Saphia Khambalia is a reporter for City TV in Toronto. In fact, she’s a very attractive reporter which makes this video clip even funnier.
Saphia Khambalia is a reporter for City TV in Toronto. In fact, she’s a very attractive reporter which makes this video clip even funnier.
She was doing a story on Charlie Sheen’s appearance at Toronoto’s Massey Hall when she had an unfortunate incident occur while she was on the air.
Toronto’s Daily Mail breathlessly describes the incident:
But as visible windy conditions bluster around her, the reporter’s nose begins to run seconds into her report. She manages to clear her nose once by combining it with a quick swish of her dark hair, only for the troubling watery stream to return seconds later. The embarrassed reporter attempts to hurriedly sign off her report and hand back to a studio colleague as her runny nose threatens to spoil her on-air appearance again. But she is powerless to prevent the nasal malfunction as the stream falls from her nose onto her microphone at the split second she finishes her piece.
We are incredibly proud right now that we were mature enough not to do any snot puns in this story.
This is the kind of media we love. Veteran reporter Ron Wood of WSYR-TV in Syracuse, New York was stung by a bee right in the middle of a report, causing him to let loose with a string of obscenities. Careful, Ron, the FCC is watching.
This is the kind of media we love. Veteran reporter Ron Wood of WSYR-TV in Syracuse, New York was stung by a bee right in the middle of a report, causing him to let loose with a string of obscenities. Careful, Ron, the FCC is watching.
For anyone who gave the details of Bill Clinton’s North Korean “rescue” the slightest thought, the veracity of it is called into question by obvious PR spin surrounding it.
The Daily Mail UK reveals details about Euna Lee and Laura Ling that make them seem much less sympathetic
You’ve undoubtedly read all about (a) the horrible ordeal suffered by American reporters Laura Ling and Euna Lee at the hands of the North Koreans and (b) how they were “rescued” by Bill Clinton, the daring former president.
For anyone who gave the details of this story the slightest thought, the veracity of (a) is called into question by obvious PR spin surrounding (b).
Here’s a perspective you’ve probably never seen, as reported by the UK Daily Mail:
But who are these two fresh-faced women? What were they doing in North Korea, undoubtedly one of the most dangerous and repressed places in the world, and how on earth did they get themselves into what a friend jauntily described on one website as ‘a bit of a disastrous pickle’?
… they were hopelessly ill-prepared for their ‘mission’ to the Chinese-Korean border, that they were working for a minor television organisation run by a former ambulance-chasing lawyer…
…
Laura, 32, describes herself as a ‘Chinese American’, but a friend said: ‘She was brought up as a true Valley girl [an upper middle-class girl]. She’s about as Chinese as the cuisine at Chin Chin [a popular Californian-Chinese restaurant chain].’
Laura is said to be the duo’s ‘driving force’. Euna, 36, who had little journalism experience and counted making a yoga video as a career highlight, was her devoted lackey, who reportedly held the video camera as Laura ‘danced around’ on the North Korean side of the border.
For Euna, who was born in South Korea but moved to California when she was a university student, it was her first overseas assignment. The trip was Laura’s second ‘dangerous’ foreign job for Current, a Left-wing cable television network based in San Francisco that rather grandly aspires to ‘democratise’ the news.
…
The two women were sent to China in March to do a report about North Korean refugees pouring over the border. A source familiar with Current said: ‘It was the sort of bleeding-hearts liberal story that would play well to their target market. But then Laura decided to take it a step further.’
…..
‘Laura is sweet but not very street-smart,’ said (a long-time Democratic Party insider). ‘She was sent to China to make a routine programme about refugees crossing the border from North Korea but, according to Kim Jong Il’s people, she was walking across the border and leaping about.
‘The official North Korean report said Euna was holding the camera. Of course, there was speculation they were working for the CIA. Forget that. This has been a farce. It couldn’t be more embarrassing for Obama and the agency. No one hired these girls. No one in Washington had ever heard about them until they were captured by the North Koreans.
‘From everything I have heard about Laura, she is a Valley girl who wanted to play in the big league. I think she did this as a stunt to compete with her sister. Lisa Ling works with people like Oprah. Laura earns peanuts at a network no one has heard of. This was her big chance.’
On March 17, Laura and Euna were arrested by North Korean soldiers after they ignored orders to stop filming. Then they vanished into the maw of the most isolated nation on Earth.
……
In fact, their ‘ordeal’ appears to have been far from tough. According to Professor Han Park, an American academic who was visiting North Korea at the time, they were housed in a guest villa designed for foreign visitors outside the capital of Pyongyang.
Professor Park said that Korean officials laughed at any suggestion that the women were receiving harsh treatment. ‘We are not Guantanamo,’ he was told.
….
Indeed, (Ling’s) worst complaint was that her rice tasted like ‘rocks’.
The Clinton confidant said: ‘The women were a prize. Most people in North Korea would be lucky to be treated the way those girls were.’
Call us cold-hearted, but after reading the Daily Mail piece in full, we have a lot less sympathy for Ling and Lee.
They caused their own problem by crossing the border illegally and “leaping about” for the camera. They were held for 140 days in the relative luxury of a guest villa normally reserved for foreign visitors. And they received treatment that would have made them the envy of the average North Korean.
Fact is, contestants on Survivor endure greater hardships than those faced by the American reporters. But like the winners of Survivor, Ling and Lee are already lining up book and TV deals that will pay them millions.
The UK Daily Mail’s story of the “rescue” of the two American reporters was a terrific piece of reporting that swept away all the PR spin. It’s packed with fascinating little nuggets.
Poor Gore. Even pot-bellied, little tinhorn dictators aren't buying his act.
The UK Daily Mail’s story of the “rescue” of the two American reporters was a terrific piece of reporting that swept away all the PR spin. It’s packed with fascinating little nuggets. For example:
For Bill Clinton, it was an easy mission. In a phone call to her husband a month ago, Laura (Ling) said that if Clinton turned up, she and Euna (Lee) would be granted amnesty.
The Clinton insider said: ‘Obama’s people suggested sending Al Gore, but Kim Jong Il only wanted Bill.
They didn’t want Al Gore. Proof that Americans and North Koreans, people from two very different cultures, have a lot in common.
London Daily Mail that reveals details about the so-called Bill Clinotn “rescue” of reporters imprisoned in North Korea that have been conspicuously absent in the American media.
"Just me and two hot Asian chicks," the former President mused, "alone in an airplane for fifteen hours."
Last week was like old times for the American media. According to the template, former President Bill Clinton flew into enemy territory and used the power of his charm to free two innocent American journalists who had been unlawfully arrested by the evil North Koreans.
Unfortunately, none of it is true.
Luckily, Sunday’s London Daily Mail that reveals details about the so-called “rescue” that have been conspicuously absent in the American media:
…Bill Clinton has found it increasingly hard to reconcile himself to life on the sidelines. When asked to undertake a ‘sensitive’ mission to ‘rescue’ the pair, he jumped at the chance.
He was picked up at an airport near his home in the bucolic New York suburb of Chappaqua by a private jet laid on by the Dow Chemical company. It flew him 3,000 miles to Burbank, California, where he boarded a Boeing 737 provided by Steve Bing, one of his best friends and a generous contributor to the Clinton Foundation, the charity with which he has been occupying his post-Presidential years. Continue reading “The real story of Slick Willy’s excellent adventure in Pyongyang”
Here’s Kimmel’s concept of how Hollywood might handle its version of the “President-Clinton-rescues-two-reporters” story.
Jimmy Kimmel gets less hype than Conan O’Brien and David Letterman, but night-in and night-out, he’s by far the funniest of the three late night hosts.
Here’s Kimmel’s concept of how Hollywood might handle its version of the “President-Clinton-rescues-two-reporters” story.
Thanks, Jimmy. We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.
(Actually, we couldn’t have said it nearly as well, but by saying “we couldn’t have said it better” we subconsciously elevate ourselves to Kimmel’s level in your mind. At least that’s our theory. How’s it working?)
So-called Town Hall meetings have always been a farce. Same with Obama’s idea of “transparency.” Now reporters are even starting to complain.
So-called Town Hall meetings have always been a farce. Same with Obama’s idea of “transparency.” Now reporters are even starting to complain.
Absent the pretense of a campaign “debate” platform, Town Hall meetings are now merely infomercials. Pure propaganda. Filled with hack partisan activists and axe-grinders who have nothing better to do than ask pre-approved questions. Unless it’s your job to report on these charades, you shouldn’t be watching them.
But it seems the media lapdogs are growing restless. Some in the White House press corps are no longer content to be the Obama administration’s public relations pep squad.
Helen Thomas has covered every president since Lincoln, er… Kennedy. Anyway, she’s old enough to know better and to resent the spoon-feeding. We don’t agree with Thomas on muchof anything, but we can’t help but cheer for her in this video. Watch as she teams up with CBS’ Chip Reid to confront smarmy spokes-tool Robert Gibbs about the White House’s manipulative question-planting techniques and his insulting non-answers.
Then imagine the outcry if the Bush team had been as “transparent” as this bunch.
This one’s too bizarre for words. Just too damn bizarre for words.
A Dutch journalist named Joanie de Rijke went looking for the Taliban in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, she found them.
We’ll let the Brussels Journal take it from here:
“In November 2008 a Dutch journalist, Joanie de Rijke, was abducted by Taliban fighters in Afghanistan. She was held captive, raped repeatedly, and released after six days for a ransom of 100,000 euros ($137,000). After her ordeal, she acknowledged that her captors ‘did horrible things to me,’ but added in several media interviews ‘They also respected me,’ and emphasized ‘They are not monsters.’”
Bizarrely, de Rijke said this ordeal didn’t make her angry. de Rijke said, “They also respected me.” How did she say they demonstrate this immense respect? Believe it or not, by giving her tea and biscuits between rape sessions.
There’s no explaining this case. Maybe it’s Stockholm Syndrome. Maybe it’s lunacy. Maybe it’s the left’s complete inability to confront evil. Take your choice.
Sometimes things are not as they appear. Even this British TV reporter couldn’t believe the results of his “hard-hitting” investigation of racism in real estate.
You’ve read a lot about waterboarding. You’ve heard a lot about waterboarding. But have you ever seen someone actually waterboarded?
We hadn’t until we saw this video. Playboy reporter Mike Guy got the unenviable assignment to experience waterboarding personally, which probably makes him the first guy who ever considered working for Playboy to be torture.
Turns out waterboarding is nothing like we expected and it’s definitely nothing like tough talking Mike Guy expected.
Never trust a NYPD horse. They are notorious liars. The city’s bankrupt. Taxes are going through the roof. And Rush Limbaugh’s leaving town. Just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse comes this news:
A former New York City police detective who is now a TV news reporter for Fox affiliate WNYW was charged with DUI after his car crashed into a police horse on Monday night.
Police reported that 60-year-old Michael Sheehan refused a breathalyzer test which resulted in the automatic suspension of his license.
Thomas Monaghan, Sheehan’s attorney, said police had the story backwards and that the horse had actually slammed into Sheehan’s car and “not the other way around.”
You’re the press secretary for the most powerful man on the planet. You’re in the middle of the greatest financial crisis in generations. Terrorists threaten the future of the world. Under the circumstances, people hang on your every word.
Unless you’re Robert Gibbs, the president’s press secretary. He smirks, he snarls, he smears, but even that isn’t enough to keep reporters from falling into deathlike trances during his daily press briefings.
One member of the White House press corps actually fell asleep yesterday. You can see her over the left shoulder of the reporter asking the question in this video.
It’s still a bit of a mystery who the heavy-lidded journalist may have been, but press corps observers say it appears to be Wall Street Journal reporter Laura Meckler, who is pregnant.
Our first inclination is to say, “Cut her some slack. She’s pregnant.” But upon further reflection, we’d like to amend that to, “Cut her some slack. She was listening to Robert Gibbs.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnCnRuoYMxEYes, we hate the media, so we love mistakes on the news. C’mon, admit it. You love those live TV screw-ups as much as we do. We have to give this Barbie credit – she kept her composure better than we would have.
The newspaper business may be dying, but journalists’ careers are being reincarnated by the Obama administration.
The latest is the Chicago Tribune’s Jill Zuckman. She’s hooking up with the administration as Director of Public Affairs at the Department of Transportation. Peter Gosselin, one of her coworkers at the Trib, recently hired on as chief speech writer for Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. Time Magazine’s Jay Carney is now Joe Biden’s communications director. CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta is rumored to be in the running for Surgeon General.
Many conservatives fear this intentional blurring of the lines between impartial journalism and partisan politics.
(Hey, who picked up the mail today? Did anyone notice if our job offer came in yet?)
The selection is questioners at Obama's press conference was unusual, to say the least.
The press corps was gathered at the White House for President Obama’s first primetime press conference. They were on the edge of their seats, hoping to be called on by the Boy Prince.
The press conference started normally enough. Then, as the Wall Street Journal reports, the President started asking the questions.
A completely impartial reporter was arrested yesterday after jumping over a rope barrier, squealing like a teenage girl watching the Beatles on Ed Sullivan, and trying to get President Obama’s autograph.
Luckily, the president’s Secret Service detail grabbed the impartial reporter, and took him away for a little good, old fashioned interrogation. Reports say the man was later seen boxing up his impartial personal items in the White House press room and being impartially led away.
Although this story blurs the already hazy line between satire and reality in this administration, every word of it is true. Except the part about the squealing, which we made up.
