Oct 3rd, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Simmons Mocks Palin
You know a narrative has really broken through when it starts popping up in the non-political media. For example, this Bill Simmons column:
I like reading all kinds of publications. All of them. Any of them that have been in front of me all these years. I have a vast variety of sources from which I get my news.
(Oh, wait, you wanted details?)
This is followed by him saying something totally non-political about USA Today Sports Weekly.
45 Responses to “Simmons Mocks Palin”
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October 3rd, 2008 at 5:38 pm
I was much happier back in the good old days when it was baseball weekly
October 3rd, 2008 at 5:57 pm
That’s definitely cute, but I have a feeling that, as usual, MattY is missing something. Namely, thinking. For instance, would the same person feel free to make a negative reference about BHO? Did he make that reference knowing that his upper level bosses would approve and give him points for it? Did an editor see it and approve it? Is he basically just a favor-currying hack? You know, that whole look-beneath-the-surface thing we would normally expect from Harvard grads.
October 3rd, 2008 at 5:59 pm
I’ll ask again- why is lonewacko’s traffic plummeting during an election season?
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details/lonewacko.com
It’s because you’re annoying and stupid.
October 3rd, 2008 at 6:08 pm
I think we need a hard hitting piece on Palin’s frequent, annoying habit of saying “also” far too often and in a manner that makes no sense.
October 3rd, 2008 at 6:14 pm
Can I just say that my favorite troll technique by far this season is the what-if/factchecker twist. The poster makes a reasonable assumption, and the conservative commentor poses a less-reasonable alternate scenario favorable to conservatives, then lambasts the original poster for not doing his research. The funny thing is the alternate scenario is NEVER right, and can usually be disproved fairly easily through even a cursory amount of…wait for it…RESEARCH!
But of course the point isn’t to discover the truth (haha!), it’s merely to advance the conservative talking point.
FWIW, Simmons is a longtime Dem, asnd has been taking swipes at Bush since at least 2004–not exactly a fertile time for political opposition. He scored an interview with Obama this year, ESPN refused to run it, and he almost resigned.
But what if it was all an elaborate ploy by ABC/Disney to build sympathy for Obama…?
October 3rd, 2008 at 6:31 pm
I heartily apologize to Bill Simmons then. He’s a valiant fighter for all that’s right, fighting the System – and The Man – from the inside. Sometimes – in my quieter moments – I ponder what sort of MegaPerson it takes to stand up for their liberal tendencies in the media/showbiz environment, which is well known for being completely hostile to anything but archconservative views.
Also, I’m surprised that MattY hasn’t retransmitted the latest smear from the BHO campaign, which is currently being retransmitted by ABC. Oddly enough, ABC’s main quote source is also the “validator” for the smear as published on BHO’s site, and Sully has linked to it already. Was the email to MattY delayed or something?
October 3rd, 2008 at 6:34 pm
So if I understand what you’re saying correctly scythia, Bill Simmons must be that rarest of all breeds, a liberal journalist.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:01 pm
to completely generalize, most journalists are liberal, but most sports journalists are white guys, and most white guys are conservative, so i think the white guy-ness balances out the journalist-ness, which means the sports-ness moves it to conservative catagory
This may or may not make any sense.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:15 pm
Congratulations on ignoring the point of the post guys, which was that the Palin-as-ignoramous meme has moved from the chattering political class to people who may only vaguely follow politics.
And Simmons has taken some swipes at Bush, but nothing much and not really beyond what anyone else who is essentially an entertainer (which is what he is) has done.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:23 pm
And yes, I’m aware I misspelled ignoramus.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:46 pm
You should check out King Kauffman’s blog at Salon today. He does a much better job of weaving it all into his NFL picks.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:53 pm
You should check out King Kauffman’s blog at Salon today. He does a much better job of weaving it all into his NFL picks.
Agreed, but Matt’s point is that even people who don’t follow politics are getting the facts on Palin. King Kauffman is published at Salon, though, and the average Salon reader follows politics quite closely. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if the average Salon reader follows politics more closely than Sarah Palin does, since if she’s reading every newspaper it’s pretty clear she skips directly to the funnies.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:53 pm
Matt:
Fox News has redone the interview and now it includes names of both periodicals and dailies.
If you would just stop annoying her, she would be able to think of these things.
October 3rd, 2008 at 7:54 pm
James Glassman, the Undersecretay of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, was just introduced on C-Span at the National Press Club. As he approached the speaker’s platform he said: “Thank you Donna. May I call you Donna?” Then he went immediately into “a shout out” to the school his daughter(s) go to. I thought those were pretty amusing considering he was in front of such a staid institution. He got a few chuckles too!
October 3rd, 2008 at 8:08 pm
I remember Simmons from his Digital City days. He’s lost his fastball, a product of the L.A. sunshine and the national exposure.
October 3rd, 2008 at 8:13 pm
14: that’s certainly interesting. Perhaps the Undersecretay of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs shouldn’t be doing such things, but what matters decorum?
He appears to be center right establishment (state.gov/r/pa/ei/biog/105829.htm), and there’s even something of a MattY/Power Glutes link:
He is the former president of The Atlantic Monthly Co.
October 3rd, 2008 at 8:19 pm
I’ll ask again- why is lonewacko’s traffic plummeting during an election season?
What ERE doesn’t understand is that to bypass the media filter and influence of the MexicanGovernment that denies me the nightly three-hour primetime show I clearly deserve, my one-note hate site is now at AssForAHeadDotCom. Also, Alexa is an agent of the MexicanGovernment, suppressing my pagerank from the 135,295th place that only hacks like MattY and ERE dispute.
October 3rd, 2008 at 8:43 pm
I believe that the Repubs decided that McCain had little chance to win went for a hail mary and what the heck if it doesn’t work, we’ll be setting up Palin for 2012. I think this is why McCain seems so pissed. He realizes that he was used and has pissed away all his credibility in the process and he is going to get routed anyway. Unfortunately for the Republicans, Palin is more of an idiot than they had anticipated and thus has ruined the whole master plan. But I admit it was pretty clever, perhaps too clever. And who knows, perhaps everyone will forget these Couric interviews by 2012?
Back on topic, anyone who reads Simmons knows he is not exactly a political creature but certainly leans left like any self-respecting Mass-hole relative to the rest of the country.
October 3rd, 2008 at 8:55 pm
I gave up on Simmons when he started devoting columns to how the greedy television writers were ruining Jimmy Kimmel’s show with the strike.
October 3rd, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Maybe it’s because he’s not blogwhoring enough. I mean, he only pimped his own site twice in three posts on this thread. That’s weak. The old lonedipshit would have pasted six or seven links to his own site in those three posts. It’s like he doesn’t even care anymore.
October 3rd, 2008 at 10:10 pm
18 – doesn’t that overlook the essential point that McCain picked Palin? There were scores of other more qualified candidates that the base would have been happy about. Even if you wanted to take a woman, Snowe or Hutchinson would be much better.
McCain played the Hail Mary without fully evaluating his veep nominee despite the longest amount of time to make this decision in modern political history.
To blame anyone but McCain is crazy. This is all on him.
October 3rd, 2008 at 10:56 pm
James Glassman, the Undersecretay of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. . .
Do you mean Mr. Dow 36,000? It’s funny to think that the Dow was actually higher 9 years ago when he published that book than it is today.
October 3rd, 2008 at 10:59 pm
It’s also funny to think that Kevin Hassett, co-author of Dow 36,000, is one of John McCain’s economic advisors.
October 3rd, 2008 at 11:59 pm
Has anyone forgotten “you’re no Jack Kennedy”? I think Palin is tarred for life.
Funny, but not ha ha funny.
October 4th, 2008 at 1:34 am
Listen people! What about the antichrist. He will come out of nowhere. He will win people over with his words. He will be from the east or raised muslum. Although his identity cannot be proven through any research some will know it in their hearts. He will survive a clearly fatal assasination attempt further winning him a following. He will seem to solve all of America’s problems but after 3 1/2 years he will require the mark of the devil for all transactions. How can America vote for a man that denounced his church for a popularity contest or presidential election when this country was built on the freedom of religion.
October 4th, 2008 at 1:36 am
Listen people! I am not a religious fanatic. I dont even go to church on Sundays. But I try to live my life as God expects me to. What about the antichrist. He will come out of nowhere. He will win people over with his words. He will be from the east or raised muslum. Although his identity cannot be proven through any research some will know it in their hearts. He will survive a clearly fatal assasination attempt further winning him a following. He will seem to solve all of America’s problems but after 3 1/2 years he will require the mark of the devil for all transactions. How can America vote for a man that denounced his church for a popularity contest or presidential election when this country was built on the freedom of religion.
October 4th, 2008 at 5:26 am
OK, I’ll bite…
He will be from the east or raised muslum.
1. East of where? (BTW. Obama’s birthplace is Honolulu, the westernmost major city in the US.)
2. The “raised [M]usl[i]m” part must be a later addition to the criteria, seeing as how Christianity predates Islam by ~500 years.
Although his identity cannot be proven through any research….
KERNERS ARE GO!!!!
October 4th, 2008 at 9:16 am
Then there is this Movie review from the WP.
She is a pop culture joke and shorthand for ridiculous.
Cheers
October 4th, 2008 at 11:12 am
The antiChrist won’t be born in a big country like the US, so that eliminates Obama. He’s more likely to be born in a smaller place, like, say Panama. For instance.
October 4th, 2008 at 12:28 pm
wow, this is an exceedingly strange comments thread. i guess bill simmons could be the antichrist, it just seems unlikely.
October 4th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
“For Sarah Palin, Thursday’s night’s debate was an open-book exam. She spent much of the evening methodically reading and rehearsing answers from “carefully scripted talking points.” Palin’s notes were largely hidden from plain view, resting behind the lectern where she stood. Because the cable and network television stations did not show a split screen of the debate, most viewers could not see that, during Joe Biden’s answers, Palin spent almost all her time looking down and studiously reading her notes. But viewers did see that when Palin delivered her answers, she would repeatedly glance down to check her talking points. ThinkProgress has compiled a video documenting some of the instances where it was clear to the audience that Palin was propped up by written responses. Watch a video compilation.” There is another reporter who says it is against the rules to have notes, but Palin did have notes — “JULIE MENIN, Founder & President of Wall Street Rising: stated she found it “interesting that Plain used her notes throughout the debate. And when you are a leader, you don’t have time to look at notes. So I found her use of constantly shuffling through her note cards and looking down for the answers very disconcerting and troubling overall.” [AC 360]
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/03/palin-can-read/
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