[Ads-l] The Mooch and print journalism

[paul johnson]

My memory was a NYT reporter


On 7/29/2017 4:10 PM, Marc Sacks wrote:
> I believe the someone, for what it's worth, was Sen. Patrick Leahy of
> Vermont.
>
> On Sat, Jul 29, 2017 at 2:27 PM, George Thompson <george.thompson at nyu.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU>
>> Subject:      Re: The Mooch and print journalism
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> -------------------
>>
>> As I recall, during the Cheney administration, Dick Cheney told someone to
>> go fuck himself.  the NYTimes printed it in full, and responded to a
>> complaint by saying that the words of the president-behind-the-throne had
>> said was the news story and it could not properly be reported without
>> quoting them.
>> Meanwhile, TLS (the Times Literary Supplement), a sister publication to the
>> [London] Times, the original Gray Lady, now allows its writers to use the
>> emphatic "fuck"/"fucking".  Mind you, that Times is now owned by Rupert
>> Murdock.
>>
>> GAT
>>
>> On Sat, Jul 29, 2017 at 2:14 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On the topic of The Mooch:
>>>
>>> Interesting moment in the history of the F-word and related
>>> asteriskabilia...
>>>
>>> As many of you have no doubt noticed, The Mooch=E2=80=99s rant (first of
>> =
>> what we
>>> can hope will be many) has led to the Decency Drawbridge being
>>> significantly lowered by the Gray Lady and other news sources.  Am I
>> righ=
>> t
>>> in thinking this was the first (or one of the first) instances in which
>> t=
>> he
>>> Times has printed =E2=80=9Cfucking=E2=80=9D in so many letters? (Jesse
>> wi=
>> ll know.) Not to
>>> mention the bit where The Mooch maintains that he, unlike Bannon, isn=E2=
>> =80=99t
>>> =E2=80=9Ctrying to suck [his] own cock=E2=80=9D.  Note this article in
>> to=
>> day=E2=80=99s print
>>> version reflecting on the issue:
>>>
>>> =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D
>>> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/28/business/scaramuccis-
>>> vulgar-rant-spurs-newsroom-debate-asterisks-or-no-asterisks.html
>>>
>>>
>>> [=E2=80=A6]
>>> At The New York Times, editors had a lengthy, raucous discussion about
>>> which obscenities to include, and how many. Dean Baquet, the executive
>>> editor of The Times, made the final decision.
>>>
>>> =E2=80=9CWe concluded that it was newsworthy that a top Trump aide used
>> s=
>> uch
>>> language,=E2=80=9D Cliff Levy, a deputy managing editor at The Times,
>> wro=
>> te on
>>> Twitter. =E2=80=9CAnd we didn=E2=80=99t want our readers to have to
>> searc=
>> h elsewhere to
>>> find out what Scaramucci said.=E2=80=9D
>>>
>>> Still, the publication of so many expletives and vulgarities, while
>> deeme=
>> d
>>> newsworthy, may have baffled any reader accustomed to The Times of yore.
>>>
>>> =E2=80=9CThere is no question in my mind that in recent years, we have
>> be=
>> en more
>>> open to considering exceptions in a range of cases,=E2=80=9D Phil
>> Corbett=
>> , the
>>> standards editor for The Times, said. =E2=80=9CFifteen years ago, we
>> almo=
>> st never
>>> would have made exceptions like this.=E2=80=9D
>>>
>>> One Times policy has remained intact: after publishing vulgar language
>> an=
>> d
>>> obscenities in an article, the paper rarely repeats them in subsequent
>>> ones. And, thus, this story.
>>> =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D
>>>
>>> =E2=80=94That is, Ember=E2=80=99s article itself avoids all such terms,
>> r=
>> eferring instead
>>> to "an F and G with asterisks between" and =E2=80=9CC-blocking=E2=80=9D.
>> =
>>   But while that
>>> may be the Times=E2=80=99 policy, it apparently can be relaxed for
>> column=
>> ists, as
>>> seen in this op-ed by Bret Stephens in the same issue, which spells
>>> everything out in full (sixth and seventh paragraphs down):
>>>
>>> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/28/opinion/trump-vulgarity-
>>> scaramucci-conservatives.html
>>>
>>> LH
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>
>>
>>
>> --=20
>> George A. Thompson
>> The Guy Who Still Looks Stuff Up in Books.
>> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
>> Univ. Pr., 1998.
>>
>> But when aroused at the Trump of Doom / Ye shall start, bold kings, from
>> your lowly tomb. . .
>> L. H. Sigourney, "Burial of Mazeen", Poems.  Boston, 1827, p. 112
>>
>> The Trump of Doom -- affectionately (of course) also known as The Dunghill
>> Toadstool.  (Here's a picture of one.)
>> http://www.parliament.uk/worksofart/artwork/james-
>> gillray/an-excrescence---=
>> a-fungus-alias-a-toadstool-upon-a-dunghill/3851
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

-- 
Forgive your enemy, but remember the ass-hole's name.

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