U.S. Olympic cyclist asshats

Spnited: PaulO already got laid off, in March. LANG didn't send anybody. He's there on his own, freelancing for a few SoCal papers (and any others that want a 12-time Olympic writer to string for them *hint hint*)

 

I have no idea who PaulO is, who he works for/has workled for nor why he is in Beijing.
My point is papers had to make this commitment two years ago and did not have the foresight to see that 20K per person to cover these Games was a big nut. Nor did they have the balls to cancel some or all of that coverage when they were going in the shitter.

What I do know is that in the next two months 200 people, many of them very good people, some of them friends of mine, will accept or be forced to take buyouts at the Star-Ledger while at this moment there are 3 writers (at least 2 too many) and 2 photogs (none needed) in Beijing at the cost of at least $100,000 to a paper that claims it will lose $50 million this year.

And at this moment, the Beijing Olympics rank as no better than the 5th story in the NJ/NY market -- behind Brett fucking Favre, the Yankees, Mets, and Giants. Shit, more people might even care about Rutgers football than some swimmer form central Jersey who won't even make the freaking finals in his/her event.

But damn, that story today about Manahan walling up the Great Wall was real fascinating stuff.

 

nobody gives a fuck about the mets, either, spnited.

 

fuck you, tomas.

 

SONUVABITCH

 

Damn it.. that's "son of a bitch."

What the fuck does "UVA" mean ... other than University of Virginia?

 

you, sir, inspired sonuvabitch, and you know it.

 

I understand your point. Just pointing out PaulO was already one of those newspaper casualties you're talking about -- and the irony of the fact that he wouldn't have been allowed to go to the Olympics if he hadn't been laid off, and now the best writer LANG could have had in Beijing is now stringing for at least one of their main competitors.

 

So, who is paying for him to be there? If he's paying his own ay, he's guaranteed to lose money.
And LANG and its readers really don't casre if all they have is wire coverage.

 

Hell, he paid his own way to the World Cup two years ago -- used his vacation days to get the time off and made all the arrangements himself. As for Beijing, he'll get some of it back from freelancing (and maybe break even, if he's lucky) but I don't think he's too concerned about losing money. He'd rather be there to cover it.

And slight correction: LANG doesn't give a shit about anything. Olympics or otherwise.

 

Back to the air. It's another lousy air-quailty day in Beijing, judging from Canadian TV. Air so heavy it makes cheesecake look light.

 

Pour the air through a strainer or sifter, inhale, exhale and try to make it work.

Will the Olympic flame even be able to stay lit with such air quality issues abounding there?