Aaron Sorkin creating new HBO show based on reporters

Um, what?

 

I always thought Boom was the one with the strategic misspellings. I'm the one who twists on usernames.

 

+1

 

You weren't saying that when you opened the giant Asian dong PM.

 

Met Magary last night at his book reading in DC. Fortunately, he only read for like 3 minutes. He spent 10 to 15 minutes doing a Q&A, which was interesting. Seemed like a decent dude. Didn't use much of the schtick you're used to seeing him use online, but some of the people in the audience asking questions? Oy. Just one, big schtick party. He cursed just like he does online, but no more than you or I would. Or maybe that's just me.

I lied. The one bit he did pull out was "That's Great Hustle!" when he signed my book.

Either way, the highlight of the night were the half-smokes at Dodge City Bar. May have topped the ones at Ben's Chili Bowl, which was right down the street actually. Damn good.

 

Dare I say it? I agree with doodah? The post's tone was right, because Magary clearly believes it a horrible f---ing show. The cursing emphasized that. I generally don't like cursing/being an asshole in writing for the sake of doing it (Taibbi/Raab seem to come to mind), but it worked here, IMO.

 

Could've been done twice as effectively with half the profanity.

And an aside to doodah -- you DO understand, don't you, that you don't get to slip a "shit" or "fuck" into copy in a daily newspaper because it strengthens your point? You just cannot do it ...

 

I understand, but you can't do that because it's the NEWSPAPER'S policy. If a sports editor were to decide one day that "fuck" or "shit" was allowed to be published in the newspaper, it would not be a crime.

Also, as an aside, the Greenville News ran a "fuck" in an article not too long ago.

 

LOL

 

By mistake. And no newspaper will ever decide that that is a good idea. If there is a great quote that would be ruined by NOT using the profanity, some papers will use it. But no sports editor is ever going to unilaterally say it's OK to use those words in print. Well, there might be a couple out there who might, but they would find out very quickly that it was a mistake.

 

Funny, back in the 70s/80s, we thought once the barriers of "hell," "damn," "crap" and "suck" were breached, the rest of Carlin's Seven Magic Words would soon follow.

Hasn't happened quite that quickly.

 

It does beg the question though. Why haven't newspapers gotten on board with having foul language yet?

My guess is that, normally it doesn't add to the story. But in a column, I think it's perfect there. Language can help set tone of your argument, whereas in a straight news story, you aren't giving an argument. You're presenting the facts.

I think one day we'll see newspapers allow posts like Magary's to have columns in the printed edition.