He renounces it now, of course, but still, good for him for writing it in the first place.
(Washingtonian via Wonkette)
Maybe this is the Malbec talking but I think “Fuck Tim Russert” might be a good new category tag.
Update. This was well before Russert died, so there’s nothing tasteless about it.
robertdsc
LMAO at Wonkette calling Ezra the “child typist”.
MikeJ
At least Russert had the courtesy to die soon after. Who can we get Ezra to curse next?
General Egali Tarian Stuck
“fuck him with an spiky acid-tipped dick”
woo hoo. If I swung that way, I could fall in love. Ezra eats his spinach and chases it with a box of Wheaties. The fresh scrubbed ivory tower wankers must have got the vapors reading that. You go Ezraaaaaa!!
Rosali
I’m sorry, I’m not a Twitter follower. What was it that brought out that sentiment now?
Edit- Ok, I clicked the link. I see that it was a comment made years ago.
DougJ
@MikeJ:
At least Russert had the courtesy to die soon after.
Yes, credit where credit is due.
valdivia
Malbec only causes great things to happen :) I seoncd this should be a tag.
MikeJ
OT, but All the President’s Men is starting now on TCM. See the origin of the term “ratfucking”!
williamc
Ezra,
If you somehow read this, please work your magic on Luke, son of Tim, next. I can’t stand that asshat. The Village needs to get its cliches correct: they can’t continually spread the conservative value of each person succeeding due to his or her hard work and plucky individualism and all the while let Lil’ Luke not-qualified run around pretending like he’s some old salt Washington hand who learnt everythin he needed to know from sitting at the knee of his Pa Lil’ Russ listenin to his news fiddle.
My dad is a mechanic whose coworkers love him. If he dropped dead in the shop under a car tomorrow, NO ONE THERE would consider me replacing him as a mechanic in the shop, because I would look like an ass talking about car when I have no idea what I’m talking about! I would hope that I have too much pride to even consider doing something like that, but I guess I have more common sense that Lil’ Luke, that upper-class twit.
DougJ
@MikeJ:
Thanks for the tip.
You know, Robert Redford isn’t a very good actor.
JGabriel
Huh. For some reason I thought there was a “Fuck Tim Russert” category tag. I’m kind of surprised there isn’t.
Pity, this would have been a perfect addition.
.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Anyone know what Russert said to provoke this well-earned invective? Russert was a bloated useless hump of sanctimony. The only greater blight on our political media was/is Broder.
DougJ
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I don’t think Broder is worse. Russert really screwed the pooch on Iraq. That was epic fail.
Q
I don’t know if it’s their sense of decorum or their utter cluelessness, but The Washingtonian really botches the context of the SpikyDickTweet:
I believe young Ezra tweeted that he wanted to fuck Russert with said spiky acid-tipped dick. Not that he believed he was one.
The Main Gauche of Mild Reason
@robertdsc:
Klein DOES type like a child–if you look at him in the video, he can’t touch type!
http://attackerman.firedoglake.com/2009/08/27/the-awful-two-fingered-truth-about-ezra-klein/
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@DougJ: I tend to think of Russert as the student who (almost) surpassed the MasterWanker, but Broder is still there.
williamc
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I thought that this was a response to Russert dropping dead (OMG, a big fat man who looked like he never met a 64oz sirloin and a six pack he didn’t like had a heart attack and died! OH NO! Who can believe it!?). At least I guess I was just hoping Ezra is as spiteful as I am, since I thought at the time of his death, “Goebbels is just calling him to Hell to help Satan sell his war against Heaven (God literally has weather of mass destruction, it’ll be a cakewalk)…”
Even after all this time, I second Ezra’s emotion, Fukc Russert, he helped out an undercover CIA agent and helped sell us down the Mesopotamia.
d Nelson
Don’t you know it is not what you know, it is who you know. Everyone in Washington is inbred. Their children, spouses, etc. are all interconnected. They all go to the best schools, go to the best parties, and most of all they have the best dresses, it is disgusting. I live in No Cal, now I have to live with Meg Whitman, showing her baby photos and her billion dollar portfolio. It is disgusting, why do the billionaires and millionairs control our lives. I usually do not comment, but I am so sick, it is vomit material.
I have had it.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Truth hurtz, donut?
A bit rough on a dead guy but he was no pillar of journalistic goodness like the M$M has made him out to be. He was just another unremarkable face on TV, one of many who have given politicians on both sides free passes though Russert’s guests did favor the right more than the left. Much of the mess our M$M is in is because of mealy-mouthed paid shills for corporate America like Russert who are willing to get paid lots of money to pretend they are reporting the truth about important issues, supposedly without slanting the coverage.
Not a great career move Ezra but kudos for saying what you really feel about Russert, I just wish other reporters were willing to stick their necks out like you did.
Jim C.
Gosh I like Ezra Klein. Pretty much the only reason why anyone should read any part of the Washington Post these days.
Mike Kay
who’s tim russert?
Steeplejack
@DougJ:
He was never able (or willing) to break out of the glamour-boy mold. Which resulted in a somewhat thin résumé (thin as in one-dimensional, not short). He was in a lot of movies that ended up being less than the sum of their parts. I have a soft spot for Three Days of the Condor, which came right before All the President’s Men. It didn’t try to do too much, and it succeeded admirably.
fraught
good for EK. I stopped watching ALL the Sunday shows just so I wouldn’t just accidentally have to hear “Go Bills” and have to spit up my coffee. I hated that guy. He perfectly represented the ascendancy of the mediocre which has reached its apotheosis with David fucking Gregory.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Steeplejack:
Me too. Probly in my top ten all time fav flicks. Haven’t watched it in a while. One of those movies seen many times and still is fun to watch. But espionage type movies are my favorite.
just got Path to War today from netflix, about Johnson and Vietnam.
Mark S.
I’ve always thought this piece by Yglesias nailed Russert perfectly.
I never learned a thing watching Russert on MTP. Granted, most of those Sunday shows are boring when they are interviewing politicians, but MTP was in its own league. I think the problem was that Russert was too stupid and his understanding of the issues was so paper thin that he could never ask an intelligent follow-up question. So he had to stick with whatever questions his staff wrote up for him.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@fraught: Oh God… his whole “I’m just a regular guy from Buffalo” schtick, with his five million dollar vacation home on the Vinyard (or maybe the Cape… I can’t imagine it matters). I believe it was the Bill Moyers review of how badly the MSM fucked up Iraq, and Moyers asked him why he never challenged his sources, and Russert actually defended himself by saying “I know my sources. I’m from Buffalo.” Buffalo fucking hump. This post has brought my Russert hate back from the grave.
DougJ
Jason Robards was really something, though.
Steeplejack
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Will have to check out Path to War. Thanks for the tip.
DonBoy
Don’t hate on Luke; hate the idiots who put him on TV.
Mark S.
@Mark S.:
I maybe should have put a little more context in that quote.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mark S.:
Nah, we’re good.
Mike in NC
Excellent flick, and Michael Gambon as LBJ is simply amazing.
Don’t know where they buried asshole Tim Russert, but I wouldn’t mind pissing on his grave if I was ever in the neighborhood.
Mike Kay
Fuck sally quinn. Fuck her with a spiky acid-tipped dick.
Mike Kay
@Mike in NC:
Do a full david vitter and take a dump, as well
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=27526951
Comrade Mary
I’m another two fingered typist. Yeah, it’s not elegant, but on the other hand, despite decades of university and work typing, I’ve never developed even a touch of carpal tunnel or any other overuse syndrome. Awkward, inefficient typing techniques for the win!
wasabi gasp
Fucking Tim Russert is probably best left to only the chunkiest of Resse Witherspoons.
freelancer
@DougJ:
Y’know, sport, he was perfectly cast as Gatsby.
Also, Sneakers is a great
filmthrowaway weekend movie.ETA:
Agreed, but recent spotlights on Sally Quinn have me disliking Robards, even though all he did was play her husband. Funny the way film affects us.
ricky
@Mike Kay:
Didn’t her managing editor already do that?
Steeplejack
@freelancer:
Redford was well cast as Gatsby, but that was a wretchedly bad movie. Nothing beyond the costumes and set design. Although I think maybe the music won an Oscar. Meh.
different church-lady
This is not helping me see why Twitter is a good thing.
Yutsano
@different church-lady: Agreed. I’m still not signing up.
freelancer
@Steeplejack:
Agreed, the adaptation is indeed tedious, and pretentious, Some art is never meant to be translated.
ETA: going to the next thread for the rest of the night.
db
I still don’t get all the Ezra Klein worshiping.
I’ve read so much that others link. And I still I don’t get the fascination. Is it original? Groundbreaking? What am I missing?
I don’t learn anything; I don’t lose anything. It’s like an involuntary muscle. I breathe in, I breathe out. I haven’t learned anything by breathing and I haven’t learned anything by reading Ezra Klein.
Yutsano
@db:
Not to put too fine a point on it, but have you been paying attention? Ezra Klein is like a sane voice in a crazy universe. He manages to take on the arcana of health care policy (and a few other subjects) and put them in a real world context. He’s a good solid writer in a sea of MSM crapola.
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: Or this.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@db: It’s unpretentious and smart with a lot of effort to know the subject first. Specially with HCR. And honest. Straight talk with minimum agenda driving and partisan politics. I don’t always agree with him, but I trust his reporting. And that is rare for me these days. Just my opinion.
burnspbesq
@Jim C.:
The only reason? No, not while the Post continues to employ Michael Wilbon and Gene Robinson.
Yutsano
@burnspbesq:
Tell me this ain’t so. You’re breaking my heart Michael.
Ailuridae
Robert Redford isn’t a very good actor
I think that’s certainly the Malbec talking. I realize there is a tendency to penalize actors and actresses who are attractive but I can rattle off more than a half dozen movies where Redford is nothing short of brilliant.
I hope the Malbec is local and, if not local, very good. And I certainly hope you aren’t of the ilk that would describe Robert Redford as “not a very good actor” and then sing the praises of someone like, say, Al Pacino.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Ailuridae: Redford is the prototypical leading man actor. He has limited range that way, but i think is solid in that category, and in some roles great. Like Electric Horseman. I think that affects how some rate him, because he doesn’t do any kind of character acting that I’ve seen.
gwangung
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: Yeah, a lot of people mistake range as acting.
That includes a lot of so-called critics.
I recall one saying to me, “I measure the talent of an actor by how different he is in a role from what he is in real life.” And I’m thinking, “How the HELL do you know what he is in real life? And why should that have anything to do with the work he put up on the screen/stage???”
Ailuridae
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
Have you seen Downhill Racer?
He completely halted his career (or his ascension to the top of Hollywood) in the late 60s to avoid being type cast as the blonde lead type.
Basically you can look at the meat of his career (66 to 80) and find about a dozen excellent performances many very good performances and no doozies. He may not have his fastball anymore but he still shows flashes (he stole every scene he was in in The Last Castle)
Angry Space Cadet
Grrr… yet another example of liberals mocking the disabled. I had an aunt who married a man with a spikey aid tipped penis. You should see the children they produced.
slightly_peeved
How many other bloggers, journos or commenters on Health Care have actually read. The. Damn. Bill? And quote it?
I’ve tried to find quotes to, say, show that there’s no ability for insurers to increase premiums due to pre-existing conditions. Because Ezra Klein hadn’t blogged about it, I had to read the bill myself (section 2701, if memory serves me correct).
So many people argue about the Senate Health Care Bill, so few read it, and so very few actually discuss the text in depth. Ezra Klein does. If you know any other good bloggers who do, please link ’em.
Sly
@slightly_peeved:
I still run into people who argue that the bill will require you to hand over half income to Aetna or Obama will send men with guns to your house who will take all your shit and send you to jail for twenty years. So having other people who’ve actually studied the text of the bill (and who can understand certain aspects of legislationese that I’ve yet to fully wrap my head around) helps a lot. Especially when people who are supposed to know about Health Care policy go on TV and make claims that aren’t true. Like when Dean praised the idea of giving exchange regulators the ability to be prudent purchasers, and lamented that it wasn’t in the bill. When it actually is in the bill.
Jonathan Cohn is still kicking.
A recall a few GOS diarists who did, but I think they all gave up after the excise tax shit. A lot of people who took an honest look at the bill and saw that it was very good, despite having some flaws, were quickly overwhelmed by activists who wanted their Single Payer unicorn.
slightly_peeved
I’ll have to give Cohn a bit more of a read then. Thanks :)
Randy P
@Steeplejack:
I started out early in my movie-watching career (late 60s) kind of dismissing Redford as a pretty boy, but I got more and more fond of him over the years. Condor is on my all-time list of favorite spy movies. I suppose his buddy movies with Paul Newman aren’t great acting, but they’re great movies. And when he’s chosen to come back out in front of the camera lately, I’ve enjoyed those characters too.
But I think I may admire him most for what he’s done behind the camera. It seems like every actor says “I wanna direct” but he does it well, or maybe he just chooses good vehicles, because I was impressed with his directing credits right from the start too. And creating the Sundance Festival has changed the movie industry in big ways.
mai naem
IMHO Jonathan Cohn is better than Ezra on HCR.
I cannot absolutely cannot stand Luke Russert. His reporting is godamned awful. Tim may have been bad but Luke looks like a high school reporter on campus teevee. And OMG the breathless reporting on the Eric Massa purported sexual harrassment…just ugh. It’s almost like the idiot doesn’t care to learn about the intricacies of policy and house and senate rules but this, sexual harrassment, silly Luke can get his pea sized brain around.
Randy P
@freelancer:
I know this isn’t a movie thread but you guys keep mentioned my favorites.
I LOVE Sneakers! But as a math geek, what I think I love most about it is that it gets the math right. Hollywood no longer seems to bother hiring technical consultants, at least for “science” in their science fiction. The violations of the laws of physics are so infuriating it’s really starting to spoil some movies for me.
What Sneakers said about factoring large primes, complexity theory, and the impact on cryptography if somebody could manage to find an efficient algorithm was right on the money. And IIRC, there was some math on a blackboard early in the film which was also good math.
I actually didn’t remember Redford was in this, though. I always think of Dan Ackroyd when I think of this movie.
Josh Huaco
@Randy P:
With, of all people, Donal Logue as the mathematician whose algorithm was coveted.
Plus, “be a beacon” always makes me laugh.
Svensker
@Angry Space Cadet:
I saw that.
WereBear
@Randy P: On the same note, my partner is a military historian buff, and liked Valkyrie for getting the military stuff on the coats and hats correct.
It generally doesn’t cost a bit more, really, and keeps the movie from looking like an idiot.
But yeah, Luke Russert. “Journalism! So easy a child could do it!”
kth
iirc, Russert was moderating a debate (maybe primary, maybe general), and one of his patented non sequitur gotchas was what provoked EZ-E’s outburst.
Tim F.
@Randy P: I bet you remember Dan Ackroyd because he asked for a winnebago.
kay
The media response to Tim Russert’s death was really revealing.
I thought it was ridiculously over the top and self-congratulatory and so repulsively insiderish. Cringe-inducing. He just wasn’t some kind of folk hero, although clearly he was adored by other members of the press.
People made fun of the Michael Jackson coverage, I know I did, but at least that had some connection to reality. Michael Jackson really was loved by millions of people, and they completely enjoyed his music and dancing. I mean, Tim Russert? I used to laugh out loud at how seriously he took himself, and his whole crafted persona was supposed to be “regular guy”.
He was so completely self-aware and self-conscious. It was like watching someone play a journalist.
flukebucket
The Russert Rule
chrome agnomen
tim russert: the kind of columnist you’d like to have a beer with.
///////s
chrome agnomen
you know what redford was/played? a likable guy. a sympathetic character. he was a pretty boy for sure, but, like newman, he wasn’t a preener.
sundance kid, jeremiah johnson, johnny hooker, roy hobbs, and many others. those were characters i was interested in, and liked, and wanted to be like in some way. lovable losers, maybe, but that’s not so bad.
Steeplejack
@Randy P:
Sundance is a good thing, and I was going to mention his directing Ordinary People and A River Runs Through It, both excellent movies. But then I remembered that he also did The Legend of Bagger Vance. [Shudder] And we were talking about Redford as an actor.
I’m not whizzing on him. He has had a long, productive career. But it seems in retrospect a little bland and Hollywooden. Ailuridae upthread cites Downhill Racer as some sort of daring, break-the-mold evidence that Redford “completely halted his career (or his ascension to the top of Hollywood) in the late ’60s to avoid being typecast as the blond lead type.” I don’t see how playing a glamorous Olympic skier was a huge stretch for Redford, and the run of movies right after that, with the exception of Little Fauss and Big Halsy, is practically a monument to the “blond lead type”: The Hot Rock, The Candidate, Jeremiah Johnson, The Way We Were, The Sting, The Great Gatsby. Okay, the blond lead thing was a little muted in Jeremiah Johnson, but that was probably because of the dirt and buffalo fat.
Redford has been in a number of good movies, even some great ones, but there are very few where you are left thinking that Redford was the best thing about the movie.
Sorry to blow on so long (and off topic–eek!), but I love talking about movies.
Steeplejack
@flukebucket:
That whole piece is pure gold.
I wish I had known about Jon Swift before now. I will be mining his archives.
Mr Furious
I think Redford was great in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
Was he floating in Newman’s wake in that film and The Sting? Perhaps. But they are great, great films, and he held his own in an awkward hybrid of co-lead and a supporting guy.
The Natural is another fantastic film. Is that because of a mind-blowing performance by Redford? No. It’s a phenomenal story. But he carries that film with the help of an amazing supporting cast—but no other stars or even major characters (in terms of comparable screen time) at all. (Wilfred Brimley DOES get the best line in the script, though…)
Is he an Oscar-caliber character actor? Absolutely not. As someone mentioned upthread he’s more of an old-school leading man. Kind of like a Cary Grant or Bogart for the 60s-70s. Not a DeNiro or Daniel Day Lewis who literally, physically transform themselves into their characters.
DougJ
@Ailuridae:
I just don’t think he acts very well. And, yes, the *young* Al Pacino was great. Dog Day Afternoon.
Steeplejack
@Mr Furious:
There’s not much to disagree with in your post. I’m not that big a fan of The Natural–I hate it when they beat me over the head with the symbolism wiffle bat–but, hey, tastes vary.
Steeplejack
@DougJ:
Aw, Doug! Here I’ve got your back on Redford, and now you mention the one movie where I hatey-hate-mc-hate Pacino. He keeps it turned up to 11 all the way through Dog Day Afternoon, and not in a good way.
Whoa, wait. I just flashed on . . . And Justice for All. Another screamer.
In the interest of blog amity, I will say that Carlito’s Way is a great movie. Very underrated, and Pacino is remarkably subtle.
Mr Furious
@Steeplejack: Yep. Not sure what it is about the “two Pacinos.” A strong director keeping him in check?
His most powerful roles were in most cases his quietest ones.
And Justice For All…Scent of a Woman…even Dog Day Afternoon and Scarface had moments where they almost seem like roles created specifically for the Pacino monologue/outburst.
Give me the quiet intensity of Michael Corleone over that every time.
Mr Furious Trivia: I lived in the building they used as the bank in Dog Day. It’s on Prospect Park West in Brooklyn
slippy
Russert was unmistakably one of the shittiest journalists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Nothing more than a celebrity with cozy access to important people who filtered the news in whatever way got him even more access.
He sucked. Raw ass. Period. He was never good at what he did. He was never even competent. He was a complete failure as a journalist. In fact, I’d like to write a full-length article on Russert’s catastrophic journalism failures and post it on the GOS. That sounds like a good way to spend my weekend.
celticdragonchick
@db:
Me too. I don’t see the deal with him.