Daily Dose
Daily Dose: 4/11/17
The passenger and United Airlines are still getting dragged
12:45 PMI’m going to my first Major League Baseball game of the season Tuesday night. Needless to say, I’m extremely excited.
Pulitzer Day is a special one in the journalism world. It’s a day when, if you’ve done this job for any amount of time, you take a second to recognize your peers who’ve put in the work to change the world with that aspirational spirit that drives most reporters. If you’ve got a Pulitzer, people take you seriously for the rest of your life. That said, this year the winners list featured quite a few black writers, which is not usual. As a black journalist, yes, this makes me very happy.
The school shooting in San Bernardino, California, was a domestic incident. A man who was upset about his relationship with his estranged wife decided to walk into a school, her workplace, and shoot to kill her in front of children. There are multiple things worth noting here, besides the awful nature of the murder. The victim, Karen Smith, decided to leave Cedric Anderson. He then killed her. He had a history of abuse, so when you find yourself saying, “Why not just walk away?” when it comes to becoming a victim in that situation, now you know. Typically, it’s less safe.
If you get dragged off a plane by airport authorities, prepare to get your reputation dragged too. That’s exactly what’s happening to David Dao, the man you saw on TV and the internet getting pulled by his arms off a United Airlines flight Monday. As it turns out, his past in Kentucky as a doctor involves quite a few controversial incidents, including multiple felony charges for fraudulently giving out drugs. This is what we call the “no angel” defense that we’ve seen so many times before. Of course, none of this matters at all, really, because beating people up on planes isn’t cool, ever.
There’s no love lost between old ACC foes. Last week, the University of Maryland president floated a rather drastic idea when publicly discussing what should happen to the University of North Carolina regarding its academic fraud scandal. This situation is particularly awkward because it mainly involved letting kids take fake classes in African and Afro-American studies, which just does not look good at all. Wallace Loh thinks UNC deserves the death penalty. Wow.
Free Food
Coffee Break: If you tell me that you were attacked by a runaway deer, the likelihood that I believe you is low. I mean, who on earth is just walking down the street when Bambi is rolling through? Well, it happened to this guy, and now there’s video to prove it.
Snack Time: Sometimes it feels like there’s nothing but bad news around these parts. Between all the outrage and injustice, here’s a story about strangers coming together to help someone find his dad’s lost friend. Cue the tears.
Dessert: If you’re in a bad mood and need cheering up, this song should help you out.
All Day
Daily Dose: 4/10/17
Stars come out for Tupac’s Hall of Fame induction
12:05 PMBig news in radio world. Sort of. All three hours of The Morning Roast are now available for podcast, if you can’t listen live. Y’all have been asking, and now you’ve got it. If you haven’t yet, please do subscribe, rate and review!
Travel can be stressful. Dealing with airports and the like can take its toll on you. But should you ever be in a situation in which you are given incentive to not get on a plane, take your options seriously. Because if you’re on United, you just might get knocked out and dragged off a flight by police officers for not “volunteering” to leave on your own. It happened to a doctor, and it was captured on video. Seriously, watch this. All because they wanted their own employees to be able to catch the flight.
Tupac Shakur was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame over the weekend. Snoop Dogg gave his induction speech, and it was pretty epic. It’s honestly really refreshing to hear people talk about Shakur as more than just an outsize gangsta rapper whose life ended too early. But T.I. decided to pay homage to ‘Pac at the ceremony, and it didn’t really go that well. This is not an easy outfit to pull off, and Tip might want to think twice before moving into the leather vest game. Some of these zings are straight-up hilarious.
The United States sent missiles into Syria last week. Never mind the fact that when President Barack Obama considered doing this, everyone balked. Never mind the fact that this country is apparently bombing one country to stop it from bombing itself. And never mind the fact that the entire decision could drastically upset the political situation in that part of the world and globally because of allied interests. What apparently drove Trump to do this: disturbing images. Maybe someone should show him images of Flint, Michigan.
Batting helmets are important. Obviously, they’re designed to protect baseball players from injury, but as a style component, they matter a lot. It’s crazy to think there was a time in the bigs when batters didn’t even wear them. Anyway, times are changing in MLB, where quite a few teams have gone to a matte look, which I love, by the way. Now, the Atlanta Braves are going next level for the opening of their new park. Be sure to check out the lids that feature something called “hydro dripping,“ which just sounds dope.
Free Food
Coffee Break: We’re always leery when there’s a story that states someone was shot over a completely trivial matter and someone ends up dead. Particularly when family is involved. So something tells me an argument over who would walk the dog is not the only reason this father/son shootout ended poorly.
Snack Time: The story of 5Pointz is so heartbreaking. A public institution, basically, for graffiti art that ended as an insult to the artists who loved it. They’re getting their day in court today over the literal whitewashing of their work.
Dessert: Take this quiz. It’s fun. And colorful.
All Day
Daily Dose: 4/7/17
2:30 PMClinton Yates is not here today. He’s currently at the Coca-Cola headquarters, pitching executives on a new ad campaign starring Iggy Azalea.
The Trump administration launched a cruise missile strike against the Syrian government Thursday night. According to ABC News, “59 tomahawk missiles were launched from destroyers USS Porter and USS Ross in the Mediterranean Sea over a half-hour span beginning at 7:36 p.m. ET.” The U.S. military forewarned its Russian counterparts in the area that the airstrike was coming, and reportedly no Syrians were killed. National security adviser H.R. McMaster said the attack would not “stop [Syrian President Bashar al-] Assad’s ability to carry out future attacks,” according to CNN, so not much can be made of what happened last night.
LaVar Ball is talking … again. The noted loudmouth has been saying insane things for months now, but now he just said something plain stupid. Ball told the Southern California News Group that UCLA, his son Lonzo’s former team, was eliminated from the NCAA tournament last month because “you can’t win no championship with three white guys because the foot speed is too slow.” Aside from that not being true, UCLA lost in part because Lonzo Ball scored just 10 points on 4-of-10 shooting in the team’s Sweet 16 loss to Kentucky, while Wildcats guard De’Aaron Fox dropped 39 points in his face. And for nonblack people, this doesn’t make LaVar Ball racist, so leave those think pieces in your Drafts folder.
There’s a new All Eyez on Me trailer. The Tupac Shakur biopic looks amazing. From the cast — The Wire‘s Jamie Hector, The Walking Dead‘s Danai Gurira and Notorious‘ Jamal Woolard, reprising his role as Notorious B.I.G. — to the music to the drama, this movie appears to have it all. Lead actor Demetrius Shipp Jr., who plays the late rapper, makes you think you’re watching a documentary (or a Coachella hologram) rather than a feature film because of his striking resemblance to the titular character. And it appears we’re getting a 360-degree view of Shakur, from his upbringing in New York alongside his Black Panther mother and stepfather to his “California Love” lifestyle as a rap superstar all the way to his premature death at the age of 25. There’s even time to fit in former girlfriend Jada Pinkett Smith. The movie opens on June 17.
Quick notes:
1. An Arizona elementary school was out here stamping kids’ arms for not having enough lunch money.
2. Aaron Rodgers and Olivia Munn are officially calling it quits.
3. Kendrick Lamar was reportedly supposed to drop an album last night. He did not.
All Day
Daily Dose: 4/6/17
French Montana puts himself in a bad spot
2:20 PMY’all know that I’m a Georgetown Hoyas fan. Some of you know that the team is a disaster right now. Well, they hired Patrick Ewing as coach. I talked about it on Outside the Lines Wednesday with Bob Ley. Had to bring out the camo.
OK, Montana. For those of you who don’t know, French is a Moroccan guy who moved to New York City as a preteen and grew up in the Bronx. He made it rich making movies about extremely ‘hood stuff and then moved into rap, where he became more of a star than anyone expected. He parlayed that into dating a Kardashian, which is always a solid career move. French’s blackness is one of those things wrapped up in the concept of “born in Africa” and “he can use the N-word” politics. Then he went and called a black woman’s hair nappy. Bad move. Now, he’s sorry.
Let’s be real. We’ve all had our cards declined at some point. Whether it was when you were by yourself trying to eke out those last couple of dollars for some food at the grocery store, or you went out of town and forgot to inform the bank and they hit you with a “this is for your protection” notification. Life is life, and if you’re reading this, you’re likely not made out of money. If you are, btw, holla at your boy. That aside, what you should not do when the cashier gives you that look is flip out. This guy did, and he’s still on the run.
Angela Rye is a national treasure. She’s a lawyer and a political commentator, so when it comes to wrecking people’s shop on-air, believe she knows what she’s doing. So when some guy named Joe Walsh tried to step in her zone the other day on CNN, she informed him in no uncertain terms that his bigotry was not going to be tolerated in a civilized discussion. Alas, he couldn’t handle that information and started yelling random racist comments, which she summarily dismissed. Rye talked to Desus & Mero about the situation.
Is LeBron James as good as Michael Jordan? If I never hear that question again in my life, I’ll die a happy person. But because this is what we do, every time anyone who even knows MJ has a microphone in his face, he feels the need to chime in on this nondiscussion. The latest person on this list is Dennis Rodman, who for whatever reason seems to believe that because James sits a game or two here and there, he’s not as tough as Jordan. LET’S JUST IGNORE THE FACT THAT JORDAN DIDN’T PLAY TWO ENTIRE SEASONS. Thanks, Rodman.
Free Food
Coffee Break: If you want to know how important voting is to people trying to remain in power, all you have to do is look at how hard people fight to prevent other people from doing it. In Georgia, one woman is about to go to jail simply for helping another person who didn’t know how to use the voting machine. Trust me, this isn’t only about that.
Snack Time: Local broadcasters hold special places in people’s hearts. One such person for me is Phil Chenier of the Washington Wizards, who is being unceremoniously dumped this offseason. Paint your boy seriously incensed.
Dessert: Eric Thames is my third favorite player in the bigs this year. He’s off to a start.