The Press Box - How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Woj Bomb | The Press Box

Episode Date: July 2, 2019

Fallout from the Democratic debates (03:00), the “Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week” (16:00), NBA free agency (21:00), a school shooting impostor (31:15), and more. Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. To get you through the holiday week, check out the ringer.com for our July streaming recommendations, analysis on the U.S. women's national team during the World Cup, and takeaways from an exciting start to NBA-free agency. Also, we'll be sticking to our regular podcast schedule, so make sure to tune in to your favorite shows throughout the week as usual. David, a story about the Democratic debates on Fox News.com, quoted Ringer, editor-at-large Brian Curtis,

and media guru David Shoemaker. Oh, yeah. What I want to know is, is this the first time you've been quoted by Fox News? Um, I... Oh, God. The answer is no.

I mean, I don't know if I've ever been quoted in a story before. I did appear on Fox and Friends. Little known fact. Wow. Six years ago or so, maybe more. See if someone can track down the tape. I had a book out called The Squared

Circle, Life Death, Professional Wrestling. It's still available on Amazon.com and bookstores around the world. And I had a weird run of conservative media attention. I think we launched with the New York Post excerpt, and I was on Imas. I mean, at the time, that was

kind of distinctly in the conservative sphere. A lot of different conservative papers. But yeah, I was on Fox and Friends. And you were in studio? You were on the set with those people? In studio with pancake makeup all over my bald head. Yeah, and I got to sit down next to Brian Kilmead on some plush chairs, and he asked me all about the book. It was pretty fun.

You've got a lot to answer for. I'm a fan, Fox and Friends. David Shoemaker would do anything to sell a book. I suggested, that was the first time I put it in their ear that they should suggest to Donald Trump. He should run for president. We are the large gurus of media podcasts. This is the press box, a part of the ringer podcast network. Hello, media consumers.

Welcome to the press box. Brian Curtis and David Shoemaker of the Ringer here. On today's pod, we're going to hit Donald Trump at the DMZ, a school shooting imposter, NBA free agency, how to leave your journalism job, plus that overworked Twitter joke of the week. But first, David, let's get back to the fallout of the Democratic debates, which were last week. First off, I spent an hour on Thursday night mispronouncing Senator Harris's name.

It is Kamala, not Kamala, and I knew that. Anyway, thanks to a listener Gray for calling us out on that. The big story of Night 2, though, was Kamala Harris challenging Joe Biden on his happy talk about working with segregationists and his position on school busing. This was my favorite thing, I think a senior Biden advisor said right after the debate that Harris was doing, quote, exactly what Trump wants. And then another Biden advisor denied that the campaign had made that statement. But both the statement and the denial were on Twitter. at the same time. So that's, uh...

What? Yeah, I know. The Biden campaign continues to sail right along. By the way, do you enjoy how every media entity had to call the Biden Harris bit a heated exchange? That's the only vocabulary we're allowed to use? Yeah, that was, that was kind of odd. I know, it didn't feel that heat is not the word that I would have used to describe it,

although, you know, in the moment, maybe that's just the word that you've mean on. I thought the boxing metaphor was better. right, staggered, stunned Biden. I think that was more, it was more that than he did exchange. But we'll let him get away with that. One answer that Harris gave that bled into the coverage on Friday was that she raised her hand when Lester Holt asked about getting rid of private insurance. But you've got to listen closely to Lester Holt's question.

Here it is as he asked it Thursday night. We're going to turn to the issue of health care right now. I really try to understand whether there may or may not be daylight between you. Many people watching at home have health insurance. coverage through their employer. Who here would abolish their private health insurance in favor of a government run plan? Just to show hands starting up with. Did you hear the slight confusion there? Where he says, he starts out saying many people watching at home have health insurance to their employer. Who here would abolish their private health insurance in favor of the government run plan?

So there, he's apparently talking about everybody watching. But. Okay. It's when I heard that question live, I thought he was saying candidates, which of you would give up your private insurance to the government run plan, which is a pretty easy thing to agree to whether or not you endorse immediate Medicare for all. Yeah. Kamala Harris put her hand up and she and Bernie Sanders only puts their hands up. And then the day after, she had to clean it up because she realized what she'd agreed to. So here's what she said on more. Joe. So once and for all, do you believe that private insurance should be eliminated in this country? No. You don't? No, I do not. But you raised your hand last night. But the question was, would you give up your private insurance for that option? And I said yes. Oh, I think you heard it differently than others then. Probably, because that's what I heard. But yeah, but I will. By the way, do we have a rule, by the way, in future debates. No more hand raised.

So the only thing we can agree on, David, is that MSNBC. didn't do a good job with the debate. Even Joe Scarborough thinks that raised-hand questions are a bad idea. But am I wrong that that was confusing and strange? No, it was incredibly confusing. But I don't know that raise-hand questions are a bad idea as the way to come out of this. It's raised-hand questions if they're impossible to understand are a bad idea. But I think we talked about this on the night.

I mean, and they're also a little bit like, you know, elementary school or a little bit, you know, there's an inherent silliness to, you know, 10 grown people raising their hand to answer a question. But at the same time, it seemed I felt like that was the only time we got anything approaching a real answer for half the night, except for the few, like, you know, pet issues that each candidate really wanted to talk about. Yeah, or at least you could distinguish between the candidates. Yeah. It wouldn't have been a huge deal with Harris, except she has been down this road before. Earlier in the campaign, she called for eliminating private insurance. and then she walked it back.

And that's what led to her big reboot back in May. And it's a good reminder that when everybody says, yeah, why hasn't Kamala Harris, why hasn't she been a top-tier candidate? Why hasn't she been among the leaders? It was because her campaign, after starting with a huge crowd in Oakland,

raising a lot of money, didn't go particularly well. And she didn't seem ready. And her team was worried that she was sort of cowtowing to the left or the lefty elements in the party a little bit too much instead of. And you notice now, she says the word prosecutor like every five words.

She is, she is back to the prosecutor, Kamala Harris. I'm going to prosecute the case against Trump. I'm going to worry about, you know, whatever kind of, you know,

whatever kind of cognitive dissonance this creates with, with other people in the Democratic coalition. But this is me now. I'm leaning into it. Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think that I mentioned this some after her performance.

I mean, she was exceptional in the debate on, in terms of, you know, debating goes. I mean she came she came away from that looking really good and all the reactions to the night

to the polls and everything else seemed to reflect that but I think that well for one thing you know there's no time in a debate at least in a 10 certainly not in a 10 person debate for someone to come from behind like that and for anyone else to have an adequate response. You know no one's going to be ready for it's one thing to

go to the boxing metaphor. It's one thing to be you know ready for a sucker punch. or a, you know, even an uppercut you didn't see, you didn't plan for. But it's another thing to, you know, when that punch comes from like, is like someone weighing you from behind out of the audience or something like that. So it's, you know, I think that she's certainly going to be a target moving forward. And there's going to be a lot more attention on her campaign and the same degree to which we've sort of just painfully rolled our eyes at the Biden campaign, you know, so far.

If Harris has any more, you know, scrubs along the lines of the one she's already had, even, And I think that those are going to reflect a whole lot more negatively on her as a candidate. Another dynamic that's really interesting is the revenge of the moderates within the Democratic Party. You pointed out very correctly that if you watched the second debate or even the first one last week, it seemed like Bernie Sanders had won, even if he was sort of a smaller and sort of lost figure within that whole debate. His ideas had been broadly adopted on the stage. And then we saw a big piece in The New York Times this weekend with people like Rahm Emanuel, being quoted and saying this is not going to win the presidential election.

I know those are all Rahm Emanuel and those guys are all figures of fun on Twitter, but those kinds of people are big and important rank and file Democrats within the Democratic Party. And the idea that all these candidates are going to drift way to the left is not going to go down with a lot of people. And I just think whether it's Harris, whether it's Biden's future, all of that is going to be refracted through that lens. And that to me is one of the most interesting stories going for it. Because a lot of people are not going to be on the train of, hey, let's just do, you know, Medicare for all and all the other things we heard about the other night. Yeah, I just, I mean, this is maybe beside the point, but I just feel like the biggest problem with the argument that people like Rahm Emanuel are making

when they say that kind of stuff is that it's Ram Emanuel and people like that making it. Like the least convincing messenger is possible for this or the people who have been there and done that before. I mean, this is what the, what the base of the Democratic Party is kind of of agitating against it's not i mean sure there's donald trump sure there's the republicans but it's the sort of the status quo the machine that like you know that kept burning out of the out of the general election four years ago you know i mean these are the sort it just it just seems like when somebody when somebody like you know comes it tries to come in off the top rope with a let me tell you how these elections really work thing it's just gonna it's just going to infuriate people even more i

i agree but don't we think that i don't think he's wrong but i mean i don't think he's necessarily wrong, but like if you think, if you know so much about politics, then like consider that you're the worst messenger for that. Yeah, I mean, I'm not arguing that he's, that he's right or that certainly I want more Rahm Emanuel in my life in any possible way. But don't we think he's much more of a comic figure on Twitter than he is within the Democratic Party? I mean, I understand like, I just think we're reading, you know, constant, that guy gets just torn up on Twitter every single day, every time he speaks. This is true. But I just don't think, I mean, you know, again, like, you know, And nobody is going back and saying, well, wasn't he a great mayor of Chicago?

I'm not saying any of that. But I think these people are more powerful and influential within the Democratic coalition among donors, among people like that than we realize. And if you just read liberal Twitter all day that you might realize. And again, it's just, I'm just saying there is a battle. There is a not secret battle for what's the Democratic Party going to be and what's the Democratic Party candidate going to be like. And I'm just going to be interested to see how that plays out. Meanwhile in Joe Biden land, David, Dan Diamond at Politico flagged this bit. Biden was speaking at a fundraiser in Seattle.

And the pool report noted Biden suggested public sentiment has come far on gay rights issues in a short period of time saying five years ago, if someone at a business meeting in Seattle, quote, made fun of a gay waiter, end of quote, people would just let it go. The audience vocally pushed back at that saying not in Seattle. So that was a weird moment. Biden also in Chicago this last week, defending what he called his lifetime commitment to civil rights, of course, after the Harris Exchange. Let's listen to how he did it. We've got to recognize that kid wearing a hoodie.

May very well be the next poet laureate and not a gangbanger. Ladies and gentlemen, there are too many black men and I might add women in prison. Okay. That is the first I heard that. That is amazing. I mean, just top-notch work there. Corey Booker came back in a question. course, I asked why it's a problem that the kid wears the hoodie in the first place,

whether or not becomes poet laureate. I just, I have a feeling. I mean, we're in a weird place with Biden because we're also in a place where the footage we're seeing of him, whether it's k-file or one of these people unearthing it is inevitably like Biden in 1982 or 1978 talking about busing. And it just reminds people. I mean, it cannot be good for a political campaign to have 30-year-old footage of you playing nonstop, no matter what it's about. And it does not exactly scream the future.

But I feel he is in a really, really weird place right now. We haven't gotten the Biden reboot, though. Or if we have, I've missed it, you know, the huddling with advisors and that kind of stuff. I mean, I think it's really, well, I think we were about two degrees off from it, like the night of the debate. Like as you were making that, as you were making that joke or that proclamation that on, on our podcast, I felt like it was, they're, they're deliberately getting away. I think they're avoiding the idea of the reboot because that would show defeat or weakness, but we're not that far away from it in the way it's been used in the past. But also that, you know, the historical footage thing is a double-edged sword. I mean, he talks about, you know, he talks about his civil rights record. And obviously there's a, there is a degree to which, you know, like Bernie Sanders marching for civil rights in those old folks. is certainly going to help him in some ways. You know, I guess Bernie's not, never tried to really disguise his age. He's never tried to be cool.

But there's some ways that history can help you. But I think that, that you're right. In this case, it's definitely not a benefit. Finally, one of the big debate stories was the tangle between Texans, Beto O'Rourke, and Julian Castro. Two days after the debate, Castro was headed to Austin for a scheduled event. And what some saw as a big footing exercise, Beto also went to Austin and scheduled. and scheduled an event a few blocks away from Castro. There's only room enough in this state for one charismatic outsider.

That's going to be me. Castro, speaking to reporters, said a few months ago, they were writing me up as the other Texan, but that is no more, I am the Texan in this race. And O'Rourke for his part, his campaign sent out a release, noting that according to a poll of Texas voters, Beto has a three-point lead over Joe Biden and a 25 point lead over fellow Texan Julian Castro.

To just slip that in there. That was important to note in the press release. That's also what you said when the Ringer hired John than Charks. You were just like, I end to one Texan to the ringer.com. Yeah, it's like who's the real Texan here? That was, this is, I feel like this is going to be a subplot that is ultimately about nothing. Neither one. These guys are going to win.

But the battle for who gets to represent Texas in the Democratic primary is when I am all four. And I want to know, you know, who can get to Bucky's first and get a photo op. Yeah, I think that the, I think that, I mean, the notion of like delivering states in a national election, I think is a little bit overblown. I think that, you know, that's one of the lessons we might have should have learned four years ago. but it is kind of endearing to see two people fighting over the potential ability to deliver the state of Texas that's not going to happen anyways. The AP found one fan at the Beto event with a black t-shirt emblazoned with Beto Days Are Coming. So add that to the strain pun column. Beto days are coming.

He certainly hope so. All right, David, time for the overworked Twitter joke of the week where we celebrate a gag that was so obvious that all of media Twitter made it at exactly the same time. please send your nominees to at the press box pod. There were a bunch of them this week, and thank you very much for all of them. First, David, the world saw that wonderful photograph of Megan Rapino of the U.S. soccer team, arms outstretched, totally victorious and somehow totally serene at the same time after the Americans beat France 2-1 in the World Cup semifinals. It was an overwork Twitter joke to use the photo and write me when my inbox gets a zero.

thanks to pickle jar hero for that one. David, NBA free agency went bonkers yesterday in predictable fashion. Yeah. Or an unpredictable fashion, I guess. A lot of players quickly signed, but one that didn't was the enigmatic Kawhi Leonard.

It was an overworked Twitter joke to speculate on what rudimentary technology Leonard would finally use to announce his choice. For example, Kawhi Leonard is so low key, he's going to announce his decision soon via Western Union Telegram. He's going to fax his decision to an A.A. traffic and news radio station. He's going to announce by updating his

LinkedIn profile. And finally, have we considered the possibility that Kauai was locked out of his Yahoo email account? Thanks to a bunch of people for that one, including KL, Connor Widegarden, Coleman Barton, Biso, Bill Hebel, and D.K. Metcalfe, that is a very inside NFL draft reference. Go ahead.

How many of those were Jeff Foxworthy tweets? I think if he was aware of the Kauai Leonard decision-making process, he would definitely had one. Surprising for agency was the Golden State Warriors

trading for DiAngelo Russell. Before he got good last season, Russell was best known perhaps for allegedly releasing a piece of video

in which his teammate Nick Young appeared to talk about cheating on Iggy Azalia. To make room for Russell, the Warriors traded away Andre Iguodala

and it was an overwork Twitter joked right. This isn't the first time DeAngelo Russell did Iggy wrong. Thanks to Vincent Orlek for that one.

And this was kind of a layup, David, but why not? a big schadenfreude, a rich news item last week was that the NRA is ending NRA TV and its association with Dana Loche.

Oh. Yeah, I know. Very sad. It was an overwork Twitter joke to write thoughts and prayers. Thanks to Anthony Galsden, Paul J. Stevens, Michael Mason, and somebody else. Michael, just Michael. That's the last name. All right, David, time for the notebook dump. First item here I have is Trump at the

DMZ. The president was at the G20 in Osaka on Friday. This is just an amazing media story, I think, beyond the just obvious ha ha. So he's at the G20 and he tweets I will be leaving Japan for South Korea while there

if Chairman Kim of North Korea sees this, I would like to meet him at the border DMZ just to shake his hand and say hello. Parenthesis question mark, close parenthesis, exclamation point. Did he post it on Twitter? Was that on Craigslist misconnections?

Not exactly. Yeah, someone tweeted, is this Trump's live journal account? That is the weirdest thing I've ever heard. I remember, like, I saw it on Twitter and still think it's a joke. I don't quit. Yeah, it was. But it worked. It worked.

You did work. They have, Trump and Kim had their photo op at the border. And then, after that, Trump sat with Kim and he said this. And I want to thank. Chairman Kim, for something else, when I put out the social media notification, if he didn't show up, the press was going to make me look very bad. So you made us both look good, and I appreciate it. But we've developed a great relationship. Okay. So David, help us dig out of this context of no context. Trump tweets an invitation to Kim to meet him at the DMZ.

They have the photo op. And then among his first remarks to the media afterwards, I am grateful to Mr. Kim for showing up and not making me look bad for this tweet I put out there. What do we do with that? I don't know. I mean, it's just also, like, if I'm going to be slightly sympathetic,

you know, we've gotten to a point, I mean, I don't think there's any justification for any of this stuff, but we've certainly gotten to a point where he believes his own, Donald, President Trump, that is, believes, if he was ever joking about the media being an enemy, he's certainly he's bought into that.

He's bought into that as the truth now. And whatever. I mean, the fact that he sees these, he sees these like crazy foreign leaders as like better friends of his than, you know, the Wall Street Journal editorial board is just sad on so many levels. Let's talk NBA free agency.

Kevin Draper mentioned this on Twitter, and I could not agree more, which was the weirdness of ESPN, both covering free agency, And then when Chris Middleton and Tobias Harris signed their contracts, tweeting out prefab players tribune style pieces about why they signed where they did. Yeah. A couple notes on this. When someone resigns with their team, that's not actually the most interesting why I did it.

That's like me. I've decided to keep working at the ringer. Well, you know, okay. You know, thanks for letting us know. Yeah. Also, the pieces themselves, Middleton's as told to, I'm going to read a sentence, we have unfinished business here in Milwaukee dot, dot, dot. The goal is it wasn't to reach the Eastern Conference Finals.

We're on a mission to win a championship. And this is from Harris's. We've got unfinished business and I'm ready to commit to a long-term vision of bringing a title to Philadelphia. It's the same thing. And it's the same thing they would say in a press conference anyway. We just, we got the jump on the kind of like two minutes of. unquotable stuff they would say when this contract gets officially announced. It's like I can understand ESPN seeing Woge out there clowning them on draft night and just

being like, we need to get in the Woj business, you know, even if that means signing a competitor. They're in the Woj business. No, no, no, I know. But before that happened. And I can understand them, I can understand, you know, them seeing, I mean, whatever else. They could see, I mean, just they could say like, oh, we need to be doing more story. We need to be doing more long form stories like the ringer.com. We need to be, you know, that's not a, they've made the opposite choice.

But whatever. I mean, you can see them looking at competition and saying, we need to do some of that and it making sense. It just is mind-boggling that they were like, we need to get in that Players Tribune game. Because it's just like sacrificing, I mean, if there's any, if there's any ombudsman on duty over there, like, it's just like it seems like such an odd sacrifice for such like a menial just accumulation of clicks off Twitter. But I guess, you know, I'm sure it builds relationships or whatever else too.

So, you know, have that. Yeah, I'm just for never doing these kind of stories, just almost never. But even if you admit, even if there's like, you argue, okay, there's one or two of them where there's some, some, you know, benefit for doing them. Yeah. I mean, I've got unfinished business is not a benefit. I just don't get that at all. Chris Almeida points out. I would like, this is sort of like the who's, like whose side has got on argument.

I want to find somebody who signs with the team who like thinks they're. is no unfinished business. Yeah. When they leave a team, just be like, yeah, the main reason I left the Golden State Warriors is because we are completely done with unfinished, with all of our business. There was no business left unfinished. Well, yeah, I would just say, like, I just really wanted to get a lot of money. And if we went a title, that'd be a nice side benefit.

But this is what I've been working for is a huge contract and mission accomplished. Chris Almeida points out a media evolution at work this week. Back in 2016, Kevin Durant, who just signed with Annettes, announced his free agent pick via the Players Tribune. And this year he attempted to announce it via his own thing, which is the boardroom. So it was sort of like, even the Players Tribune was too much of an outside media. I'm going to do it my own. I think he was actually scooped by Woage.

Is that right? In his own thing. Kind of a weird intra-Espian deal there, too. Speaking of Woge, one thing he did this year was tweet out the agent's names. Did you know that a lot? Notice that? Yes, I saw that. Do you have a theory for what?

why he did that? I mean, it's all transactional. We always knew it was the agents. That, you know, for anything, not just basketball, football. We always knew it was the agents. I mean, listen, a lot of these guys have, a lot of the agents have taken a lot of junk this year, Rich Paul, Rich Klyman in particular.

Their names have been out there a lot. But their names have been out there a lot. You know, and maybe there's, maybe there's other agents that see it, not just as a marketing tool to other basketball players, but like, you know, maybe, maybe there are other agents that want their own boardroom style TV shows or, you know, just want to want to have the sort of cachet that a, you know, Bill Simmons podcast guest might have, you know, maybe it's, maybe it's, that's part of it. Yeah, I think that's a good theory. Verrier kind of pointed this out when he was sitting in for you the other day, which was that if you use the term league sources or any

anonymous sources. It makes a story more interesting than if you just name who gave it to you. So listen to, I'm just, here are two sample tweets and you tell me which one of these are both, this is from Woj. Tell me what sounds more interesting. Free agent guard, Patrick Beverly has agreed to a three year $40 million deal to stay with the Clippers league sources tell ESPN. Or Beverly agreed to a three year, 40 million dollar deal. His agent Kevin Bradbury tells ESPN. Now, doesn't the first one sound like a bigger deal? No, sure. It sounds like a secret as opposed to, Yeah, his agent just told me. People are talking about it.

Yeah. You know? This has worked its way, it worked its way around the, around the, the, the telephone line. But it's funny, right, because they're the exact same story. And they're probably gotten the exact same way. But one of them just sounds infinitely more, like more of a secret than the other one. Mm-hmm. Which is really funny.

And I just somebody was, somebody and I were talking about that the other day that's like, if you just, if you took all the on the record stuff you got and just put sources instead, I think you would just make your stories like 50% more interesting. Exactly. Everybody would be wondering who the sources are. And it doesn't matter. It doesn't. The information would be exactly the same.

Almeida also notes for us that we have a new tradition, which is that every NBA news cycle ends when Magic Johnson sends out a thuddingly obvious tweet. We have reached this point in history. So after the Anthony Davis trade to the Lakers, he says, great job by owner Jeannie Bus bringing AD to the Lakers. Laker Nation, the Lakers are back in the championship hunt, et cetera, et cetera. And then after the Lakers cleared cap room the other day to try to sign another free agent, wow, wow, wow, what a trade.

Big move by Jeannie and Rob, dot, dot, dot, dot. This feels like when, you know, like a celebrity dies and we have all the heartfelt tributes of the people actually know them and then the president weighs in, you know. Melani and I would love to extend our condolences to the family of Aretha Franklin. And then you know that the new cycle is absolutely over. We've done the formalities. signal the end of the news cycle in a very in a very precise way. But I do wish that Magic Johnson would just contribute his gifts to all manner of subjects and not just basketball. Like,

like sad to hear that the great artist, Aretha Franklin, has died. When you die, usually they embalm you and then bury you in a casket and dig you six feet under the ground. And people send you off. So sad. Wow, wow, wow. Wow, wow. David, this from the Department of How the Media Sausage is made. The TV show Inside Edition, which I'm not sure I knew was still on. Oof. Got its hands on a recording of Harvey Weinstein talking to New York Times reporters Jody Kanner and Megan Tui. This took place in October 2016, two days before Kanner and Tui dropped their big story that effectively ended Weinstein's career.

Let's listen to a little of the sound. You're going to hear some Inside Edition narrator voice. and the reporter's voice you'll hear as Canter, who is my former colleague, full disclosure. We've found a pattern over three decades of allegations of sexual harassment of multiple women. I think you ought to be specific and tell me who they are, and if they're on the record. Weinstein tries to challenge their reporting. There are many mistakes you've made. Do you want to identify any of them?

We will. I promise you we will. I'm going to say this nicely. Get the facts right. You're a journalist. The now disgraced media mogul tries to defend himself. I'm not a saint, but I'm not the sinner you think I am. The reporters ask Weinstein about actress Rose McGowan, who said she was sexually assaulted by Weinstein in 1997.

We know that in 1997 you paid $100,000 to Rose McGowan following an encounter in a hotel room. Is there anything we want to tell us about that? Weinstein refers almost every question to his attorney, Charles, Harder. I'll let Charles handle that. I think Charles can respond to that. Charles Harder's frequent response.

Yeah, I will get back to you on that. We'll get back to you. Yeah, I'm going to get back to you on all of these things. Weinstein did respond soon after denying any sexual misconduct. Fascinating, is it not? I would, I would love to hear that for every big piece ever published. A couple of things you hear Weinstein doing there. One is saying that they've made mistakes in their reporting.

And of course, when reporters are reporting the story like that, that's the thing they fear, that there'll be some little mistake that will undermine the bigger story they're trying to get out there. Yes. Some little thing that they're missing some error. He is happy to introduce that into their mind, though not tell them what the mistake is, notice. The other thing is just kicking the can down the road as much as he can. My lawyer will get back to you on all this, which do we really think. there's going to be like it would would be a substantive response from the lawyer on any of this probably not um but just like don't don't worry i'll just get back to you on all this you know yeah

and we've seen in other instances and other other versions of this like kind of how the donuts are made stories especially in the of this me too era is that there have been instances where you know the editors in chief will wait uh endlessly for the high power to cues to to return with her response. Yeah. The Weinstein also says in that inside edition piece, I recommend you watch the whole thing, that he wasn't comfortable with Canter and Tui taping the call.

And he insisted he wasn't taping it himself. But one of his employees tells Inside Edition that Weinstein actually asked him to tape the call, which is where this audio comes from. So he's saying, I don't want you to tape this. They, of course, want to tape it for accuracy and records and all that kind of stuff. He says don't,

but then secretly, apparently, asks his employee to tape it. Anyway, fascinating stuff. David, this is a weird story from the Department of Journalistic Imposters. You remember that awful shooting in the Santa Fe Springs Texas High School last year? Ten people died, many more injured. A substitute teacher at the school named David Briscoe was quoted or referenced in the Wall Street Journal in Time in CNN. And today, Monday, there's an amazing piece by Alex Samuels in the Texas Tribune that reveals that as best anyone can tell David Briscoe, Briscoe was not in that school at all, was not a substitute teacher, has no bearing on any of this. Samuels did some digging and finds no record that he was a substitute, finds his vivid descriptions of hearing loud shots, do not match other accounts of the shooting. And here's the kicker.

Samuel started this story because David Briscoe or someone with his Twitter account DM'd her and offered himself up for a one-year anniversary follow-up article. So this person infiltrated the media, allegedly, and then DMs her and says, hey, you want, hey, I'm available if you'd like, if you'd like to write a, you know, one year later piece on this. Wow. But was apparently not in the school at all. Anyway, head over to the Texas Tribune and read that, a fascinating story. I've got a small rant. Do we want to call it? We were going to talk about rants as Mount Journalism.

Do we still want that as the title for this? Oh, that's fine. Whatever you want to do. The rare case, you know, we try not to, we try not to be those kind of media podcasters, but the rare moment where you have to get out the ice axe and climb to the top of the mountain and just make a point. Here's my point. And this is really not a sub-tweet of anybody because I've seen like six of these this week. It's kind of a sub-tweet of everybody, actually.

When you leave a journalism job now, why have we gotten to the point where you go to Twitter and announce that you're leaving the job, but you can't say anything about the next job. And then, like, a week later, two weeks later, you have another big Twitter hit where you announce the new job. Can we just do that in one shot? Do we have to officially depart and then sometime later officially join the new media organization? Yeah, but you got to get out there before somebody else scoops you, right? Isn't that the number one rule of journalism that you don't want to have like somebody from some other lesser media organization out there tweeting like trying to, trying to steal some of your shine being like, oh, man, it's really heartbreaking when

great writers like Brian Curtis leave good outlets like The Ringer. I really hope that I really hope that there's not more to the story than meets the eye. I don't, I don't want to be mean to anybody, but these are not these are not competitive scoops, these transactions. Nor would mine be, by the way, but these are not competitive. I just, LeBron needed only one announcement when he changed teams, right? LeBron did not do farewell Cleveland and then a week later, hello L.A. He just needed one time. But journalists somehow need two different

media moments. I just, I don't understand. I really don't understand what's happening. And most people, we don't notice if you just, if I, if I disappeared from the ringer for like a month, nobody would be like, is everything okay, Brian? Nobody would even notice. Yeah. Nobody noticed. I don't believe

this whole thing of, oh, there was like a moratorium period where he couldn't talk. No, just, just just do one time. I will take one time. I know your run at whatever website was huge and we'll all remember it, but just one announcement for both. Anyway, that's it.

I'm just sending them out now. From the Department of Student Newspapers, David, great piece by Mariel Padilla in the New York Times about a high school newspaper at the Amherst Pelham Regional High School. The writer his name is Spencer Clitch, I think. It's spelled like

cliche, but I'm going to I'm going to go with Spencer Clitch. Clitch wrote a 3,000 word piece Padilla reports in the student paper that revealed that his high school was using underpaid prison labor to re-opulster the seats in the school auditorium. Spencer overheard a parent and faculty member talking about this. He was able to get the contract from the school district. He found another company that paid formerly incarcerated people more money that had actually been shut out of the contract. And then after his piece ran in the school. the school newspaper, the superintendent stopped using prison labor. So welcome to long form

Spencer Clitch. Wow. Yeah. I mean, that is, let me just say when I was writing for the high school newspaper, there were not a lot of stories of that magnitude. We're not. I disagree. The pantherette put out a lot of really top-notch material in your time there. Please, nobody go look. Speaking of cliches or clitches, I was reminded, Jacob Weisberg, my old boss wrote a piece in slate way back in 1998. You and I have talked about this before. One of the great headlines of all time. Yes, it is.

About the New York Times book review, which was then celebrating its 100th anniversary. And David, did you like to share what the very good pun headline was? If I remember correctly, it's 100 years of lassitude. A hundred years of lassitude. Yes, very good. Wiseberg is talking about the New York, there was this kind of like Control Plus V book review. This is how you write a book review in the New York Times. And he writes way back in 98, the formula is to meander on the general topic for three paragraphs, summarize the book in four more, note a flaw in the penultimate paragraph, and close with an upbeat summation on the order of still moon over Nova Scotia is a valuable contribution to our understanding of the shifting portions of Atlantic eel fishing.

Okay. That is how you write. And he even found in this piece that even the New York Times book reviews review of MINEConf. was written in this form. Yes, there were some, there were some bad parts, but so what a contribution to German history, okay? I was reading the book review on Sunday. It was a review of spying on the South, which is the new and final book by Tony Horowitz, author of the great Confederates in the attic who just died suddenly. Yeah. The review hues almost exactly to the Weisberg formula. This is the penultimate paragraph. Some of the book is predictable. One wishes for

more depth and more breadth. The views of a community or business leader would have added perspective. Okay. New graph. Nonetheless, Horowitz has produced a valuable work that combines biography, history, and travel. How do people learn how to do this? Do you just read the Times book review so much and you just kind of, by osmosis, kind of figure it out? Do we, I mean, I've never written the Times book review. Are we sure that they don't just get written by some sort of like online questionnaire? Like a Google survey where you fill out the sort of you kind of Madlib your way through a review. Please plug in a couple of qualms about the book here.

Yes. And then you start to type the fourth, the last paragraph and nonetheless just comes out on your computer like auto fill. Exactly. It's wild. I always, I just always enjoy reading him too because it really does happen.

And again, I don't, I don't know who is doing this other than we just read that book reveal all our lives and eventually start writing like that. All right. It's time for David Shoeaker, guesses the strain pun headline. God damn.

We got a good one this week. By the way, shout out to Justin Varyer for thinking it was going to be easy last week, huh? Yeah, that was funny. That was funny. Talk to big game.

Did not guess the strain pun headline. This one comes to us from that guy, Tyler, and it is a good one, a good headline. David, there's this thing in New York City where people

gather in parks on weekends and they bring their finches. I'm talking about the bird, a finch. and they have singing contests. Okay? You with me so far? And this is in the news.

The finches are singing? The finches are singing. The finches are singing. Not the owners. The finches are singing. And this is news because a man who flew to JFK from Guyana was recently busted for smuggling more than 30 finches in his luggage. Each of them was stuffed inside a hair curler.

I'm not kidding. Okay. But put aside the smuggling for a second. The New York posted a big story, a follow-up story. a follow-up story, if you will, on the Finch's singing contests that are occurring in New York parks. What was the New York Post's

strain pun headline? On Finch's singing, we're skipping the smuggling story. Yes, I just, that is, I just want to put it in it. That was why that came up, which is, I'm more interested in how this guy

was, it was probably on smuggling 20 finches. By the way, there were pictures of the finch inside the hair curler. I mean, they were literally inside a hair girl each each one I'll give you the subhead New Yorkers flock to

Finch singing contests amid crackdown This is the front page In The York Post by the way It's maybe part of the Finch Finch body part Beak Wing

Feather Lower Talon Talent show So close So close America's Got Talent America's Got Talent

Yes Good job Good headline too Now right America's got talent I don't immediately go From Finch to Tallon So I would

I'd like I should say that was the best Yeah I know No it's not your fault I'm saying like if it If I'm gonna put Talon in my pun headline I should I hope there's like

It's a raptor or something You know I'm not gonna it was a good headline It's hard to imagine a finch tearing anything else apart Anyway, David and I are back this Friday with more press box. So if you were lighten up, use sparklers or simply trying to avoid your family, please join us, will you? For more lukewarm takes about the media.

See you then, David. See you later, Brian. Yes. First off, I know your run at whatever website was huge and we'll all remember, but just please nobody go look. Is everything okay? It's really heartbreaking when great writers like Brian Curtis leave good outlets like The Ringer. I really hope that when you die, usually they embalm you and then very, very, you're really. you in a casket and dig you six feet under the ground.

Okay. So sad. I don't even notice. Yeah. I really hope that there's not more to the story than meets the eye. Hey, I'm available if you'd like to write a, you know, one year later piece on this. Yeah, sure. It sounds like a secret.

People are talking about it. Yeah, I think that's a good theory. But if I'm going to be slightly sympathetic. Oh, no. How do people learn how to do? this. That is the weirdest thing I've ever heard. I remember like I I saw it on Twitter and still think it's a joke. I don't quit it. But it worked. Fascinating. It's a nod.