checkbookjournalism

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Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
Price of Battered Rihanna Pic: $62,500
Obama Spawn Could Breed Grade-School Paparazzi
$7.50 For Every 1,000 Views
If You're Not Paying, World's Worst Person John Fitzgerald Page Isn't Talking
The Paris Hilton Post-Jail Interview

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ErcoleCanus
09/12/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
Being a cop isn't nearly as dangerous as you spew on about BlackXacto. In fact cops are far more likely to kill an innocent person than to die in the line of "duty."

They don't work for me, and I have never had a cop do anything to protect me. EVER. I have had to help two officers take down a suspect who they couldn't control. It was very easy, and the officers were more of a hinderance than a help. You are probably a member of the thin blue line, and I do hope your job is more dangerous than most.
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BettyCrocker
09/13/09

@ErcoleCanus: Speaking of snotty and self-entitled and reeking of douchery... you haven't had a cop DO anything to protect you EVER, because you're too stupid to realize that by walking the streets in uniform, they have done a lot to protect you.

As for your assistance to police officers - thanks. Now get out of the way, and stay there.
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organicgardener
09/12/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
I was always turned off by not only the show's concept but the fact that he stands up there with his little cup & straw holding court over a bunch of twenty-somethings. Just.so.silly.
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MrInBetween
09/12/09

@organicgardener: I agree. And he always makes sure his most prized possessions, his biceps, are showing. The guy is a clown.
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Martiniman
09/12/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
Wow, find myself torn between the cops' monetary gain and the groundswell of disgust the pictures have created for a creep who still doesn't understand what all the fuss is about.
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maude_flanders promoted this comment Edited by Martiniman at 09/12/09 9:06 AM Martiniman was starred Martiniman was unstarred

BlackXacto
09/11/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
"steady job and comfy retirement"
Tate, you're a f____g idiot. These guy's put their life on the line every hour they are on the job for idiots like you. You pea-brained dimwit.
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bens
09/12/09

@BlackXacto: They lost all sense of duty, honor, and respect by selling that picture. Its not like there's a higher moral motivation for leaking it, its purely for monetary gain. I doubt someone willing to sell out their operating principles so quickly is putting their life on the line, or that they're doing their job all that well.
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skt.smth
09/12/09

@BlackXacto: Yeah, so they should be able to go around selling police evidence photos of battered celebrities for money. That makes complete sense.
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BettyCrocker
09/12/09

@BlackXacto: I'm on your side; I sleep next to the finest of NYPD's Finest every night. And the tone of Tate's post is snotty and self-entitled and reeking of douchery.

That said - cops should not be selling pics of victims, whether the victim is Rihanna or Ma Kettle. Doing so dishonors the badge.
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snugbug
09/11/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
Paying for news? G_d, Levin truly is a maggot. Can we please stop referring him as a "journalist"? He's a lawyer. As he loudly proclaims himself in his production company's logo--"I'm a lawyer!" EVIL.
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Matt Cherette
09/11/09

@snugbug: Everyone pays for "news," though. I think that, if anything, the real issue is more about the kinds of things Levin pays for and the means by which he acquires them than it is the fact that he engages in that practice in the first place.
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Aaron Altman
09/12/09

@snugbug: I don't think anyone in their right mind really calls Harvey a journalist. Whether or not TMZ sometimes breaks "news."
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Spirit Fingers
09/11/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
Well, that's just awful. You can just imagine that the two women had probably gained Rihanna's trust, or at least were supposed to be a source of comfort in those most humiliating moments.
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Shelwood
09/13/09

@Spirit Fingers: Is it possible they justified it by thinking they were humiliating Chris Brown, not Rihanna? After all, he caused those bruises, not her.

That said, cops should follow the law as much as possible. If these two were truly trying to make a point, money should not have changed hands and the photos should have been leaked to someone other than TMZ.
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Matt Cherette
09/11/09

In reply to Cops Who Leaked Rihanna Pic: Caught?
Who needs law enforcement, anyway? With guns like that, Harvey can protect us all.
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iplaudius
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
I expect a shadowy league of vigilante superheros will start picking off the leadership one by one.
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Iwillnotauditionforastar
08/03/09

@iplaudius: No. All you have to do is destroy the aura of invincibility. Gravity will take care of it from there on its own timetable.

See: Iran.
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Iwillnotauditionforastar
08/03/09

@Iwillnotauditionforastar: "The world will know...before this battle was over, even a god-king can bleed."
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Uncle_Billy_Slumming
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
We could form a much more pleasant alternative cult based on sardonic humor, youtube videos, celebrity bashing, and macabre magazine jokes.

Hi.
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MissNormaDesmond
08/03/09

@Uncle_Billy_Slumming: Would there be backrubs? I like backrubs.
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Uncle_Billy_Slumming
08/03/09

@MissNormaDesmond:

Check.
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skt.smth
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
New rule: An organization may not receive tax exemption if it is, or significantly resembles, a bizarre religious-corporate mega-entity precipitating the plot arc of a Thomas Pynchon and/or Neal Stephenson novel. We could call this the Pynchon/Stephenson Litmus Test.
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Matthew_Maurice
08/02/09

@skt.smth: I would think that merely having a "marketing unit" pretty much means you're a business not a church.
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skt.smth
08/02/09

@Matthew_Maurice:Well, if you claim to be a religion, and you have enough money to put a fancy face on the organization, you can pretty much do anything you want in the United States. Nowhere else in the world does there exist a greater tendency to extend trust and benefits to people who merely claim they are devoted to a higher power.
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Edited by skt.smth at 08/02/09 10:37 PM skt.smth was starred skt.smth was unstarred

mexiback
08/02/09

@Matthew_Maurice: And let's not forget about the "celebrity centres", because is a fact, that celebrities are simply 'better' human beings than the rest of us.
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Iwillnotauditionforastar
08/03/09

@skt.smth: I am right now processing the incorporation documents for the Madoff Church of the Invested God.

Le Chaim!
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Edited by Iwillnotauditionforastar at 08/03/09 12:37 AM

skt.smth
08/03/09

@Iwillnotauditionforastar: I lawled.
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pony_express
08/03/09

@skt.smth: Or just get rid of the tax exemption status of religious organizations; all of them tend to get surreal at some point.
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skt.smth
08/03/09

@pony_express: I can get behind that, but first, let's at least stop giving tax exemptions to crazy, world-domination-plans-having, ex-member-blackmailing organizations.
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MaxChampion
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
Foster, these people are being held in prison-like conditions. How do you think they're going to get their hands on a mobile phone with camera capacity, let alone be able to use it?

In a lovely bit of synchronicity (probably orchestrated by Miscavige), St Petersburg residents each received an 80 page magazine from Scientology this weekend, that dedicates 44 pages to savaging the SP Times reporters and the first four whistleblowers, referring to them as KingPin, the ConMan, Fact-Checker and Adulteress.

No, I'm not joking. Download it here: http://www.freedommag.org/

If that's not corroboration...
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skt.smth
08/02/09

@MaxChampion: I'm not going to download or read that document, but I'm assuming that "KingPin" and "ConMan" are being outed for illegal or unethical activities, based on the nicknames given to them. Question: if these people admitted to illegal activities in the course of being "analyzed" as Scientologists, isn't the "church" culpable for knowing that information and not divulging it to authorities. The idea that this would help their image seems really absurd to me, since it basically just looks, to the public at large, like they collect damaging information on their members as a matter of policy, in case they need to use it for blackmail.
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minge
08/03/09

@skt.smth: Oh, it's crazy. I read the thing from cover to cover. You have *no idea* how nuts this thing is. And they had a month to get it ready.

There are PI photos of the sources' houses, lurid statements from their still-in ex-wives, many many quotes from supposedly confidental files...it goes on and on. If the magazine had been put together by critics it couldn't have made the CoS look crazier.

Deserves its own post, imo.
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Dr. Nick
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
The St. Petersburg Times deserves a Pulitzer. And perhaps a Nobel.
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MissNormaDesmond promoted this comment Edited by Dr. Nick at 08/02/09 9:11 PM Dr. Nick was starred Dr. Nick was unstarred

MissNormaDesmond
08/03/09

@Dr. Nick: And then a nice hot bubble bath and a nap.
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The Lone Scout
08/03/09

@MissNormaDesmond: Preceded by a massage, of course.
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SeaBassTian
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
This Chairman of the Board is quite a change of pace from Ol' Blue Eyes. I don't believe that Sinatra ever body-slammed the staff. I don't know why I find these horror stores so compelling. The fact that somebody so pious could be the epitome of evil makes me smile. Where the hell is my so-called compassion? I mean, the hard labor camp is bad enough, but BANG, BANG, BANG is just unforgivable.
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skt.smth
08/02/09

@SeaBassTian: Sinatra was too busy "slamming" the ladies, if you get my meaning. *wink wink*

*wink*
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DoctorNine
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
Later, Mr. Miscavige was quoted as saying:

"..Oh pshaw... Cherry is actually a soft wood. I was merely using Mr. Rinder's brylcreem soaked cranium to lubricate an imperfection in the veneer..."

No witnesses to the scene were available to corroborate Mr. Miscavige's assertion, due to several layers of restraining orders, which were ritually delivered by a pair of well dressed lawyers in pinstripe suits with silver piping, the day after the incident. Once again, the inscrutible mysteries of Scientology tantalize the uninitiated masses.
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Baroness
08/02/09

In reply to Scientology Leader David Miscavige: Still A Scary, Insane Psychopath
The creepiest thing about Scientology to me is the way they ape evangelical Christianity: there's a Christian Cross on their podiums, with a subtle "X" at the middle. Crossing it out, as it were. I don't know why I find this particular part of their symbolism disturbing. But I do.

Now I need to go fortify my castle keep.
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Edited by Baroness at 08/02/09 8:30 PM Baroness was starred Baroness was unstarred

heywhat
08/02/09

@Baroness: Yes, that is very creepy. Kind of satanic or a suggestion that they intend to replace Christianity as the dominate religion in the U.S.?
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