Being An Asshole Must Be Genetic

The not-so-skilled media consultant

Conservative pundit Tucker Carlson’s brother Buckley Carlson made the news this week after he referred to NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio’s spokesperson as a “self-righteous bitch” in an email.

Buckley Swanson Peck Carlson is a self-described "crisis communications media consultant", writer and political strategist.   It's not even certain that he even graduated from college-- according to his resume, Buckley was an "Aeronautical Science major from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University . . . he also "studied English at the University of Mississippi." 

Buckley's time in the white-hot limelight all started when de Blasio's spokesman Amy Spitalnick emailed Peter Fricke, an editor at the Daily Caller, requesting that they make a correction about a story in which they incorrectly stated that the Mayor didn't support Barack Obama's proposal for an $80 billion infrastructure investment in the federal transportation budget:

Peter -

Your story on Mayor de Blasio and the USCM is totally inaccurate. The mayors said $50B in flat funding was not enough, and cited the President’s $80B proposal as one that boosted funding to adequate levels.

The transcript is on nyc.gov.

Peter Fricke denied her request, replying:

Amy,

Based on what is in the transcript, I have to respectfully disagree with your assessment.  The mayor called Obama’s plan “an ideal reference point” and talked about “[following] the president’s vision,” but never said that $80 billion was “adequate.”

Indeed, his claim that “we’re going to push for the highest number attainable” clearly implies that the mayors would gladly accept an even higher figure. That impression is further reinforced by his response to the question about exact dollar amounts, where he said, “we’re all working on that together,” indicating that the task force has not endorsed any specific figure.

The Daily Caller editor grew even more steadfast in his refusal to make the correction, despite Spitalnick 's providing both a direct link to the video of the mayor, as well as an audio file of the Mayor's exact quote.  Fricke finally replied in the following manner:

We’re reviewing the video now, Amy. If you annoy me with another whiny email before then, I’m muting this thread, thanks.

Spitalnick then forwarded the entire thread (with comment) to Carlson (full name: Tucker Swanson McNear Carlson, if you thought the name Buckley was too much):

Tucker – it’s pretty appalling that this is how your staff chose to respond to us requesting a basic correction (and providing a transcript that directly contradicts the original story).

To which Carlson Tucker replied:

Dear Amy,

Thanks for your email. You believe our story was inaccurate and have demanded a correction. Totally fair. We are going over the transcript now.

What Bedford complained about was your tone, which, I have to agree, was whiny and annoying, and I say that in the spirit of helpful correction rather than as a criticism. Outside of New York City, adults generally write polite, cheerful emails to one another, even when asking for corrections. Something to keep in mind the next time you communicate with people who don’t live on your island.

The story took an unexpected turn after Tucker (for some unexplained reason) decided to blind CC his brother Buckley on the above email.  Buckley (predictably) clicked on "reply all" when responding to his brother-- which resulted in Amy Spitalnick getting the reply below:

Great response. Whiny little self-righteous bitch. “Appalling?”  And with such an ironic name, too…Spitalnick?  Ironic because you just know she has extreme dick-fright; no chance has this girl ever had a pearl necklace.  Spoogeneck?  I don’t think so.  More like LabiaFace.

Buckley Carlson

Being a misognyist himself, Tucker Carlson didn't see any problem with his brother's reply, portraying him as the victim:

It really affected [Buckley's] job and he had all kinds of problems as a result….For some reason it became, like, this big thing because, I guess, they don’t like my politics or something. I really don’t know, but it was an accident and he apologized for it and I don’t really see why it was a big news story.

Wanna Help California's Drought? Stop Drinking Bottled Water

California is in the middle of an epic drought -- but that hasn't stopped bottled water production in the state. Even as residents face mandatory cutbacks and fields lie fallow, companies continue pumping hundreds of millions of gallons of water every year into plastic bottles -- sometimes straight from a municipal water supply.

The Important Of Monitoring Police Activity

The Walter Scott shooting in Charleston, SC has heightened the need for everyday folk to be prepared to film the public activity of law enforcement if needed.  Earlier this week, PBS Newshour aired a piece about the important of citizens recording police brutality and how to do it properly so that the evidence will hold up in court:




The ACLU has also documented some simple steps to follow when recording police/public activity:

1. Maintain your right to record. Police do not have the right to take your phone if you’re not committing a crime, and they need a warrant to search it. In Sharp v. Baltimore City Police Department, the court ruled that the public has the right to videotape or photograph public police activity in public places.

2. Capture as much information as you can. The video out of North Charleston was powerful because it was a wide shot, said Bock. “The person who was taping that was far enough away to not get involved, but close enough to see what happened.”

3. Do not edit the video.  The Walter Scott video was released as one continuous shot, which makes the timing look more faithful and greatly adds credibility to the footage as well as the photographer.

4. Be respectful. You legally may not interfere with police procedure, and you should not be argumentative or aggressive, said Bock. Instead, she recommends, a civilian monitor should maintain a distance and remind the officer of their rights: “I’m a member of the public, I’m in a public space, you’re doing public work, and I’m just documenting what’s going on.”

5. Be mindful of other laws. Just because you have the right to record doesn’t mean you have the right to trespass or damage property in the process.

6. If you are stopped or detained, ask to leave. You cannot be detained without reasonable suspicion that you have committed, or are about to commit, a crime. If you ask to leave and are denied, this constitutes unlawful detention.

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As If We Needed More Evidence Bill O'Reilly Is A Liar

Throughout all the controversy over Bill O'Reilly's alleged journalistic experience, the Fox News pundit has steadfastly maintained that “everything I’ve said about my reportorial career — everything — is true.”  But now the cameraman who O’Reilly worked with in Buenos Aires after the end of the Falklands War has come forward to call out his bullshit.

O’Reilly has characterized his coverage of the riots in Buenos Aires after the end of the Falklands War as having “reported on the ground in [an] active war zone.”  In addition, he has claimed he rescued a CBS colleague who “got run down and then hit his head and was bleeding from the ear on the concrete  . . . I dragged him off the street because he was bleeding from the ear and had hit his head on the concrete."

But Ignacio Medrano-Carbo, who worked with O’Reilly during the protests, has now revealed that he was neither injured nor in need of rescue.  “I never fell [down] nor was I bleeding out my ear at any time during my Buenos Aires assignment,” Medrano-Carbo said.  “I do not even recall Mr. O'Reilly being near me when I shot all that footage nor after I left the unrest at Plaza de Mayo that evening.”

O’Reilly has claimed he was working with CBS cameraman Roberto Moreno on the night of the Buenos Aires riots, but in reality, Moreno was a sound engineer at the time and did not even begin working as a cameraman until years later.

O'Reilly has also said he witnessed widespread casualties during the Buenos Aires riot.  Medrano-Carbo says this is also untrue. “I can confirm that no one I know of who worked with me in Buenos Aires during the Falkland War ever heard of any CBS crew member getting beat or hurt,” he says. “Nor did any demonstrators get killed that night at Plaza de Mayo.”

O'Reilly has responded to the allegation, saying he never worked with Medrano.   Medrano-Carbo quickly responded to O'Reilly's denials, saying "I don't know what to say... Ninety-nine percent of the footage in his report was mine.  How'd he get that footage, if I [wasn't] his cameraman?

Bummed Out About Lungfish

A Brazilian who needed to have a large eel-like fish removed from his bowels had to suffer the additional humiliation of his nurses laughing at him during the operation.

The unidentified man from Londrina somehow got a South American Lungfish stuck inside his anus and the removal was filmed.  Once inside, the lungfish decided to stay, necessitating his surgery at Hospital Universitário in Londrina.

The doctors were able to remove the foot-long fish, but at the expense of the patient's dignity.  The video was first posted on BestGore.com in December, but is starting to go viral after being posted on LiveLeak.com.  In the video, people can be heard laughing and gasping as the lungfish is finally pulled out from the patient's intestines. Many of the observers can be seen filming the procedure.

Having an eel stuck where the sun doesn't shine is strange enough, but, more bizarrely, this isn't an isolated event.

In April, 2013, a man in China's southeastern Guangdong province admitted himself to a local hospital after he reportedly got a live eel stuck inside him. The man inserted the 20-inch-long Asian swamp eel into his anus after seeing it done in a porn movie, and he had to endure all-night surgery to have it extracted.

In 2012, a New Zealand man had to have an eel removed from his posterior. In 2010, a Chinese man died after his friends allegedly inserted an eel into his rectum as a joke.

Boy Scouts: Secret Sex Abuse Files As Far Back As the 1920's

The sexual abuse of a 13-year-old boy scout by an adult volunteer was part of a "sordid history of child sexual abuse" within the Boy Scouts that has been documented internally by the organization for nearly a century.  This was just one of several stunning revelations made at the outset of an Oregon lawsuit this week.

The scout, now 20 years old, has sued the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) for punitive damages after being molested by a volunteer leader in 2007. He claims that the Scouts failed to educate, train and warn parents and adult volunteers about the dangers of sex abuse.

His attorney, Tim Hale, won the right to draw from more than 30 years of "perversion" files kept by the BSA-- but it turns out that the BSA actually kept hidden  almost 10,000 such files, detailing sexual abuse cases as far back as 1920.  "The Boy Scouts of America has a long and sordid history of child sexual abuse committed by Scout leaders . . . What has not been going on is [notification] to the public and [affected] parents," Tim Hale said in his opening statement.

Boy Scouts of America officials have tried to claim that the "perversion" files were created to keep children safe by maintaining a master list of people ineligible to volunteer with the Scouts.  But the organization will not admit any wrongdoing in keeping its investigations and case files a secret-- acknowledging only that it had made some mistakes in the way sex abuse allegations were handled in the past.

In 2012, the Oregon Supreme Court ordered the Scouts to make public a trove of files from 1965 to 1985. The records showed that more than one-third of abuse allegations never were reported to police and that even when authorities were told, little was done.  The 1965-85 documents came to light after a jury in 2010 imposed a nearly $20 million penalty against the Scouts in a molestation case in Portland, Oregon, that dated to the early 1980s.

Since then, plaintiffs' attorneys in several states, including Texas and Minnesota, have sought to publicize the more recent records through similar lawsuits.  But the BSA settled all those cases before they went to trial-- thus preventing public dissemination of the incriminating records.

The judge in the current Oregon case has already ruled that after the trial, the plaintiff's counsel and other interested parties can petition the court for the release of all the files.  Cross your fingers . . .

Chinese Officials Feast On Endangered Species

Chinese officials feasted on a critically endangered giant salamander and turned violent when journalists photographed the luxury banquet, which appeared to flout Beijing's austerity campaign.  The 28 diners included senior police officials from the southern city of Shenzhen. "In my territory, it is my treat," it quoted a man in the room as saying.

The giant salamander is believed by some Chinese to have anti-ageing properties, but there is no orthodox evidence to back the claim. The species is classed as "critically endangered" on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's (IUCN) Red List of threatened species, which says the population has "declined catastrophically over the last 30 years".

The Global Times cited the Guangzhou-based Southern Metropolis Daily, which said its journalists were beaten up when their identities were discovered by the diners.  One was kicked and slapped, another had his mobile phone forcibly taken, while the photographer was choked, beaten up and had his camera smashed.

A total of 14 police have been suspended and an investigation launched into the incident, according to reports.  One of the Shenzhen diners provided the salamander and said it had been captive-bred, according to reports.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has launched a much-publicized austerity drive for the ruling classes, including a campaign for simple meals with the catchphrase “four dishes and one soup”.  The ruling Communist Party also says it is cracking down on the consumption of endangered species, including shark's fin.  China's legislature last April approved a law including prison sentences for people caught eating rare wild animals.