What happens when the dog finally catches the car? Mike Bettes' open heart in Joplin; Aaron Barnhart misses THE ethical question in the Star

Watching Mike Bettes, the Weather Channel's tornado chaser, catch his prey Sunday afternoon in Joplin was one of those moments of live television which stop you in your tracks. It was not hard to see that Bettes had gotten more than he bargained for.

The wise injunction to 'be careful what you wish for,' may have gone through his head at the moment he stood among the bare shards of trees and cars, the devastated hospital framing the sky in the background.

Bettes seemed quite sincerely moved. So often television turns life into a game of sorts -- a contest, a reality show. We know it does this to politics and political scientists suspect this is destructive to our schema about what is really at stake in an election.

Talk to a Vietnam veteran -- anti-war or not -- about how television coverage led away from the reality of that bleak moment in history rather than revealing it. My sense is early on Vietnam was covered as a trench war -- like WWI or the Civil War, or even WWII -- geographical coverage that lent itself to maps and advances and retreats, territory taken or lost. Reality was much different.

So, it is no surprise tornado chasing has perhaps obscured the reality of these enormously destructive storms. Mike Bettes seemed to be realizing this Sunday afternoon. We must be grateful to him for allowing his emotions to show. Television is best at showing emotion and genuine emotion -- not scripted, not contrived -- is rare on television these days.

Aaron Barnhart, the Kansas City Star's television "critic", wrote about Bettes today, but his piece was little more than a collage of one-liners from good sources. It was, in modern parlance, well-sourced but it was written on auto-pilot. Barnhart missed THE most important question raised by Mike Bettes at the scene, and today amplified by the presence of everyone from Al Roker to Anderson Cooper, and every television talker in this town.

Let's go back to the moments after the storm and Mike Bettes holding the microphone, stunned and humbled by the utter destruction as far has his cameraman could pan. A man comes up, stage left, obviously distraught, moves into the frame, tells Bettes he's just burrowed out of his house and he needs help finding his 74-year-old neighbor. Great television, eh?

You can see the ethical problem developing like a storm cloud in the reporter's head. Does he help? Or does he film? He tries feebly to evade the horns of the bull by telling the guy he will help and walking back with him to what might have been a house. But he doesn't really help -- what could he do with one hand -- and, if memory serves, we are abruptly switched to commercial so we never really know what came next.

Here's how you phrase the question: Confronted with immediate need, do you continue to broadcast or do you put down the microphone and begin trying to move lumber?

The answer might seem simple to those who are not reporters, which is one clue reporters need to notice. People who aren't reporters say, "Well, yes. Of course." But reporters often take another position, a position their bosses take even more strongly. My job is not to rescue; my job is to report. We all have our jobs.

For Bettes, the argument is more difficult because he was not just reporting but also warning. On the microphone, he was telling people, literally, the tornado is still on the ground east of here, for god sake, take cover. He had a compelling reason to keep talking.

Still, a man may have been trapped under that rubble behind him. He could have put the microphone down, and his cameraman could have put the camera down, and they both could have started pawing through the debris. Would you have blamed them? Would you have applauded?

I was raising this issue in the abstract in class several years ago when a student held up his hand. His father, he said, had been a cameraman at a local television station -- I don't recall which -- and had been one of the first to arrive at the scene of the Hyatt Regency collapse in 1981 where about the same number of people were crushed by concrete as died in the Joplin twister. In fact, he had arrived before fire and police -- a true first responder that day. He could hear cries for help inside the rubble. My student said his father called into the station on the radio and told his boss he was putting down the camera and going in.

According to my student, his boss told him his job was to take pictures and he'd be fired if he didn't.

He didn't and he was fired.

As you can imagine, our discussion went from abstract to real in a heartbeat. That's what reality does. It takes the abstract -- a tornado forming because the jet stream is stuck in a late winter mode -- and makes it real. Mike Bettes gave us a glimpse of what happens when reality strikes and we have to be grateful to him for opening his heart and our eyes. And, in his dilemma, we glimpsed a big ethical issue -- are reporters, when the rubber of a crisis meets the road, observers or doers? Which raises the even bigger ethical issue of what television does to us viewers when it turns its mighty power to making us passive observers rather than doers.

And if the television observer at the local newspaper can't see the real dilemma here, the reality of our passivity will continue to elude us, both as viewers and as professionals in news. This was a genuine lost moment -- on television and in print. If the Star could spare Aaron Barnhart from television criticism and send him to Joplin to cover the damage and the rescue effort, he would -- if he were not on ethical auto-pilot -- be forced to face this critical issue.

--Lofflin

I see where Tony wrote on this, too, this morning. I think he missed the point also because he was thinking in the old-school journalism way about objectivity and the passivity being objective requires. That's a surprise coming from Tony's Kansas City.

All hell is breaking loose in the world... we interrupt this program for an important announcement: Kansas does not win NCAA championship!

The world is in serious trouble. Budgets for education and health care are being cut dramatically. (What’s wrong with this picture?) Nuclear water 100,000 times more radioactive than normal ambient readings, is leaking into the Pacific Ocean. The Middle East is in turmoil, caught in a revolutionary wild fire.

And Kansas lost to VCU in the Elite Eight.

As I said, the world is in serious trouble.

OK, I knew Kansas was in trouble about two minutes into the game when, with a 6-0 lead, the camera caught one of The Twins exhorting the crowd to cheer. Six-zero does not indicate a significant moment in the game. The job ain’t done… the job has barely begun. Had a sense of entitlement set in?

Somebody needed to explain to the players the difference between entitle-ment and title win.

What followed was a disappointing evening for the faithful. Have you ever tried to strike wet matches to light a campfire? You just keep thinking the next one will spark up and you’ll get that tinder going and any minute now the flames will spread.

For a minute it looked like the sparks might catch on, but then a couple of defensive assignments were forgotten and the team with no entitlement came raging back.

Here’s the stunning part. The eight-graph Kansas City Star article – I’m still confused about why a sports writer at such an event could only squeeze out eight graphs before morning – garnered 94 pages of comments within two hours. Today it stands at 1,300 comments despite being retired from the front page of the Web site. Another Elite Eight story garnered more than 900 comments.

Which adds up to more than 2,200 instances of the most vacuous drool the human mind has ever produced.

Yes, the world is in serious trouble. Kansas lost in the Elite Eight. Fifty-six teams, including Ohio and Duke, went home first. And, by the way, pink slips went out in the Kansas City, Kansas school district -- 57 comments --, the Shawnee Mission School District is set to slash million from its budget, six nuclear reactors are in serious trouble in Japan, the United States is participating in a third simultaneous war, the Middle East has come unhinged…

Stay tuned for further developments ... on KU basketball.

--Lofflin -- and if you want to think more about "irony and outrage" read this fine story from today's New York Times (while it's still free...)

PPS: If I were a basketball coach I would put an immediate stop to this habit of raising the arms above the head begging fans to cheer. Everything about this all-too-common WWE-style practice is wrong. It absolutely shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what is happening in the game. Are you actually saying, "Hey, we did something great here but you people in the stands didn't recognize it because you're too stupid?" If I were a coach, I'd tell my players -- let your actions tell the story. If you play well enough, the fans will cheer. If you don't (or if it is only two minutes into the game...) they won't cheer. Your focus is on the game -- or it should be. Let the cheerleaders do their jobs and you do yours.

Reed photo courtesy: http://www.stsnews.com/news-morris-twins-lead-kansas-past-texas-a/

Morris photo courtesy: http://www.kansan.com/staff/mike_lavieri/

Story of career diswasher killed by hit and run driver is moving; a great example of beautiful writing and solid journalism

Back in the saddle, almost, after finally finishing (I think) the process of writing a course for delivery entirely by one and zero -- in other words -- through computer screens and on line.

Imagine someone asks you to write down how to make a left turn in your car. Problem is, the person doesn't know what a steering wheel is, what a brake pedal is, or, what left is. When you write for on-line delivery, at least at our place, you have to create not only instructions for students but instructions -- on the left turn model -- for teachers. Ugh.

I don't usually send you elsewhere, but today I am. And, I'm not sending you to I-70 baseball because I'm sure you've been there.

I'm sending you to the St. Petersburg Fla., Times. The Times is a progressive newspaper in both design and writing, and a student hepped me to an absolutely stunning piece there.

This piece is stunning in its simplicity. It is a perfect example, in my opinion, of the art of journalism. It perfectly illustrates the aesthetic of journalism, what journalists think is beautiful in writing. This is not the same, generally, as what English teachers think is beautiful. Poets may appreciate it -- I'm not sure.

The piece grows out of a controversy broiling in the profession which I have mentioned here as my secret pleasure - the comments section under stories in daily newspapers and Web pages. The controversy centers on the most outlandish, childish, racist and tasteless comments in these threads. The newspaper wants to be a forum. It seeks democracy. It seeks full First Amendment rights. But, the news stories themselves are edited for taste, style, and content in the name of decency and to fit the standards of the community.

The motto of the New York Times before "All the news that's fit to print" was "It doesn't soil the breakfast cloth."

Well, what's appearing in comment sections today does more than soil the breakfast cloth.

And the St. Pete paper recently ran a story about a 48-year-old career dishwasher, Neil Alan Smith, who was killed in a hit and run accident. The driver has not been caught. In the comments section under the story someone (oh, I'd like to add some adjectives here, but will refrain) wrote that a 48-year-old dishwasher is probably better off dead.

This is not unusual for comments sections. I guarantee you can find something of similar worth in the comments under the stories in today's Kansas City Star.

The St. Pete Times, however, decided to do a full obit on the dishwasher and Andrew Meacham's piece is brilliant. It should win an award. It should make the commentator crawl under a rock. It should be read by everyone. You can find it here.

--Lofflin

Big questions about the girl in the polka dot bikini, folks sucking in their guts and the future of photojournalism poolside at The Jones

Who are these people?

(You can plug in the lyric from "Who are you..." here if you are a Who fan.)

One of my guilty pleasures is the photo galleries the Star posts to its Web site via INK. This one is about a pool party on the roof of the long-gone Jones Store. Go there, then come back.

I say to you again, who are these people? Never in the history of photography have so many people expended so much effort holding their bellies in. You can almost hear the choir of sighs after the camera goes off.

And what are these poses? Who are they imitating? Do they all imagine they are shooting a still version of a rap video? Hmmm....Not a very integrated rap video, eh? I mean, what are these poses they are striking about?

The star here seems to be the young woman in a polka dot bikini. Isn't that a song from the 1950s? Somebody needs to buy her a sandwich. Maybe she's in so many pictures because she doesn't have to hold her belly in. It's concave.

And is this the proud future of photojournalism?

--Lofflin, puzzling the mysteries of the universe.

Don't miss the real meat in Jason Whitlock's bizarre Shakespearean Sandwich -- the money quote, to be or not to be... a reporter or a celebrity

While most focus on the sauce, the meat of Jason Whitlock’s Big Sandwich, if you can find it, is probably a lot more nutritious.

Strip all the intriguing… salacious… details away. Why did Mr. Whitlock quit writing for the Kansas City Star on May 26?

According to Mr. Whitlock, he quit because his editor told him he could not credit another news source in his column. Bare bones, he made his stand on only this point. I’ve made stands on points just as seemingly mundane, and, of course, that’s where all the other saucy stuff comes in. If he hadn’t slathered on the sad history of his entire career in journalism, seasoned by a few references to childhood and college, the explanation would have lasted a good hundred eighty seconds instead of a hundred eighty minutes.

His editor said you can’t reference Yahoo.com in your story. Mr. Whitlock drew a line in the sand.

Now, you can look at this at least two ways. The first is the way Mr. Whitlock chose. The “awards culture” of the Kansas City Star -- fueled by the evil characters in his tragic narrative -- thought the piece he had written might bring the newspaper another plaque for the wall at 17th and Grand. The judges would not look kindly on a reference to someone else’s reporting for a major portion of the story.

It is not uncommon to think this way if you are thinking about awards. If you want to submit a wonderful design in the design category, you can’t use a background of roses you downloaded from the Web. You need to go out and shoot some roses for yourself and build the design from your own work.

The other way to look at this pivotal incident is this. Mr. Whitlock’s editor may have been demanding he develop the Yahoo.com part of the story himself, quoting his own sources and, hopefully, adding his own detail. If this was the case, you can’t fault her, or her superiors. Most editors would make the same demand. And, they should make the same demand.

I wasn’t there, so I don’t know. But I do find a lot of columnists today are little more than amalgamators, stitching together “reports” into stories then pouring on their own special sauce of opinion. The special sauce is their claim to fame. In essence, it is their celebrity. They think in terms of their brand, of using their brand to drive traffic to themselves – and, incidentally, to their publication.

Not a bad strategy for Rosedale Bar-B-Que. Let your sauce do the talking. Of course, the meat ain't bad at Rosedale either.

Amalgamating is essentially what most bloggers do. It is easier than the care and feeding of good sources, working the phones, attending the games or the city council meetings, and sitting down for the long interview it might take to get the one money quote.

The other way is to gather “reports” and let the money quote come from you.

You become the money quote.

More often than not, Mr. Whitlock has been his own money quote. He said as much Friday.

It’s possible Mr. Whitlock’s line in the sand has to do with both perspectives, the “awards culture” of a newspaper and the “celebrity culture” of columnists today.

--Lofflin … and, yes, I’m writing this in the back of the kitchen with a cup of strong coffee and one eye on the hummingbirds outside. No original reporting here. But, whoa!, I needed to leave for work six paragraphs ago. And, I don’t expect to win an award for this little ditty nor do I expect to get paid. Therein likes the big flaw in the notion of citizen journalism.

Who gives a rat's whatever about sports talk or talker ethics? New school attacks the old school (spit) journalism...

I haven't heard the word "journalism" spoken anywhere with such distaste ... not Sarah Palin, not Sam Shepard playing Chuck Yeager in "The Right Stuff," not even in academia.

I'm listening to a snippet of one of the morning sports talk talkers. This is as close as I can get to the quote by writing it on a peanut bag balanced against the steering wheel.

"We're able to get away with more because the standards for what's right have dropped," the guy growled.

In the sentence before he said something about how "journalists" wouldn't like what he was about to say. Something about how media people wouldn't agree with him, about how he would be the bad guy among media people. Maybe even to his boss for saying this. Not a bad listenership ploy, I suppose. Paint yourself as the victim, the outsider, even before you speak.

"But you don't care," he said with the confidence of the clairvoyant. "As a sports fan you don't give a rat's (something) about whether a journalist asks Tim Tebow for his autograph."

That's close enough for you to get the meaning, I think.

What got me was the way he expectorated the word "journalist." I'm not sure what that was about. I know in studying humor, some theorists think when you happen on particularly over the top humor, it usually indicates something psychological lurking just under the surface of the humorist or the society. Or both...

(One thing I have to figure out how to do is wire my car radio so it goes directly to XM music in the morning if I've listened to the ball game on it the night before. )

As I said, I only caught a snippet. About enough to back out of the driveway and get to the corner to turn left. So I'm just speculating on the story behind this rant. I'm sorry, I could listen longer. I just couldn't take the voice. You know, I'm not asking for the professional big boy voice that was kind to the ears in the old days. I'm not that old school. I'm just asking for a voice that doesn't sound like a blender on puree. Or, as I said a few blogs ago about an afternoon talker, like your mother nagging you about cutting the grass.

Does it matter to you if "journalists" fawn over the folks they are paid to cover?

I heard a story that I haven't been able to confirm, so take it as a "what if..." The story goes like this: One year the Los Angeles Rams gave every beat reporter a color television at the end of the season.

Now, as a fan, would you expect those reporters to write tough things about the Rams? I wouldn't. Those guys have to be wondering what the gift will be next year. A car? Better to keep your mouth shut and stay on the beat. Better not to do anything to get yourself reassigned.

At one time I read the Kansas City Star bought two season tickets every year for its Royals reporters even though they never sat in the seats. I don't know if they still follow that practice but it was the right thing to do.

The New York Times did an interesting story on a new school television reporter who is also a conditioning agent for NFL athletes. Boy, that's somebody you want to trust with the straight goods.

I've been wined and dined by sources who refused to let me pay. When I got home I sent them checks for the dinner, explaining that as a reporter I simply could not accept their generosity (and I submitted expense account reports in the same amount to the magazines... Now, that's not old school -- that's business).

You just can't let the reader or listener think you might be biased by the gifts you're offered. So, no, I don't want the people who cover sports fawning over athletes they are supposed to tell me the truth about. I don't want them accepting tee-shirts or hats or other perks they are offered on their beats.

And although I've often suspected it, I don't want them to make it obvious to me that they are really star struck in the locker room. The way they ask what they consider tough questions makes you think of an orderly trying to calm a suicidal mental patent in the emergency room.

Surely this sports talker would not want the Star's city hall reporter to accept gifts from the mayor. If the mayor wrote a book, surely he wouldn't want the guy fawning over an autographed copy. And surely he wouldn't want a supplier of snow plows sending the mayor on a free golfing junket to Florida just before the decision on which plows to buy is made. In politics, that's called conflict of interest and among politicians and business people it's often against the law. The law takes it seriously.

So, bottom line, his argument -- the little I heard -- seemed to be these things just aren't important in sports and to sports fans. And, about that, he may be right. Sports may not be very important in the dangerous world we occupy. Perhaps not even important enough to listen to some guy debate with himself whether the football coach should be more open to the press or why Brett Farve decided to return for another season.

On second thought, why would anybody tune into these guys? Unless, of course, he was listening to the ballgame on that radio the night before.

--Lofflin

Thoughts on KU loss, Jenee and Jason, sports, weddings and the responsibility of students to do good in the world with what they learn..

...
I'm afraid to write after Matt's surprising piece on trash day.

But, being a writer, write I must. Take this entry as a work in progress. Literally. I'll add to it later in the day. I do have a day job.

I'm still digesting the KU loss Saturday evening. I have to admit to feeling generally depressed after the final buzzer -- a freak snowstorm also contributes to my bleak view of the fairness of life. Here are several strangely related thoughts (I'll let you figure out if they are related and how):

1) I happened onto a Jeneé Osterheldt column from early March yesterday. Don't ask how -- it has to do with when and where I do the daily crossword. It was about a young college graduate who was lucky enough to land a job right out of school. She graduated in special education and was able immediately to put the skills a whole team of people labored hard for four or five years to give her to work in the community.

But that wasn't what Jenee was happy about. Jenee was happy this young suburban woman had decided mid-year to resign her position in special education to concentrate on planning her wedding and "working on her marriage."

Now, aside from the hard fact that her marriage stands less than a 50-50 chance of taking, what rankles is the resignation. What about the children? She just walked out on a group of children who need her. She walked out so she can tend to what amounts to a self-absorbed, overblown, celebration of ... her! Special ed kids need consistency more than any others. But wedding and marriage planning trumped her responsibility to the community.

Now, as a man, I know I do not understand weddings, despite having been through three of them -- only one of which took. I do understand girls grow up dreaming of weddings the way I grew up dreaming about standing on the pitching mound in a major league ball park. I get it.

But, I don't get walking out in the middle of the year on the kids. Even to play major league baseball. (Can't believe I wrote that...)

But read the article for yourself. Tell me it isn't all about me, right down to the Dave Ramsey prosperity religion stuff. She felt pressure in college (from her parents, I presume) to find a career and, since she chose education, apparently she wanted a career helping people learn. Now she wishes she had gone in graphic design.

One thing I think college students miss today is their responsibility. As teachers, we have studied 20,30, 50 years to learn what we have to pass onto them in four years. We show up every day, do our best to teach, agonize over how to present difficult ideas, agonize over grades, agonize over how to show them what it means to be a citizen in a community, registrars get them into the right classes and rooms, financial aid officers get them money, the cafeteria feeds them ... they have a responsibility to go out into the world and do good.

That's what I said. They have a responsibility to go out into the world and do good.

No matter how much money they paid for their education, they owe us this.

I tried once to build this concept into the mission statement of the university where I teach but the phrase didn't make it out of committee. I know the idea that education is about doing good in the world flies against the consumer concept of education. The drive up window metaphor for education doesn't fit this idea. Imagine the kid at the drive up window telling you to remember you have a responsibility to eat that hamburger and get stronger from it so you can do good in the world because a cow gave its life and the staff inside prepared it lovingly for you. Sounds silly, I admit. But, dammit, higher education is not a drive up window and ideas are not hamburgers.

2) Jason Whitlock is the most inconsistent writer in big time journalism. Red Smith said it was impossible to write a column every day and not have a clinker once in a while. But Whitlock puts the great sports columnist's idea to the test. He writes well one day and terrible the next. This is more about the editor than the writer, in my opinion. His column today about the blame game in KU's loss is disorganized, unthoughtful, ragged and weak. It's really just a rough draft and apparently no one at the Star is deputized to tell him so.

First, he does exactly what he says he shouldn't. He hands out blame, though he waits until the last graph to do so. Then, inexplicably, he drops race into the picture -- arguing three teams were under-seeded in the tournament because they were predominantly white. I'm inferring this because he doesn't bother giving what could be an interesting idea more than quick jab. And, like the Missouri defense, he's all over the place. In basketball, this is good. In writing it is disrespectful to the reader.

3) The difference is amazing. While Kansas fans writhe over a defeat in the second round of the NCAA tournament, Missouri fans celebrate a defeat in the second round of the tournament. What does this mean? My guess is it speaks volumes about the media circus which surrounds college basketball these days.

I think one reason for KU's stunning loss of composure was the media. Here is a prime example. In the press conference after the first victory (If I were a college coach I'd only send the end of the bench boys out to meet the press for this exact reason...) Tyrel Reed was asked by a reporter if all he does now is look for the three-pointer. Reed, who appears to be basketball smart, was taken aback by this. No, he protested. Three's are what they've been giving me. I take what I can get.

The seed, however, was planted. Reed may have thought it denigrating to be seen as just a three-point shooter rather than a driver. He may also have thought if other teams think the three is all he has, they may overplay him outside and to survive he needs to drive once in a while. And, so, in the waning seconds of the crucial game with come-from-behind victory in his grasp, he turned down an open three and drove to the bucket where he was called for a charge. It was, by the way, the right call. You have to guess the reporter's question was squirming around somewhere in the back of his mind just before that ill-fated drive.

But, tears? Players collapsed on the floor? Comparisons to the emotions of losing a child? Fans too depressed to be civil at dinner? It was just sports. Right? It was just a game. Right?

-- Lofflin, too depressed to be civil at dinner...

Is the balloon boy news?

Now that we've heard every detail of the Heene family and the Balloon Boy saga, the media is doing its job and turning the magnifying glass on itself. I've seen several cable news reports and editorials examining the way the media covered the event.

My favorite line came from a talking head on a cable news program, who said that since the whole incident was nothing but a hoax, essentially "The whole world watched a balloon floating in the air for three hours."

That same segment questioned whether the story was really news.

You bet your ass it's news.

It's news because people are interested in it, some - including myself - downright fascinated.

It's news because, as one paper estimated, as much as $2 million was spent in the rescue efforts.

It's news because one American family, with little more than a jumbo-sized role of aluminum foil and a helium tank, was able to capture the attention of the nation.

And it's news because thousands of people in Denver and millions more around the globe, either through prayers, ideas or actions, came together to help save a little boy in trouble.

Just because he wasn't really in trouble doesn't mean it's not news.

I'd love to hear what John has to say about this, as well as any of our other readers with connections to the news business.

--Matt Kelsey

The carelessness of the local TV news

Local television news shows have always depended on newspapers to get their information. But now that newspapers are disappearing, what are local news programs going to do to make sure their news is accurate?

Nothing, apparently.

Last night I was watching a local news broadcast (I think it was Channel 9,but I'm not 100% sure - they all seem the same to me). During their short report on the Royals' win over the White Sox, the sports anchor made not one but TWO mistakes about players' names. Now, I'm the last to criticize simple proofreading errors made by reporters - God knows I made more than my fair share during my career (like the time I wrote that the Civil War took place in 1962). But these mistakes were just plain dumb.

First, the anchor said Billy Butler hit an RBI double off White Sox pitcher Freddy Sanchez. The White Sox pitcher at the time was Freddy Garcia; Freddy Sanchez is an infielder for the San Francisco Giants. Just seconds later the anchor reported that Butler scored on a single by Esteban German. This is a little more plausible since German actually did play for the Royals at one point. But now, he plays for the Texas Rangers. The guy who drove in Butler was Alberto Callaspo.

Maybe the anchor just has difficulty with Hispanic names. But it would be nice if our local TV reporters knew enough about the Royals to at least get the names right.

-- Matt Kelsey

Jon Miller is back!

Man, this is one powerful blog!

Jon Miller is back tonight calling the Cards and the Cubs. ESPN obviously listened. Now if we could just get them to move Phillips to any other night.

--Lofflin

Nohitter in San Fran, Jonathon Sanchez hurls first in 33 years: Jon Miller has the call...

Just listened to Jon Miller call the ninth inning of Jonathon Sanchez no hitter in San Francisco against the Padres. It was a dignified and passionate call, almost literary in language. One of the best radio calls I've ever heard. This was the first Giants' no hitter in 33 years; "A night to remember at the corner of Second and King Streets..."

What can ESPN be thinking?

--Lofflin

ESPN, Where in the World is Jon Miller?

It looked like forever for Jon Miller and Joe Morgan on Sunday nights. Until now.

I'm asking again, where is Jon Miller on Sunday Night Baseball? A quick search turned up serious questions about the Miller / Morgan team late last year across the virtual rumor mill. I'm not a Joe Morgan hater; I can take him or leave him. But I'd rather hear Jon Miller call a game than anybody except Vin Scully or Bob Uecker. Sometimes I tune into San Francisco games late at night just to listen to Miller's call.

The only good thing I could see about not playing ball on Sunday nights this year (aside from keeping the peace with Dr. Lofflin, to whom I made a promise to just play two nights a week...) was Sunday Night Baseball. But without Jon Miller, these broadcasts are dull as oatmeal. And, with the former GM in the booth, they've actually become tedius.

OK, ESPN, fess up. Where is Jon Miller?

--Lofflin

Where in the world is Jon Miller on Sunday night?

Henry, you're welcome. We wish you would come to Kansas City and just pitch an inning but if not we'd be happy to take you to Danny Edward's Eat It And Beat It for lunch. Three old smokies, please.

Question: Where in the world is Jon Miller? He is Sunday Night Baseball, in my opinion and he has been AWOL the past three weeks. I disliked the inclusion of Steve Phillips in the booth this year. The chemistry between Joe Morgan and Jon Miller was just right. Phillips simply grates. I enjoyed listening to Morgan and Miller talk even if the game wasn't interesting.

But the absence of Jon Miller the past three weeks, including the Texas - Tampa Bay game tonight, is curious, especially since Miller called the Giants game this afternoon on KNBR radio.

Anyone know?

This is a Michael Jackson, Jon & Kate - Free Zone: Thinking about Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing" at 20

I've been thinking about civility lately. We're working on civility at the university, attempting to identify what it looks like when it happens and what it doesn't look like (which is much easier). We're trying to find that fine line where free speech becomes harmful speech.

Sissela Bok postulates you always need a reason to lie but not to tell the truth.

As a journalist, I agreed with her at first. But 20-some classes of students talking about the same idea have taught me to think again about it. Maybe you need an excuse sometimes to say something you think is absolutely right but also hurtful. Then, again...

What, for example, is the difference between passionate speech and angry speech?

What we've found in our working group deliberations, instead of answers, is the therapeutic nature of free speech. In particular, we've found how powerful it is to say things honestly to each other, to trot it all out the way people trot out their belongings for a yard sale -- that old couch over there, the broken lamp here, the high chair we think we'll never need again out by the street.

Thinking about this reminded me of "Do The Right Thing," Spike Lee's brilliantly profane film which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this month. I thought strongly about bringing in a clip of the infamous scene where each character simply stands in the street shouting racial slurs into the camera. It is a testament to a film when well-meaning people are afraid to show clips from it even though those clips perfectly fit the situation.

"Do The Right Thing" was beautifully photographed. The way Lee used the camera to create unexpected points of view reminded me of "Rebel Without A Cause." The dialogue was Henry Wiggen in a completely different context. The voices were so real they hurt.

And the film raised as many ethical questions as it answered. For example, Lee decided before he made the film no one in it would smoke. He said he wanted to undo the stereotype of African-Americans as smokers. I think only a couple character are shown drinking alcohol in the film and I can't recall a character who was drunk in any scene. This is, of course, a lie. But, is it a justifiable lie?

Lee might say African-Americans have been subjected to lies about themselves and their communities from the invention of film. And, he'd be right.

Here's another ethical dilemma. I read an interview with Rosie Perez. She said she cried through the entire scene where she appeared in the nude -- the ice cube scene -- which killed the eroticism of those wonderful goosebumps for me forever.

And, of course, the solution to the film, what appears to be Lee's answer to what "the right thing" is, raises more questions than it answers. When he raises the trash can over his head as the protagonist Mookie and hurls it through the window of Sal's Pizzeria, you can't help but cheer.

Brecht warned the use of catharsis in theater in his time, the 1930s and 1940s, had fallen to the level of bourgeois drug traffic. Lee, however, turns catharsis on its noodle. Here, the catharsis we feel makes us everything we wish not to be. It feels good, it feels right, it feels bad and it feels wrong, all at the same time.

Is it therapeutic? After 20 years, I still don't know. But I do know this. Any film which can keep you engaged in a single question for two decades, certainly did its job.

--Lofflin

From the You-Won't-Believe-This file: Nixon on abortion; "Of course, if you have a white and a black..."

You couldn't make this up.

And, pardon, please, my shock.

New Richard M. Nixon Oval Office tapes were released today, according to the New York Times. They contained a conversation about Roe V. Wade. The president of the United States worried the decision might lead to promiscuity. However, he allowed, abortion might be necessary in some cases.

"There are times when an abortion is necessary. I know that. When you have a black and a white... or a rape.”

This is so astounding, I want to yell "stop the presses." But, I did not see or hear it anywhere today. I couldn't find it this morning on the front page of the Kansas City Star Website but I did find six weather stories, yet another Midtown murder story, a Wichita story about a guy hitting his brother with a bat, three Jon&Kate stories and a story offering five steps to a happy marriage.

The Times' headline only said the president of the United States had been "ambivalent" about abortion.

Not ambivalent about race, apparently.

What irony is this. A bare four decades later, the current president of the United States is, indeed, just the sort of baby whose abortion another recent United States president thought justified.

We may have come a long way when we elected Barack Obama, but we sure as hell had a long way to go.

You can follow the Times' link, download the tape, and listen for yourself, if you have the stomach. The statement comes at about 13 minutes 30 seconds into the discussion.

Lofflin -- starting the day disgusted

PostPost: CNN finally got to this story tonight. Anderson Cooper teased it as "shocking." I guess you can't really blame the cable outlets. I mean, we certainly need to know all we can about the governor of South Carolina's bizarre affair.

The revolution IS being televisied and the reporting reaches fever level

Easy to see I was wrong before. The revolution IS being televised.

No question about it, they're making a revolution in Iran and we're seeing it televised. Only it's not being televised through the usual channels. It's coming to the western world through YouTube and Twitter and Myspace.

And, of course, the traditional media is having a hard time making sense of it at such a distance. I'm glad they've had the good sense to qualify their publication of the social media accounts and images by admitting it is impossible to verify the authenticity of the material. It would be good if they continued that skepticism even when the news comes from Pittsburgh or Atlanta. On the Net, you just don't know what you're getting.

I watched some late night coverage Saturday night into Sunday morning. I found transcripts today to help recall what I saw, but unfortunately transcripts don't tell you what was on the crawl. I was interested because I remember being shocked that Fox news had the death toll at 126 on the crawl and CNN at 112 -- at least that's what I remember -- and the New York Times had it at 10, then 19 this morning. Here is the reporting from the Times:

"There was no verifiable accounting of the death toll from the mayhem on Saturday, partly because the government has imposed severe restrictions on news coverage and warned foreign reporters who remained in the country to stay off the streets.

"It also ordered the BBC’s longtime correspondent expelled and ordered Newsweek’s correspondent detained.

"State television said that 10 people had died in clashes, while radio reports said 19. The news agency ISNA said 457 people had been arrested."

Quite a difference, but I may have been wrong about the crawl. The late night cable reporting, however, was frantic. Shepard Smith at Fox was particularly dramatic. Police were attacking protesters with tear gas and water cannons, he said -- the same report at CNN. Then he added, with real foreboding in his voice, helicopters have been reportedly dropping liquid on protesters, nobody knows what the liquid is, "but it is hot."

I didn't see any reports of this terrifying tactic anywhere in the light of day.

Interestingly, the reporting on both CNN and Fox felt like the kind of dreams you get late at night when you're running a high fever. Call it War of the Worlds reporting. Let's hope it doesn't whip up passions enough to push the president into a disastrous move that will satisfy conservatives (OK, they're never satisfied...) but undercut what brave Iranians are doing on their own.

-- Lofflin

Ibanez is right, talk radio is wrong, and what the gull happened up there in Cleveland?

Mark Harris couldn't write this latest Royal's debacle. John R. Tunis would snicker if you told him this plot. Even W. P. Kinsella (read "The Iowa Baseball Conspiracy," or "Box Socials," if you can...) would say this is too fantastic even for magic realism.

The ball hits a gull in centerfield in the 10th. The local heroes lose.

Of course, this is why we watch, listen and read about baseball. As Yogi said, "In baseball, you don't know nuthin'. Something crazy, something you've never seen before, will happen. It's a game of almost stupefying regularity -- take the same swing every time, my hitting coach impatiently moaned yesterday -- punctuated by moments of zaniness.

Johnny Damon drops an easy fly ball in Fenway. Deion Sanders and Jose Canseco (interesting pair) get bopped in the head with fly balls. A reserve infielder comes in to pitch in a blowout game and retires the side one, two, three.

One thing about the Kansas City Royals remains consistent: Losing. Now, I think this is a better team. They'll go on another winning streak soon and they'll play well again in September. I'd be surprised in they didn't finish in the middle of the pack. But right now, as a team, they stink.

If you have a baseball heart, you have to hurt for Zach Greinke.

While I'm riffing here over morning coffee, allow me to veer seamlessly into the territory of talk radio. Before I could get the radio shifted over from the baseball station to music yesterday, I caught a few moments of two radio talkers talking about, what else?, talk radio. Actually, I think they were talking about Raul Ibanez and blogging and talk radio. The argument (if you can call it such) went something like this: "You listeners over 40 grew up with newspapers so you are conditioned to believe everything you read because if you read it, it must be right. Right?"

Pause here. Wrong. Nobody believes everything they read. Even in the golden age of newspapers, the effects of news stories were quite limited. You could look it up.

I'm still paraphrasing. I wasn't taking notes because I was busy trying to maneuver between parked cars, snap on my sunglasses, manage a cup of hot coffee between my legs and fumble with the radio at the same time.

"So, do you believe what you read on blogs? Do you trust what people say on this show? (Are you kidding?) I don't think, we were just going over this and we couldn't think of anything we've said here that proved to be wrong but..."

Finally got the cruiser out into traffic and the radio to music so I don't know where they went next. No doubt more self-aggrandizement.

But, interestingly, they had stumbled on one of the major issues of our media times. Call it the death of editing. Without editing, well, we have a couple of guys at the mike shooting off their mouths ... multiply that times a factor of thousands.

I've had my run-ins with editors and I've been known as difficult to work with (DTWW) on occasion. But editors have saved my reputation a few times, to say nothing of my ass, and I've never written anything that wasn't better shorter. (Is this post an example? Probably...) However, good editors are all that stand between good information and junk. We live in an age of overwrought speculation, media hotdogging and downright lies.

And the guy in his house slippers in his mother's basement knocking out his blog (I am still wearing house slippers, by the way, but I'm upstairs at the kitchen table) can say anything he likes to get attention. Then the radio talkers riff on it and suddenly, wham-o, it's a fact. Ibanez is right. More power to him, no pun intended.

I'll never forget a classic Royal's slump a few years ago and a guy who said his name was Roy who called one of the shows. To get his accent right you have to imagine the word "fire" spelled "far."

"Far 'em all," Roy said, as if god himself had dictated the solution, "and har some new ones."

Indeed. Could anyone understand major league baseball less? Well, a thousand yahoos are out there on open mikes all over the country, all day long, right now, trying their best. Ole Roy has plenty of competition.

-- Lofflin

The revolution will not be televised... maybe ... last word on the Tank Man for now and a note on the WWFing of news

Stuart Franklin, © Magnum Photos

Last word on the marvelous photographs of the Tank Man and his inspiring act of courage. If you read the New York Times piece, you know the bravery of the men who photographed this event. Hate to mention this in public, but there's a screen play somewhere in this.

Gil Scott Heron wrote a provocative song in the late 1960s called "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised." It became an anthem of sorts in anti-war, civil rights circles. Heron is a gifted poet and writer, who had the musical foresight to combine his spoken word poetry with jazz, collaborating with saxman Brian Jackson. "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" was, in my opinion, their best moment.
Here's the opening bit:

You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and
Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.


But, when you look at the photographs of the Tank Man, or recall the televised images of students standing on top of the Berlin Wall with sledge hammers, how can you not think the revolution will be televised? Maybe Gil Scott Heron was wrong. This is the age of cable news and the 24-hour news cycle. The president recently described this modern cable news environment as the WWFing of news. Of course it will be televised and Geraldo or Brian or Anderson or Campbell will be there to cover it.


Then again, maybe not. The Tank Man -- and this takes nothing away from his act -- did not make a revolution. A real revolution would make television itself irrelevant, wouldn't it? I mean, the real revolution would be if mankind rejected the television.


The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox
In four parts without commercial interruptions.
The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon
blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John
Mitchell, General Abrams and Spiro Agnew to eat
hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary.
The revolution will not be televised.



Then again, doesn't the election of the first black American president make a revolution? If you think so, then you have to say he was wrong; the revolution was most definitely televised, and in minute detail.


The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal.
The revolution will not get rid of the nubs.
The revolution will not make you look five pounds
thinner, because the revolution will not be televised, Brother.



Then again, perhaps the jury is out on whether the election of Barack Obama actually constitutes a revolution. It may be a start toward one, but, then again ... well, we're well past a hundred days and we've still got two wars going, we've bailed out Wall Street on the backs of working men and women who have lost their jobs in stunning numbers, and ghettos all over this country are caught up in senseless, self-defeating, murderous drug-fueled wars.


In academia, we would say, the revolution may be televised but at this point we don't have enough data to suggest whether the hypothesis is supported.

Confused? Me, too, obviously. Here, at any rate, is more of Gil Scott Heron's great lyric.


There will be no pictures of you and Willie Mays
pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run,
or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance.
NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32
or report from 29 districts.
The revolution will not be televised.

Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville
Junction will no longer be so damned relevant, and
women will not care if Dick finally gets down with
Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people
will be in the street looking for a brighter day.
The revolution will not be televised.

The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb,
Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom
Jones, Johnny Cash, Englebert Humperdink, or the Rare Earth.
The revolution will not be televised.

The revolution will not be right back after a message
about a white tornado, white lightning, or white people.
You will not have to worry about a dove in your
bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl.

The revolution will not go better with Coke.
The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath.
The revolution will put you in the driver's seat.

The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.


You can listen to some of his music -- not "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised," unfortunately -- here, however you'll need to read French to fully use this unofficial site..

-- Lofflin, banging the drum again tomorrow...

Tank Man: For photographers a great read

Following up on yesterday's blog, here is a story from the New York Times today with the words of all three photographers and a new photograph never before published. If you're a photographer, this is not a story to miss. Let me know what you think.
-- Lofflin

Tiananmen Square two decades later, the man in the white shirt facing down the tanks... would you do the same?

Stuart Franklin, © Magnum Photos

This is one of the most important photographs to be published in my lifetime. I have thought about it many times, it was the seed of one unpublished novel, it has guided my sometime Quixotic adventures in free speech, and it touches my soul. It happened 20 years and two days ago in Tiananmen Square in China. It remains the most heroic moment I know.

Blogger Mike Johnson posted this photograph along with a thought provoking discussion of the image and the moment under the brilliant title "Witness" in March of 2006. He notes three photographers made nearly the same image -- Stuart Franklin, Charlie Cole, and another photographer (Cole identified the third photographer as Arthur Chang of Reuters) in addition to a videographer.

Johnson said he could find little written by Franklin about the moment but he did find some interesting material written by Cole, who won an important prize, the 1990 World Press Photo of the Year, for the image. Someone identifying himself as Charlie Cole actually responded to Johnson's blog, posting in the comments section. Here is just one part of what he had to say, and, to me, it speaks nearly as much as the image:

"For me the shot of the young man facing down the tanks isn’t an award winner, or a stand alone, or any of that. Quite simply for me, it's the testament of a man who defined probably most important moment of his life rather than letting the moment define him..."

The urge to preach, here, is strong. Let me just say I think it is important for each of us to learn to stand up to the tanks that are bearing down on us. Look at the inspiration one man in a white shirt with two shopping bags created through a single futile act of bravery. A non-violent act, I might add. What excuses do we have for not being as brave ourselves?

And, to photographers -- is this not why you load film in your cameras? To bear witness...

Incidentally, I saw this event with my wife on our honeymoon. We watched it on a television in a small pastry shop in the French Quarter. I began my first (yet unpublished) novel on the way home on a napkin in a Waffle House in West Memphis, the brave moment I had seen on the television fresh in mind.

Lofflin -- Urging you to visit this thoughtful 2006 blog entry... And if you are a photographer, partake of this excellent discussion of the controversial nature of photography in today's NY Times.