Mix in the arrogance of the professional journalism class, a little simple mathematics and you get the comic relief issued on MSNBC’s The 11th Hour with Brian Williams.

“True” and “disturbing” is pretty close to the mark here.

Let’s try and keep this simple for the “journalists”. Three hundred twenty-seven million people given $1 each equals $327 million.

Had Williams and Gay gotten that through their numerically-challenged heads immediately after reading Rivas’ Tweet, the segment would not have gone so south, so quickly. Three hundred twenty-seven million people given $1 million each would require Mike Bloomberg to have at least $327 trillion in the bank.

We all know about the credibility challenges rightfully sticking to Brian Williams, so moving right along….

Mekita Rivas boasts of being a writer for Refinery29, Yahoo News UK, Yahoo Lifestyle, Teen Vogue, The Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Sydney Morning Herald, Broadly, GARAGE Magazine, CNBC, Eventbrite Rally, The (Toronto) Star and other blogs. Williams’ on-air guest Mara Gay is a member of the New York Times editorial board and also wrote for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, New York Daily News, MarketWatch, New York Magazine, The Dallas Morning News, Fox Business, RealClearPolitics, Pulse Nigeria, Salt Lake Tribune. One would think these women would appreciate the gravity of what they put out on social media or say on national television, no matter how small the audience.

Rivas has since protected her Twitter account AND her website because she appears to be one of those arrogant, thin skinned bloggers who can dish it but retreats when self-inflicted public stupidity smacks her back in the face.

“Blah blah math blah blah”….

Of course, one of Rivas’ colleagues rushed to the defense of the narcissistic butthurt.

Humans aren’t necessarily bad at math, but we are indisputably bad at scale. As we evolved, we had no need to intuitively understand the concept of a million, much less a billion. We get the difference between $1 and $1,000, but the transition from “million” to “billion” feels more like the transition from 10 to 20 than going from a thousand thousands to a thousand thousand thousands. Combine that blind spot with a predisposition to see Bloomberg’s spending as wasteful and here we are.
— Philip Bump, Washington Post, 3/6/20

Remember this when the media trashes President Trump, claims he lies and/or misrepresents facts. As a successful businessman, he’s obviously mastered rather simple math, unlike his college-educated critics.

When today’s journalists get it wrong, especially the younger ones, there are seldom apologies and/or sincere contrition. We’re supposed to understand what they meant, no matter how badly they mangle the obvious.

Poor Jemele Hill was the victim, but let’s also note that she’s part of a growing list of privileged who go out of their way to get in our faces to prove their blackness and those attempts don’t always end well.

Our position on women sportscasters are sideline commentators are well known. It’s not sexism but because most have no experience playing the sports they cover and let’s be real: the only reason networks put them in front of cameras is for the T&A factor. That’s something that would be phrased carefully if we were to say as much on, for example, CNN.

Some people just aren’t as nuanced.

Despite what the politically correct would have you believe, the only real value young, skimpy-dressed, (when dressed) women have on local and network sports is their anatomies.

CNN’s Brooke Baldwin can act all shocked at Fox Sports Net’s Clay Travis and his clumsy introduction of female attributes in a cable news discussion, but the entertainment industry still lives by the “sex sells” credo. There is no other reason why it’s so in-your-face, especially during sports programming, punctuated by male enhancement commercials during breaks in the action. Given her faux outrage, Baldwin would be the last to admit that the young men seen during daytime viewing hours are cast to appeal to the bored housewife, home alone during the day.

If tomorrow there were only male announcers and former-player sideline reporters during the NFL broadcasts, I’d be willing to bet the viewer drop-off would be minimal.

I’ll let you in on a little secret: lots of women these days have no business being in sports locker rooms because they’re not qualified and it’s not because their skirt is too high or their blouse is too low. It’s because they don’t belong there because they haven’t earned the right to be there and they’re not qualified and because they got the job because of their looks and not their intellect or expertise.

Clinton Portis is NOT far from wrong on many counts. There ARE women who get into sports journalism at this point to be around naked athletes. And they are there to attract those “exclusive interviews” that men can’t get with their charm, nice perfume and long legs.
— Nestor Aparicio, 9/17/10

The women wouldn’t be missed because it’s about the game, period. We’ll take Hank Williams’ “All My Rowdy Friends” over Carrie Underwood’s “I’ve Been Waitin’ All Day for Sunday Night”. Then again, Hank was fired because he said something against ESPN’s preferred president. No hypocrisy here.

Nah, it’s easier to act all shocked about the word “boobs” while working for one of the most sexist industries in the United States.

You know it, we know it, and anyone who says otherwise is a liar or a wuss.

UPDATE

After her long stint at ESPN, Jemele Hill wound up at another sports industry leader… The Atlantic?

“The Atlantic made perfect sense to me because during this period, it’s critical to be aligned with people who understand this mission: Sports is a great entry point for exploring what’s happening in the wider society,” said Hill. “You can’t talk about sports without talking about race, class, gender and politics. I want to explore the complications and discomforts with a publication that has a long history of supporting this kind of work.”
— The Atlantic, 10/1/18

They offered her a paycheck.

Hill had an opportunity to explain her career moves and how hard it is for female journalists on another sports giant, The Wendy Williams Show….

Jemele Hill, like many others, has blown off the fact that sports is all about competition. It’s about box scores and stats. It’s also great entertainment where one ever really knows from the opening whistle or first pitch who will win the game, which is sports’ ultimate beauty.

It’s not an arena for those who wish to make “race, class, gender and politics” statements. Those who continue to pursue that agenda are correctly relegated to the ash heap of sports “journalism”.

Race has long been an unsettling undercurrent of the 2016 presidential race. But this week, the two major candidates forced that debate into the open with Hillary Clinton’s speech linking Donald Trump to the “alt-right” movement, and Trump’s new charge that the former secretary of state is “a bigot” who has pandered to minorities with feckless policies as part of a calculated quest for votes.
— CNN, 8/26/16

Racism’s been a consistent club used to bash Trump, especially after Breitbart’s Steve Bannon was picked to be an advisor within his administration. Breitbart.com is no more a white supremacist website than is any liberal media site, but Democrats are never hesitant to slander anyone or anything they deem a threat.

The “alt-right” narrative was explored during a group interview on the BBC, and the following is an excerpt of that discussion.

If a film or video is created and presents a particular point of view, the producer’s accuracy and motivations are appropriately scrutinized. However, when a film or video is self-labeled a “documentary”, it’s enjoys the immediate assumption of being an absolute truth which is why they permeate grade schools, colleges and are delivered to online platforms aimed at the impressionable.

Yoni Appelbaum, Washington Bureau Chief at The Atlantic, got all butt-hurt when Bob dared challenge their “journalism” and accused The Atlantic of selective editing in their so-called “documentary” clip of The National Policy Institute’s Richard Spencer speech. While Applebaum said the entire video is “available online”, The Atlantic has provided no link to their original post to this day.

The full radio segment, America’s ‘Alt-right’, can be found on the BBC’s website.