Comments | discreet_chaos: Pardon the Interruption

discreet_chaos

Pardon the Interruption

Dec 27, 2006 02:09

With about ten minutes remaining in tonight's rerun of Boston Legal, ABC News jumped into programming with a "Special Report", where Terry Moran told us that Gerald Ford had died. I'll admit that the death of a former President is news, but the man was of an advanced age, he was the longest living former President and he has not been well for a ( Read more... )

boston legal, consumer news, media

Comments 15

eparchos December 27 2006, 10:42:06 UTC

you should check out the metafilter thread about it... one guess which username I'm using.

discreet_chaos December 27 2006, 11:13:09 UTC

Dude - I'm not going to beat up the former President because in my book, ABC News and Terry Moran showed poor judgement last night and if they're so inclined, they can still fight back.

Though after reading through that entire thread, I do find it odd that there's been no mention of "WIN" buttons and the ridiculous attempt to form a Reagan/Ford co-presidency to try and make Ronnie more palatable.

eparchos December 27 2006, 11:25:47 UTC

I'm not beating up a former President for anything less than what the fuck that piece of crap deserves. On the other hand, I'm not one of those mealy-mouthed inbred retards who thinks democracy is so dead that it's OK to idolize dead formerly elected officials. *barfs on Reagan's corpse*

discreet_chaos December 27 2006, 12:48:46 UTC

I generally only look at Metafilter when someone points me in that direction, so I don't really know, but I'd venture that most of those commenting only know Gerald Ford as the guy who pardoned Nixon and from Saturday Night Live reruns. He really hasn't had much of a public life after leaving the White House, mostly he's served on several corporate boards and played a lot of golf, so most of those commenting probably only know him from the scant information in their history texts.

aquarian_lefty December 27 2006, 20:37:01 UTC

The part that bothers me about all of this is the articles sprouting all over the internet lionizing this man. Correct me if I'm wrong, but was he not a fairly inept president, and was he not the only man to hold the office without being elected or re-elected to it? It's like back when Nixon died. All of his many many failings and vices were glossed over and he was remembered by many as "reformed" and as an "elder statesman of the party." But he was a crook, plain and simple. I'm not saying Ford was a bad man, but let's keep some perspective.

And yes, interrupting a television program to report that a man who hasn't been president in 30 years, and was only in the office then through sheer fortune, has died is fairly pointless.

discreet_chaos December 27 2006, 21:58:46 UTC

In my own defense, I have to say that it wasn't so much the interruption, but that it pre-empted all off of the final minutes of the program, nothing was really added to the conversation and you can't say that the news wasn't expected. In response to your comment, I just did some googling for a page describing a similar situation which happened in 2004. In that instance, a producer actually violated some network policy when they decided to overwrite the final minutes of a CSI: New York to report on the death of Yassar Arafat and as a result, they were subsequently fired and the CSI was rebroadcast during a weekend overnight ( ... )

eparchos December 27 2006, 23:14:03 UTC

A digest of what I actually wrote in that thread:
The pardon of Nixon (and yes, I know it wasn't for an impeachment, and I clarified that several times in that thread) says to the American people, who were very divided and generally low on faith in their own government, that former Presidents are above the law. This did not help establish faith in government and it did nothing to heal the wounds created by Vietnam and Nixon. In fact, it exacerbated those problems. Ford didn't appear to even be TRYING to represent the people of this country, only the interests of his own little country club of criminals.

Obviously, it'd help if I properly coded the link discreet_chaos December 29 2006, 20:47:17 UTC

It's a couple of days later, but in case it hasn't crossed your desk, I thought I'd toss you this link to a Bob Woodward article about Ford & Nixon because you'd probably appreciate it.

Thread 9

somanesa December 27 2006, 21:11:23 UTC

oddly, enough, I first saw it at http://isc.sans.org/diary.php?storyid=1978&rss

really, the last place I would expect to hear news of a celebrity death. More odd firstyness I guess

artificialpuppy December 28 2006, 00:26:57 UTC

James Brown of Gerald Ford, which old dead guy is more important?

Nixon, was a bastard, but he was a bastard who did a lot to smooth out the Cold War, mostly by positioning people, who were smarter than he was, so they could influence things for the better. His motives were seldom pure, but the outcome was a good one. As far as thefts, crookery and abuse of official institutions is concerned, is it a crime to steal from thieves? The answer to that is yes, but it is also a matter of context as to whether or not one should really care; unless one has an ulterior motive, in which case, one really should be honest about it.

His anti-Communist credentials made it possible for him to break the ice with Stalin. Of course these also made him no friends amongst Communists themselves.