May 14, 2014

Sterling's iSteveish PR offensive working as expected

From the NYT:
The Opinion Pages | OP-ED COLUMNIST 
The AIDS-Shaming of Magic Johnson 
MAY 14, 2014 
"Smug-looking? Moi?
Charles M. Blow

The sheer volume of bile spewing from the mouth of the Clippers owner, Donald Sterling, is staggering. But just as awe-inducing, and stomach-churning, is the unrestrained breadth of its variety, which makes putting the offenses in order — if one were inclined to — nearly impossible. 
But high on any list — on a par with the racism, sexism, misogyny, paternalistic plantation thinking and bias cloaked in benevolence — has to be Sterling’s attempt to AIDS-shame Magic Johnson. ...
“What kind of guy goes to every city, has sex with every girl, then goes and catches H.I.V.? Is that someone we want to respect and tell our kids about? I think he should be ashamed of himself. I think he should go into the background.” 
And there’s more: 
“Here’s a man, I don’t know if I should say this, he acts so holy. He made love with every girl in every city in America, and he had AIDS, and when he had those AIDS, I went to my synagogue and I prayed for him. I hoped he could live and be well. I didn’t criticize him. I could have. Is he an example for children?” 
This line of attack on Johnson is one of the most revolting things to come out of this whole revolting episode. It feeds into the ignorance about the disease itself and the stigma attached to it that is an enormous hindrance to bringing it more under control in this country. 
Let’s start here: Contracting H.I.V. (or AIDS) is not evidence of a character defect. 
It is simply a disease and should be treated as such. The way that so many people, like Sterling, seem to separate out and shun people with communicable diseases — particularly sex-related ones —is outrageous and mustn’t be tolerated and glossed over.

So, don't shun people with sex-related communicable diseases. Your intolerance is intolerable. In fact, why aren't you having sex with them right now? What kind of bigot are you? Look at Donald T. Sterling -- he didn't want people to think he was having sex with a woman who was also having sex with an HIV-infected man. Isn't that the most disgusting thing you ever heard in your life? (Not the part about Donald getting Magic's sloppy seconds -- there's nothing disgusting about that. Don't even think about that. I mean, the disgusting part is about Sterling not wanting the public to think he's getting Magic's leftovers.)
... What we don’t need is a man of Sterling’s dubious motives and questionable character spreading pernicious misinformation and hurtful poison about a disease he seems to little understand.

Seriously, we live in an age that admires, above almost all else, slick professional marketing. And a big reason that Donald T. Sterling has so outraged the world is that he's such an awful, amateurish marketer.


Look how horrible-looking his countless ads in the L.A. Times have been for decades. Sterling has poor taste and a giant ego and is unable to discern amateurism from professionalism as long as he's the center of attention.

For example, as far as I can tell, Clippers owner Sterling is a man of similar personal character to the late Lakers owner, the universally admired Dr. Jerry Buss, two friends who did real estate business together. But Buss had the sense to pay to have Jerry West pick his team for him, while Sterling was content with the other 1960s Lakers living legend, Elgin Baylor. Sterling let Baylor run the Clippers for 22 years, finally dumping him when Elgin was older than Hillary would be when she's running for re-election 2020. In contrast, Buss hired smart white guys like West, Mitch Kupchak, and Phil Jackson for his front office, while Sterling stood by the not-so-smart black guy Baylor, who sued him for racial discrimination when Sterling finally fired Baylor after 20 losing seasons.

Thus, Sterling just wings a lot of stuff on his own instead of bringing in expensive experts to do it for him in a way that will meet with media approbation. I joked about Sterling getting all of his public relations strategies from this blog, but the press loves slick PR campaigns.

Much of political campaign coverage these days consists of marketing criticism. PR is a common second career path for journalists, so modern journalists admire well-crafted PR campaigns, and are horrified by obvious miscues like not remembering you've agreed to do your first interview with Anderson Cooper before raising the touchy issue of the guilt of people like Magic who may well have killed other people with AIDS for his own pleasure.

That's just poor PR. After such knowledge, what forgiveness?
 

70 comments:

DJF said...

AIDs cost the US Federal taxpayer $30 billion a year and rising.

“”””President Obama’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2014 federal budget request, released on April 10, includes an estimated $29.7 billion for combined domestic and global HIV/AIDS activities”””

http://kff.org/global-health-policy/fact-sheet/u-s-federal-funding-for-hivaids-the-presidents-fy-2014-budget-request/

Anonymous said...

"""""The sheer volume of bile spewing from the mouth of the Clippers owner, Donald Sterling, is staggering. """"""


Apparently he's never listened to the Chronic album.

Anonymous said...

So what's more damaging to society: a white man who doesn't like blacks much, but mostly keeps it to himself, or a black man who travels from city to city having unprotected sex with hundreds of women, spreading illegitimacy and disease? The Donald Sterlings of this world are not the ones who have ruined Detroit, D.C., Memphis, Oakland, and pretty much all of Africa.

Anonymous said...

http://m.us.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303851804579559673037406670?mobile=y

OT: The Obama Administration has decided that another massive real estate bubble is just what this country needs to get the economy going again. They have also probably calculated, probably correctly, that the bubble won't burst until well into the next (possibly Republican) president's term.

Nephilim said...

I have to hand it to Stirling here. He's 80. He's simply decided to take on what he's been thinking about for a while.

It's not like he was caught kiddie fiddling.

He's decided to launch a few broadsides at some puffed up preening overweening twits.


Charles Blow simply reveals the deep stupidity of the Journalistic profession and if he's a top 10% I fear for the future. He's very nearly saying it's okay to infect sex partners.

Nephilim said...

You ought to write the Public Editor with that.

Anonymous said...

"""""""Look how horrible-looking his countless ads in the L.A. Times have been for decades. Sterling has poor taste and a giant ego and is unable to discern amateurism from professionalism""""""""


Well, he made his fortune in real estate and that largely depends on PR, especially in the pre-Internet era.

So, from a pure business standpoint it must've worked for him since it helped make him a billionaire.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Of course, now its broke and there's really nobody around willing or able to help fix Sterling's problem.

Whiskey said...

There is the NYT outrage. And then there's the average guy who hears this and figures, "hey yeah Magic Johnson did kill a lot of people with AIDS."

Howard Stern makes his living out of being the guy the NYT finds untouchable and unmentionable. So maybe Sterling is not so dumb after all. Putin showed how the media tidal wave doesn't matter if you just don't care. And have your own power centers outside it.

Prof. Woland said...

"Let’s start here: Contracting H.I.V. (or AIDS) is not evidence of a character defect."

Yes, it is well known Magic Johnson got AIDS from a toilet seat. He just happened to eat from the wrong one.

peterike said...

"paternalistic plantation thinking"

This seems relatively new in the Cookbook of Progressive Outrage. I do not think we have seen the last of this. I knew "12 Years a Slave" would have a negative impact.

Lefty Lawyer said...

Sterling's comments re the guy with the magic johnson were not all that clear. There is a huge moral distinction to be made between someone who is ultra-promiscuous while knowing he is HIV+, vs. someone who is ultra-promiscuous but does not know he is HIV+. If Sterling was clearly accusing Johnson of the former (conduct which everyone including militant AIDS activists would condemn), I wonder how much criticism there would be. Of course, at this point if Sterling condemned the Holocaust everyone would pile on him for being racist against Germans.

Dennis Dale said...

You gotta love Sterling choosing the least-black black player on the roster, and himself, to put on the poster.

Anonymous said...

This Sterling stuff is Steve at his best, like he was with the Chechen baby boom topic.

Its pretty depressing what that says about USA ca. 2014, but lively reads nonetheless.

He is truly a hero of the modern-day samizdat.

Anonymous said...

Seriously, we live in an age that admires, above almost all else, slick professional marketing.

Yeah, and how's that working for us? Not only can't we put a man on the moon anymore, we can't put a man into orbit. We've regressed to 1961 so far, as though John Glenn never existed.

David said...

Bug-chaser outrage?

Harry Baldwin said...

It's amazing that AIDS, which you'd think would have made male homosexuals about as popular as lepers, instead vaulted them into the forefront of sanctified victims. Who would have guessed that the AIDS epidemic would turn out to be the best thing that could have happened to the gay rights movement.

Dennis Dale said...

Who would have guessed that the AIDS epidemic would turn out to be the best thing that could have happened to the gay rights movement

And we're right back to the subject of PR. Also note how 9/11 turned Muslims into a "victim" group. Who knows what's down the pike.

Steve Sailer said...

"There is a huge moral distinction to be made between someone who is ultra-promiscuous while knowing he is HIV+, vs. someone who is ultra-promiscuous but does not know he is HIV+."

Sure ... in 1981, as long as you want to ignore all the other STDs he was spreading. But this was 1991.

Icepick said...

Sorry, I just can't get past the Chuck Blow byline. Seriously? I mean, you're kidding me, right? This is a parody, has to be.

Oswald Spengler said...

Charles M. Blow really has a backpfeifengesicht.

Anonymous said...

"Bile spewing from the mouth of ...Sterling" hardly seems the equal of "HIV spewing from the penis of Johnson."

Not even close, buster Blow.

Anonymous said...

Blow's expression is like "I'm sitting on the lap of the man who gave Magic Johnson HIV."

Anonymous said...

Harry Baldwin, the AIDS epidemic only "helped" gays because the media is in control of dissemination of information about HIV spread, and face it, many in high places in the media are gay or are in bed (apt phrase) with the pols that take money from the gay lobby.

Anonymous said...

The victim parade, I'm convinced is not at all at is apex even yet. You could make up some malady, give it an acronym, go on shows women watch (the morning network shows, Ellen, The View, The Talk) and with even no professional training in marketing, as long as you were likeable and attractive or funny, you could create a movement which would garner support and sympathy for you and those like you who suffer greatly from __________(fill in the blank) but make sure there is a group on whom you can blame your suffering.

Those who have caused you great harm cannot be women or minorities. I still think gay men might not be forgiven for all they have done and continue to do.

Yes. How about this victim group? Women who've been used as beards, been married by gay males, produced children with them, been cheated on by them, even catching HIV from them, all the result of gay males wanting to have it both ways. Done right, I do think gay males can be portrayed as users of women and children.

Whitehall said...

What? We're not allowed to use "syphilitic" as an insult anymore?

I'll be at a loss for words, especially since "sex worker" replaced "whore."

eah said...

You ought to write the Public Editor with that.

Reminds me of this video.

LOL! Yes, you ought to do that.

a woman said...

I just have to say it. Charles Blow is a very unattractive man and his name doesn't help a bit

On top of it all, he's always been a horrible thinker and writer. But that puss!

Anonymous said...

OT question:

Do HIV retroviral drugs cause folks to blow up like a blowfish.

Magic looks bloated, huge, in his face and body.

Anyone know the outward physical effects of such cocktails?

eah said...

working as expected

OMG, yes it's developing perfectly. Next Sterling has to tell Blow to ... blow me!

I mean, he just has to.

a very knowing American said...

To celebrate the new age, where sexually transmitted diseases have lost their shameful stigma, here's Tom Lehrer, "I got it from Agnes"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Glfk_8oU7ko

Oswald Spengler said...

OMG, yes it's developing perfectly. Next Sterling has to tell Blow to ... blow me!

I mean, he just has to.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

[An excerpt from the next Donald Sterling recording]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM6R_JYdOV0

Anonymous said...

Obama's latest boondoggle: U.S. Pours Millions Into Failing Black Colleges, Breaks New Student Loan Rules

Mr. Anon said...

Sterling should get all ADL on these bastards - charging Johnson and Blow and his other detractors with anti-semitism.

Oswald Spengler said...

"sheer volume of bile spewing from the mouth"

"awe-inducing, and stomach-churning"

"one of the most revolting things to come out of this whole revolting episode"

"outrageous and mustn’t be tolerated"

"capitalist running-dog lackey stooges"

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Are those quotes from The New York Times in 2014 or from the pages of Izvestia, eighty years earlier?

Anonymous said...

Sterling was inches from raising the question -- is Magic gay. Or bisexual. Or was he doing transvestites.

Anything to force Magic or his advocates to deny his sexual history.

The more you have to deny something ... the more questions.

Sterling could redeem himself by profusely apologizing for criticizing Magic's sexuality.

"I didn't mean to call Magic promiscuous. Of course, I don't know the details regarding how he got HIV. Or how many women and men he had sex with. And, I misspoke when i failed to say he only had HIV, not full blown AIDS. And HIV isn't contagious, right? Or .... I don't know. Maybe he infected no one and .... I'm sorry."

Anything to change the subject from the general -- racism and all other isms -- to the specific -- Magic Johnson and even more specifically his sex life.

Don Draper said...

Sterling should get all ADL on these bastards - charging Johnson and Blow and his other detractors with anti-semitism.

That ship has sailed. At this point he'd have to do something really gonzo like offering $50k cash to the parents of each H.S. athlete currently being recruited by an AP poll team, to be paid upon his matriculating at South Dakota, or Yellowknife, or upper North Slave -- wherever the smallest media market is. The more hypocritical/insane the stunt, the better.

Nephilim said...

Wxseren wideo. A Rittel more to the reft

Larry Levy said...

Here's what I'm seeing: "Clippers Buyers Club" -- it'll be like "Angels in America" meets "Space Jam." We'll get Roland Emmerich or possibly Brett Ratner to direct; I think Bryan Singer's availability is just too hectic at the moment.

Anonymous said...

>>Baylor, who sued him for racial discrimination<<

Someone with the NBA told me Baylor sued him for age, not racial, discrimination.

Alcalde Jaime Miguel Curleo said...

The levels of .999 pure self-congratulation among the G and by extension LBT activist community could be set back, possibly by decades, if a credible report of an old homosexual encounter involving Magic were ever publicized, even a sufficiently disguised tranny-ladyboy political refugee he happened to pick up at the airport, what with his famed lack of choosiness. More than one generation now has come up thinking either 12-year-old Ryan White or Starsky's wife was the Patient Zero of the infection, which then randomly spread to Africa's impoverished heteros. So it leaves Magic in the outlandish situation of being the medieval totemic sacrifice to The Closet so that other celebs may live free from judgment. Reading the 1992 Michael Fumento piece knocked me over, having attended elementary school in the 80s (what's worse, in 80s L.A.) after AIDS sermons were added to the common core -- though it was a Catholic place so not quite joining the anti-Christian tenor of AIDS rhetoric you heard around town. Didn't make the connection to the philanthropy strategy at the time, specifically how the red-ribbon faction saw their chance to push cancer charities out of the line -- in retrospect, it all makes perfect sense. Not a huge coincidence that Estee Lauder comes out with a rival colorful ribbon the following year; and then awareness/activism commodification & politicized diseases lived happily ever after, or at least remained a safe marketing bet.

I'd nearly forgotten the drama at the '92 All Star Game too, with Karl Malone and A.C. Green citing workplace safety concerns about Mr. Face Of HIV

Andrew Sullivan and Armed TV Producers said...

Sterling was inches from raising the question

That's the problem, he's "inches away" from all manner of gross flotsam & jetsam and seems senile/oblivious to it; cf. Exhibit V. I think you all will be let down when Sterling the ol' plantation king fails to deliver the silver-bullet critique of the post-morality post-reality Los Angeles media sicko demimonde, and the NYC columnists who aspire to join it, that finally sets off WW3 between the liberals vs. North Dakota or whatever -- the guy's just too befuddled. Sorry, this will be more "slo-mo June train wreck" than "February Revolution."

call your provider to get iSteveNet Southwest 2 HD today said...

There should be a special ripped-from-the-headlines edition of "Scandal" where she's brought aboard to perform some regenerative function etc. for a disgracist sports boss but dramatically sabotages him (I freely admit to not knowing what the actual premise of "Scandal" is). Most of the Acela corridor newspapers and the AV Club are already hailing it as the miniseries event of 2014.

Anonymous said...

I googled Charles Blow and he worked mostly as a graphic/art director. I used to work with those people and not one of them could write more than a thank you note. They did "art" and had writers to write. I'm not saying he couldn't write his dreadful stuff but I'd have to see it in person to believe it.

Mr. Anon said...

Blow has that smug, self-satisfied look of the affirmative-action hire who hasn't the vaguest inkling that he is nowhere near as smart as he thinks.

Why Not In the Hair said...

Stirling should have read this pamphleteer out to Cooper...

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mqujsURKxS4

Number 10 is genius.

Pat Boyle said...

Asking for help again.

I don't really understand the business model for owning a sports team. What kind of investment is it?

I had naively assumed that you made money if your team won. But Sterling doesn't seem to have made much effort to develop a winning team. Or am I wrong about that?

I can understand enjoying the prospect of always hanging around with sports stars. But is it a losing proposition? Do you have to bleed millions to indulge your sports hobby? Is sports team ownership just a form of conspicuous consumption like driving a Ferrari? Or is it a safe and proven way to earn a steady return on your capitol?

What was his ROI? Did he make more or less than on his real estate investments?

I had a friend over last week and he made me watch the Oakland Clippers game. That's the first B ball game I've watched in thirty years. The Clippers play real ugly basketball. They don't run many plays and there is little teamwork. But Golden State didn't have a big man in the middle and just got beaten up. I wasn't anxious to see more games.

Pat Boyle

Dennis Dale said...

Harry Baldwin, the AIDS epidemic only "helped" gays because the media is in control of dissemination of information about HIV spread, and face it, many in high places in the media are gay or are in bed (apt phrase) with the pols that take money from the gay lobby

Take "helped" out of quotation marks. It was transformative in changing the status of gays. AIDS, somehow, is how gays became respectable. It was the PR campaign of the millennium. It's not just that the extent to which gays are responsible (hate word) for its spread has been suppressed--they've transitioned from suppressing this reality to making it irrelevant in our eyes. This is something entirely new.

Think about just how brilliant the campaign is: they managed to get the world believing any single one of us was as much in danger of contagion as the next guy, without any attendant stigma for their introduction of the virus in the first place!
They took the shame of the thing and transferred it to anyone but them--and concentrated in on religious and social conservatism. The turnabout play is amazing: sexual mores have held promiscuity and sodomy (the two legs upon which AIDS walks) are inherently unhealthy. Nothing would seem to have proved this like AIDS. But here we are at the end of it and it's sexual mores and their defenders that have been de-legitimized.

No, there's something more going on now. Collectively we haven't the ability to condemn any group other than "pale males"; any group other than that with even the potential to be "discriminated" against is brought into the anti-traditional fold. It's got a lot to do with our having made "discrimination" the greatest evil ever.
The model they've adapted they get from the black American experience. Think about it: blacks remain atop the grievance hierarchy largely because they can't get their shit together in the first place, because all the dysfunction, all the failure, is attributed to white malice enforced by "discrimination".
Craven New World!

Anonymous said...

OT question:

Do HIV retroviral drugs cause folks to blow up like a blowfish.

Magic looks bloated, huge, in his face and body.

Anyone know the outward physical effects of such cocktails?

5/14/14, 9:15 PM


Funny you should mention this. In one of the BART stations I frequent in San Francisco, there used to be an advertisement for a drug called Egrifta, which helps HIV+ people deal with a condition that led to excessive belly fat.

Of course it could just be that Magic, like many other athletes, bloated up once his playing days were over.

voor said...

Magic Johnson brought heterosexually transmitted HIV out of the shadows. When he discovered he was HIV positive, he went public with it. By doing so, he encouraged others who believed they were not susceptible to infection to be tested, and he made the discussion of HIV more acceptable. As a professional working with people with HIV at that time, I will always be grateful for his courage, his grace, and his wonderful humanity. Is he a role model for children? You bet he is!

fist said...

Magic Johnson has had to travel a long road after learning that he carries HIV and on that road he has exhibited courage, strength, dignity, tolerance, candor, responsibility, generosity, humility, self-respect and love for humanity.

He has nothing to apologize for.

We can't thank him enough.

Steve Hunter said...

This is obviously a high profile story that has drawn a lot of media attention. We all know Sterling is a pompous, self absorbed one percenter but we need to move on to the major problems of inequality in our society and the high poverty rate among blacks in our country. This needs significantly more media attention than this little slug of a man Sterling.

Luettgen said...

"What kind of guy goes to every city, has sex with every girl ...?" Just about any single guy with half a brain, unless he's gay, in which case you just replace "girl" with "guy".

Dennis Dale said...

Magic Johnson is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever met in my life.

Anonymous said...

He has what I Like to call a very punchable face. Similar to Bill Maher among others.

Dan in DC

Dan said...

Pat,

Sterling owns multiple parking lots near the stadium.

That's the underlying business model.

Anonymous said...

Magic Johnson spread a pathogen that kills because of his promiscuity, one which is avoidable, one which has taken a lot of money out of Americans' pockets.

Gay men continue to get infected with HIV. I think male homosexuality is a type of mental illness in that whatever damage has done been done to the brain that causes it also damages judgement and self-control.

Anonymous said...

voor--for someone in the field (?) you really need to keep track of un-pc CDC stats.


TontoBubbaGoldstein said...

which helps HIV+ people deal with a condition that led to excessive belly fat.

OH NOES!!

I better get tested.

Dana Thompson said...

Match the name with the description: "Nice fella, wouldn't mind hoisting a brew with him" and "stomach-churningly repulsive, don't want to breathe the same air with him." The names are a) Donald Sterling; and b) Adam Silver. It's too bad this site isn't set up for poll-taking.

Dissident said...

"Is he a role model for children? You bet he is!"

I think I'm going to puke. Is this Huffington Post that I'm reading?

bluto said...

Pat,
TV money (though that's probably less true for basketball than other sports). Football gets about 4-5 billion/yr in TV revenue and about 5 billion in gate admissions (add to that license fees and concessions). That's 300 million per team (and in football that's almost all split 32 ways). Their costs are basically players (whose collective bargaining agreements generally specify 50-55% of revenues).

Plus, over the last few decades, they've seen very dramatic increases in price (I think Donald paid $12 million for the Clippers which are likely to fetch 500 million even in a distressed sale). That's a 12% rate of return if he's earned nothing between then and now.

Anonymous said...

"I googled Charles Blow and he worked mostly as a graphic/art director."

Even more likely to know the man who gave Magic Johnson HIV.

Dierickx said...

What an absolutely comically bad writer this person is.

"The sheer volume of bile spewing from the mouth of the Clippers owner, Donald Sterling, is staggering. But just as awe-inducing, and stomach-churning, is the unrestrained breadth of its variety, which makes putting the offenses in order — if one were inclined to — nearly impossible. "

So the bile spewing from Sterling's mouth has "variety", and this variety itself has "breadth", and this "breadth" - the "breadth", that is, of the variety of the bile spewing from Sterling's mouth, is "unrestrained". Does one "restrain" a simple physical dimension? Surely one restrains growth, or instincts. Anyway, the unrestrainedness of the breadth of the variety of the bile spewing from Sterling's mouth is both stomach-churning and awe-inducing... and then you have the volume of the bile, which can somehow be characterised separately from its breadth, or was it the breadth of its variety... anyway, the volume has a special power of its own, namely the power to stagger, and then... it's impossible to catalogue the ways in which Blow is a truly terrible writer. You could literally pick a person off the street and have a better than average chance of them being able to write something significantly better in one minute than Blow can come up with in the several hours it presumably takes him to produce his screeds.

The annoying thing is that some people probably take this astonishingly awful paragraph for eloquence!

SFG said...

"Match the name with the description: "Nice fella, wouldn't mind hoisting a brew with him" and "stomach-churningly repulsive, don't want to breathe the same air with him." The names are a) Donald Sterling; and b) Adam Silver. It's too bad this site isn't set up for poll-taking."

Sterling's almost certainly an A-class douchebag as well--you don't succeed in business by being nice. I do appreciate him going off the reservation, but he's probably just senile.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
Obama's latest boondoggle: U.S. Pours Millions Into Failing Black Colleges, Breaks New Student Loan Rules

5/14/14, 9:29 PM

Yeah, but Arne Duncan is a helluva basketball player. Which is also why the general public gives Earvin a pass. I knew one of Magic's uncles from Albion, MI. He was one dumb MFer, so Earvin has become a huge success despite being a cut above dumbass. Only in Amerikkka!

Dennis Dale said...

Earvin has become a huge success despite being a cut above dumbass

I recall Magic ascribing his success to his superior "work ethnic". Making U of Michigan proud!

Mr. Anon said...

"Dierickx said...

The annoying thing is that some people probably take this astonishingly awful paragraph for eloquence!"

The customary word is "articulate".

ogunsiron said...

Mr. Anon said...

Blow has that smug, self-satisfied look of the affirmative-action hire who hasn't the vaguest inkling that he is nowhere near as smart as he thinks.
==
Charles Blow, Marquis of Kruger-Duenning.

Paul Rain said...

"obvious miscues like not remembering you've agreed to do your first interview with Anderson Cooper before raising the touchy issue of the guilt of people like Magic who may well have killed other people with AIDS for his own pleasure."

Nah, I don't think Cooper looks like a 'top'. No reason that he'd take offence.

Alcalde Jaime Miguel Curleo said...


voor said...
Magic Johnson brought heterosexually transmitted HIV out of the shadows. When he discovered he was HIV positive, he went public with it. By doing so, he encouraged others who believed they were not susceptible to infection to be tested, and he made the discussion of HIV more acceptable. As a professional working with people with HIV at that time, I will always be grateful for his courage, his grace, and his wonderful humanity. Is he a role model for children? You bet he is!

5/15/14, 9:17 AM
Anonymous fist said...
Magic Johnson has had to travel a long road after learning that he carries HIV and on that road he has exhibited courage, strength, dignity, tolerance, candor, responsibility, generosity, humility, self-respect and love for humanity.

He has nothing to apologize for.

We can't thank him enough.

5/15/14, 9:19 AM


I guess now the Norwegian Nobel Committee can take the rest of the year off