Author: Dan Kennedy

Ganging up on Obama

I caught the podcast of “Meet the Press” early this morning and couldn’t believe my ears. Guest host Brian Williams devoted the first dozen or so minutes to pounding Barack Obama over his flip-flop on accepting public campaign money.

Fair enough. But you’d think someone would have brought up the fact that John McCain appears to be violating the campaign-finance law right now. Not Williams. Not McCain surrogate Lindsey Graham. Not even Obama supporter Joe Biden. At least Biden didn’t call Obama “clean and articulate.”

It’s one and out for Williams, who’ll be replaced by Tom Brokaw next week. Let’s hope that Brokaw is better prepared.

The Globe and the Pentagon Papers

Former Boston Globe editor Matt Storin writes about the Globe’s role in publishing the Pentagon Papers.

Given that the case led to a landmark Supreme Court decision extending freedom of the press, it’s interesting to ponder the note on which Storin closes. He quotes Daniel Ellsberg, the Defense Department employee who stole the documents and gave them to the press, as saying that today he’d simply upload them to the Internet.

Where, indeed, you will find them now.

Tania deLuzuriaga’s illegal smile

I’d be interested to know from Media Nation readers whether Boston Globe reporter Tania deLuzuriaga was violating the state’s motor-vehicle laws in her test drive of a Vespa.

Let’s start by asking whether a Vespa is a scooter or a motorcycle. If it’s a scooter, then she was definitely violating the law. It’s illegal to drive a scooter fast than 20 mph, and the operator must stay to the right-hand side at all times.

DeLuzuriaga makes it clear that she was prepared to go as fast as 35, the Vespa’s top speed. Also, the photo of her on the front of City & Region — not online, for some reason — shows her on the left side of the right-hand lane, nearly on the dividing line, with a motorcyclist to her right.

But that’s just throat-clearing. For legal purposes, the Vespa is probably considered a motorcycle. And here’s what she writes in her lede:

It was an all-too-familiar situation: Ahead, a red light glared, and bumper-to-bumper traffic stretched as far as the eye could see. Taxis honked. Drivers sighed. Nobody was happy — except the reporter on the white Vespa who slipped into the space between the lanes and nimbly passed among the cars. Pedestrians stopped to watch, and drivers’ eyes gleamed with irritation and envy as the reporter made her way to the front of the line, turned right, and zipped off on her way.

As I understand it, it’s illegal for the operator of any motor vehicle, most definitely including motorcycles, to wiggle between lanes of traffic. I think this is the relevant law, although it doesn’t seem quite to get at it:

When any way has been divided into lanes, the driver of a vehicle shall so drive that the vehicle shall be entirely within a single lane, and he shall not move from the lane in which he is driving until he has first ascertained if such movement can be made with safety. The operators of motorcycles shall not ride abreast of more than one other motorcycle, shall ride single file when passing, and shall not pass any other motor vehicle within the same lane, except another motorcycle.

In addition, the state Registry of Motor Vehicles advises motorcyclists, “Never weave between lanes.” The RMV’s advice tends to be the law.

Finally, Media Nation’s Grammar and Style Police have ruled that when writing a first-person story, you should use “I” instead of referring to yourself in the third person. Unless you’re Wade Boggs. Which deLuzuriaga is not.

Assessing Curt Schilling

Nick Cafardo asks: Does Curt Schilling belong in the Hall of Fame?

But that’s shorthand. Here’s the real question: Does a guy whose career record makes him, at best, a borderline candidate for the Hall deserve to go in because of his extraordinary post-seasons?

I say yes. When Schilling had a chance to perform on baseball’s biggest stage, he came through. It’s a shame that Jim Rice, to name just one example, never had the same opportunity. But the point is to win it all, and Schilling’s been a key guy on three separate occasions.

Jim Marzilli and mental illness

The amateur psychologist’s award for today goes to the Phoenix’s Adam Reilly, who blogged on June 5 that state Sen. Jim Marzilli’s bizarre behavior toward women could be the result of manic depression.

Now the Boston Herald’s Casey Ross reports that Marzilli, D-Arlington, is being treated at McLean Hospital for bipolar disorder, the preferred medical term for manic depression.

Ross rather cynically writes that Marzilli “could be laying the groundwork for a defense based on a diagnosis of bipolar disorder.” Well, yes. And I would imagine Marzilli will have as hard a time convincing a jury as most defendants do when they cite mental illness.

But that doesn’t mean it isn’t valid — in Marzilli’s case, and in those of many other people, too.

By the way, why is Marzilli’s lawyer, Terrence Kennedy, still attacking people? Now he’s calling Wendy Murphy, the lawyer for another alleged victim, “a grandstanding ambulance-chaser,” according to Ross.

It’s true that Murphy is a heat-seeking missile when it comes to microphones and cameras. But it’s also true that she’s got a serious case to make.

Farewell, Curt

Curt Schilling announces that his career is over, or close to it, as he needs surgery on his ailing shoulder. He was the key to one championship and made a big contribution to another. His constant, occasionally self-serving patter wasn’t popular with everyone, but he strikes me as a pretty good guy who’ll do anything to win.

Even if he can come back, Schilling predicts that the rehab will be brutal, and that it probably wouldn’t make sense for him to start pitching before mid-2009. Which means that the Red Sox’ preferred strategy for this year — a strengthening program rather than immediate surgery — was the wise course of action, even though it didn’t work out. If he’d had surgery back in February, he’d have almost certainly missed the entire season.

Photo (cc) by guano, and republished here under a Creative Commons license. Some rights reserved.

Second-best Celtics team ever? (II)

Media Nation reader J.V. notes that Bob Ryan wasn’t exactly predicting glory last August, when it looked to him like the Celtics were going to throw three superstars and a bunch of not-very-warm bodies out there every night. Ryan wrote:

Unless it really is going to be a three-on-three NBA, the Celtics will be forced to place two additional players on the floor, and not just occasionally, but for every one of the 48 minutes.

That concerns me. That concerns me because what I am about to say is nonnegotiable: What’s left on the Celtics’ roster is by far the worst collection of proven talent in the NBA.

Be sure to watch the video, too, in which Charlie Pierce agrees with Ryan. Hey, it wasn’t that dumb when they said it. I guess.