Imperfect Humans

“Many conservatives — elected and otherwise — openly espouse the belief that the press is their enemy, which is disturbing. There can’t be civic discourse if the nation’s divided into tribalistic corners where citizens in one region don’t speak the same language as those who live a state, county or even just a town away.

“That’s why the best journalists strive to speak in one language: that of facts, backed up with the best data, science and sources available. Sure, we often fall short of our ultimate goal, but that doesn’t mean we have an agenda; just that we’re imperfect humans.”

—Matt Laslo, reporter and blogger, “The New York Times presidential endorsement shows why newspapers must end the practice,” Think, NBC News, Jan. 20, 2020.

• Editorial Comment: That’s a fact.

PeezPix

Sad Lion

  

      

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

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Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

NH Primary Day

In honor of today’s New Hampshire presidential primary: You know the definition of politics, don’t you? It’s from the Greek — poly, meaning many; and tics, meaning blood-sucking insects...

“My choice early in life was between whether to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there’s hardly any difference.” —Harry S. Truman

“What this country needs are more unemployed politicians.” —Edward Langley, artist

“If his IQ slips any lower, we’ll have to water him twice a day.” —Molly Ivins

“I always wanted to get into politics, but I was never light enough to make the team.” —Art Buchwald

“The major parties could conduct live human sacrifices on their podiums during prime time, and I doubt that anybody would notice.” —Dave Barry

“It is fast approaching the point where I don’t want to elect anyone stupid enough to want the job.” —Erma Bombeck

“He knows nothing and thinks he knows everything. That points clearly to a political career.” —George Bernard Shaw

• Editorial Comment: Live Free or Die.

PeezPix

Bleeding Hearts (get it?)

      

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

Mental Vacuity Explained

“Of all the people expressing their mental vacuity, none has a better excuse for an empty head than the newspaperman: If he pauses to restock his brain, he invites onrushing deadlines to trample him flat. 

“Broadcasting the contents of empty minds is what most of us do most of the time, and nobody more relentlessly than I.”

—Russell Baker (1925-2019), double Pulitzer Prize-winning author and columnist. Image, 1979.

• Editorial Comment: Excuses, excuses.

PeezPix

Swirly Evening

      

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

Mainstream Mediocres?

“Listen, Mario, media is the plural of mediocre.” 

—Jimmy Breslin (1928-2017), legendary New York Daily News columnist, to New York Gov. Mario Cuomo, 1978.

• Editorial Comment: How many mediocres in a media? Or is it medium?

PeezPix

Shelter dog

     

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

Hard-Boiled

Tatum: “I didn’t go to any college, but I know what makes a good story because, before I ever worked on a paper, I sold ’em on a street corner. You know the first thing I found out? Bad news sells best because good news is no news.” 

Lorraine: “I’ve met some hard-boiled eggs in my time, but you . . . you’re 20 minutes.”

—Kirk Douglas (1916-2020), playing journalist Charles Tatum in “Ace in the Hole” (aka “The Big Carnival”), screenplay by Billy Wilder, Lesser Samuels and Walter Newman (1951).

• Editorial Comment: I am Spartacus.

• NBC Obit: “Kirk Douglas, legendary Hollywood tough guy, dead at 103.”

• WaPost Obit: “Kirk Douglas, whose masculine energy powered scores of film roles, dies at 103.”

PeezPix

Good night.

  

  

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

From the Life-Must-Go-On Department

“I get up every morning determined to both change the world and have one hell of a good time. Sometimes this makes planning my day difficult.” 

—E.B. White (1899-1985), writer.

  

• Editorial Comment: And what to do after lunch?

PeezPix

Ever Hopeful

  

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

Into the Arms of Monarchy

“The truth unquestionably is, that the only path to a subversion of the republican system of the Country is by flattering the prejudices of the people and exciting their jealousies and apprehensions, to throw affairs into confusion, and bring on civil commotion. Tired at length of anarchy, or want of government, they may take shelter in the arms of monarchy for repose and security.” 

 —Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804), colonial-era statesman, “Objections and Answers Respecting the Administration of the Government,” The Hamilton Papers, 1792.

  

• Editorial Comment: God save the queen.

PeezPix

Post-Caucus Greyscape

  

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard

Mr. Smiley’s Conundrum

“One day somebody will explain to me why it is that, at a time when science has never been wiser, or the truth more stark, or human knowledge more available, populists and liars are in such pressing demand.”

—John le Carré,* British spy novelist, accepting the 2019 Olof Palme Prize, “John le Carré on Bexit: ‘It’s breaking my heart,’” The Guardian, Feb. 1, 2020. (Thanks to alert WORDster Jane Kirtley) *né David John Moore Cornwell

  

• Editorial Comment: Still out there in the cold, Mr. Smiley.

PeezPix

Kelp

  

February’s Senior News hits newsstands!

  

FREE! Get TODAY'S WORD ON JOURNALISM in your email This free “service” is sent to 2,000,000 or so subscribers around the planet more or less every weekday morning during WORD season. If you have recovered from whatever illness led you to subscribe and don’t want it anymore, send “unsubscribe” to ted.pease@gmail.com. Or if you want to afflict someone else, send me the email address and watch the fun begin. (Disclaimer: I just quote ’em, I don’t necessarily endorse ’em. Don’t shoot the messenger.) 

 
Ted Pease, Professor of Interesting Stuff, Trinidad, California. (Be)Friend The WORD

“I don’t think writers are sacred, but words are. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little.” —Tom Stoppard