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January 03, 2005

Media Smackdown: Jim Pinkerton vs. Tucker Carlson

I'm a partisan here, because I kind of like Jim Pinkerton -- especially given his constant and enthusiastic promotion of blogs, and not just the three or four that always get named -- and I always kind of didn't like Tucker Carlson.

I don't know why. The bowtie, maybe. He just always rubbed me the wrong way. And he didn't seem like much of a conservative... he seemed like the sort of conservative trying to get hired by the New York Times, if you know what I mean. Always willing to tell the Establishment what they want to hear, even while keeping his conservative credentials (barely) in order.

Anyway, Pinkerton slapped him around pretty good on this Saturday's Fox News Watch, generally a terrific show to watch ten minutes of when you're trying to fall asleep.

The put-down was delivered better than will come across in print. It was so contemptuous and dismissive. I loved it.

PINKERTON: My nominee for worst pundit performance is Tucker Carlson...
HOST: On CNN's Crossfire.

PINKERTON: Maybe also PBS and MSNBC... Nothing succeeds like failure.

HOST: He kept saying the same things everywhere?

PINKERTON: Exactly. Smugness without gravitas, upward mobility without ratings... There's always a fine line in these argument shows between sincere discussion and schlock. And Crossfire crossed that line a long time ago.

Ouch! Smugness without gravitas, upward mobility without ratings... And you know for anyone in the media business-- it's the last clause that stings the worst.

He went on to talk about the overrated Jon Stewart making fools of Begala and Carlson, which I'm not sure I completely agree with -- Stewart is a paid TV clown, whether he likes it or not, whether he believes his own press clippings about being a "real journalist" now or not, and when someone says "Make me laugh, TV Clown," he ought to make with the funny -- but I still like the beginning of the insults.

Update: The Colossus thinks Tucker is just George Will lite, which I think is a disservice to George Will.

He makes a good point, though. The bowtie thing? When Raj from The Apprentice is using the bowtie as a signal to say "I belong to an earlier age, the age of Captains of Industry and Teddy Roosevelt," it's fair to say that the bowtie affectation has jumped the shark.

Now, maybe Tucker should get himself a cane and bright red shoes.

posted by Ace at 02:30 AM

Comments

So what you're really saying is that Tucker Carlson is the Alan Colmes of the Right.

Posted by: rw on January 3, 2005 05:22 AM

What really bugs me about The Daily Show is that high school-age kids will watch it and think that they are "informed" and "politically conscious."

Posted by: Kazmin on January 3, 2005 06:36 AM

Ace, I think your dislike for Carlson colors your impressions of the Pinkerton quote. If that was a slapdown, it was delivered with a limp wrist.

If you'd like to contrast Carlson wtih Pinkerton, ask yourself who's filled with his own importance?

OBTW. Calrson bitch-slapped Stewart on the show ("Be funny, John, be funny!"). And Stewart has prodigious talent, although his show became unwatchable as he and staff became shills for the Dims.

Posted by: Norman Rogers on January 3, 2005 07:31 AM

In the world of Liberal pundits being right is secondary to being politically correct. I can remember writing letters to PBS radio about that great blowhard of the Left, Daniel Schorr. I pointed out that his great prognostications for the last three years had all been wrong, and wishing I had the kind of job where I could be wrong so much of the time and it wouldn't matter. Come to think of it, I need to start my own blog.

Posted by: 72VIRGINS on January 3, 2005 10:16 AM

On Tucker Carlson, I have to agree with something Ron and/or Fez said on their radio show, which is that wearing a bow tie is appropriate for only two occasions: 1. Getting married, and 2. Serving ice cream.

Posted by: David C on January 3, 2005 11:18 AM

Does Colmes think he's a republican? Or is he supposed to be the retarded sidekick to Hannity?

Posted by: Dianne on January 3, 2005 12:25 PM

I like that comment, Tucker Carlson=Alan Colmes. Good analogy.

I saw Tucker with Jon Stewart on the television when Stewart said his infamous "stop it, you're hurting the country" line..... and it was really Jon Stewart that was seriously lacking gravitas as he often is. I don't pay attention to Tucker, there are many more, brilliant and worhty pundits out there, in print and on the tube.

Posted by: Vladimir on January 3, 2005 12:50 PM

The end of this post touches on something that has been bothering me the last couple of weeks.
Lost in all of the year end wrap-up and 1st Anniversary posting is the fact that Jon Stewart has become both the biggest Democratic shill as well as the most overrated person in Hollywood. Its a shame what passes for literature these days.

Posted by: Jersey Matt on January 3, 2005 02:27 PM

I saw Pinkerton's critique of Tucker Carlson and it was delightful because it was an acid-tongued work of art. And everyone there knew it was devastating, and true, so they cringed at it....sort of like someone throwing a phosporous grenade in a cave and all of a sudden there is this screaming Al Qaeda guy tumbling out enveloped in flames.

Horrible, yet righteous.

Carlson is the fresh, empty Repblican face who regularly gets buffalo'd by Democratic hacks...draws rotten ratings...yet seems to advance in Media Stardom..as opposed to Allen Colmes who is also regularly buffalo'd by conservatives, but seems sincere, plays a good foil, and helps the ratings. But who will never be the Next Big Media Star that Carlson was being groomed by PBS and NBC to be before Pinkerton napalmed his ass.

As for Crossfire, remember it started with some thoughful exchanges on 60 minutes with Point/Counterpoint. But Crossfire is pure schlock....no discussion, just hacks shouting past each other...and Jon Stewart showing up and doing an adroit takedown move right in the Crossfire producers homecourt will be remembered as one of the great moments in elevating TV. (And I don't care if Stewart is Democratic or not. He did millions of Americans interested in bona fide discussion of issues a real service.)

Posted by: Cedarford on January 3, 2005 03:07 PM

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What? Skeleton of the most famous Musketeer, D'Artagnan, possibly discovered in Dutch church closet.
Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
The Gascon nobleman inspired Alexandre Dumas's hero in "The Three Musketeers" in the 19th century, a character now known worldwide thanks to the novel and numerous film adaptations.
D'Artagnan was killed during the siege of Maastricht in 1673, and there is a statue honoring the musketeer in the city. His final resting place has remained a mystery ever since.

A lot of Dumas's stories are based on bits of real history. The plot of the >Three Musketeers, about trying to recover lost diamonds from the queen's necklace, was cribbed from the then-almost-contemporaneous Affair of the Queen's Necklace. And the Man in the Iron Mask is based on real accounts of a prisoner forced to wear a mask (though I think it was a velvet mask).
* Oh, I should mention, Dumas says all this, about finding the names in an old book, in the prologue to his novel. But authors lie a lot. They frequently present fictions as based on historic fact. The twist is, he was actually telling the truth here. At least about these four musketeers having actually existed and served under Louis XIV.
Fun fact: You know the beginning of A Fistful of Dollars where the local gunslingers make fun of Clint Eastwood's donkey and Eastwood demands they apologize to the donkey? That's lifted from The Three Musketeers. Rochefort mocks D'Artagnan's old, brokedown farm horse and D'Artagnan is incensed.

A commenter asked which should be read first, The Hobbit of LOTR?
Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
LOTR is a very long story. Fifteen hundred pages or so. The Hobbit is relatively short and very punchy and easy to read. If you don't like The Hobbit, you can skip out on LOTR. If you do like it, you'll be primed to read LOTR.
Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
LOTR is written for adults. (It's said that Tolkien wrote both for his children, but LOTR was written 17 years later, when his children were adults.) Some might not like The Hobbit due to its sometimes frivolous tone. Me, I love it. I find it constantly amusing. Both are really good but there is a starkly different tone to both. LOTR is epic, grand, and serious, about a world war, The Hobbit is light and breezy, and about a heist. Though a heist that culminates in a war for the spoils.

The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
But the narrator -- who we will learn in LOTR was none of than Bilbo himself, who wrote the book as "There and Back Again" -- says this about Gollum's ring:
"But who knows how Gollum had come by that present [the Ring], ages ago in the old days when such rings were still at large in the world? Perhaps even the Master who ruled them could not have said."
In another passage, the ring is identified as a "ring of power."
I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

Finish the job, Mr. President!
Melanie Phillips lays out the case for the total destruction of the Iranian government and armed forces. [CBD]

TJM acts like he knows anything about John Wick and screenwriting. It's embarrassing, really.

Podcast: Sefton and CBD talk about how would a peace treaty with Iran work, Democrats defending murderers and rapists, The GOP vs. Dem bench for 2028, composting bodies? And more!

Oh, I forgot to mention this quote from Pete Hegseth, reported by Roger Kimball: "We are sharing the ocean with the Iranian Navy. We're giving them the bottom half."

Batman fires The Batman
Batman is disgusted by the Joachim Phoenix version of Joker
Batman tries to fire Superman
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Forgotten 80s Mystery Click: Red Leather Suit and Sweatband Edition
And I was here to please
I'm even on knees
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I gotta do it my way
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Tomorrow is March 25th, "Tolkien Reading Day," because March 25th is the day when the Ring is destroyed in the book. I think I'm going to start the Hobbit tomorrow and read all four books this time.
The only bad part of the trilogy are the Frodo/Sam chapters in The Two Towers. They're repetitive, slow, and mostly about the weather and terrain. But most everything else is good. Weirdly, the Frodo-Sam chapters in Return of the King are exciting and action-packed and among the best in the trilogy. (Though the chapters with everyone else in Return of the King get pretty slow again. Mostly people talking about marching towards war, and then marching towards war.)

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[Hat Tip: Diogenes] [CBD]

TJM gives you a brief tour of his movie collection.

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click
One day I'm gonna write a poem in a letter
One day I'm gonna get that faculty together
Remember that everybody has to wait in line
Oh, [Song Title], look out world, oh, you know I've got mine

US decimation of Iran's ICBM forces is due to Space Force's instant detection of launches -- and the launchers' hiding places -- and rapid counter-attack via missiles
AI is doing a lot of the work in analyzing images to find the exact hiding place of the launchers. Counter-strikes are now coming in four hours after a launch, whereas previously it might have taken days for humans to go over the imagery and data.

Robert Mueller, Former Special Counsel Who Probed Trump, Dies

“robert mueller just died,” trump wrote in a truth social post on march 21. “good, i’m glad he’s dead. he can no longer hurt innocent people! president donald j. trump.”

TJM has thoughts on Superheros and Iconography

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