Friday, November 24

:
Fr Nov 24 -

SoFlo Local and Beyond:
CARTOONIST WITH A GUN -


It started out as an ordinary Black Friday with wall-to-wall coverage of shoppers who had arisen early and busy shopping malls with parking lot and traffic conditions. And it soon became unwatchable. But late this morning, just in time for the noon TV News broadcasts, the SoFlo Situation rapidly spiralled out of the MSM's main agenda for the day: Shopping.

* * * * * * * *
An apparently sacked editorial cartoonist armed with a grievance and a gun entered the sixth floor of the downtown Miami Herald Newspaper Building today, demanding to confront El Nuevo Herald's executive editor, Humberto Castello.

Jose M Varela, dressed in camoflage clothing, complained he had been subjected to censorship.

Varela managed to telephone his Miami lawyer, Joe Garcia, a couple of times from within the building.

*Garcia said Varela was concerned about a conflict of interest at El Nuevo Herald.*

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The newspaper said Varela entered the newsroom at about 10:40 Friday morning and ended shortly before 2:30, when Varela was taken into police custody. Police say no shots were fired.
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In conversations with a Nuevo reporter, Varela demanded the resignation of Executive Editor Castello, who, it was reported, was not in the building. While the episode unfolded, most of the employees were evacuated from the building.

*In a 1999 Nuevo column, then-exec editor Ramon Mestre mentioned that his father and Varela's father were both political prisoners in Castro's Cuba.*

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:: Varela's tongue-in-cheek mini
auto-biography [in translation]
from the Nuevo website.
========================
:: Samples:: of
Varela's work [in Spanish].
...

Thursday, November 23

:
W/Thurs Nov 23 -

SoFlo: BLOTTINGS -

# UN-BANKING: The FBI has arrested Thomas Manuel Colon, the 19-year-old son of a Fort Lauderdale police officer, for the robbery of a bank under their surveillance in Miramar. Colon is suspected of perpetrating a spree around the state, marauding the Wachovia Banking system.

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# BEAUTY RAID: A wolfette pack of three (non-descript) women conducted a raid on a Beauty Supply store in Broward County just after 2pm Wednesday, grabbing numerous packages of human hair and several pairs of gold-plated earrings. When confronted during the act, they pepper-sprayed the owner. He was transported to a medical facility for treatment.
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# LEAF PEEPING: Wilton Manors may be headed for a culture clash. The Colhatchee Park there is allegedly being used for sexual activities which may be illegal.

As for Other Peepings: Don't send "perv" stories to Jack Shafer! He says he can't take it. "Send something civil, something with happy bunnies or frolicking puppies. Nobody beats Murdoch's paper on this sordid beat."

...
:
W/Thurs Nov 23 -

STALE EVERGREENS -

"They are telling us absolutely
nothing we don’t already know.
This is journalism?"


Jeff Jarvis laments the lame offerings the MSM is foisting on us this week: travel and shopping. I agree! If you're not doing the family thing for the holiday, it might be a good day to catch up on your reading:

# The whereabouts of the little boy named Trenton Duckett are still mysterious in Florida. Enter the bodacious TV Legal Diva, Miss Nancy Grace. And then the mother commits suicide. Now lawyers for the estate say they are filing papers for a wrongful death lawsuit against Miss Grace. Can you figure out where that little boy is?

# Or you might want to dip into the
current Carnival of the True
Crime Blogs
just posted.

# "You should read Nir Rosen's Anatomy of a Civil War, recently published in the Boston Review," recommends Zeyad at his Healing Iraq Blog.

...

Tuesday, November 21

:
Tu Nov 21 -

MEDIA WARS -

#BAGHDAD: Al-Zawraa TV is the brainchild of Mishaan al-Jubouri, a Sunni member of the Iraqi parliament who fled to Syria recently amid allegations of corruption.

:: By Hannah Allamm ::
-- McClatchy Newspapers --

#NEW YORK: Saleh Elahwal, 53, of Matawan, N.J., is the second man charged in the Hezbollah TV case in the New York Metro area.

...
:
Tu Nov 21 -

A WALK ON THE DARK SIDE -

Pierce writes that the latest issue of Rolling Stone contains a feature about true-crime blogs. I haven't seen it yet.

Then, surfing links,
Trench writes:

The gunman from the Geschwister Scholl in Emsdetten, Germany has been identified as 18-year-old Sebastian Bosse. As it turns out the similarities to Kimveer Gill are almost uncanny…

...
:
Tu Nov 21 -

THE DAILY SNARL -

While I don't care much for "happytalk" first thing in the morning, I don't like people snarling at me either. This morning was a real doozy with not one, but two snarling stories.

The first one that hit me was about Michael Richards ("Kramer"). I don't like the N-word and have never used it; I don't think it belongs in polite society usage at all. I couldn't decipher very much of Richards' rant; what I could discern sounded distasteful. But I kept waiting for the story to resolve, and it didn't, which irked me.

It is rude to heckle a performer. If you don't like the act, you can leave and even try to ask for a refund. Not only did two guys heckle Richards, they then went on to say some very hateful things to him. These two guys ruined a hundred people's evening with their disruptive misbehavior and have never apologized. The only guy who came out of all this lookin' classy was the owner of the club: Jamie Masada, who offered a refund to anyone who wanted one.
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"Michael Richards: Not a Jew-- not that there's anything wrong with that." Is this really necessary? {8-o

The thought also crossed my mind that perhaps Richards' act was a piece of some sort of strange performance art like Andy Kaufman used to do. Why? Because the Seinfeld show sometimes dealt with social taboos.
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As if that "Kramer" story weren't enough for me, lurking just around the corner on MyWay was the story that really put the start of my day this morning way outta wack: The 6 Imans on an Airplane Story. Oh, Boy!

I see the story has been somewhat updated this evening. When I first started reading it this morning, I was somewhat sympathetic about a possible unfortunate misunderstanding, but when I got to the middle of the story, some Muslim activist said he was angry!

If you want to pray on an airplane, good manners suggest you alert the stewardess first. But if they were in the airport terminal, why didn't they go to the chapel to pray? Most airports have a place which is designated for prayer. I'm still not clear about the events in question.

Be that as it may, what really ticked me off about the original story was the rant that they were behaving "normally," implying that 260 million Americans are abnormal freaks. I don't go for their imperialistic attitude. If they don't like the way most Americans do things here, I think they should leave or be deported. They seemed to think we have to conform to their requirements and exhibited a very distorted sense of entitlement. I expect people to show good manners. They seemed to think the whole world should revolve around them. Whoever brought these crackpots into the U.S. to begin with, should be fired or voted out of office.

So, how many imans does it
take to ground an airline flight?
Maybe 6 ;-)
...

Monday, November 20

:
Mo Nov 20 -

BLOGGING THE NEWS -

# WaPo's Downie Exposed: Stephen Brook with The UK Guardian's Media Desk writes about Leonard Downie Jr, the exec ed of the Washington Post. A very worthwhile article-- grab it!
* * * * * * * * * *
-- A Peek: Some Blogs by
Norfolk England residents.
========================
SoFlo Local:
# No I.D. & No Description: Over the weekend, it emerged that a woman's body was discovered in North West Ft Lauderdale near an apartment complex. The cadaver had no identification papers on it: no driver's license, library card, Medicare card, etc..

Although this was reported by at least a half-dozen news organizations, both TV station broadcasts/websites and local newspapers, none of the reporters gave a description of the female victim. How does this happen?

Monday Update: This item has now disappeared from the Media entities online, with the exception of the Sun-Sentinel, where it now appears under Broward County Newsbriefs which adds that the woman was white. But still no description!

...