Michael Phelps, who has now won more gold medals — 11, in fact — than any other athlete ever, is an eating machine. My kind of guy.

The difference is that when I pig out, I unfortunately don’t work off the extra calories. As for Phelps…well, you know that story.

Visit this site for an interesting look at Phelps’s daily intake. Amazing!

Two things generally happen when a well-known person dies.

He is mourned, his accomplishments noted, his humanity honored by some. He is insulted, his accomplishments slighted, his humanity devalued in favor of getting partisan or personal grievances at the top of the page by others. The former is appropriate, and the latter is not…at least right away.

It doesn’t take long to find a lot of sadness and a lot of accolades for Tim Russert, NBC Washington Bureau Chief, moderator of Meet the Press, and the man responsible for orchestrating NBC’s government and political news coverage.

There’s also the less-common snippet of slights, pointing out this occasion or that occasion when he didn’t ask enough questions, or didn’t needle one person as much as he seemed to needle someone else, or didn’t sufficiently “skewer” someone the commenter didn’t like.

I had a great deal of respect for Russert.  I don’t watch many political shows, because most of them aren’t news programs so much as opinionated crap or pointless yelling back and forth that reminds me of having a meal with my father’s side of the family:  the arguing turns my stomach.  But I watched Meet the Press.  I was always impressed with Russert’s ability to pull quotes and video clips of his interview subjects, pointing out where they had previously told a different story or made a different promise.

The man did his homework.  Far more homework than some interviewers ever bother to do.

No reporter can ever ask “enough” questions.  Interviews would never end.

No reporter can ever be prepared for every lie, every distortion, and every little white lie.

And contrary to what some politicos might think, it isn’t a reporter’s job to “rake someone over the coals.”  They’re supposed to ask the questions, let the public hear the answers, and ultimately let people judge for themselves who’s right and who’s wrong.  When it’s clear that someone is wrong, and a reporter can prove it beyond a doubt, he should.  Otherwise, there comes a point where the public has to spend a little bit of time actually thinking about what’s going on, rather than being spoon-fed what they should or shouldn’t believe.

If you’re looking for someone to think for you, tune in to mindless commentary like Rush Limbaugh.  No thinking person can truly believe everything people like him say.

For the rest of us, there’s a big void in the world of journalism tonight.  We’ll miss a tough interviewer who did ask tough questions and tougher follow-ups.  And Sundays just won’t be the same.

I had an interesting dinner conversation the other night with a co-worker. We were talking about the 40 anniversary of Bobby Kennedy’s assassination in California, and we realized that this November 22nd will be the 45th anniversary of John Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas.

We discussed all of the JFK conspiracy theories, and my co-worker asked me if I thought there had been a conspiracy to kill JFK or if I thought Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone. I said that I believe a conspiracy was definitely possible, but that I didn’t think it was the level of conspiracy that movies like Oliver Stone’s JFK depicted.

I mentioned a quote from Walter Cronkite about Stone’s depiction of the events, which he had called a “bill of goods” that unsuspecting young people had fully bought into. Cronkite said, in effect, that if there had been that level of conspiracy from all angles of our government, organized crime and foreign powers, there is almost no way that by now, someone wouldn’t have come forward and spilled the beans, making every detail public.

Imagine the big book deal. Imagine sitting on that couch with a teary-eyed Oprah.

The co-worker then said something interesting: “I think bits and pieces of the truth have gotten out…they’re just small enough that they don’t get a lot of notice by themselves.”

That got me thinking about conspiracy theories in general. How can a piece of the puzzle about what some regard as one of the greatest murder mysteries of the 20th century go largely unnoticed? By making the murder itself the subject of so many conspiracy theories.

A conspiracy theory, in essence, makes even true facts easier to dismiss as fiction because it is assumed that what is really the truth is only part of the conspiracy theory itself. We see it every day.

So when some former gangster comes forward and says he was friends with Jack Ruby and Lee Oswald, and that he hosted a meeting of the two in his apartment in Dallas three days before the murder, it’s easier to write him off as being one of the “nutjob” conspiracy theorists than to take the time to try to verify his story. There have been plenty of nutjobs who have come up with their own reasons of why that shooting happened (as well as who pulled the trigger). (I made this scenario up, but I’m sure it has probably happened at some point.)

But what if his story is true? We could be missing a major piece of the puzzle, because we’ve been conditioned by the conspiracy theorists to believe nothing. So we don’t believe him, either.

Here’s another example, on a subject that’s everyone’s favorite: global warming.

I’ll start with a clip from January 2, 2007, of the Today show in which Willard Scott appeared on the set in New York with Meredith Viera:

Here, in case you miss something, is a transcript of what is said:

SCOTT: Well, listen are you a globing — a global-warming fan? Do you believe in global warming?

VIEIRA: I’m not a fan. No. No, sir.

SCOTT: Well –

VIEIRA: But I — something’s going on, ’cause it’s warm here.

SCOTT: Well, now, wait a minute — that’s it; it’s warm here. From Savannah [Georgia] all the way up to Boston, we’re having unheard-of warm weather, but ask the folks out in Denver and Colorado –

VIEIRA: That’s so.

SCOTT: — the coldest winter they’ve had in years. So it all depends on which side of the Mississippi you’re hanging your hat.

When Media Matters, a watchdog organization that describes its goal as “comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.” Yet when it posted the clip on YouTube, it gave it this headline:

“Willard Scott Denies Global Warming”

Trouble is, he didn’t deny that global warming exists. He merely pointed out that while it’s hot on one side of the country, it’s cold on the other; he suggested that it is easy to characterize hot weather as part of global warming, but that when you’re dealing with particularly cold weather, the concept of global warming isn’t necessarily rolling off your tongue.

Does Willard Scott personally believe in global warming? Maybe he does or maybe he doesn’t. The answer isn’t clear from that snippet. If anything, he believes that the hot weather Viera describes isn’t solely a result of global warming, particularly when it’s not being felt uniformly everywhere.

But one might hope that a “watchdog” group designed to weed out “misinformation” wouldn’t feel the need to resort to hyperbole to make its points. Even on its own website, the group posted a headline not quite on the mark:

“Willard Scott suggested weather ‘in Denver and Colorado’ casts doubt on global warming”

Again, it isn’t really what he said, but it’s possible to assume that he’s saying something along those lines. It’s also possible to assume that he’s saying that these two weather extremes aren’t necessarily clear examples, like, say, melting polar ice caps are. But we’re not in Willard’s head, and he doesn’t elaborate there, so the best we can do, one way or the other, is assume. And that shouldn’t be a valid base for criticism.

On the other hand, it’s easy for people like Scott to make a statement about global warming because there are so many global warming enthusiasts out there who tend to want to make everything about global warming. Here in Charleston, it’s 88 degrees outside as I type this post. The high today is 93. That’s hot. But we’re just days away from the start of summer, so it’s supposed to be hot.

But the environmental conspiracy theorists, those so quick to point to every little symptom as that pesky global warming again make easy for the rest of us to roll our eyes and dismiss what they’re saying.

In essence, conspiracy theorists who are a little “over the top” about making their case, tend to make the rest of us blind to the elements that may genuinely be true, just because we’re so tired of hearing about the constant “worst-case scenarios.”

Somehow, I don’t think that helps their argument.

Just heard on Today: Katie Couric is returning to the Today show tomorrow, according to Matt Lauer. She’s coming back, apparently, for a single appearance and to make a “major announcement.”

Is she announcing that she’s giving up the anchor chair at the CBS Evening News? Probably not. It seems like CBS wouldn’t allow her to go announce such a thing on her former show at NBC.

Meredith Viera even joked, upon hearing the news, “Permanently?” Viera, of course, replaced Couric on Today when Couric left for CBS.

Is it some cheap marketing ploy designed to make people just curious enough to watch? Yep.

I’m curious enough, and I’m sure I’ll be disappointed by whatever the “major announcement” turns out to be.

UPDATE:  I found out what the “major announcement” is, and wouldn’t have spoiled the details until I realized that all of the networks were doing a fine job of spoiling it on their own.  And it’s not just Katie Couric appearing on Today.  NBC’s Brian Williams is going to appear on ABC’s Good Morning America.  And ABC’s Charlie Gibson is headed to CBS’s The Early Show.  In fact, all three anchors are appearing together on all three morning shows.

The reason?  To announce a new initiative to fight cancer.  More here.

See?  Not knowing was a lot more exciting.

I turned on the Today show this morning and found myself watching American Idol.

To be specific, Today was airing a package (TV talk for a pre-recorded story voiced by a reporter) on American Idol and the latest developments from the most recent episode — which I can only imagine aired last night.

But Today is on NBC. American Idol, last time I checked, is on Fox.

I don’t know why I have developed such a short fuse when it comes to Today airing fluff. This is the same show that in the early days brought on a chimpanzee in the hopes that its antics would attract kids (and thereby, their parents) every morning. It worked. And it seems to have set a unfortunate precedent over the years that is currently being followed more and more often.

I don’t care about American Idol. Even if I were a fan of the show, I wouldn’t need to get updates on it from a morning show on another network.

I wish NBC would focus more of its daily morning news marathon on news. They’ve stretched Today out to four hours now. If they add one more hour, they’ll have to retitle it, This Afternoon.

Surely they can put crap about American Idol in the later hours so that people trying to get their day started don’t have to sit through it.

I know that the passage of time makes even mediocre things seem better than they ever were, but I swear I remember Today having lots more real news back in the 1980s when it was hosted by Bryant Gumbel and Jane Pauley.

If you watched the 134th running of the Kentucky Derby on NBC this past Saturday, you likely did not see the shocking aftermath of the race, when three-year-old filly Eight Belles collapsed just past the finish line, the ankles of both front legs broken.

At one point, the network replayed footage from a blimp, but did not take close-up shots.

Sally Jenkins, sports columnist at the Washington Post, called NBC’s decision to cut away from the horse lying on the ground “cowardlike:”

“The camera cut away from her, but it should have stayed on her. Eight Belles had run herself half to death yesterday, and now the vets were finishing the job as she lay on her side, her beautiful figure a black hump on the track.”

She goes on to point out that twice since 2006, horses have gone down on live television with “catastrophic injuries.” “Horses are being over-bred and over raced, until their bodies cannot support their own ambitions, or those of the humans who race them,” she said.

But it wasn’t that NBC wasn’t aware of the unfolding tragedy. As USA Today sports columnist Michael Hiestand pointed out, “NBC’s production truck had close-ups of the injured filly it could have chosen to show.” It didn’t, and that, Hiestand says, was the right call to have made.

NBC Sports producer Sam Flood described what he saw on the monitors inside the production truck:

“She was writhing. It was gruesome. I elected not to go to it for the simple reason it’s not something I’d like my wife or children at home to see.”

It is ironic that anyone is angry at NBC for making a judgment call that erred on the side of decency in not showing “gruesome” footage. How many times a day do people argue that the networks go entirely too far, showing footage that is anything but appropriate? And I’m not talking about prime time dramas like Desperate Housewives: producers of news get the same complaints routinely.

Not so ironically, the complaint about the lack of coverage appears part of a bigger agenda to skewer the horse racing industry, whether it deserves it or not, and there are serious reasons to ask why these animals are getting fatal injuries. But if you want the graphic images of a suffering animal shown because “we need a hard look at the real cost to the horses, no matter how upsetting and painful it is to see,” one has every right to question how completely unbiased you are.

As someone who works in the media, I find it sad that this producer, who seemingly took action for what seems to be the right reason, is coming under fire for not doing what gets complained about constantly.

Your turn: Should NBC have shown Eight Belles’ final agonizing moments have been broadcast? Or was cutting away the right thing to do for decency’s sake?

In what has to be the most-blown surprise of the year, President Bush will make a “surprise” appearance on NBC’s Deal or No Deal on Monday.

The purpose of the appearance, which was taped at the White House in advance of actual game play, is so that Bush can thank an Iraqi war veteran for serving the country. The veteran, contestant Captain Joseph Kobes, is hoping to pay off his parents’ home. He is a Purple Heart and Bronze Start recipient who completed three tours of duty in Iraq.

The fact that Bush took the time to tape the message that will appear on a game show will no doubt get the Bush haters all riled up just like those silly correspondent dinners. (These same people will play dumb, of course, the next time a president of their party does anything remotely lighthearted during any kind of negative national situation.)

But let’s be clear: whether this vet supported the war or not, he felt it was his duty to serve three tours there. He deserves at least a million bucks in my book.

The only thing that confuses me is why NBC wouldn’t hold this episode until the following Monday: May sweeps begins Thursday of this week.

NBC is still reeling from the spectacularly bad ratings of the television premiere of Quarterlife, a series about sa group of twenty-somethings.  I note that it was the television premiere because the show has been running for some time online on Myspace.  I’m not sure how many people have viewed the show’s “webisodes,” but as TV shows go, last Tuesday’s 10pm premiere earned the Peacock network its lowest ratings for a premiere in 17 years!

That’s gotta smart.

NBC had originally planned to air six episodes of the series.  That plan quickly changed after its 1.6 rating debut, which translates into barely over 3 million viewers.  While most cable networks would jump for joy with numbers like that, for a major network, it’s not the news anyone would hope for.

The show’s creator didn’t seem all that surprised:

“It never should have been a network show. It’s too specific,” [Marshall Herskowitz] told a Harvard Business School conference Wednesday, according to The Hollywood Reporter. “From the first three minutes” of watching the show on TV, he added, ”I knew it wasn’t right.”

Too bad he didn’t come to this realization a little sooner.  At least, I figure that NBC might have liked to hear that argument.

In the old days, the show would probably make at least one more appearance, hoping that the audience would “find” it, give it a chance, and come back.  Now, shows that place in the ratings cellar rarely get the benefit of the doubt:  in terms of NBC’s prime time schedule, Quarterlife is dead.

All in the Family was one of those shows that began with low ratings.  Part of that was by design, as the story goes.  After NBC and ABC passed on the show, a cautious CBS scheduled it in a poor time slot, hoping more than anything that their switchboard wouldn’t be flooded with calls about the social satire that comprised the series’ scripts.  It was during the summer reruns of the shows first season that viewers started noticing, and liked what they saw.  And All in the Family still ranks in the top 10 best sitcoms of all time in my book.

I missed the premiere of Quarterlife, which puts me right in line with most everyone else, apparently.  So I can’t offer much in the way of the quality of the series.  I just hope it isn’t anything nearly as entertaining as All in the Family was back in 1971.  It’d be a shame to have missed a show like that these days.

Some were crying, some were screaming.

That’s how one insider described the scene at the production offices of NBC’s late night shows after staffers were told by the network that they were out of a job and that there was no guarantee that they would be rehired when the writers strike ended.

The strike by the Writers Guild of America began on November 5th, and quickly halted television productions including The Tonight Show and Late Night with Conan O’Brien. Days after it began, Jay Leno reportedly told his staff that their jobs would be safe, and many didn’t look for other jobs despite the fact that NBC had predicted layoffs.

One of the early options that was considered was to have Leno do the show without a monologue, relying heavily on musical acts and stand-up comics. (Personally, I don’t see what would be wrong with this: let Leno do without his opening bits and let the rest of us still have something than reruns to watch.) For whatever reason, this idea never went anywhere.

Some of the striking writers are accusing the network of trying to pit groups against each other. While the accusations are flying, the two sides aren’t talking. It would seem to me that their time could be better spent.

Meanwhile, about 500 people who aren’t on strike but have been hurt financially because of it participated in a “Strike a Deal” march to urge the parties to sit down and work out an agreement.

The writers, in case you have forgotten, are demanding a percentage of royalties when their work is used on the internet, which isn’t an unreasonable request. What does seem unreasonable to me is that while their strike has been knocking others out of jobs, the striking writers are still getting paid for residuals from all of the reruns.

I tend to agree with the sentiment of one of the marchers, who said, “Lock yourselves in a room, throw away the key. Stay there until a settlement is reached. All of our lives and our livelihoods hang in the balance.”

It’s hardly fair for them to hold someone else’s income hostage, even while they’re fighting for what they deserve.

It’s funny how discrimination is perceived. Sometimes, we’re sure we’re the targets of it, even when those slights we are so convinced are directed at us aren’t really slights at all.

Earlier this month, a federal judge expressed concern over the suggestion that our current system of currency discriminates against the blind. Blind people have difficulty distinguishing between the dollar bill and, say, a $50 dollar bill. That presents an obvious problem, and forces them, pretty much, to rely either on caregivers, the kindness of strangers, or debit/credit cards.

Some courts have determined, therefore, that our system of currency discriminates against the blind.

The aforementioned judge wasn’t so sure:

“‘Where does this stop?’ asked Judge A. Raymond Randolph. Are postage stamps illegal? Government Web sites? When mail carriers leave handwritten notes on front doors, are they discriminating against blind people?

“‘The National Gallery is having a Hopper exhibit,’ Randolph said. ‘Those paintings, do they violate the Rehabilitation Act?’”

What lengths have to be taken to create completely equal access without “discriminating” against the sighted?

Should art galleries close their doors or be penalized because the blind cannot use their services? Sure, it seems like a silly question. But here’s one that maybe isn’t as silly: should such institutions lose governmental funding because a certain percentage of the population is unable to use them?

The sad reality is that not everyone is equal: there are handicaps. (I’m sorry if that word is offensive, but I’m not sure what the current “politically-correct” substitute for handicap, when used in general terms, is at this particular moment.) Maybe, if I were blind, I might feel differently. I suspect, however, that I would accept the fact that there are limitations that I just have to deal with. Just as I must deal with certain limitations based on my size and fitness level. I don’t demand, for instance, that local municipalities stop funding events like marathons because I haven’t always been in good enough shape to participate.

Our constitution says that all men were created equal. But everyone does have his own unique set of gifts and deficiencies, and no matter how hard society works to equalize those disparities, there’s only so much that can be done.

Am I comparing apples to oranges? Maybe…I’m not sure.

Meanwhile, NBC’s Brian Williams recently came under fire after a comment he made on the air and on his Daily Nightly blog over at MSNBC.com. Continue reading “When Is It (Really) Discrimination?”

Star Trek is boldly going where few television shows have ever gone before: to local theaters across the country for a special showing of the newly-remastered 2-part episode that incorporated footage from the original pilot made to sell the series to NBC.

Mark your calendars: on November 13th, 300 theaters will show the episode, “The Menagerie,” which tells the story of Capt. Christopher Pike, James Kirk’s predecessor aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise.

(Click this link to find out whether it’s being shown in your area.)

For those who have managed to spend the last 40 years being blissfully unaware of ‘Trek’ history, Gene Roddenberry’s first pilot episode was called “The Cage” and starred Jeffrey Hunter as Pike. Leonard Nimoy appeared in that original episode as Spock, the Vulcan science officer. In that episode, Pike is abducted by an underground alien race whose mental powers have evolved to the point that they can control minds and create any illusion they wish. Over the course of the hour, as you probably would guess, Pike is able to escape and leave behind a nice glimpse of a human race that evolved the problems of everyday life we’re wrapped up in so much of the time.

But NBC wasn’t convinced that this little show would deliver ratings week to week. So they did something almost unheard of at the time: Continue reading “‘Trek’ Like You’ve Never Seen It Before”

Halie Swan and her family recently traveled to Los Angeles for a taping of NBC’s Deal or No Deal. As a contestant on the show, Halie won $50,000.

If you’re reaching for your remote control so you can program Tivo to record it for you, you can set the remote back on the table. (Or, if you’re like me, wedge it back in between the sofa cushions.)

You won’t be seeing Swan’s appearance, because the producers of the show decided not to air it.

The show was to be part of the kickoff of the new season of ‘Deal,’ but apparently because Swan won a “measley” fifty-grand, the producers felt it wasn’t exciting enough.

The good news is that Swan still gets the money and still has the memories of spending time with 20 of her family members during the process of winning the cash.

In the local newspaper article that covered her trip, Swan’s dad says that they were disappointed that the episode wouldn’t be shown, but he was quick to add that $50,000 is nothing to gripe about. Yet at the end of the article, Halie says they’d probably think twice before auditioning for another game show.

Really? If I’d won $50,000, I’d be looking to make game show appearances my new career.

Still, I do think it’s a little strange that DoND would decide not to air the show at all. Continue reading “Show Says ‘No Deal’”