Why make this Olympic journey?

The Dwarf makes it too easy...

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080807/SPORTS17/80807060

... because the PGA's in town and the last time I had to cover golf, I almost didn't make it back from Augusta alive
... because I can use the word "I" "Me" or "my" 18 times in a column....
... because I can chime in on Kwame from anywhere in the world, since I am the voice of southeastern Michigan.

 

It reads like a Tony Kornheiser-just flew into the Super Bowl and man this place sucks-piece.

 

I just love how supposedly cash-strapped newspapers are spending roughly 20K per writer/photog etc. to tell us Beijing is awful, the smog is gonna kill all of us, the Chinese governament is repressive ...

And, oh, by the way, we need to lop 20 more people next week to remain profitable.

 

Mitch's existence is probably causing at least 20 people to have their bags packed elsewhere throughout Gannett. By himself.

Great comment already below Albom's column:
"Because there are over a billion people I can sell my books to."
(Shouldn't "suckers" be substituted for "people"?)

 

Considering the time delay, and most events aren't going to be aired until the day after they occur, or if live to the East Coast, too late to get it in the next paper, do "scoop" TV or wait until the day after they air so you can get some decent quotes?

 

And opposite the Olympics, spnited has programmed reruns.

 

Tuesdays with Mao?

 

I'm surprised slappy didn't jump all over this part:

Make shit up? That's a felony now?

 

It's the lazy column that so many columnists write every time they're covering the Olympics, Super Bowl etc...

Personally, I hate these columns because if the paper is paying to send me somewhere, I feel the need to give them something that they can only get from someone who is there. Albom could have written the same column from his couch, and he probably did.

 

It should be. And I'm ticked off because I didn't see it, either.

 

The problem is Jim Murray perfected the slam column and no one else can measure up to that, although I have enjoyed quite a few of Simers's insults.

Some of Murray's:

on an unfinished highway to a stadium in Cincinnati : "It must be Kentucky 's turn to use the cement mixer."

On New Jersey : "Its principal export is soot."

On Philadelphia : "A place to park the truck and change your socks."

On Spokane. "The trouble with Spokane is that there's nothing to do after 10 o'clock. In the morning."

 

I have less of a problem with Simers writing the slam column, because that is essentially what he does.

The Slam column has gotten Woody Paige in trouble more than once, see Salt Lake City, Atlanta and Jacksonville.