Greg Mitchell's Blog, page 298

Trayvon Targets

A police officer in the Florida city of Port Canaveral has been suspended (maybe fired) for making and using a Trayvon Martin target for gun practice and offering others to three other officers.    More here. "Port Canaveral, Fla. Interim Chief Executive Officer John Walsh told WFTV on Saturday that Sgt. Ron King (left) was leading a target practice with two other officers and a civilian when he pulled out the targets April 4. Walsh says King asked the group if they wanted to use the targets, and they said no."  UPDATE:  Video added below:

Just Nuke Me, Please

Somehow, end of the world might be preferable to having to watch, and especially, listen to another No. Korean propaganda video, with missiles hitting U.S. to the sounds of synths and bad electric guitars.  Also, they place target in Colorado in Louisiana.  Now, that's fighting words!

Saturday Night Music Pick

Greatest (mature) pickup song ever?  Van Morrison's re-make of "I'll Take of You."  And below, originator Bobby "Blue" Bland.  And finally,  Ms. Irma Thomas.  Yes, we will spare you the Rihanna and Drake version.

Which One's Sonny and Which One's Cher?

Gotta be the strangest duet of recent rock epochs, from 1973, with David "Ziggy" Bowie joined by "So Long" Marianne Faithfull (as a flying nun?) on "I Got You, Babe."   (h/t Paul Slansky)

Ross-ified

Yet another laughable Ross Douthat column coming in print in NYT tomorrow but just posted online.   Hitting media bias but along the way joins the ranks of rightwingers bashing the supposedly liberal media for ignoring the practices of a certain "abortion doctor"--even though the rightwing media and blogs also pretty much ignored it.  Enjoy the hypocrisy of Douthat, who often writes about the abortion issue himself, not once mentioning this case--until today.

“Leading the conversation” is how you end up with the major Sunday shows somehow neglecting to invite a single anti-amnesty politician on a weekend dominated by the immigration debate. It’s how you end up with officially nonideological anchors and journalists lecturing social conservatives for being out of step with modern values. And it’s how you end up with a press corps that went all-in for the supposed “war on women” having to be shamed and harassed — by two writers in particular, Kirsten Powers in USA Today and Mollie Ziegler Hemingway of GetReligion — into paying attention to the grisly case of a Philadelphia doctor whose methods of late-term abortion included snipping the spines of neonates after they were delivered.

As the last example suggests, the problem here isn’t that American journalists are too quick to go on crusades. Rather, it’s that the press’s ideological blinders limit the kinds of crusades mainstream outlets are willing to entertain, and the formal commitment to neutrality encourages self-deception about what counts as crusading.

The Boy Who Cried Wolfowitz: Bomb Korea!

Yes, the NYT feels the need to carry an op-ed tonight by a not-so-noted young prof from the University of Texas calling for us to bomb North Korea while we have the chance.  I love the lines that all-out war is not likely but "not-inconceivable"  and China's role "hard to predict." Sounds good. What could go wrong?

A war on the Korean Peninsula is unlikely after an American strike, but it is not inconceivable. The North Koreans might continue to escalate, and Mr. Kim might feel obligated to start a war to save face. Under these unfortunate circumstances, the United States and its allies would still be better off fighting a war with North Korea today, when the conflict could still be confined largely to the Korean Peninsula.

 Greg Mitchell's new book on another pre-emtpive war, in Iraq, and media malpractice is "So Wrong for So Long."  

Friday Night Music Pick

Hugh Laurie, actor, and Allen Toussaint do Fess's "Tipitina," our true National Anthem.

Report: A-Roid Bought Drug Docs

When I picked up the NYT today (yes, some people still do that, from the front lawn) and saw that a major league baseball player had purchased docs from that clinic to destroy them and keep them from baseball officials and the law.  My first thought was: A-Roid, of course.  Now NYT reports that this seems to be the case.   Lifetime ban coming?  Arrest? Please?

Investigators for Major League Baseball have uncovered what they believe is evidence that a representative of Alex Rodriguez purchased medical records from a person connected to a South Florida anti-aging clinic that is suspected of providing performance-enhancing drugs to a number of major leaguers, according to two people briefed on the matter. 

Steve Earle Takes a Village

The Wall St. Journal tags along as one of my heroes roams my old neighborhood, near my where I lived on Bleecker St., checking out guitars,  tossing $20 to street musicians, lunching on escargots, chatting about the needs of his autistic son, and rapping about his new album.   First single off the record (starts at Brooklyn Bridge).

Levon: Well Enough Alone

First trailer for upcoming Levon Helm doc.   Screening tomorrow up in Woodstock but sold out.  If you care, I've just finished my first novel--set partly at Big Pink.  Also, a memoir of my years at Crawdaddy.  Write me at epic1934@aol.com if interested in either....