It's ironic, though, don't you think? Why does Dan continually write columns indirectly complaining about the media? You ARE the media, Dan, in case you hadn't noticed. You've committed every sin you rail about.
Here is the column, in a nutshell: "A plane crashed into a building. The news got all frantic and treated it like terrorism. It turned out to be Cory Lidle. The story deflated."
OK. So?
Suddenly, a lot of television watchers switched from CNN to ESPN. The international news story was becoming a sad sports story.ESPN was the last station I thought of turning to. I had CNN Headline on all afternoon. Why would I want to listen to Steve Phillips talk about this?
And why isn't this still an international news story? A plane flew into the side of a building. Yes, it was a known athlete piloting it, but it was still a plane crashing into a building. That shouldn't happen. What went wrong? This doesn't have to be a sports story.
I don't want to pick at this too badly because of the nature of the subject matter. There's really nothing tasteless in here except for the fact that he's Dan Shaughnessy and therefore everything is inherently tasteless.
Thoughts and prayers go out to the Lidle family and the families of the flight instructor and the injured firefighters. A horrible, random tragedy.
2 comments:
A CHB column - even one like this - simply cannot exist without a slam. Didn't take long to find it:
"Yankees general manager Brian Cashman found out about Boston's interest in Lidle and insisted Lidle be included in New York's expensive acquisition of Bobby Abreu. And so Abreu and Lidle went to the Yankees, while the Sox stood pat."
A column about the tragedy of a young athlete's death, and CHB takes another opportunity to dump on the Sox. It's like the sun rising in the East.
Meanwhile, The Dugout hits the nail right on the head:
http://progressiveboink.com/dugout/archive/jon79.html
Anon,
What is also great about the quotation is that it contradicts itself. The Sox showing interest in Lidle is proof that they did not stand pat.
My problem with the column was that Shank overplayed the terrorism angle for effect. When I first read about the crash on cnn.com, the Feds already stated that they did not think it was terrorism. Plus, a small plane plowing into a high rise apartment building doesn't strike me as a terrorist act. Maybe it was different in NYC on an emotional level, but I am not sure that was the case.
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