George Allen learned it ... Don Imus learned it ... David Shuster got a taste of it ... that weird guy who played Kramer learned it ... Isaiah Washington learned it, too, big time, and Rev. Jeremiah Wright has lost a 30-year career of good works learning it ... and now, Air America talker Randi Rhodes has, too. The New Law of Public Discourse is that soundbites can and will be used against you in the court of public opinion, and you only get to screw up once. Sez the Huffpo:
Air America host Randi Rhodes called both Geraldine Ferraro and Hillary Clinton "whores" in a recent appearance, seen below. Rhodes, who hosts a weekday radio show on Air America, said to the cheering crowd, "What a whore Geraldine Ferraro is! She's such a fucking whore!" She then proceeded to say, "Hillary is a big fucking whore, too" to a mixed audience reaction. "You know why she's a big fucking whore? Because her deal is always, 'Read the fine print, asshole!'"
... Rhodes has been now been suspended from the network.
... Indefinitely ... And yes, there is Youtube. This is big news, frankly, for Sam Seder, a very capable on-air guy who is thankfully no longer saddled with that crackpot comedienne he used to be stuck with on "The Majority Report." Now he'll get his big chance to shine, unless AA does their usual goofball thing by putting Elaine Boozler on the mic. (shudder...)
Back to The law. It was first instituted On January 6, 1988, when then-CBS sports analyst Jimmy "the Greek" Snyder dropped the race bomb during a commentary about black athletes:
He told a Washington D.C. television reporter that a black athlete, “…is bred to be the better athlete because, this goes all the way to the Civil War when ... the slave owner would breed his big woman so that he would have a big black kid."
"The black is a better athlete to begin with because he's been bred to be that way -- because of his high thighs and big thighs that goes up into his back, and they can jump higher and run faster because of their bigger thighs. This goes back all the way to the Civil War when during the slave trading, the owner -- the slave owner would breed his big black to his big woman so that he could have a big black kid."
JTG's utterance would have been unremarkable even a couple decades earlier, when racism was as American as apple pie. But from Greek's firing on, there was a serious limit to the kinds of things you could say in public, and not lose your gig.
Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott got slapped down by the law in 1992, and it has rolled on merrily from there.
Call it political correctness, limitations on free speech, call it corporate cowardice. It really doesn't matter. As Bush spokesliar Ari Fleischer once said, you really do have to watch what you say...
<%
dim done
done = request.form("done")
if done = "" then
done = "No"
%>
Tell a friend
<%
Else
if request.form("done") = "Yes" then
'sets variables
dim email, sendmail
email = request.form("email")
Set sendmail = Server.CreateObject("CDONTS.NewMail")
'put the webmaster address here
sendmail.From = "webmaster@aspbasics.com"
'The mail is sent to the address entered in the previous page.
sendmail.To = email
'Enter the subject of your mail here
sendmail.Subject = "Check out this website"
'send a specific page or send a site url
dim url
'url = Request.ServerVariables("HTTP_REFERER")
url = "http://www.aspbasics.net"
'This is the content of the message.
sendmail.Body = "Site recommendation from a friend!" & _
vbCrlf & vbCrlf & "A friend has sent you this email and thought you would should check out this site." & _
vbCrlf & url & vbCrlf
'this sets mail priority.... 0=low 1=normal 2=high
sendmail.Importance = 1
sendmail.Send 'Send the email!
response.redirect Request.ServerVariables("HTTP_REFERER")
'Response.write ("Sent to ") & email
End if
End if
%>
"[T]he practice of arbitrary imprisonments, have been, in all ages, the favorite and most formidable instruments of tyranny.' Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 84, August, 1788
