Blab of the Day: Dead or Alive?

I don't remember if I mentioned it before, but I subscribe to this Fort Worth newspaper called the Star-Telegram that regularly annoys me. I know a lot of people have issues with various publications, but til I started reading the Star-Telegram I never had that type of issue. In some way on almost every day there is something I'll read in the Star-Telegram that is in some way on some level just wrong.

Like today's example. There is a section of the paper called "Live!". It a fluff page mostly about celebrity news and reviews of plays or concerts. On this page there is a daily feature called "BLAB! OF THE DAY".

Today's Blab was about Valerie Bertinelli. She came to celebrity hood on a TV sit-com a few decades back called One Day at a Time. One of her co-stars was Mackenzie Phillips. Years ago Mackenzie got into some addiction problems that became fodder for the tabloids.

Valerie Bertenelli is the new spokeswoman for Jenny Craig. She was on Oprah and for some reason mentioned a short romance with Steven Spielberg after she auditioned for Raiders of the Lost Ark.

So, this is what this inane Blab thing had to say regarding the above---"Bertinelli was wrong for the film, but Blab! hears her One Day at a Time co-star Mackenzie Phillips did help score drugs for the crew."

Does that strike anyone with any sort of sense of humor as being amusing, witty or even remotely imaginative? Oh yes, that is hilarious, how clever, Mackenzie Phillips had some drug problems, it's so funny to suggest she helped get drugs for the movie crew while her former co-star was trying to be in the film.

Doesn't stuff like this have to get past an editor? Maybe an adult? Before it shows up in print?

Awhile back this Live! page added a little new feature that was in such obvious bad taste that when I first saw it I figured it was someone's idea of a one day only bad practical joke. But the feature remained for quite some time, til finally complaints in Letters to the Editor and likely phone calls and maybe just common sense caused the Star-Telegram to delete the feature.

And what was that feature? It was called, if memory serves, "Dead or Alive". The blurb would name a person, with a short bio. Like "Sonny Bono, Congressman, husband of Cher, mayor of Palm Springs: Dead or Alive?" I think the way it worked, if I remember right, is the next day the paper would let its waiting with bated breath readers know if the person was Dead or Alive.

Right now I can't think of anything tackier that I've ever seen in any legit newspaper. I wonder if anyone got fired for the Dead or Alive lapse in judgement?

I wonder if anyone will get fired over the Blab! of the Day lapses in judgement? I suspect not.