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jasonelias
12/05/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
I've got to say I've noticed that musicians are often the worst music reviewers ever. It's nothing but pat phrases, lack of insight and often a startling lack of an idea of what makes music, work.
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Superawesomerad
12/05/09

@jasonelias: Rolling Stone still hasn't figured this out. Those "Best (whatever) Of All Time" listicles they put out every year or so are always partially written by musicians, and those blurbs are always embarrassing to read (yes, even by RS standards).
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jasonelias
12:35 AM

@Superawesomerad: Very true, it's amazing how a musician can't articulate what they like about an influence. Weird I can't really think of one good one.
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Trai_Dep
12/05/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
Err, we ARE talking about the editorial page of the freaken' Wall Street Journal, correct? As a launchpad to suggest that bringing in people not on the masthead is a bad idea?
I think your initial premise needs more work, Ravi.
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Lysergic Asset
12/04/09

In reply to Ashley Dupre Cannot Stop Talking to Tabloids About Prostitution
My mother used to say that "marriage is basically legalized prostitution" and that if she hadn't had kids, she never would have bothered getting married.

I think Ashley is right.
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adiam7
12/04/09

In reply to Ashley Dupre Cannot Stop Talking to Tabloids About Prostitution
She is right.
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heywhat
12/04/09

In reply to Ashley Dupre Cannot Stop Talking to Tabloids About Prostitution
Oh, Ashley. I'm sure you are regretting selling the poon to random strangers but it's too late. What you should have done is found some athlete or sugar-daddy to sucker. P.S. opening your mouth to the tabloids for $500,000 beats screwing pot-bellied, balding, middle-aged johns any day of the week.
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Smitros
12/04/09

In reply to When Local Reporter Pops the Trunk, Hit the Deck
Will Dallas Morning New reporters now be told not to advertorialize in their stories?
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Bobby BoJangles
12/04/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
I was working on Ted Nugent's book Ted, White, and Blue...yes, yes, ridiculous title. Anyway, he had a sentence that went thusly: "we [the U.S.] have the technology to literally drop a bomb on the pins of assholes." I called him and said I didn't think this was quite accurate. He said no, it's accurate. I said, what exactly is a pin of an asshole? He said, you know. I brushed it off and asked: how about we at least take out the word "literally." He cursed at me and hung up. It's still in the book.
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Lysergic Asset
12/04/09

@Bobby BoJangles: Kudos to you for breathing the same air as him and living to tell the tale, literally - ha!
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The Real JR
12/04/09

In reply to When Local Reporter Pops the Trunk, Hit the Deck
EXCELLENT BEATNUTS REFERENCE.
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Hamilton Nolan
12/04/09

@The Real JR: Thank you. You're listening to the world famous.
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OMG! Ponies!
12/04/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
I have to say, James Franco's writing was self-important claptrap.

After the first paragraph, I found myself asking, "Mr Franco, why should I care about your 'art'?"

I am still waiting for an answer.
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IamnotStarJones
12/04/09

In reply to Ashley Dupre Cannot Stop Talking to Tabloids About Prostitution
She has too much free time on her hands. Shouldn't one of her rich mogul friends (sideyeing Russell Simmons) have given her a job by now?
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daveyjonesisdead
12/04/09

In reply to Page Six Hires Stephanie Smith
Just in time for the discrimination suit....
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Tremonius
12/04/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
"But wait. The women. Look at the women. All is not well. I'm thinking about the women. This is Iran."

This is Toro, crawling across the ring to retrieve his mouthpiece in The Harder They Fall. When you're stunned, you go back to basics, like simple declarative sentences. And, like Toro, a celebrity is convinced he's Champ simply because everybody lays down for him.
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snugbug
12/04/09

@Tremonius: Penn would do much better as a TV reporter. Or at least please my broadcast prof in J-school, whose eternal refrain was: "Short. Declarative. Sentences." As someone who's addicted to compound adjectives and adverbs, I don't get it, but I suppose sounding like a telegram has its advantages.
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Edited by snugbug at 12/04/09 12:47 PM snugbug was starred snugbug was unstarred

Tremonius
12/04/09

@snugbug: Mark Twain says he learned from an editor you write something, then go back and take out all the adjectives. But I read later about ol' Sal and Dean cruising DC during the inaugural for Harry S Truman and at the end of all the vast armaments lined up murderous and threatening there was one ordinary small boat "looking pitiful and foolish in the snowy grass."

I always loved that ever since. It's great humor and done simply, and you have to use adjectives to make it work. I try and remember that.

"Ah, yass, Harry Truman, man from Missouri, as I am; that must be his own boat." - On the Road
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snugbug
12/04/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
Actually, Bono's worst op-ed piece to date was an interminable "ode to Berlin" that he penned for the NYT for the 2oth anniversary "of the wall's falling" this past October.

It's formatted as a 2,000-word film script that flashes backward and forward, and during which Bono refers to himself in the third person as "THE SINGER" (sic, all caps) with the ironic subtlety of a jackhammer tearing up the pavement.

Cobbled together from deeply metaphoric constructions such as "The black has devoured the blue," and "The bandmates found it darkly funny to imagine the papers back home carrying a photo of them protesting Mikhail Gorbachev’s great drawing back of the Iron Curtain," the message emerges:

Yeah, the fall of the Berlin was kinda cool and symbolic and whatever, but the fact that U2 was there to witness it blow-by-blow is what really propelled it into history books.

This shit was way over the top even for someone with Bono's messianic complex. One has to laugh..
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Edited by snugbug at 12/04/09 12:14 PM snugbug was starred snugbug was unstarred

epiclady
12/04/09

@snugbug: CHRIST. Gave the Berlin Wall article a try, and I just can't...there are no...it's totally...all I can come up with is "unreadable" and "unbelievable." Bono said it all, I guess.
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snugbug
12/04/09

@epiclady: Your loss, lady. You missed the part when Bono interrupted German Chancellor Angela Merkel during a G-8 summit to school her in how to do her job, plus his hard-earned, Weltschmerz-y conclusion: "I think honesty is the hardest thing for a performer"..
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TheologicalSong
12/04/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
that's all well and good, but how does "aging midget who wears sunglasses indoors" buttress your point, exactly, Ravi? an example of responsible, incisive journalism, apparently. if you must insist on cheap shots, a modicum of elegance might be useful.
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Tremonius
12/04/09

@TheologicalSong: Okay, how about "Cyd Charisse in boxers"?
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TheologicalSong
12/04/09

@Tremonius: now yer talkin', Tre!
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Tremonius
12/04/09

@TheologicalSong: Yes, but remember, now, Mike Royko or one of them grizzled newshounds of yore relayed the first advice he ever received from an even older and more grizzled editor: "Write about nuns and midgets. A story about nuns and midgets tells itself."
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TheologicalSong
12/04/09

@Tremonius: sounds about right.
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Tweezergal
12/04/09

In reply to Why Celebrity Op-Eds Suck
But even worse than your-average-run-in-the-mill celebrity "authors" are business-people, anchors, and politicians who hire academics, reporters, or independent intellectuals to ghostwrite their articles: I can think of a few esteemed bigwigs who've "published" pieces in the rarified New York Review of Books-- only they haven't really written them. And do you think Tom Brokaw penned any of "his" books?
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Edited by Tweezergal at 12/04/09 11:41 AM Tweezergal was starred Tweezergal was unstarred

Ravi Somaiya
12/04/09

@Tweezergal: email me their names!
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