This just in…
If there was any remaining doubt, yesterday’s lightening quick dismantling of Roseanne Barr‘s hugely successful sitcom on ABC, put the subject to rest.
We live in Zero Tolerance Land.
Day to day life is now like mountain climbing – one small slip and you’re done for.
Gone are the “good old days” and notions like “second chances” and “mulligans.”
From this point forward – and I guess we’ll find out for how long – it’s every man and woman for his or herself. We live in a world where a single gaffe can result in disgrace and financial ruin. Where a single accusation can prove fatal. Where practically every individual out there can elevate themselves to the role of judge, jury and hangman.
The $64 million question: While for the time being, this seems to be more the case with high profile celebrities, politicians and the like, is this the direction our daily lives is headed in?
Think about some of the over-the-top, at times vile comments, for example, certain locals have left on KC Confidential. Or practically anywhere and everywhere for that matter.
When one of these days some leaker of bad news reveals who Boom Boom, aka Harley, aka Jo Jo is, will he be disgorged from his lofty perch atop a prestigious law firm or lending institution? Hoisted with his own petard? Or more likely perhaps, forced to walk the plank on the trash truck he jumps off and on however many times each week.
Face it folks, there’s pretty much nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.
When I was writing for the Kansas City Star I took part in a number of speaking engagements. The first was painful – horrible – unscripted, unrehearsed and unbearable…at least for me.
I vowed never to allow that to happen again and quickly got up to speed in giving what amounted to tell-all talks.
My stints as a public speaker were largely behind the scenes peeks at people, places and things I’d written about along with the untold fallout and results.
Like the time the then head of DST cursed me like a sailor for revealing the sordid details of a downtown KC real estate transaction he’d crafted. And that shortly thereafter a high profile local mover and shaker called me later out of the blue to apologize for the execs rant.
Frankly, my candor in the retelling of some of those stories and details in this age of the iPhone and throw-thy-neighbor-under-the-bus, might well have gotten me fired.
Trust me, he was this pissed!
And similar to Roseanne, I had a very highly read column in the newspaper and was a public figure. So I could easily have gone down.
I told stories like the time I wrote about George Brett selling his bachelor furniture at an off-Plaza boutique. And that he’d been pine tar mad at me and exploded over the phone when he called editor Art Brisbane to complain and got stuck having to vent his spleen to Brisbane’s executive assistance Candace Spurney.
Candace Spurney
I’d laundry listed some of the items that Brett was selling, their asking prices and likened them to sports collectibles – riffing tongue-in-cheek that buyers could comb Brett’s bachelor couch for forensic evidence of high profile past dates like smoking hot former WDAF TV anchor Kelly Minton.
Art was away when Brett called and his fury was every bit that of the infamous bat brou-ha-ha. Candace had nowhere to run or hide. So she sucked it up and made the best of things by totally pimping the Kansas City Royals hall of famer which only infuriated him further.
Trust me, there are eight million outlandish stories in the Naked Cowtown and I’ve accumulated plenty of ’em. And in my ultra candid retelling, more often than not I left out precious few of those details. I often wondered as I blathered on, what editor Mark Zieman might have said or done were some of those anecdotes to get back to the Star.
Luckily I guess, they didn’t, and so for 16 years I survived my tightrope walks.
Could I get away with any of that today? No effing way!
Can anyone? OK, maybe Donald Trump.
The kind of paranoia that can rear its head today even in car sales might astound you.
The bottom line: We live in strange and dangerous times.
Good luck to one and all, and watch your back, Boom Boom.
The woman has been a disgrace for well over a couple of decades; good riddance to bad rubbish.
Fame brings an ugly side to some. They wind up in a self-absorbed silo that is fed by friends and hangers-on.
Roseanne begins to think, ‘I’m famous for being funny and outspoken, so I can say whatever I want and people will think it’s hilarious.’
Eric Greitens begins to think, ‘I’m smarter than everyone else, and people love me because of the the heroic military image I’ve cultivated, so they will naturally go along with whatever I want.’
Meanwhile, I’m a bottom-feeder who sees how tenuous fame can be and wonders why more people don’t use their small window of opportunity for good instead of espousing political beliefs. Jimmy Carter was a lackluster president, but he’s still out there building houses. KC’s own Jeremy Guthrie was only a so-so ballplayer, but he’s now trying to make a difference for his church. For every person like them there are a thousand Jimmy Kimmels, Roseanne Barrs, or Rob Reiners who just talk, talk, talk.
Excellent point, Paul…
However, having been around a ton of comics over the years, many if not most of the ones who make it big swing for the fences. As in they test the limits of good taste, etc. But every so often they test it a bit too far and wham!
One of Roseanne’s first major moments was when she was at that baseball game on the field and grabbed her crotch right after the national anthem.
Remember that one? Very controversial but she’s scaled quite a few heights in the ensuing years.
And lived to tell the story
“We now live in a zero tolerance world.”
Tell that to Trump. Sleeping with porn stars, mocking disabled reporters, retweeting white supremacists, turning Memorial Day into a celebration of him, calling Kim Jong Whathistits “honorable,” grabbing women by the pussies, plus a million other things, times infinity, ad nauseam, etc.
How has any of this negatively affected him?
Remember I described him as the Teflon Don?
There are always exceptions to the rule, but clearly the times they are a changing
Trump is a Mud Monster. It doesn’t do any good to throw more mud at him, cause…well he’s had plenty on him for years and he still got elected President. Mud on top of mud…you can’t really tell the difference.
Good point,Guy…
problem hernia is that boom boom is always right…it just takes a detour to sometimes
to get to the facts.
I predicted royals/chiefs! Glaze picked them to suck….boom boom said they were
good while glazo bozo predicted armageddon and boom boom said that glaze
jinxed the team or said they were bad then they played good and won series
which even kerowacky had to eat his words.
Greitens…gone…like glazo …he played his hand too long! Like glazo he went down.
And boom boom predicted it.
Trump…well the russians and blugarians help him win..in fact congress know they
played with computers to gie him the win. Now all trumps republican friends
have turned on him and the entire trump gang will go down. They tried keeping
cohen from seeing thru trump but trump blew that too and the state of new york
will take care of trump on those charges. Mueller has known everything for months
and knows exactly the right time to take all these thieves down.
Lets look at recently:
SPYGATE: special meeting fell apart…no longer in news….fbi/cia were watching
soviets (our enemies)…another ruse to take heat off trump…didn’t work!!!!!!!!
MELANIA: leaving trump andhope will testify against him meaning she didn’t
want time in attica with all the other girls who would have loved her to death!!!!!!!!!
MANFORTS SON IN LAW who was right in the middle of everything is now
a gov witness…just think what he can tell about his father in law who had real estate
with trump…..
MUELLER: we hear news everyday but the news peoplle including FOX SAY
“In january, mueller talked with __________ who turned on trump….BUT ITS
JUNE AND WE’RE ALL WAY BEHIND MUELLERS EIGHT BALL. MUELLEER KNEW THIS BECAUSE FLYNN AND FLIPPERS ALREADY TOLD HIM THE
REAL FACTS OF TRUMP.
DON JR. Shot his mouth off about another meeting with ayrabs and now the
hole is een deeper.
MORE PORN STARS: AVENATTI has them….he’s going to depose trump and rip
trump a new a hole…..avenatti is cool dude…google him….he’s everything glazo lied to us that glazo was in kc while avenatti was doing it internationally.
Okay booom boom picked the popular vote…but russians manipulated the three
states that got trump in. Now trump wants to work with ZTE…a huge corrupt
mistake…..and with russians supplying phones in defense department with their
secret mics that give them all the info.
kim: trump might make deal but it will be bad one. Give him the nobel prize.
Obaama got one and never held office! hahahahahahahaa.
So before yougo shooting your mouth off hearne….be very careful. I know more than
you think and could blow this town up if it ever got out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As I have said….NEVER DOUBT BOOM BOOM! i BACK UP EVERYTHING WITH
FACTS AND STATS AND NEVER JUST BLURT B.S. LIKE YOU AND GLAZO BOZO.
And thats why boom boom is still around.
I got the meats (ass arbys says).
good luck with roseane….great show years ago…waiting for return of petticoat
junction and beverly hillbillies but all those hotties gotta look rough these days.
Anyway its all fun and entertainment…laugh….time is short…the checks are
coming in the mail on time….and you moved to the big city.
Good luck…lots of hot older women for you in fact i’ve got one perfect for you.
But please….I’m just a small town guy…living in a small town world (journey song)
trying to keep all the seniors on kcc straight when they leave the tracks.
good luck in all you do. Love your site….love glazo bozo and the rest of the
gang and enjoy the occassional chance when i get more ink that glazo.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…..
also i never write horrible stuff like those who went after glazo after his younger
brothers death. In fact i hated those comments. Mine are usually about sports/
politics/afew hotties sprinkled in but never the low down crap we saw over the
last few weeks.
don’t put me in that category!
Oh, of course, Booms…
We all know butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth
what????????????????????????????????????????? comeon
hernia come up with something more funny. But again…prove
me wrong….YOU CANT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And thats
why either its me or glazo bozo who run this show!
Quick question, Booms…
Is your entire house filled with mirrors so you can constantly admire yourself?
thanks for putting me as a lawyer or big time bman…..
appreciate it…but it is way over the top for me. I just read lots.
How about the trash man gig?
hahahahaha ! come on hearn….get glazo to write some better jokes about me thn the crap you’re putting on your own site!
“Like the time the then head of DST cursed me like a sailor for revealing the sordid details of a downtown KC real estate transaction he’d crafted. And that shortly thereafter a high profile local mover and shaker called me later out of the blue to apologize for the execs rant.”
Hearne, please retell this tale of woe! I’m dying to hear what Tom McDonnell/Tom McCullough may have said.
Those guys were way too classy. Guess again. Real estate head, more I think about it. And the initials of the guy who called to apologize was…the initials, A.M.
HC, of all the “tightrope walking” you did during your days at The Star, did you EVER write something that wasn’t true? (to the best of your knowledge)
Spilling dirt, info, secrets, et al about someone is a far cry from calling a black woman an ape. Don’t you agree?
We aren’t talking zero tolerance here. We’re talking about someone saying something utterly repugnant about another human being because of the color of her skin.
Sure, she had the absolute right to say it. Having the “right” to say it and being immune to any consequences for saying it are not the same thing.
Barr is and always has been a complete whack job. it’s not like this was a loss for humanity.
Couple of loaded questions, Jimbo…
Lemme see if I can help you. First, yes I did write a thing or three that wasn’t true. Nobody in the journalism racket that I know has been able to completely dodge that bullet. They’re called errors. Or in layman’s lingo, mistakes. For which we write corrections.
To your point though, never knowingly.
As for Roseanne’s indiscretion, I’m a little more liberal than you on this topic.
For one, she didn’t call her an ape. To me it was more nuanced than that based upon the look of the totally non ape characters in the movie. It was an obvious attempt at sarcasm that in today’s hyper sensitive racial climate was a shot to the foot…Roseanne’s foot.
That said, comedians have been telling equally or even more off color jokes at comedy clubs and in specials for years. And Roseanne came up thru the ranks as a standup comic, not an actor. And sometimes you never know how bad you’re joke is gonna fall flat until it’s too late.
I’m no Kathy Griffin fan, but look at her Trump deal.
Does the punishment fir the crime in Roseanne’s case; you decide.
More than 100 innocent people stand to lose their jobs. And tens of millions of consumers – regular Americans are gonna Americans are gonna not be able to enjoy something that they like for like EVER.
I’m not so sure the joke was about skin color as I am the look and facial features of the characters in those movies. Which was not in the slightest – to the best of my knowledge – meant to be about how black people look, as opposed to cartoonish apes.
Roseanne should know better. She could’ve told that joke/comment in some smokey comedy club, and no one would give a damn. But she tweeted it, (God, how I LOATHE twitter) and her employer (ABC/Disney) was forced to make a move. She should know better. In some ways, it’s similiar to the Kapernick fiasco. You can shoot your mouth off all you want in public, but when it starts to impact or potentially impact your employer’s bottom line or public image, be ready to suffer the consequences.
Hard to argue it guy…
Do you suppose there could have been a lesser punishment by Disney that would have sufficed and made it past public review?
Hearne,
Maybe, but I’m not sure what. But this doesn’t really hurt Roseanne financially. Sheezus, she’s a multimillionaire several times over. I don’t think much of her comedy, so this doesn’t ruffle my feathers at all. Never watched her borderline white trash show when it was on originally, and didn’t watch it this time either.
I’m with you here
HC, had it been RB’s first reference to an ape regarding the women of color in O’s administration, she might get a pass. It wasn’t. To me, there’s no nuance when the reference continues to be used.
Listen, I’m not one to get offended by much of anything. I can turn on or turn off anything I choose. But, I can certainly recognize idiocy and stupidity when I see it. What Griffin and Barr did qualifies for both.
At the very least, I’ll go with stupidity…
I just think dumb as it was it wasn’t a capital crime…especially with the instant retraction and apology
NO HEARNE THEY’RE CALLED LIES. LIES……LIES ABOUT
PEOPLE…AND NOEXCUSE FOR THEM EXCEPT IN TH
WRITERS MIND!
The Politically Correct Overton Window moves at the whim and caprice of our Thought-Leader-Commissars in the 4th Estate, The Deep State, Hollywood and Academe. What was a previously overlooked venial sin just one year ago, is now punishable by time in the Social Media Stocks, loss of income and future and disgrace in the streets. The Left killed, with prejudice, their own better angels just prior to inducing the right, to assassinate their own. FOX News is a behemoth, but cowers before the aggregate power of the Main Stream Media, who in combination with the heretofore mentioned Fascist organizations that determine the mood of the zeitgeist, is fighting a losing battle against a superior foe, with superior fire power. Roseanne is just the latest ex post facto victim of the howling mob.
Prima Facie, Trey Quisling Gowdy, jumping through hoops in a paroxysm of sophistic deconstruction explaining, as did James Clapper, that “Spies” are a “Good Thing”. The power of the Megaphone, incessantly repeating Progressive talking points and diktats, will, like Chinese Water Torture, bend us all to the innate power of the new Imperium.
It’s like the guy, whose wife comes home, catches him In Delicto Flagrante. He repeats, again and again, a thousand times, as his paramour leaves, he showers up, his wife berates him and day turns to night, that she didn’t see anything and it’s time to catch a good Charles Boyer movie.
At some point in time, we all, will just say to ourselves, “Forget It Jake, It’s Chinatown.
CHUCK…WHAT NO HOLES TO DIG
I am really surprised that in contracts for actors and athletes, that they don’t put in them to stay off social media or control their social media more. I know they put in that they cant ride motorcycles or parachute. I know it would be hard to control, just saying I’m surprised they haven’t. Or maybe they have and I haven’t heard of it.
If there isn’t, my hunch is there soon will be, Goose…
In the very early days of social media in 2009 when the Star klayoffs were going strong, a bunch of those people – Mike Hendricks being the poster boy for it – took some major hits grousing about the newspaper, pay cuts, layoffs, you name it.
Hendricks even went job hunting on Facebook after they cut him back – like somehow nobody would notice.
Then when he got an invitation to interview for a PR job in like Topeka or someplace and told the woman that had contacted him that the position was too low for him. That he should be interviewing for the person who was over the person’s job he was to interview for.
At which point she told him, “That would be my job.”
Then she wrote the whole mess up for some PR industry publication as a lesson learned in how NOT to apply for a job!
Call the President’s daughter the C-word and he calls you out.
Call another man’s daughter the C-word and he invites you to the White House for a photo op.
Two wrongs don’t make a right but three do QED???
President of ARCO Chemical was in charge of the bicentennial celebration of the US Constitution. His personal assistant sent out her resume with every packet going to corporations to get funds. Hal was going to run for mayor of Philadelphia but this ended that dream.
What’s the big deal? We (black, white, Asian) are all just evolved apes anyways.
In the smoldering 60s, The Smothers Brothers got in a bit of trouble with LBJ after making fun of him on their variety show. Johnson called the head of CBS who got the Brothers to cut out the presidential satire. But other heresies such as putting Pete Seeger on the air eventually got the show taken off the air. Though in the end Johnson was publicly gracious about the matter Tom and Dick’s careers never recovered.
JUST LIKE SOMEONE WE KNOW AFTER GETTING FIRED FROM KCSTAR