Mr. Irresponsible's Bad Advice

In The Name of God, Don't Watch This

Gosh, we've seen so many different O.J. Simpsons over the years. He's been a Protean figure -- a Heisman-winning running back, a record-shattering pro, an actor, a murderer *... Now we learn we've hardly known O.J. at all. The real O.J., it turns out, is none of these things. He's a practical joker! A nutty prankster!  Taping a pay-per-view TV special/DVD to be called "Juiced," Simpson portrays an Elvis impersonator, a curbside orange peddler, and an elderly man leading a Bingo game. Oh yeah, also: In a hidden-camera segment, Simpson tries to get a used-car dealer to buy his White Bronco, claiming that "It was good for me, it helped me get away."

Get it?

The Simpson camp has had a little trouble getting its story straight on this. The producer of the special told the AP that Simpson "was not paid for the program," implying that he did at least knowingly participate, and wasn't loopy on Ambien or under the influence of a hypnotist or some other person holding one of those twirly hypno-wheels at the time the cameras rolled. Simpson's attorney, cutting the salami a little thinner, told the New York Daily News that Simpson isn't involved with the current project (proving that the only party who scuttles away from a sinking ship faster than a pay-per-view TV producer is a lawyer) and the footage probably came from a failed TV pilot Simpson shot three years ago. Oh, okay. Because three years ago the bit wasn't repugnant or anything. Why, three years ago it was a whole different world! Three years ago George Bush was in the White House and we were stuck in the intractable quandary of an unwinnable ground war in Iraq!

But I digress. The real question is: Seriously now, how much more loathsome can this guy get? Either he's doing it for the dough, which he'll use for greens fees and dinners at Joe's Stone Crab instead of paying down the $33 million civil judgment still hanging over his head, or he's doing it for attention. And wouldn't you think he's had enough of that? Hasn't he been in the papers quite enough for one lifetime? It seems a little tone-deaf, no? Why, a person who's that nakedly sociopathic could be capable of... anything. If I were advising Simpson, for which there isn't a Brink's truck big enough to back up to my door, my advice would be short and sweet: Hey, Juice? Publicity, good or bad, is not your friend. Keep your head down. Stay out of the papers. Stay off morning drive radio. And if some sleazy hack with a Digicam tries to get you to prank somebody for profit, get in the Bronco and drive away. It isn't like you don't know how.

*Redacted on advice of counsel

Olbermann: Still Too Good For Prime Time

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann continues to have a beautiful capacity for withering outrage, and if there's one thing Mr. Irresponsible appreciates, in a strictly professional sort of way, it's withering outrage. Enjoy it while you can; "Countdown," the sharpest nightly news broadcast that doesn't star a professional comedian, represents a pronounced trough in the cable network's ratings, hammocking dangerously between the blustery Chris Matthews and the bewildering Rita Cosby. Here's Olbermann on a very bad day for the Bush White House, including the president's disastrously stiff Q&A with military personnel in Iraq. (One of whom, I could swear, was that "I Kiss You!" guy.) It was, Olbermann observed in stunned disbelief, "like watching the Jesse Ventura show."

Olbermann: Too Good For Prime Time?

Some incidents provide such compelling lessons on appropriate public behavior that an advice columnist just can't turn away. Bad etiquette? Touchy ethical and moral ground? Life and death themselves hovering just offstage? Baby, that's where Mr. Irresponsible eats. And so to the flap over MSNBC anchor Keith Olbermann's graphic commentary on his recent cancer scare. (It's here; scroll down to the bottom.) Reasonable people may disagree over whether Olbermann's remarks were self-promoting, or his imagery dialed up too high. Never having had the experience myself, I'm reluctant to tell someone who has that he ought to tone things down. If you're inclined to believe, though, that Olbermann needs to provide a rationale for his text, the one he expressed in a posting to media columnist Jim Romenesko's web site seems perfectly legitimate:

My point in putting the audience through all that was to emphasize that even when the biopsy results are good, that experience alone can be nightmarish and frightening enough to tip the balance irrevocably away from any sense that there are any positives to smoking -- a sense that I can assure you, as a recovering smoker, a lot of us cling to as the basis of our rationalizations.

Initial broadcast, subsequent debate, reasoned response -- this is all is good, and healthy. Somewhat less healthy and more... What's the word I want? Oh yeah: Nuts... is the reaction of Olbermann's boss, as reported by Lloyd Grove of the New York Daily News:

Olbermann... is said to have looked stunned as [MSNBC president Rick] Kaplan raced onto the set and shouted at him after he signed off....

I'm told that Kaplan erupted angrily and at length, calling Olbermann "out of control" and "not to be trusted," and accusing him of driving away viewers from the 9 p.m. debut of Kaplan hire Rita Cosby's show, "Live and Direct."

Here's the thing: I've been called names. I've been called "cynical" and "Machiavellian" and "dangerous." But it would never occur to me to use a brush with cancer to sink a co-worker. The implication that Olbermann would reveals in Kaplan a depth of paranoia that strikes even me as excessive, and I sleep with a Glock under my pillow. Besides, if Olbermann really wants to doom Cosby, a new MSNBC hire in the Camera-Gobbling-Scary-Lady mold of CNN's terrifying Nancy Grace, all he's got to do is urge people to watch her. Cosby is too bewilderingly spooky to last for long, even on MSNBC, and seems so unhinged by the presence of the bright studio lights that a run on prime time could induce a debilitating freak-out.  Olbermann, meanwhile, is a born broadcaster, which probably means he's on borrowed time in the floundering, trend-happy world of cable news. In any event, he deserves better than to be called out in front of his colleagues for injecting passion and personality into a commentary -- one whose aim, let's not forget, was to get people to quit smoking and live a little longer. Although, to paraphrase the old joke, people who quit smoking and watch Rita Cosby may not actually live longer. It may just seem that way.