Whitlock’s Anti-Fab Five Column Proves One Thing … He Is A Bitter Buffoon

I’ve never been much of a fan of controversial columnist Jason Whitlock, who has positioned himself in the national spotlight by taking contrary positions on race … I believe strictly for the purpose of notoriety.

Whitlock, who shows his narrow-minded prejudice in the very beginning of this column, is back at it with a column taking shots at the Fab Five ESPN documentary (this is not at all unexpected considering his past connections to the Fab Five of Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, Ray Jackson, Juwan Howard and Jimmy King, and my comments above).

So, I will lay out some of the points Whitlock has made and make rebuttals.

Whitlock point:

With the help of the Worldwide Leader, Rose took baggy shorts, black socks, bald heads and trash talk and created the illusion the Fab Five were some sort of transcendent, revolutionary freedom fighters cut from the same cloth as Jackie Robinson, Jim Brown, Arthur Ashe and Muhammad Ali.

Rebuttal:

This is a classic case of gross overstatement to set the stage to tear down the product. By insanely invoking Jackie Robinson, Jim Brown, Arthur Ashe and Muhammad Ali, Whitlock reveals himself as more of an irrational buffoon. This is less of a commentary on Jalen Rose (executive producer of Fab Five) and more of a statement about the lack of credibility coming from Jason Whitlock.

Whitlock point:

The legacy of the Fab Five is that they were on the cutting edge of America’s unashamed embrace of style over substance.

When Rose ended the documentary waxing about how no one knows the names of the starters on North Carolina’s 1993 national championship team and everyone remembers Rose, Webber, Howard, King and Jackson, it dawned on me the Fab Five were the original Charlie Sheen.

 

Let me make this clear: I do not dislike the Fab Five. I made my bones as a journalist covering the Fab Five for the Ann Arbor News.

Rebuttal:

The last part is akin to “I’m not racist … I have black friends.” Whitlock’s entire column reveals a dislike for the Fab Five or some aspect of the Fab Five he never truly reveals (either by ignorance or cowardice). By the way, Whitlock never challenges the truth of the point about the naming of the starters.

Whitlock point:

The Fab Five are taking credit for the real accomplishments of John Thompson’s and Patrick Ewing’s Georgetown Hoyas.

It was Thompson’s all-black, Ewing-led teams a decade before the Fab Five that shook the foundation of college basketball, changed the complexion of starting lineups across the country, opened coaching doors that had previously been closed to blacks and paved the way for black sportswriters at major newspapers.

It’s easy to forgive Rose for his lack of self-awareness. It’s America. In this country, self-awareness and common sense are our most rare commodities.

Rebuttal:

Whitlock thinks it’s all about race. It’s not all about race, Jason. This was as much about culture, hip-hop, rap music, etc. It’s not all about race, Whitlock. It’s not easy to forgive Jason for his lack of self-awareness. It seems that Whitlock is stuck on the race aspect of it and misses the point of the influence the Fab Five had … stunning considering he was actually there, supposedly.

Whitlock point:

Five super-talented black kids enrolled at a prestigious, white university to play for an inexperienced, piss-poor-at-the-time white coach and, 20 years later, had the audacity to embark on a media tour preaching about black Duke players being Uncle Toms.

Are you kidding me?

Are we really this lost as a people?

Let’s end the facade that Rose’s words about the Duke players are being taken out of context.

Rebuttal:

Here’s Whitlock playing the so-called race card. He takes a shot at Steve Fisher who took the Fab Five to two Final Fours and won a national championship. All that and the guy was a “piss-poor-at-the-time white coach. Sounds racist, huh? I guess I will have to watch the documentary again because I thought the Uncle Tom thing (not that I condone it) was in reference to how they perceived Duke when they were college freshmen.

Whitlock point:

The Fab Five clearly believe Coach K and Duke didn’t and don’t recruit inner-city black kids, and they believe race/racism/elitism are the driving forces behind the philosophy.

Rebuttal:

I believe this is a micharacterization of what the Fab Five guys were talking about in the documentary. It wasn’t about race or racism … maybe elitism. I think it was more about classism and trying to project a certain kind of image that appealed to the kind of audience that likes Duke … an elitist largely white audience (truth be told). People felt this way when the Blue Devils played against UNLV.

Whitlock point:

During the three-year run of the Fab Five (one season without Webber), Duke beat Michigan all four times the schools met while winning two ACC titles and one NCAA title. During the same span, Michigan won zero conference or national titles. In addition, Webber’s interactions with booster Ed Martin put the program on probation and caused Michigan to forfeit all its games.

Rebuttal:

True, but Duke should have beaten the Fab Five. Duke had more experienced teams with about as much talent. The Fab Five were freshmen and sophomores. The Webber-Ed Martin thing is well-documented for the harm it caused Michigan and Webber.

Whitlock point:

Coach K probably thought the same thing I thought watching the Fab Five play: They’re immature, arrogant, interested in playing for a coach they could ignore and incapable of putting together the consistent focus and effort necessary to win a conference championship.

Two teams consistently beat the Fab Five — Duke (4-0) and Indiana (4-2).

Let me translate that for you: Structured, disciplined, well-coached teams beat Michigan.

Rebuttal:

If Coach K thought that then he was an idiot like you. He would have been disrespectful of how good Ohio State and Indiana were at the time. He also would have been too ignorant to realize how amazing it was for five freshman to accomplish what these guys accomplished. Two teams consistently beat Michigan, Whitlock writes. He cites structure, discipline and coaching. What this moron doesn’t cite is experience. Is that an accident? If it is then he is a complete tool. If not then he is corrupt as a journalist.

Whitlock point:

While making money for their white university and allowing their incompetent, white coach to learn on the job, the Fab Five were not man enough to harness the courage and focus to outduel — in their minds — inferior, racist teams.

Rebuttal:

Steve Fisher was a lot of things, but he has proven over the long haul that he is a pretty damn good coach. His accomplishments stack up nicely against a lot of other coaches. Is Whitlock to stupid to realize that these guys were freshmen and sophomores? This last comment from Whitlock shows how much of an idiot he is as a writer and analyst.

Glenn Beck; President Obama Is Sympathetic To (Terrorists) Cause

Glenn Beck

Normally, I tend to avoid writing much about Glenn Beck because I see him as one of two things: a con man using racial politics and nutty extremism to get an audience of crazies or a freak.

I suppose he could be a little of both.

Anyway, here is the latest craziness coming from Beck that I found particularly disturbing even by his pitiful standards of human decency.

From Media Matters for America:

GLENN BECK: The Japanese government has no plans to expand the 12 mile evacuation zone. Meanwhile, we’re loading up all of the diplomats from the State Department and getting out of there. Also something that I’m going to do tonight, I’m going to give the speech that the President should give in the Oval Office that he hasn’t, and I don’t know why. Our donations are way, way down for Japan. I don’t see Hollywood mobilizing. So, we will. The speech from my Oval Office, tonight. It’s amazing what’s going on, and I don’t really understand why yet I haven’t figured it out yet.

There’s another story that is very disturbing. And this just came in, it’s an alert from the Wall Street Journal. The Obama Administration is seeking an United Nations security resolution that would authorize a wide range of possible military strikes against the forces of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. It is aimed at preventing them from overrunning the rebels and civilians in the country’s east. In discussions with other Security Council members, the Obama administration is making the case that a no-fly zone is not enough. It would be insufficient to save the rebel capital in Eastern Libya. So the U.S. is seeking a broad UN authorization for strikes aimed at holding back Libyan ground and air forces with the aim of protecting the rebel capital and avoiding a humanitarian crisis there. Military operations could include a no-fly zone but wouldn’t be limited to that.

Holy cow. What does this mean? You know we’ve been saying that – where is the President on Libya? Tonight, I lay out the case, and it’s not a smoking gun, and it’s not an open and shut case, but it is something that I haven’t found the right people yet, or the right evidence to link it all together, but I can feel it, that there’s something wrong with this Libyan thing. We were talking about it this morning, Pat. That the time to have a no-fly zone is not now.

PAT GRAY: Yeah, right at the beginning. Right at the beginning. Seriously, I mean, it’s progressed way too far just to do a no-fly zone.

BECK: Now it’s going to be a civil war. Now, now, this would be – think of this America, this would be the third country that America has ground forces or air forces or sea, that is in battle and engaged in a Muslim country. That’s insanity.

GRAY: Mmhmm.

BECK: And the time to support the rebels was at the very beginning when the momentum was there. There’s no momentum now. The momentum is the other way. I’m not saying we don’t do something to protect these people, but I’ll tell you, it’s very disturbing to me that our military could be engaged in yet another war in the Middle East.

GRAY: I think if you would have done this at the beginning, you would have been far less likely to have any kind of confrontation. You remember 1989 when we had that little run-in with the MiGs, the Libyan MiGs? And our -

BECK: – our guys

GRAY: Our F-14 tomcats took ‘em down.

BECK: Yeah.

GRAY: And there was not a peep out of Libya for the next 20 years. Libya didn’t make a sound. Well -

BECK: Yeah. [unintelligible]

GRAY: I mean, they had the couple terrorist activities. But, for the most part, Moammar Gadhafi was pretty quiet after that point.

BECK: Oh yeah. We were bombing his tent.

GRAY: Yeah.

BECK: There’s no – there’s, I mean, now, this is the problem with this president, it’s the same thing. Look at his pattern, the BP oil spill. This is the thing that bothers me. And it’s always patterns. The BP oil spill – we all know he used that to his advantage – never let a good crisis go to waste. And so what did he do? He wasn’t there – he was engaged, of course he talked about it, but he wasn’t engaged. Until it started getting out of control, and all of us were saying, where is the government?

GRAY: Mmhmm.

BECK: Where is the president on this? And he was strangely absent.

GRAY: Hasn’t it been like that with every crisis -

BECK: Everything. Every crisis.

GRAY: The Fort Hood – the Fort Hood shooting. He wasn’t really out front with that, and that was, you know, 13 U.S. soldiers being killed on their base. And then when he finally did make the statement, he comes out and talks about the – the Indian medicine man first -

BECK: Right. OK.

GRAY: – for two minutes before he even got around to the mention.

BECK: But here is – here is the point on that. I believe that’s because he just sees us as the oppressor nation. He just sees us as a nation who is and has oppressed the Native Americans and, and the Muslim communities around the world. And so he’s – he’s – he’s not with the terrorists, I’m not saying that, but he is sympathetic to their cause, which slows people down. You know what I mean?

GRAY: Mm.

BECK: You agree with that or disagree with that?

GRAY: Well, I don’t know if sympathetic to the cause is the right -

BECK: Sym -

GRAY: – phrase.

BECK: Sym – oh, uh – wait a minute, I’m not saying that he’s sympathetic with people blowing people up.

GRAY: Yeah.

BECK: I’m saying -

GRAY: I just wanted to make sure -

BECK: Yeah, yeah.

GRAY: – that people know that you’re not saying that.

BECK: He’s sympathetic, he’s sympathetic [unintelligible]

GRAY: Well I think he sympathizes that America has done some bad things -

BECK: Yeah.

GRAY: And, and so – [unintelligible]

BECK: The Palestinian plight.

GRAY: Yes.

BECK: The Palestinian plight – only like 23 percent of Americans agree with the Palestinians. But he is, I believe, he’s probably one of the 23 percent.

GRAY: Well, his pastor said it best, didn’t he, when he said America’s chickens have come home to roost.

BECK: Yes.

GRAY: Maybe he has a little of that sentiment -

BECK: Yes.

GRAY: – I don’t know.

BECK: Yes, yes. I’m not saying that he’s in league with the terrorists, I’m not saying that he agrees with bombings like that. But he is slower to react because he is a guy who is sympathetic to something that most Americans are not. We don’t – he has said it himself over and over, I’m tired of Muslim-Americans being rounded up in the middle of the night. That’s never happened. And if it has, show it to me, Mr. President because I will be with you on that. I agree with you that that shouldn’t happen. So show me the evidence, and I will stand with you.

But what’s disturbing about the BP oil crisis is it worked to his favor, it worked to his advantage by leaving it go for a while and not capping it, he had to have a massive disaster to be able to do what he did. Now is this what’s happening in Libya? Because the time for that, I mean, even France is leading this. Nobody, is – and the people are crying out, America. And everybody knows we’re the only one that can do it. We have the carriers right there. I’ve been on the aircraft carriers in the fifth fleet – 90 miles off the coast of Libya. We have them. We can do it. But the time to do it was when we had momentum and now, what’re we gonna – we have more troops going someplace? The possibility of it? We’re going to engage people with our military? What’re – what – we’re going to get involved in another war? What are you, out of your mind? It doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t make sense.

And here’s the other thing that I just want to share with those who think that the workers of the world can unite. What is happening in the world right now is exactly what happened in the 1920s and early 1930s in Europe, and it is the communists, and the socialists, and the Marxists that believe in one global order, and they believe that if the workers will unite – I mean, the people who took out the permit for the unions for the American Dream Act in Washington D.C., they say it clearly on their own website, the International Socialist Organization, that they believe that only the workers uniting will actually cause the revolution to happen.

Well here’s where they go wrong. If you look at what’s happening in Japan right now and you look at the spike of the yen, that is because people love their country and they are selling their stuff, and they are getting out of gold or whatever it is, and they are buying their own dollar, their yen, and they are going to invest it in their own country. When the whole world melts down, when America begins to fall on real hard times – and I mean, I – I hope I’m discredited on this, but I believe it’s coming. And when we fall on real hard times, they will say workers of the world unite, and they will unite all of the workers, but at some point the unions – the union workers will say, wait a minute, how are you going to balance the world, you’re giving our jobs to India, or Mexico, or whatever. And people become nationalists, that’s what’s happening in Japan. There’s no – I’m not saying it’s communist or anything else, I’m just talking about the yen – they’re becoming nationalists. We did it after 9/11. We protect our own countries.

And that’s what the Soviet Union, that’s where Lenin and Marx and Stalin all went wrong – is they think they can unite the whole world with the workers. But the first step where it starts to go wrong is people start to protect themselves and their own communities that they understand as communities. And the world does not accept this global order, it doesn’t, and when things get better in India or jobs go to India instead of here, they will not listen to a socialist saying, “workers of the world, unite” what they will listen to is a national socialist, somebody who says take care of America first, workers, you’re already unionized, you’re already together right? It’s them that is the problem, and they become national socialists, not international socialists. International socialism will not work, and it will turn the world to national socialism, which is the Nazi regime.

I don’t know how people don’t understand the logic of this, but it is true, and it happens the same way every time, and governments, and they, the, governments, or the people, that the radicals, they use the youth – which is happening, and they also use giant corporations. And they get giant corporations, some of them willingly, and some of them just acquiesce because they say, I’ll just get, ’cause they’ll let me survive, and I’ll be part of the survivors. You do not want to be part of those survivors, because in the end, they do not survive, because they always end the same way, always. Whether it’s Mao, Stalin, Hitler, or Mussolini, they always end the same way.

Beck, no one knows what you mean because you’re a freak.

One expects insane rants from Beck, but some of the stuff in here, with regards to terrorism and President Obama is disgraceful.