KC Confidential

While we’re in the midst of Tinseltown’s Thanksgiving offerings, a look ahead to what the studios will be serving up  as Kansas City’s 2019 holiday fare…

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Wait for it…

From the get go the chances of new Pitch owners stumbling onto a pot-of-gold at the end of the alternative publishing rainbow were slim to none.

That said, with the Kansas City Star on the ropes, and little to nothing waiting in the wings to fill an already gaping local news gap, all things considered, what’s left of The Pitch is doing the unthinkable.

Slowly but surely it’s rising from the former newsweekly’s all-but-certain grave and unleashing a monthly mag that’s actually worthy of note. And trust me, that’s far from easy.

Do the math; far more worthy and successful  alt zines like the Village Voice and Boston Phoenix have long since gone for their dirt naps. Meanwhile what’s left of Atlanta’s Creative Loafing and St. Louis’ Riverfront Times appear to hanging by a thread after multiple ownership changes.

Yet the Pitch – which never came close to the successes of those legacy alt weeklies – has been able in a single year to morph from a newsprint weekly into a high quality magazine.

Complete with interesting tales and takes that seem to somehow overcome the loss of immediacy as a monthly – no easy task that.

Not only was its recent “best of” issue an entertaining read, it had a fair handful of ads.

Go figure… Continue reading →

What we have here is not so much a racing movie…

It’s more of solid storytelling of a competitive friendship set AGAINST the world of racing—and marketing.

FORD v FERRARI takes place in the early 1960’s when Henry Ford II saw his company’s sales fall and the entire Ford brand in need of major image building.

Ford’s strategy: To acquire perennially dominant Italian automobile manufacturer Ferrari,. and have its name help boost his brand.

Just one problem…Enzo Ferrari nixed the deal.

So now what?

That’s when the eccentric American car boss had his marketing VP Lee Iacocca hire legendary car designer and engineer Carroll Shelby (Matt Damon) and his race car driver Ken Miles (Christian Bale).

Their assignment: To create and construct a revolutionary racing car that would BEAT Ferrari at the grueling 24 hours race at Le Mans, which in turn would bring back the glory to Ford—not to mention to their car sales.

The big test for Ford’s new GT40 would come in 1966, when the Detroit-based manufacturer finally achieved its goal which ultimately led to the very popular Cobra and, of course, Mustang.

So IS there still interest in a story set against the backdrop of Formula One racing in this age of NASCAR? Continue reading →

Once upon a time, he was a hellraiser…

Former Channel 5 political operative Dave Helling made his bones busting local pols for bogus ad claims. WDAF and later KCTV called Helling’s segments, “Truth Watch.”

So edgy was Helling that The Pitch gave him a column at one point, and after he flunked out of news anchoring and was touching up his television news resume, I hooked him with Kansas City Star editor Mark Zieman, who did the print journalism unthinkable; brought Helling aboard as a serious, print reporter (as opposed to tv talking head), and he’s been there since.

Unfortunately, full time news coverage and column writing at a newspaper is a far cry from tv news, and Helling failed to distinguish himself – nothing close to his TV successes.

Give him credit though for surviving a decade-plus of Star layoffs that saw the newspaper shrink from more than 2,000 employees to maybe 200 or fewer today.

Now with guardian angel Zieman leaving McClatchy, Helling is desperate to make a mark.

Bringsing us to his hail Mary column…

“Chiefs should rename Arrowhead Stadium for Lamar Hunt” Continue reading →

NEW YORK, NY – JULY 03: New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg consumes a dog at the Nathan’s Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog Eating Contest weigh-in ceremony on July 3, 2013 in New York City. The annual hot dog eating event is expected to draw up to 40,000 fans on July 4, in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

I’m not sure whether this works or not…

Not quite a year ago, before the circus began, I said that if Michael Bloomberg ran, he’d win.

But he didn’t…run that is.

Which surprised me, since you don’t become a billionaire – certainly on Wall Street – without an ego. Didn’t Bloomberg have the law changed so he could run for a third term in New York City? That takes chutzpah. I figured he either had skeletons in his closet, or believed he was just too old.

The story today though is he believed Joe Biden would win, so he stayed out. How delusional is he? I knew Biden had no chance, first and foremost because he’d blow himself up. He has a long history of this. Furthermore, we know there are Biden fans in Scranton and Delaware, but anywhere else? He’s like an opening act, a favor for the agent, someone tolerable if you come late, who you don’t mind missing.

Now in tech, where Bloomberg made his money, there’s a first-mover advantage. The key is to run so fast – as Mark Zuckerberg once said, “move fast and break things” – so no one can catch up. Bloomberg owns the terminal space, even when it was discovered the company was spying on its customers, despite there being talk of an upstart, nobody challenged the behemoth.

So…

Getting in late is kind of like RFK in ’68. Yup, RFK didn’t think he could win, but then when Eugene McCarthy was getting all that traction, he felt it’d be easy – like taking candy from a baby. Unfortunately, Kennedy was shot – and ultimately in a year of unrest, where the convention itself was a site of protest and police overreaction – the candidate was Hubert Humphrey, and he lost.

Biden isn’t even Humphrey…

But the lesson of ’68 is, there are incalculable grass roots, disaffection with the status quo, that the inside players and the media aren’t in touch with.

So that brings us to George McGovern. The year 1972 was not 1968. The younger generation was licking its wounds, the mass protests were over, it was the wrong time. Which is the lesson the DNC does not get – it’s not 2016 anymore, it’s 2020 – and people have changed.

Which brings us to Michael Dukakis.

That’s the paradigm the DNC is afraid of. It believes Elizabeth Warren is Dukakis, but it’s not 1988 anymore. Sure, it’s important to study history, but also not to be blinded by it. If history repeats at all, it’s with a twist.

And the history we’re talking about is 2016, and the twist is now.

Donald Trump tapped into discontent. The DNC and its cronies believe it was all white supremacists, hogwash! I know three people right off the top of my head who voted for Trump, all friends. One a famous musician, from one of the bluest states. Trump pointed out the flaws in globalization, the raw deal for the rank and file. And Hillary Clinton was damaged goods, the right had defined her.

Now the right has defined Adam Schiff.

They pushed back and Schiff shut up. WRONG!

Anybody will tell you you stand up to the bully. As for this newfangled b.s. that you need to campaign without mentioning Trump’s name… THAT’S NOT THE WAY HE PLAYS!

Get into the street fight! Continue reading →

Something bitter this way comes…

For Kansas City based movie exhibitor AMC Theaters, that is. That’s because no industry is exempt for the advancement of technology –  not horses, shopping malls, CDs and DVDs, daily newspapers – none of the above and far more.

And for the past 20-plus years – far longer, truth be told – movie theaters have been fighting the good fight to remain viable.

First it was color movies, then Cinemascope and 3D, next multiplexes in the suburbs with gigantic screens and surround sound. More recently, moviegoers are being wooed with luxurious theaters featuring comfortable seating and a wide range of upscale movie eats and liquor.

Television presented arguably the first major threat to mainstream movie theaters, but tiny black and white screens, tinny sound and ridiculously few choices gave movie exhibitors a definite edge. On top of which, it took like forever before films wound their way onto the small screen.

No mas…

These days the window for passage from box office to what amounts to as home box office is measuring in months – usually around 90 days – and that window continues to shrink.

Plus the advent and affordability of huge screens with ultra high definition pictures, complemented by killer surround audio systems, continue to make the option of waiting a few months to watching movies on-the-cheap, in the comfort of your own home (with even more comfortable seating and better, wildly more affordable food and beverage options) continues to take a toll.

Now, on top of all that, comes a boffo box office smash being released by streaming giant Netflix that’s taking it to AMC, Regal, etc like never before.

In the form of a three and one half hour mob movie called The Irishman. Continue reading →

School buses stop as traffic moves along The Paseo near 16th Street on Friday, May 11, 2018, in Kansas City, Missouri.

Time to turn the page on political correctness…

We’ve been headed down this road for a long time, but the election of Donald Trump really kicked political correctness into high gear – seriously high gear.

When a Japanese-American baseball player can’t pop on a hat at the White House that reads, “Make America Great Again,” where are we headed?

And yes, we live in a world where people of differing colors and ethnicities can still find themselves on the short end of the stick from time to time. However when you look around the globe, it’s a helluva lot better here than most countries all things considered – and like the Beatles said – it’s getting better every day.

Trouble is, we’re trapped – temporarily with luck – in a media-fueled culture of woke.

“Woke means being conscious of racial discrimination in society and other forms of oppression and injustice. In mainstream use, woke can also more generally describe someone or something as being ‘with it.'”

Face it, nobody can get away with anything anymore – off color jokes, political leanings other than to the far left, opinions celebrating religious beliefs or just about anything that passes for conservatism.

One public slip and you’re cooked.

Most folks who lean a bit towards traditional values and thinking, must remain in hiding, lest they be outed and branded as racist, sexist or whatever.

There is no middle ground for the woke culture.

Embrace it, or hide out until something like the Paseo vote comes along and…

That’s when we find that nearly three quarters of Kansas City Star readers disagree with the editorial interlopers from out of town who embrace all-things-woke. And love nothing more than scolding locals for their perceived shortcomings.

Not because the Paseo supporters  are flaming racists.

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Frankly, I didn’t know WHAT to expect…

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There, I said it…

Was talking to Wild Bill Nigro the other day and we agreed that if Craig Glazer was alive today, he would have long since fired up his chainsaw and written at least a half dozen columns predicting the doom and gloom for the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl chances.

Long as we’re on the subject, as an aside, he’d undoubtedly have suffered some major gambling losses betting on the team. He’d be reminding us dismissively of how bad KU football still is (and Bill Self will soon be gone), how K-State is a “nice little team” that nobody outside the area gives a second thought to, and he’d be on the MU Tigers bandwagon, especially given their reasonably winnable remaining games.

Ah, but all that college ball would pale in comparison to the dashing of his Chiefs hopes.

Cuz Craig would have been riding that bandwagon from the get-go…just like about everybody else in this town with a hankering for pigskin, beer and politically incorrect football cheers.

I told Nigro the other day that the Chiefs were risking quarterback Patrick Mahomes suffering an even greater injury by playing him his with that bad ankle.

For which they got basically nothing but back-to-back losses at Arrowhead.

Speaking of Nigro…

After texting me a half dozen or so images of animated ghosts with captions like, “I see dead people” and saying the Scribe  was “trying to make a comeback thru” me – he posed the question: “Who do you think Craig’s hitting on in the after life?”

Don’t have an answer for that one, but the lesson to be learned for anguished Chiefs fans is something like, “Don’t count your chickens until the eggs are hatched.”

Because at this stage of the game, the entire Kansas City is in peril.

As Craig liked to say, “Think about it.” Continue reading →

What kind of crazy, fucked-up world do we live in where Bernie Sanders has a heart attack and comes back stronger than ever?

One in which Elizabeth Warren is busy snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

The best line of the night?

When Bernie said what the people want – that 71% – want Medicare For All.

It is about the voters, right? That Trumps all the triangulation, right?

And speaking of Trump, Warren was so busy worrying about future Republican attacks that she wouldn’t admit Medicare For All would raise people’s taxes. Yes, it would be a net win, but when you can’t answer a direct question over and over again…

You lose your credibility.

And that was Warren’s key.

Does she think we can’t do math? Have Republicans toxified the word “tax” to the point where no one can utter it? Our country runs on taxes, taxes are good.

As for government waste…every business has waste, Amazon built distribution infrastructure and then tore it down when it was clear there was a better solution. The government can’t even throw out food. As for the private sector always doing better, how about those for-profit prisons, incentivized to house offenders, with less oversight than publicly-owned prisons with no profit motive?

Some things just should not be in the private sector.

So Tulsi was labeled a favorite of the right in the NYT and she can’t get over it.

Then she immediately starts talking about the downsides of impeachment and I think the NYT is right. She’s toast, she’s got to go.

As for Amy Klobuchar… I can’t put my finger exactly on why she bugs me. She’s a self-satisfied nerd. It’s like Lil Nas X saying he’s the great hope for saving music. Huh?

Beto’s got to go. He has no chance of winning.

Castro barely talked, kick him off the stage.

Kamala… She tried to attack Warren, as she did Biden in that previous debate -but it turned out Warren was on her side – made Kamala look bad.

Buttigieg. He lifted himself up to the top, surviving tier. He’s young, he’s educated, he’s smart…it’s just that he can’t run the police department of his own damn town, he can’t run on his experience.

Steyer?

Too late, sorry.

And no charisma to boot. So you made your money in banking, why should we listen to you? Why don’t you add something to society, build something, create something other than wealth? Continue reading →

Pistol Pete

I’m not sure I buy into that axiom about nice guys…

On that note, one of the nicest Kansas City Star guys I’ve ever known – Jim Fitzpatrick – fired both barrels of his sawed-off journalistic shotgun into the second nicest Star guy I ever worked with Pete Grathoff.

So yeah, even nice guys can be a bit cranky.

Still, I was more than a little surprised, given that both these guys are shoe-ins to land the poster child gig alongside the definition of the word “milquetoast.”

Not in a bad way, mind you. Cuz while  neither of them would ever be described as “macho,” there’s nothing wrong with that.

And to my knowledge they probably had little more than incidental contact at the newspaper, given that most sports dudes come in far later in the day and were quarenteened in a part of the old headquarters far removed from the main newsroom where “Jimmy C” used to hang.

That said, who doesn’t like looking at a grisly car wreck…or a nerd pillow fight?

So it is that in a recent column, Fitzpatrick wondered aloud about who the dozen rich dudes were that choked out 100 grand each to play golf at the Kansas City Country Club with Tom Watson, Jack Nicklaus and Lee Trevino. That Grathoff had reported on in the Star.

Fitzpatrick managed to flesh out three of ’em – Don Wagner, Alan Atterbury and Tom Devlin, but fell short of the mark in fingering the other nine.

Which didn’t stop Jimmy C from calling out Pistol Pete for being lazy and not serving up the nine names even thought Fitzpatrick couldn’t find ’em either.

“I said Pete Grathoff – who writes under the ‘For Pete’s Sake’ handle – is one of the laziest reporters I’ve ever seen,” Fitzpatrick wrote, adding, “Let me explain: Continue reading →