Why I hate the 21st century

OK, so my friend Ross Southerland sent me this clip earlier today:

Had no clue who "Ali-G" is, didn't much want to know, but LOVED Andy Rooney's reaction. I could tell Andy was mad.

"If this was this fool's attempt at satire, he picked the wrong scribe with which to screw," I said to myself.

Then I looked at the other videos on YouTube.

And it all clicked -- who the guy was, why Rooney didn't suffer his foolishness, and why I hated the clown from my first look. I think my friend The Giant Rat of Knoxville will also love Rooney's response and some of his one-liners.

Oh, and just for fun, here is my infamous review of Cohen's film "Borat," written in March 2007.

'Throw Borat down the well'

I am nonplussed at the thought of writing a review about "Borat." I guess the thing to do is to get some choice words out of the way.

Vile, sophomoric, lewd, disgusting, soporific, pathetic, lowbrow, worthless and unbelievable. Whew. That feels better.

I mildly laughed at the film a couple of times early on. A friend belly-laughed at scenes that were anything but funny. I knew we were in for a long night when Borat and tag-a-long buddy Azamat stopped at a bed and breakfast ran by two sweet Jewish folks. Later, when Azamat began overtly admiring a "Baywatch" book (I'm cleaning up the scene), I walked out of the room.

"Waterworld" and "Joe Vs. The Volcano" can rest easy. This is the worst movie I have ever seen.

The gag is that Sacha Baron Cohen, who is Jewish, is attempting to show that racism, and anti-Semites, are still prevalent in America, particularly --- wait for it --- down South. I'm refraining from calling this train wreck satire because satire is an artistic term and "Borat" is nowhere near worth calling art.

Thirty-five years ago, Norman Lear's "All in the Family" accomplished what this film can't by using sophistication, wit and good writing. Imagine that.

This worthless pile of celluloid is intended to shock. If you like unspeakably bad jokes, humor that wouldn't do in a frat house, full-frontal male nudity and content that should make anyone with a brain blush, by all means this film is for you. I sincerely hope I never hear of Cohen again.

At their best, movies have the power to raise us up, to comment on the human condition and make us better people. Less lofty films at least can entertain and offer 90 minutes of mindless humor.

"Borat" is none of this. It is an amazingly unfunny, poorly done, offensive, worthless piece of garbage. And all those other adjectives I used at the beginning of this piece.

That's it. I'm done. Can't believe I wasted this much of my life.

....

To which friend and colleague Carol Springer responded: "So, Jake, how do you really feel?"

'Just look for the truth'

OK, I'll admit it.

I loved Mike Wallace.

Well, let me back up. I had a love/hate relationship with the guy. Sometimes his "60 Minutes" segments made me stand up and cheer. Sometimes they'd make me mad. But, that was the point.

As Scott Pelley said last night on the CBS Evening News, Mike Wallace had a saying:

"Our job isn't hard. Just look for the truth."

Those words are more important than ever in this social media cyclone, in which even the relatively-new 24-hour news cycle has been reduced to a seven-minute one.

You no doubt know I'm a old soul. I've watched or recorded "60 Minutes" since I was a boy. Andy Rooney was my favorite. Harry Reasoner was the one I wanted to be like. Ed Bradley was the dude that dug great tunes. I had a crush on Lesley Stahl since her White House days. Morley Safer was the courtly one. Dan Rather was Dan Rather.

But the guy whose voice and manner and mere presence quickened my pulse was Mike Wallace. I admired his guts. I'd always laugh whenever he'd nail some crook. I loved to watch the powerful and the dictatorial and the arrogant asses dither and squirm. Pelley and Steve Kroft and the current crew (Safer and Stahl are still around and, for the record, I still love Stahl and now have a crush on Lara Logan) are doing a great job keeping Don Hewitt's baby and Mike Wallace's MO alive.

Wallace had been to the top of the mountain and to the depth of the valley. Gen. William Westmoreland sued him in a famous incident in 1982. Wallace later admitted the incident, plus the death of a son, touched off a series of depressive episodes. He admitted to Safer in a late interview he once tried to kill himself. I felt for him because I, too, have been nipped at the heels before by the Black Dog.

Favorite stories? Oh, the time he scooped Seymour Hersh on Hersh's own story -- while on an airplane! And the time he threw up the word "lunatic" to the Ayatollah.

Don't miss this excellent New York magazine piece by Matt Zoller Seitz.

Of the CBS clips of classic interviews, please watch Wallace's heart-wrenching story on the Secret Service agent, Clint Hill, who blamed himself for JFK's assassination. You can find it among these classic clips. Heck, watch 'em all.

As such things eerily go sometimes, I watched a Wallace-hosted 1992 CBS documentary on Watergate about 24 hours before I heard of his passing. I remember thinking how much I missed that voice, that turned-up eyebrow, that look, on "60 Minutes."

He had his faults and he wasn't a saint, but at least by one viewer who appreciated a guy going for the jugular and giving his all into his 90s, Mike Wallace will be missed.

One last story: Pelley said last night CBS threw Wallace a big party the Friday night of the week he "retired." Gave him a cake and everything.

Guess who was back at work, sitting at his desk, the following Monday?

You can't help but admire that.

"60 Minutes" will air a special tribute to Mike Wallace at 7 p.m. (Eastern) Sunday, April 15.

Agog over Adele

So, we watched the Grammy Awards last night. First time in 15 or 20 years for me, I guess.

Before that, we saw a "60 Minutes" profile on the young British singer Adele (pronounced UH-DELL). Impressive. The girl has some pipes.

Even more amazing was her live performance on the awards show, her first since recovering from vocal chord surgery. Wow!

I'd come for Glen Campbell and stayed for the Beach Boys and ended up being all agog over Adele.

As you may know, she swept the Grammys last night, winning six. By the end of the evening, we were hooked.

So, I downloaded her hit album, "21." I have not been this impressed by a mainstream pop record since Norah Jones' debut release, "Come Away with Me."

"21" is a concept album of sorts, book-ended by pain and promise. "Someone Like You" is the stunner, the showstopper. But this is an album to be savored. Enjoy it. Every minute of it.

I'm not a fan of modern pop music. Most of it is mindless drivel brought forth by fashion models who may or may not be able to carry a tune. (Thanks, Autotune!)

Adele is an exception. A great one. A joyous one.

A refreshing one.

No. 1 Giants fan would've loved Sunday

Sunday night after the Super Bowl, the thought popped into my head that the late CBS News commentator and my favorite curmudgeon, Andy Rooney, said during one of his last interviews he kept New York Giants tickets in a secret drawer inside his office desk.

Mr. Rooney would have loved the outcome of Sunday night's game.

Sure enough, the folks at "60 Minutes" uncovered this classic segment from 1987. They call it Andy Rooney's Fantasy Football. Morley Safer dubbed him "Wrong Way Rooney."

Enjoy!

Maybe he needs to get out of the Beltway...

Twitter is one of those interesting aspects of modern life that sometimes makes me wonder if it's just another excuse to waste time.

Oh, don't get me wrong. Twitter is a good way to find links to news stories you might otherwise miss, blogs, coupons, traffic tips, weather updates and amusing one-liners. I use it to plug my blog and my newspaper column. And I also follow a few celebrities, mostly news types.

Somewhere along the way I started following Luke Russert. I like his take on sports. I liked his dad, Tim, and still miss Tim's steady presence on "Meet the Press." Luke is a young man (born in 1985) who covers Congress for NBC.

Luke has made me give my Twitter feed a double take a couple of times, though. During one of the Republican presidential debates earlier in the year, he tweeted something like, "Where the hell was gas $1.59 a gallon in late 2008?" after one of the candidates mentioned it.

Well, I knew quite well that gas got that cheap here in Knoxville, so I told him so. He didn't reply.

Today he tweeted: "The entire #Bills bar including myself just went 'Who the hell is Michael Buble?'" No doubt they'd just seen one of CBS's previews for tonight's "60 Minutes" story by Lara Logan on the popular Canadian singer.

Dang, Luke, get out of the Beltway every now and then!



Buble is a Grammy Award-winning pop singer (granted that doesn't mean what it once did) who has sold more than 30 million records. He had a huge hit in 2005 with "Home" and his Christmas CD has roared to the top of the charts. I first saw him 11 years ago in the film "Duets" and enjoyed his concert at Thompson-Boling Arena in 2008.

(He's also hosting a Christmas special on Luke Russert's own network on Tuesday night.)

I can somewhat give Luke a bit of a pass on this one. I don't know much of anything about modern day music. But I do know Buble. He's a throwback in a lot of ways. He wears a coat and tie on stage and has a stronger vocal range than Frank Sinatra did. But he croons in that same style and actually has talent, which is more than one can say for most of what passes for popular music.

I will say that I did shake my head when I saw Logan was going to be profiling Buble on "60 Minutes." But, heck. It's Christmastime. And he can ring-a-ding-ding almost as well as the Chairman of the Board.

I hope you know who that is, Luke.

My favorite curmudgeon

Sunday nights will never be the same.

Andy Rooney, America's favorite curmudgeon, whose commentaries provided the perfect period for the final moments of "60 Minutes," died Friday night. He was 92.

Barely retired a month (although he said, and I concur, that a writer never retires), Rooney passed away from complications following surgery. He will be missed.

Rooney got his start during World War II, as a reporter for the daily Stars and Stripes newspaper. He said later that being in the war, first as a reluctant soldier, altered his thinking about its necessity. "I saw the Germans," he said, "and I changed my mind."

He came to fame in the final installment on "60 Minutes," complaining about everything from women's hats to flights of stairs. ("They don't take flight.")

But he could also be serious, offering a touching tribute to D-Day, raging against the senseless 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City ("I could kill the bastards!"), mocking the lyrics to Michael Jackson's "Bad."

He said, though, that of all the things about which he could complain, he could never grumble about his life. It was filled with a loving wife, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Not to mention a career to remember, punctuated by those perfect periods at the end of "60 Minutes" on Sunday nights.

'The Interrogator' vs. 'The Great Communicator'

Just in time for the Gipper's 100th birthday tomorrow, here are classic clips from "60 Minutes" interviews Mike Wallace conducted with Ronald Reagan in 1975, 1976, 1980 and 1989.

Oh, to have a president like this again...

As an added bonus, here is a clip of an interview Jim Lehrer conducted with the Gipper in 1989, in which Reagan discusses debating Jimmy Carter during the 1980 campaign.