insulting that these Wall Street types -- the ones who ran a high-stakes casino with your money and basically broke our country's economy -- are now expecting us to forget the recent past, bend over, and once again be gullible dupes for their pro-market hype, you're not alone.

Arianna Huffington puts the whole thing in very good perspective.

The Huffington Post: Wall Street, DC, and the New Financial Euphoria/5.11.09

Of War-Mongers and Men

Arianna Huffington latest column takes an interesting look at the relation between an unrepentant Dick Cheney and the character Clint Eastwood plays in his new movie, Gran Torino.

The Huffington Post: "Cheney and Clint: A Tale of Two Dicks" by Arianna Huffington/12.18.08

The More Things Change...

From Arianna Huffington's "Sunday Roundup":

"In the wake of Obama's overwhelming victory, and Democratic gains in the House and Senate, conservatives are desperately trying to convince the world that these results are meaningless. "Democrats should not make the mistake of viewing Tuesday's results as a repudiation of conservatism," insisted John Boehner. "Barack Obama understands this is a center-right country," claimed Karl Rove. "This country remains every bit as center-right as it has for a generation," parroted Brent Bozell. And David Brooks dreamed of an Obama administration that understands "this was an election where the middle asserted itself." Drunk on self-delusion, a staggering GOP whistles past the electoral graveyard, missing the whole point of this election: the center has shifted, and positions that used to be considered left-wing -- on healthcare, on global warming, on corporate responsibility, on Iraq -- are now solidly mainstream."

Mac vs. P.C.

The internet is a series of tubes -- which can be grabbed with both hands and used to beat John McCain's ass repeatedly.

"The Internet and the Death of Rovian Politics" by Arianna Huffington/10.20.08

Palin Comparison (Redux)

This pretty much sums it all up, from quite a few different perspectives:

The Huffington Post: "McCain's Big Gamble Comes Up Snake Eyes" by Arianna Huffington/9.3.08

Part of the Problem

I continued to work in television news long after coming to the conclusion that the industry was badly broken -- I admit that. But I didn't enter into it believing that it was a colossal mess, otherwise, why would I have bothered? I eventually became frustrated with the direction TV news had taken, but I never thought the medium as a whole should be done away with.

The same can't be said for many of today's Republicans; for the life of me I'll never understand how they manage to sell the public on the idea that they have a starring role in a production they utterly despise as a matter of principle. Worse than Ivy League oligarchs like George Bush and Grover Norquist casting themselves as heroes of the common man are class-act bullshit artists like John Boehner and Roy Blunt, who play along and continue to invoke the supposedly hallowed legacy of Ronald Reagan by asserting that government in and of itself is a bad thing. These self-loathing lawmakers claim to despise our government -- not simply the way it operates but, really, its very existence -- and yet they strive to be elected and re-elected to positions within it.

A good rule of thumb: When you're trying to make a business work, you don't hire employees who hate what it is that you do and believe that the less of it there is, the better.

Is it any wonder why things are so screwed up?

Read on:

(The Huffington Post: "Does McCain Still Agree with Reagan that Government is the Problem?" by Arianna Huffington/9.29.08)

Shock and Flawed (Part II)

This just about sums it up:

"Over the past 30 years, Americans have been bombarded with sermons evangelizing for the free market religion of the Right. In the course of selling us on buying, the market-worshippers tried to convince us that all concerns about the most vulnerable members of society could be left up to the soulless, self-correcting calculus of supply and demand. Government involvement was an anachronism, regulatory oversight an impediment. The last few weeks have demolished that notion. In the battle over the proper role of government, the high priests of the church of the Free Market -- including Bush, Paulson, and the Masters of Wall Street -- have suffered a monumental defeat. So why are we allowing them to dictate the terms of their surrender?

(The Huffington Post: "The Bailout Plan: Welcome to Economic Shock and Awe" by Arianna Huffington/9.23.08)

And this one headline -- from that bulwark of left wing hippie thinking, The Wall Street Journal -- is just chilling:

(The Wall Street Journal: "Wall Street" No Longer Exists/9.23.08)

A Praise Chorus

"As a blogger, Chez Pazienza is filled with outrage, passion and insight -- delivered with a distinctive point of view, a wicked sense of humor, and a two-fisted style of prose. In Dead Star Twilight, he turns all these on himself -- and produces a fierce, funny, disturbing, but ultimately uplifting memoir. This is the book A Million Little Pieces dreamed of being."

-- Arianna Huffington

How cool is that?

Girls, Girls, Girls

(Part 1: Heaven's Cates/5.4.07)
(Part 2: Screen Savors/5.9.07)
(Part 3: Rock & Roll Queens/6.14.07)
(Part 4: Funny Girls/8.17.07)


Part 5: The Journalists

Having worked in television news for far too long and consequently having known more than my fair share of female journalists, I think I'm tolerably qualified to say that -- as with their male counterparts these days -- they tend to fall into one of two categories: the smart and dedicated who are truly interested in telling a good story and aspiring to the highest standards of excellence (in other words, the ones who take their job and their responsibilities seriously), and the ones who enjoy seeing themselves on TV or on paper and are in it pretty much for their own personal gain. Unfortunately, the attractive journalist who has to prove that she falls into the former category rather than the latter is practically an archetype by this point; I've met plenty of very smart women who also happen to be great looking and who've spent a good portion of their careers frustrated over their inability to be recognized for their talent and intelligence in a position where such consideration is paramount. There are a whole lot of gorgeous TV news anchors and reporters out there -- and quite a few of them are dumb as a box of rocks. But whereas an attractive man's lack of two brain cells to rub together tends to reflect only on himself and go no further, a beautiful woman's dopiness is seen as an indictment of female journalists in general (as well as, one would hope, the lecherous, pudgy white dipshits in upper management who keep hiring her ilk). I realize that the same can be said for most businesses these days, but in the world of journalism there exists a positively monumental chasm between the indispensible and the worthless, and yet the dregs are often the ones raking in a fortune, while the truly gifted are working impossible hours, sometimes in dangerous situations, and are generally being paid crap for their trouble. Imagine being faced with that latter situation and having to work against the stereotype perpetuated by the other half of the equation. In all facets of journalism, there are women who manage to be both beautiful and brilliant at the same time. Quite a few in fact are astonishingly sexy because they're brilliant.

Here are just a few, from a cross-section of media.


Jamie Tarabay

Anyone whose bio reads that she currently lives "at an undisclosed location in Baghdad" is damn serious about her job. As a bureau chief for NPR, Jamie Tarabay has spent the past several years traveling from one war zone to another, covering some of the most important news events of this generation. She's Australian by birth, Lebanese by heritage, and only 32 years old -- which makes me feel very, very lazy.


Jancee Dunn

I've been a fan of this self-proclaimed "Jersey Girl" for quite awhile. Jancee Dunn started out as the only bright spot in the MTV2 VJ lineup, then went on to write for Rolling Stone, where she's now a contributing editor. She was also a special correspondent to Good Morning America for a few years and is the author of But Enough About Me... How much do I like Jancee? I'm willing to overlook the fact that she occasionally writes for Oprah's magazine.


Arianna Huffington

I love Arianna Huffington. There, I said it. Not so much a field journalist as a columnist and commentator, Arianna somehow pulled off what was seemingly one of the most absolute about-faces in political affiliation history. Over the course of a few years, she reinvented herself -- in a way which was astonishingly believable, her motives never really coming into question -- turning her back on the Republican party she once counted herself a member of, and emerging as an outspoken critic of the Bush Administration. Her online newspaper and blog, The Huffington Post, is required daily reading and she can often be seen on Real Time with Bill Maher, as she and Maher are close friends (she was a regular contributor to his previous show, Politically Incorrect). She's also the author of On Becoming Fearless.... in Love, Work and Life. On top of all that, she's just really, really sexy.


Jennifer Eccleston

There are fansites aplenty devoted to Jennifer Eccleston, and a few of them even recognize the brain behind her admittedly gorgeous face. Jennifer's been to every hell-hole on Earth during her career, reporting for Fox News, NBC and now CNN. At the risk of sounding patronizing, she's put herself in the line of fire time and time again when she quite frankly didn't have to. This is not in any way an obscene claim that unattractive journalists have no choice but to take the tough jobs; that's not the case at all. My point is that there's an entire vat full of myopic news directors growing somewhere that would be more than happy to make her an anchor and pay her a fortune to read a teleprompter in the comfort of an air-conditioned studio for the rest of her career. Maybe it's stupid of me to credit someone for simply doing something she loves -- something she considers rewarding -- but I've watched big money and a luxurious lifestyle occasionally tempt even the strongest journalist toward ruin. Jennifer is still out there, and news audiences are better for it.


Lara Logan

See above. The crap Jennifer Eccleston has sometimes had to deal with? CBS's Lara Logan has had it worse. Yes she's stunning -- she's also a good journalist. Enough said.


Ariel Levy

I interviewed Ariel Levy awhile back and was impressed with quite a bit about her: She's smart, spirited in the best possible way, she's not afraid to joust at some pretty big cultural windmills and yes, she's very attractive. This last quality might not matter one way or the other were it not for the fact that the Goliaths she frequently takes on include Girls Gone Wild, the porn industry, and so on. These are the kinds of entities that usually pull the frat boyish argument that a jealous desire for inclusion -- and the lack of such -- is the true motive behind the venom of any female detractor. Admittedly, Ariel may have had her conclusions all laid out before she even researched her very good book Female Chauvanist Pigs, but to put it bluntly, somebody had to say it. Ariel makes no attempt to hide her loathe for women who feel that stripping or screwing in front of a camera somehow qualifies as empowerment. Her stance: You're free to do whatever the hell you want with your life girls, but don't you dare think that the power that comes from having tits and being willing to show them off makes you some kind of latter-day Betty Friedan.


Erin Burnett

If there's a flavor-of-the-week among the "Hot TV Newswoman" set, it's Erin Burnett. The host of CNBC's Street Signs is known as much for her looks as her knowledge of the markets. Her background with Goldman Sachs and Citigroup ensures that she knows what the hell she's talking about, but I'm mentioning her here not because of her journalistic abilities, nor even because of her looks per se. She's worth talking about because of the reaction she consistently elicits from her supposedly professional male co-workers; all in all it's pretty fucking sickening. Over a period of just a few weeks, MSNBC's resident loudmouth Chris Matthews and his populist knucklehead colleague Joe Scarborough both behaved like horny schoolboys during separate live interviews with Burnett; this all happened on the air mind you. While Erin was attempting to talk about the subprime mortgage crisis -- a topic of tremendous importance -- Tweety Bird Matthews essentially ignored the words coming out of her mouth in favor of drooling over her mouth itself. He even admitted to being distracted by her beauty, thus proving both my initial assertion about the difficulties many women face in this business and the fact that Matthews is an idiot.


Maureen Dowd

A couple of weeks ago I called New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd the sexiest brain in journalism. That just about says it all.

Next: The Classics