Back on May 3, the world commemorated “World Press Freedom Day.” Everyone except North Korea, that is. They decide to wait until May 15 to celebrate by running an editorial in the state-run newspaper Rodong Sinmun. The piece is called “Mockery of Press” and it takes several shots at American media and the so-called ”Freedom of report.”

WaPo reports on the rambling editorial, which seems to make the argument that American media is both too restricted and too free. While it seems to be a generalization of ALL of American media, two reporters get glowing reviews from The Dear Leader.

Who are Kim Jong-Un’s approved reporters? Read more

In this week’s edition of “What’s Weingarten Writing?,” it’s Man vs. Machine. Gene ventured into the wilds of an Apple Store to fix a very serious problem he was having with his word processor. This classic setup sets the stage for a showdown between an Apple store employee and WaPo’s “humorist,” Gene Weingarten. In Gene’s weekly column, Gene lets us know that he is having a problem with his computer. What’s wrong with his device?

He writes, “When my computer finishes each save … it registers this operation by displaying the time of the save in year, date, hours and minutes, like this: ’2013-04-16-09.17. ‘ My problem … is that on the next line it gives me a two-digit number that seems to fluctuate almost at random.” She leaned in, nodded, and I detected a faint smile. This was pleasing her; a good technician must thrill to a good challenge.” Can you imagine fielding THAT customer? Gene probably just calls his computer an “email machine.”

How does the “genius” at the Apple store respond? Read more

We’ll take a break from examining the weekly ramblings in Gene Weingarten‘s column for WaPo to look at his Twitter feed. When we checked in on him, we were VERY upset to learn that Gene has changed his Twitter pic from a piece of poop to the picture on the right. It’s a cartoon caricature of Gene Shalit Weingarten on the cover of GQ magazine.

After recovering from the trauma of seeing a poopless Weingarten, we found that he’s using Twitter to play grammar police to fellow journalists. On Monday he went after HuffPost’s Elise Foley because of her Twitter bio. It says, “Politics and immigration reporter for HuffPost. Jessica Alba tweeted one of my articles once–it’s all been downhill from there.”

What’s wrong with that? Read more

The Media Critic

The new Prince book from Toure sounds interesting. – CNN’s Jake Tapper

Spring Fever

You guys, this is the last Friday of the year for which baseball is not an option. - Roll Call’s Meredith Shiner

Never Forget

The song “Friday” by Rebecca Black is two years old this month. – Politico’s Byron Tau

Conversations Between Two Journos

“Somewhere in my family’s junk there is a receipt, signed by Lincoln, for a bunch of fixed roads/sidewalks in dc. No joke.” – Politico’s Ben White

WaPo’s Plumline author Greg Sargent writes back, “uh, dude? might be worth digging that out.” White replied that he’s “been on hunt for some time.” Best of luck, Ben.

I give WaPo “humorist” Gene Weingarten a lot of crap about his weekly column and not to worry, that continues today. I’m first to admit that Weingarten is capable of amazing writing that touches readers on many emotional levels that range from reeling in disgust from his poop humor to laughing at his candor. These days, however, his weekly column rarely reaches such great heights unless he’s writing about or imitating FishbowlDC. It’s recycled jokes, stale bits and observations that only elderly curmudgeons can relate to.

This week is no different as Gene tackles the RED-HOT controversy surrounding The Onion tweeting the dreaded “C-Word”  with regards to Quvenzhané Wallis. Yes, THAT controversy from over a month ago. Gene uses it as a launchpad to discuss which jokes are appropriate and inappropriate to make. He writes, “Are there subjects so controversial that you just can’t joke about them? I believe the answer is no. You just have to do it right.” Fundamentally, I agree with Weingarten. You can read my original take on The Onion‘s joke here. So, this week should be easy! Gene and I will agree and we’ll all move on and be besties, right?

Well, not exactly. Read more

(A Sprinkling of Things we Think you Ought to Know…)

CPAC’s Saddest Panel – Now that CPAC is over, Twitter will be a LOT less interesting. I think we’ll kinda miss all the pictures of weirdos wearing “Zombie Obama” face-paint, sad Presidential mascots and Newt Gingrich. One of the sadder events that was featured at CPAC was an event called, ““Stop THIS: Threats, Harassment, Intimidation, Slander & Bullying from the Obama Administration.” Catchy, right?

On the panel was Breitbart’s Ben Shapiro, who has been getting a lot of attention lately. Unfortunately for him, all that attention doesn’t translate into attendance at CPAC. Little Green Footballs snapped this shot of the panel, which looks emptier than minibar in a CPAC hotel room.

WaPo‘s Weingarten thinks he can play baseball and Tapper’s debut…

Read more

On Tuesday night, Buzzfeed held its second installment of “Buzzfeed Brews” in Washington, D.C. Bureau Chief John Stanton sat down with Sen. Kirsten Gilibrand (D-NY) and crushed some whiskey and beers to talk politics. Last month, Editor-in-Chief Ben Smith talked to Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) in a similar format. It’s been a popular event with more being planned, but Politico is making moves to shark some of the attention away from the events. On Wednesday, Politico announced “Playbook Cocktails” with Mike Allen and Bill Gates.

While it doesn’t have the same ring as “Buzzfeed Brews,” it certainly seems like a familiar concept.  Read more

(A Sprinkling of Things we Think you Ought to Know…)

Weingarten Defends D.C. – WaPo “humorist” Gene Weingarten uses his weekend column to defend the honor of Washington, D.C. from NYP’s Cindy Adams. Adams famously bashed Washington a few weeks ago, calling it “a sewer.” While Adams doesn’t return Weingarten’s requests for an interview, Gene tries interviewing her anyway. He writes, “Cindy, I make fun of Washington all the time, but I do it because it is the opposite of dirty. It’s as though we took a city and surgically removed all the grit. Washington is spit-shined. People are annoyingly polite and genteel. Nobody jaywalks. The homeless wear spats. You can eat off the sidewalk; indeed, many fine restaurants encourage it. Whereas — and I mean no disrespect to your city — New York smells of stale pee, with a fresh pee chaser.” Is Gene trying to start ANOTHER DC-NYC turf war? Good for Gene for taking on a tired, hack writer for a major market newspaper. Where on EARTH could he have come up with such an idea?

Ashley Judd bares it all and Diplomat Dennis Rodman… Read more

Someone should get Bob Woodward some Preparation H because he’s acting all butthurt over a minor spat with the White House.

On Wednesday, Politico’s Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen put out this piece claiming the seasoned political reporter was “at war” with the White House. It all stems from Woodward’s recent piece alleging that the looming sequester cuts were all an idea that came from the Obama administration. Woodward tells of an angry phone conversation he had with an unidentified White House official and a follow up email that Woodward perceived as “a threat.” This led to conservatives rallying around Woodward for his calling out of the administration and pointing to their threatening tactics as a form of bullying. This made Twitter an unbelievably painful place to be on Wednesday evening.

It didn’t take long for Buzzfeed’s Ben Smith to report the White House official in question was none other than economic aide, Gene Sperling. Politico, sensing they had been scooped, confirmed that it was Sperling AND released the threatening email in question.

The only problem? It’s hardly a threat. Read more

WaPo’s Richard Cohen starts his latest piece by saying that he “loves” all of his readers. He then launches into a sermon about how we are a nation of phonies because we drop formalities or, as Cohen writes, we’ve “done away with the intermediary steps of feelings less than love.” He says it’s not enough to like someone or “hold them in some esteem.”

While I eventually found myself agreeing with Cohen, he got off to a weird start when he writes that “this all started some years back” when he called an airline company and a woman introduced herself using only her first name. Then, things get a little weird. Read more