It was Sunday morning in Iran but Saturday night in the US when the Convicted Felon Donald Chump's order to bomb Iran took place. This was an act of war and he executed it without the Constitutionally required Congressional authorization and he also failed to inform them ahead of the bombing. Three sites bombed in Iran with twelve 30,000 pound bunker buster bombs.
He says that the B-2 bomber planes were targeting nuclear sites. He says that. Others say Iran moved things from those sites long ago. His intel is faulty, some say.
It's Chump so we're talking about someone who's been booked repeatedly and charged with battering and abusing the truth.
Does truth matter?
Two documentaries gave answers last week.
AMERICAN MASTERS is a PBS program that we really wish they'd discontinue or at least rethink.
We've taken issue with the series many, many times before. A friend -- who's read all of our criticism of the series -- argues that when people get thins wrong and we say they're lying, they're just mis-remembering.
Janis Ian was the focus last week -- JANIS IAN: BREAKING SILENCES. Singer-songwriter. Responsible for classics like "At Seventeen" and "Stars." We've covered Janis before which is why we felt it was the best test for what our friend was saying.
Janis' memory is shot. We covered that. We covered how her autobiography didn't match reality. We're not going to link to it, you know how to find the past pieces. There's one where we especially documented where her timeline was off by over three years.
Janis' big problem in the documentary was that she confessed to not being an artist.
We honestly like Janis. We think she's written many classic songs and that includes "All Those Promises." We think she's talented and smart. We agree with her eearly lesson that you don't whore because if you whore, that's all you are.
One thing, before this documentary, we did believe in was Janis was an artist
That's not the case. Art is at least secondary to Janis.
She speaks of how, early on, she just wanted to be famous. But despite her self-presentation and her insisting that stopped being the case early on, her comments make clear that she's confused stardom with art.
There are two struggles in her career per the documentary -- post-"Society's Child" and post-BETWEEN THE LINES. There's the third one that finds her in Nashville but that's not really addressed or presented as such. The two presented really aren't about art They're about commerce.
She seems to think that she would and could have been a star with "Society's Child" if it had been followed up correctly. She was, according to her, the next Bob Dylan.
And that's where we go sideways. "Society's Child" is not a great song. It's a White song, we'll give it that. And we get that the NYC White crowd thought it was everything back in the sixties.
We also get that all the little White girl in the song does is whine to her mother and tell the young Black male that she can't see him anymore.
It's as though people heard the song -- White people -- in 1965 and applauded her for it and have continued to just keep applauding without ever re-examining the song's lyrics:
One of these days I'm gonna stop my listening, gonna raise my head up high
One of these days I'm gonna raise my glistening wings and fly
But that day will have to wait for a while
Sad.
Her heroes were Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Joan Baez and Odetta but she never wrote like Dylan or Ochs. She was the personal, not the political. "Society's Child" couldn't be followed up despite what she thinks. Her writing was copycat. She gets that on her vocals, noting she had to stop trying to sing like Joan or Odetta but she doesn't grasp that when it comes to her song writing. Or if she does, she won't cop to it.
Her first crisis? She had exhausted her creative juices. The well had to be refilled and she had to stretch and grow. She did five albums that were basically a child make believing. That's what they sounded like because that's what they were. That's why VERVE dropped her after album four. And VERVE rarely dropped anyone. CAPITOL signed her for one album, her fifth album, and then dumped her. She took a hiatus and came back three years later with STARS. It was art and it was seen as such. Then came AT SEVENTEEN her monster album. Huge seller but, again, we'd grade it as actual art.
Would she? Listen to her talk about AFTERTONES. Her, not the producer Brooks Arthur, listen to her. She should have worked on it more and not let it be released so soon. Over and over, we hear that. And why is that?
According to Janis, if she had worked on it more that would have made it sell more.
This is Janis' second best selling album.
Art or commerce?
She's talking about commerce.
She's also deeply stupid.
A best selling album is about luck.
It's about timing.
That's something Janis doesn't understand still. It's something Michael Jackson never understood. Joni Mitchell gets it. Your kids are going to get beat up in the playground and that's beyond your control. Immediate reaction to THE HISSING OF SUMMER LAWNS -- both sales figures and contemporary reviews -- are not the final word on the artistic merits of an album.
It was shocking to us to find that Janis didn't grasp this. Again, we applaud Janis' art -- "In The Winter" -- we're just surprised she's more about the commerce.
But then came the lie as Janis was discussing taping an episode of THE SMOTHERS BROTHERS COMEDY HOUR (CBS) in November of 1967.
Fortunately, not from Janis' mouth but, sadly, from Lily Tomlin's mouth, "Bill Cosby spoke out against her. He said that she was probably a lesbian. He said that to the press."
We love Lily.
We don't like racism.
And that's what Lily's lie is: Racism.
For the record, Lily wasn't at the taping of THE SMOTHERS BROTHERS COMEDY HOUR. She wasn't even in the state of California at the time (she was in NYC).
She didn't even know Janis at the time.
Now Bill Cosby's never been our favorite person. We've been here 20 years covering the media and long before the scandals and charges of rape broke, we were very clear that we were not fans of Bill Cosby.
The scandals have broken.
Apparently that means anyone can lie about Cosby now. That he deserves no better because of the assaults against women.
But the truth is the truth. And it does matter.
And when two White women get together to lie about a Black man, then there's a problem. And they should know that not only are their remarks racist but so is the context in which they make the remarks.
Again, Lily didn't witness a damn thing so for her to lie -- are we really going to say, "Oh, well her memory!!"?
We're not. You can be pathetic and make excuses for racism, but we're not going to do that.
Bill Cosby is a pioneer and a criminal. It's complex. And lying about him doesn't make it any better.
How is it a lie?
When Janis included the story in her autobiography (page 68), she didn't name Bill Cosby.
And she didn't get around to naming him until his name was complete dirt because of all the women coming forward saying he'd assaulted them.
So first off, there's that.
Second, read the book (not CRAPAPEDIA which gets it wrong and thinks this happened at a Smothers Brothers club performance):
Unfortunately, not everyone saw it that way. My business advisors landed on me with both feet after I taped THE SMOTHERS BROTHERS COMEDY HOUR. According to them, a very well-known television star had spied me asleep in Merka's lap during a break, and had proceeded to tell several industry people that I was obviously a lesbian and shouldn't be allowed on national television.
After women came forward to accuse Bill of assault in 2014 -- six years after her autobiography was published, Janis came forward with the name in the blind item -- the person she'd hinted about ("well-known television star had spied me" -- Bill was starring in the TV series I SPY at the time she taped her variety show appearance).
Grasp that Janis didn't hear Bill's comments. Her management -- which was bothered by rumors developing about Janis -- is who told her the story and who attached Bill's name to it.
So even Janis doesn't know that Bill's guilty of what she alleges happened.
But Lily, in her zeal to take down a Black man, does Janis one better. He's no loner talking to "several industry people." According to Lily, who wasn't there, wasn't even in the state when it happened, Bill went around She now lies, "He said that to the press!"
Show us the report, Lily, show us any reporting in 1967 or 1968 where Bill Cosby was quoted about Janis possibly being a lesbian.
There is none.
If there had been, Janis wouldn't have run the tale as a blind item in her 2008 autobiography. She would have instead named Bill Cosby and cited the outlet (or outlets) that published the stories.
Janis has always told this story, since 2008, as to mean that whomever the man was, he was trying to end her TV career and was telling TV execs.
We love Lily, we do. But when two White women tear into a Black man with lies, we're not going to be silent.
Bill may very well have done what Janis thinks he did -- thinks he did. But not even Janis knows for sure. And Lily outright lies to back up her friend Janis Ian.
What they're doing -- what PBS and AMERICAN MASTERS is letting them do -- is not that far from lynching a Black male because someone said he whistled at a White woman.
Fortunately, HBO started airing a strong, new documentary last week SURVIVING OHIO STATE. The documentary about the assault and abuse of male athletes at Ohio State for several decades is produced by Eva Orner (who also directed), David Glasser, George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Joshua Rofe and Steven J. Berger.
Survivors talk on camera about how they were abused and assaulted by Dr Richard Strauss. They talk about it and they talk about how wrestling coach Russ Hellickson and assistant coach Jim Jordan knew about the abuse and laughed at it and looked the other way. Multiple players discuss how they went to Hellickson and asked him to stand with them as they went public and he said he would. But Jim wouldn't. Jim was now US House Rep Jim Jordan. Suddenly, Russ wanted nothing to do with the men that he had hailed as his sons and Jim was too busy doing things like calling one of the accusers brothers up on the phone and begging him -- in tears -- to come forward and accuse his brother of lying in order to save Jim's reputation.
Watching, we were reminded of a man who was the envy of a huge number of straight men at one point because of whom he was married to. The man who is still alive was a college athlete in another state in an earlier time and he was pimped out to men. He even managed to turn it into a career starter. And he was happy to do it because he says he's bi (he's gay). He'll be dead soon and he'll die a disgrace (he's already disgraced himself once this year).
He was able to get away with his act because of attitudes about gay people. He didn't seem gay, right? And athletes are big and strong.
Male.
Male athletes are meat. That's the attitude. They can endure anything. They can take being ripped off by universities that basically own their bodies for four years. They can take this and that. And nobody better ever complain because you're not supposed to think, you're supposed to be an animal -- on the field and off.
"Our coaches knew," one survivor explains in the new documentary. Another explains, "We had guys complaining about Dr. Strauss to Jim Jordan."
A female coach did take it seriously and did lodge complaints and concerns about what Strauss was doing with the young men.
What was he doing?
"One of the wrestlers said, 'Dude, why does this guy have to constantly check our nuts, check our dicks."
Another explains how Jim Jordan at one point says, "If he ever did that to me, I'd snap his neck like a stick of dry balsa wood."
At other times, the future member of Congress downplayed it. He told one wrestler, "It's Strauss. You know what he does."
And this came in reply to the wrestler complaining that the team doctor was now in the locker room with the team, taking showers with the team, masturbating in the showers.
He was allowed a locker in every male team's locker room. He took several showers a day. When he would shower, he wouldn't turn to the wall where the nozzle was, he'd put his back to the wall so he could study the young males. As one survivor explains, "He's showering three times a day. He's sporting erections. He's masturbating."
And Jim Jordan and Russ Hellickson looked the other way. They were supposed to protect the students. They were legally obligated to protect them -- in loco parentis. They failed. And, years later, they won't grow the hell up and admit that they failed these men.
They always knew and they looked the other way.
A survivor explains he goes to Strauss and tells the doctor, "'My foot is sore. My foot is sore.' And the first thing he says to me is 'Drop your trousers'." Another explains, "I got in there and showed him my bleeding ear and the first thing Dr Strauss said was, 'Drop your shorts'."
Documentaries, when they're truthful, can make a difference. The Ohio State athletes never really had their day in the court of public opinion because this was the first case that really addressed how colleges and universities prey on young men. They make millions off them but will dump them in a minute due to a sports' injury. The survivors of Strauss talk about being on scholarships and how Strauss and his 'physicals' decided whether or not they played. We're not used to seeing the college 'beasts' as potential victims. They had that wall to break through with this scandal.
Their stories are consistent and address what they witnessed and what they experienced.
That's the great thing about truth -- it usually comes out. Sometimes it comes out too late. Sometimes, it's dismissed initially. But it does usually come out and it slowly leaks into our national consciousness and national conversation.
And some day -- maybe this week, maybe months or even years from now, we firmly believe that Saturday's unprovoked assault will be seen as the crime it truly was.