Fox News deserves the Pulitzer Reward for what is easily and by a long chalk my most very favorite journalism news story so far of 2014. This is the good stuff, a remarkable, quite recherche biscuit, and an ineffable pancake:
A Republican Senate candidate was kicked out of a local Oregon newspaper's editorial board meeting after daring to challenge a reporter who dissed a fellow candidate by writing "blah blah blah" in his notes instead of her actual quotes.
Oh my how not civil. Cue comical vapors.
Punchlines:
The video shows an editorial board meeting where the newspaper was interviewing Republican candidates for Senate. One of those candidates, Jo Rae Perkins, was responding to a question over the phone when Callahan noticed something was amiss.
"You want to talk about disrespect, I see what you're writing down there," he said, pointing at a reporter at the table. "You just wrote down 'blah blah blah blah blah' for everything that Jo Rae said. Jo Rae is a respectable woman. Why are you not respecting her by writing 'blah blah blah blah blah' on your notepad?"
The moderator tried to get Callahan to "move on" and answer a question about whether climate change is a "myth or a reality."
Callahan said "myth."
Then, the same reporter, later identified by the newspaper as Nigel Jaquiss, asked him a follow-up: "Where are you on the Easter Bunny?"
And....
As for what touched off the argument, the newspaper said Jaquiss was writing "blah blah blah" when Perkins, "who was supposed to be talking about health care, was instead talking about eliminating the U.S. Forest Service."
"Nigel Jaquiss" sounds like an Game of Thrones character who gets casually knifed, but the Easter Bunny rejoinder made me laugh.
Horrible idiots ought not to expect civility, though you see why clamor for it. It's a cheap way of pretending you belong at the grownup table, despite exhibiting otherwise utterly grotesque, stupid, and awful behavior.
Speaking of which, here is the Notional Revue presenting an EXCLUSIVE! statement from Condoleeza Rice on withdrawing from speaking at Rutgers just because people don't like how she got lots of people killed for no reason:
I am honored to have served my country. I have defended America’s belief in free speech and the exchange of ideas. These values are essential to the health of our democracy. But that is not what is at issue here. As a Professor for thirty years at Stanford University and as it’s former Provost and Chief academic officer, I understand and embrace the purpose of the commencement ceremony and I am simply unwilling to detract from it in any way.
All hail the humble apostrophe, with all "it's" quiet eloquence.