The Grouchy Editor

The media is an easy punching bag and it’s often unfairly slammed, but the Chilean miners coverage offers so many irresistible targets.  Here are two definitions from Merriam-Webster:

You tell me — are these miners “heroes,” as the media keeps insisting, or are they “victims”?  Personally, I’d go with definition 2a.  You might say, “what does it matter?”  It does matter, because calling the miners heroic can cheapen the status of real heroes.

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Turd of the Year:  James Michael Duncan

You might think that being trapped in an underground inferno for 69 days — 17 of them without much hope of rescue — with 32 smelly, jumpy fellow miners might gain you a bit of sympathy.  But that would be underestimating the malevolence of the anti-smoker crowd.  According to press reports, many, if not most, of the miners are smokers, and one of their first requests upon contact with the outside world was for cigarettes.

Enter NASA’s James Michael Duncan, who decided that political correctness was more important than the miners’ psychological and emotional well being.  “There will be no alcohol.  Nor tobacco, although almost all of them have asked for some,” wrote a correspondent for El Pais.  Duncan eventually relented, permitting the miners a whopping two packs a day — or one or two cigarettes per smoker.

We can only hope that the miners, if and when they finally meet Duncan, will demonstrate for him one more way of shoving something up a narrow hole.

.                           Turd of     the Year

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

I guess now we all know why Vikings quarterback Brett Favre is so fond of the song “Pants on the Ground.”

It’s brutal being a Minnesota sports fan.  On Wednesday, we were pumped up about having home-field advantage for the Twins-Yankees playoffs.  On the same day, we learned that superstar receiver Randy Moss was coming home to the Vikings, where he would team up with Favre.  Super Bowl hopes were through the roof.

Twenty-four hours later, the Twins were facing elimination, Favre was giving new meaning to that “Pants” ditty, and we all learned who Jenn Sterger is.  Moss, of all people, was the only professional athlete in Minnesota who was behaving like a model citizen.

                      Moss                                                                Sterger

As for the Vikings, this is what I wrote in the “Weekly Review” on September 18:  “There is no team in professional sports more cursed than the Vikings, no team that does a better job of punishing its fans.  Let us see what horrors this new season brings.”

Thank goodness we still have Kevin Garnett and the Timberwolves.  Wait ….

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

                           O’Keefe                                                                              Boudreau

Times are tough at CNN, and the folks who work there aren’t getting any sympathy from the vultures at MSNBC and Fox News.  Here’s a list of recent kerfuffles and shenanigans at the world’s first cable-news network:

1)  CNN, all bubbly over the launch of its new Parker Spitzer talk show, suddenly must find a replacement for the volatile Rick Sanchez.  Sanchez was canned for the sin of actually speaking his mind — something of high value at rivals MSNBC and Fox, but not so much at CNN.

2)  Judging from the previews of the Parker Spitzer show, CNN might have another ratings disaster on its hands.  Eliot Spitzer seems to be ego incarnate, and it’s embarrassing to watch Kathleen Parker try to get a word in edgewise when he’s yapping.  Perhaps if the show does nightly segments on high-price hookers, Spitzer will be forced to clam up.

3)  CNN went all out hyping news babe Abbie Boudreau’s “expose” of conservative muckraker James O’Keefe.  O’Keefe was busted attempting to hoax Boudreau with a taped “seduction” aboard a boat stocked with “a condom jar, dildos, posters and paintings of naked women, fuzzy handcuffs and a blindfold.”  But Boudreau, whom O’Keefe referred to as a “bubble-headed bleach-blonde,” came off as a pissed-off woman intent on personal payback, and not exactly a serious journalist pursuing a story.

4)  Meanwhile, Larry King keeps getting caught on camera slurping his false teeth, and earnest Anderson Cooper stutters and stammers in a series of bizarre, indignant interviews in which he tries too hard to toughen up his Boy Scout image.

This is all very sad to watch.  It looks like the once-proud network is going down, which will leave us news junkies with only those howling jackals at Fox and MSNBC.  Larry King and his false teeth must clatter at the thought.

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You Don’t Miss It Until It’s Gone

Speaking of sad tidings … it looks like Blockbuster is biting the dust.  Yes, the late fees were outrageous, and yes, they failed to stock the right movies, and yes, they bulldozed a lot of mom-and-pop video stores.  But who among us won’t get a little misty-eyed if and when the chain disappears?  I, for one, will never forget the teenage, acne-ridden clerk who would examine my video at checkout and then loudly announce to everyone within earshot, “Bubble Headed Beach Babes will be due back on Tuesday, sir!”

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I know, it’s disrespectful and in poor taste to make light of the passing of a fellow human being, but dammit … this has to be the funniest headline of the week:

Segway company owner James ‘Jimi’ Heselden dies in England after riding a Segway off cliff

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

A Cure for High Unemployment

There is a remedy for the nation’s unemployed:  aggravating television commercials.

I propose that, in order to receive government benefits, citizens without jobs be required to have their TV sets tuned to regular broadcast or cable channels, 24 hours a day.  No mute buttons, no recording devices.

I guarantee that within a week, unemployment will plummet to below 5 percent.  Desperate to get out of the house and away from their television sets, these people will be escaping from:

1)  Ellen Page and her Cisco ads.  I will never again pay to see this actress in a theatrical film, because she already resides in my living room, thanks to these nauseating, non-stop commercials.  2)  That Pierce Brosnan lookalike in the irritating Geico ads.  3)  The fingernails-scratching-on-a-blackboard music in Progressive ads.  4)  The cloying music that permeates Cialis commercials.

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Poor Randy Jackson.  He is the Frank Gifford of our times.  Gifford, you might recall, was part of the original trio of broadcasters on Monday Night Football, along with Howard Cosell and Don Meredith (I am not counting short-timer Keith Jackson).  Gifford was the dull third wheel in this group.  Meredith and Cosell left the show, but Gifford soldiered on, boring us to tears for decades.

Randy Jackson, third wheel on American Idol, will no doubt stay with the show until the fat lady sings.

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Good reason not to vote for Christine O’Donnell:

Good reason to vote for Christine O’Donnell:

To paraphrase George Sanders in All About Eve, “My dear, you have a point.  An idiotic one, but still a point.”

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

I am an addict.  As addictions go, mine is pretty ugly.  Yes, my name is Grouchy, and I am a Minnesota Vikings fan.

Having this sickness is not easy.  There is no team in professional sports more cursed than the Vikings, no team that does a better job of punishing its fans.  Heard of the “Hail Mary” pass?  The term was born in 1975, when Dallas victimized the Vikings — and I was in the stands.  Heard of the “love boat” scandal?  That boat was filled with Vikings.  Can you name one of two teams in the NFL to make four Super Bowl appearances — and lose all four games?  Guess which team boasts the only player in NFL history to run the wrong way for a touchown? That would be Viking Jim Marshall, way back in 1964.

One day in the 1980s, my sister ran into Howard Cosell on a sidewalk in New York.  During their conversation, it came out that she was a Vikings fan.  Cosell snorted and said to her, “They’ll never win anything.”

And now Brett Favre is a member of this cursed team.  Let us see what horrors this new season brings.

Sainz Appeal

Generally, I don’t care much for professional jocks, who too often are rude, entitled jerks.  But I side with the New York Jets concerning this female sports reporter brouhaha.  Mexican journalist Ines Sainz wants to have it both ways.  She wants to be respected as a serious reporter while strutting around the men’s locker-room in skin-tight attire.  She uses sex to advance her career — does she really expect these guys to just ignore that?

Lady Gags Me

Speaking of pigskin … there is only one way that Lady Gaga can top the meat dress she wore to the MTV Video Music Awards.  Next time, she should wear something with live critters.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

I suppose I should know better than to seek moral enlightenment from programs like Showbiz Tonight, but sometimes the double standards are simply breath-taking.  Brooke Anderson, grinning bimbo and co-host of the show, breathlessly informed viewers of a “catfight” between two women on Jersey Shore.  “These young women having fistfights — are you loving it, or is it just over the top?” giggled Brooke.

Not five minutes later, Brooke took 84-year-old Jerry Lewis to task for suggesting that Lindsay Lohan be spanked for her misbehavin’ ways.

In summary, viewers are invited to delight in what might constitute felony assault on Jersey Shore, but shame on dirty old man Jerry.

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Trendy Shows That I Refuse to Watch

The media fawn over certain shows, whether the public agrees or not.  When you look at the numbers, it seems that what determines a “hit” in today’s fragmented viewing market is hardly the same as in the past, when there were clear ratings juggernauts like Gunsmoke or All in the Family.  Glee, Mad Men, Jersey Shore … all enjoy media adulation — and relatively small fan bases.

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Another Thing About Sports …

Why is it that in sports like tennis and golf, the crowd is expected to hush, but not so in other sports?  When a basketball player lines up for a crucial, last-second free throw, does that not require the same type of concentration that a golfer must summon for an important putt?  Yet in basketball, the crowds are encouraged to do everything possible to distract the poor shooter, whereas in golf, well … shhhhh!

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

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“I tend almost never to throw other films under the bus, but that [Piranha] is exactly an example of what we should not be doing in 3-D.  When movies got to the bottom of the barrel of their creativity and at the last gasp of their financial lifespan, they did a 3-D version to get the last few drops out of the turnip.” — James Cameron, creatively dropping clichés like “throw under the bus” and “last few drops out of the turnip.”

So let me get this straight:  Re-releasing Avatar with just a few additional minutes of footage, and then charging full admission, is somehow not getting “the last few drops out of the turnip”?

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I was thumbing through Entertainment Weekly when I saw a picture from the TV series Sons of Anarchy.  The picture was of star Katey Sagal and some kindly, grandmotherly actress.  I recognized Sagal, but who was this elderly actress?   I read the photo caption:  Hal Holbrook.

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“It is fabulous to see girls and young women poised for success in the coming years.  But allowing generations of boys to grow up feeling rootless and obsolete is not a recipe for a peaceful future.  Men have few natural support groups and little access to social welfare; the men’s-rights groups that do exist in the U.S. are taking on an angry, antiwoman edge.  Marriages fall apart or never happen at all, and children are raised with no fathers.  Far from being celebrated, women’s rising power is perceived as a threat.” — Hanna Rosin in The Atlantic .

My theory is that society is a pendulum and that now it’s swinging to the side of estrogen.  When society declares some members the “winners” and some the “losers,” that means that — unlike what feminism would have us believe — not everybody wins.  So, how to correct the imbalance?  The same way that feminism encouraged fathers to support their daughters:  Mothers will have to stand up for their sons.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

Trendy Expressions to Throw Under the Bus

iReporters —  Just because you have a camera on your cell phone and you happened to be at Sea World when Shamu the Killer Whale gobbled up a trainer, that does not make you a journalist.  You are a schmuck with a camera who happened to get lucky.

Optics — CNN, Fox News, NBC, CBS — all of the networks — have fallen in love with this irritating new way of saying “image,” “visuals,” or “photo ops,” all of which are perfectly good terms.

Throw Him or Her Under the Bus — I guess you’re no longer allowed to backstab or double-cross anyone.

Back in the Day — This stopped being cute way back in the day.

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Stephen King’s Bad Habits

What do the following books have in common?  Christine, Misery, The Shining, Carrie, Cujo, The Dead Zone.

Now what do these books have in common?  Cell, Duma Key, Under the Dome, Insomnia, From a Buick 8.

If you said the first batch of Stephen King novels became movies, and the second group did not, you are correct.  If you said that the first six books were much, much better than the last five books, you would also be correct.  But why is that?

King often writes about quitting his old drinking and drugging habits, and we are all very happy for his new life of sobriety, but you can’t tell me that dropping those vices hasn’t affected his writing — in a bad way.  As far as I’m concerned, King wrote his last really good novel , Misery, in 1987.  That was the year he quit drinking and drugging.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

Ambler Alert Issued for Elderly Man

Mitford Mitkowski

By AL BORE, Associated Press

Last Update:  August 21, 2010 – 5:55 AM

LAS VEGAS, Nevada – Investigators are combing hotels and casinos along the Las Vegas strip in search of a 65-year-old Southern California man who vanished after he was released from custody for not paying a bill for a meal.  Investigators began their frantic search after calls went out for the man’s whereabouts by television personality Nancy Grace.  Grace, the tough-talking fixture on cable news channel CNN, often takes an interest in the disappearances of unattractive, elderly men.

Mitford Mitkowski, a former toilet-lid salesman, was arrested last September at a restaurant in Malibu, California, because he did not have money to settle his check at a downscale truck stop.  Mitkowski’s parents, Marvin and Millie Mitkowski, have been deceased for many years and could not be reached for comment.

In related news, police located several dozen attractive white females and 12 cute, gap-toothed children, all reported missing and all boarding the same plane to Buenos Aires.  One of the missing persons, 9-year-old Amber Bamber, told authorities that all of them were trying to get as far away as possible from the United States.

“We just couldn’t take it anymore,” Bamber said, removing bubble gum from her mouth.  “We wanted to move to a country  far away from Nancy Grace, because her show reports us “missing” even if we are just walking down to the store.  We can’t help it that we are so cute.”

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Yes, I know people were hurt.  But I can’t help laughing at The Revenge of the Bull in Spain this week, in which the beast leaped into a crowd at a bullfight and scattered spectators like so many cowchips.

If you haven’t seen the video that I’m referring to,  you can watch it here. 

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

Poop List:  Female Honoree — Jennifer Aniston

It takes a lot to get me to side with Bill O’Reilly, but not this week.  Jennifer Aniston, plugging a new movie in which a woman gets pregnant using a sperm donor, shared this bit of wisdom:  “Women are realizing it more and more, knowing that they don’t have to settle with a man just to have that child.”  She went on, “And, of course, many women dream of finding Prince Charming, but for those who’ve not yet found their Bill O’Reilly, I’m just glad science has provided a few other options.”

O’Reilly had said that Aniston’s original comments were “destructive to our society … diminishing the role of the dad.”  He added, “I think men get hosed all day long in the parental arena.”

O’Reilly is correct and Aniston is acting the pampered movie star whose love life isn’t everything she expected.  Imagine if a male celebrity (say, Mel Gibson) suggested that women should just give birth and then turn the kids over to men for child raising.

Poop List:  Male Honoree — Johan Santana

Yawn.  Another week, and another jock getting his wrist slapped for alleged sexual assault.  OK, even if the Mets pitcher is innocent of the assault, he still got busted cheating on his wife.

Too Tired to Poop List:  Steven Slater

I am already sick of this guy.  You made a grand exit once.  Now do it again, please.

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Worthless Technology

Security cameras      Every time my local news anchor asks me to keep an eye out for some culprit caught on camera, often in a convenience store, the picture looks like this:

Or this:

These “security” pictures are about as helpful as erectile dysfunction.  Speaking of which …

How desperate are some men for better nookie?  These are the potential side effects of something called sildenafil:

“Some patients experienced a sudden loss of some or all of their vision … the vision loss was permanent in some cases … there have been reports of heart attack, stroke, irregular heartbeat, bleeding in the brain or lungs, high blood pressure, and sudden death in men who took sildenafil for erectile dysfunction.”

Wouldn’t you rather just take a cold shower?

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