Freywatch: the fallout continues

Keeping track of who’s saying what about yesterday’s Oprah show is an exhausting endeavor so it only seems fair to do so in kind of a kamikaze, haphazard fashion.

The most comprehensive coverage of the whole thing, not surprisingly, is in Chicago, where Oprah tapes her show. The Trib devotes its bloggy time to getting pissed about ABC cutting away 20 minutes in, John Kass gives props to Madame Winfrey for giving us great TV, while Dave Wischnowsky wonders who, exactly, was using whom here. James Jenega and Patrick Reardon anchor the coverage, and there’s lots more from Mary Schmich, Phil Rosenthal and Steven Johnson, who extends the discussion further into what it means for truth in general.

Since TV was involved, that means Virginia Heffernan can offer up her take on the whole thing. Bottom line? “Indeed it was amazing television.”

What’s fun is that it seems like in every piece, some other publishing type is quoted. The Tribune talked to W. Drake McFeely of Norton; the LA Times quotes Morgan Entrenkin of Grove/Atlantic; and the AP’s making Knopf’s Ashbel Green’s name known all across the country.

As for hoaxes in general, who better to talk to than Alan Abel, who’s made it his business for over 40 years? Even though his aim is “to amuse, to provoke, to give people a healthy kick in the intellect and make them laugh a bit,” it’s hard not to draw the conclusion that people will believe in things so desperately that they’ll believe anything. Just like Oprah.

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