We Get More Letters....

That post about Peter Coyote started a little mini-shit storm! What fun! Not since the 'Criss Angel incident' have I had so much puzzling anger directed my way.

From the comments section of SFist.com (copyright 2005, DobkinCo Industries)

Wow, that is a pretty misogynistic diatribe. I don't know that much about this episode, but seems to me the indiscretion that has been reported is pretty minor compared to other shenanigans engaged in by city employees--embezzlement, stealing parking meter money, holding women prisoner in their SUVs, beating civilians in and out of uniform... sheesh. And she paid the money back. Sounds like someone has a major axe to grind for losing their job or something... who cares.

Posted by: kc at 28 October 2005

Yes, exactly, KC. Why should anyone care if someone gets fired for blowing the whistle on a criminal act committed by their boss who only got the job for being married to a shitty c-list actor?

It's very telling that you start your comment with 'I don't know much about this' before telling us why we shouldn't care. Nothing like shouting your ignorance from the hilltops before admonishing us for giving a shit. Please keep me posted if anything rotten happens unfairly to your charmed little life so I can make sure to yawn, call you sexist and accuse you having an axe to grind...

Posted by: drew at 28 October 2005

ok, ok, guys, let's step back and look at this. this poor woman had to deal with that vampire tony hall for four solid months -- can any of you say you have the cojones to do that and still show up to work combed and pressed everyday?

give her a break -- she's trying to do a tough job... and my hat is off to her.

Posted by: billthecat at 28 October 2005

A calming down is in order. I intended this to be less about Ms. Coyote and more about the anonymous 'KS.' Coyote has presided over a bevy of new film work in The City, as evidenced by the Rent, Pursuit of Happyness, the Fincher zodiac killer flick and even the Sony BRAVIA ad.

That $1,200 check was pretty shady, and by all accounts Mike Billington was a capable, hard working and dependable person. And I was sorry to hear about any further strife on the Film Commission. But KS alleges further improprieties, and while Coyote is obviously innocent until proven guilty, my ultimate goal is for The City and the film industry to be fair, ethical and equitable (I know, fat chance).

KS's points are 100% unconfirmable without the 'documents' they purport to be able to deliver. Until they provide said documents, we'll have a limited understanding of the story and can only watch and learn.

Posted by: Jackson West at 28 October 2005

say, for a guy who wants to be "fair & equitable," you sure have an interesting journalistic approach. jackson, you're starting to come off as a shoot-the-wounded kind of guy. like several guys i served with.

i can just picture KS, whomever he/she is, just dying to trust you now, after you publish his/her letter and then devote your whole column to just 1/16th of his/her letter.

and if you really are "sorry to hear about any further strife on the Film Commission," why would you go public with something so patently inflammatory?

i say let's just drop the he-said/she-said and at least act like adults, without linking to bloggs that defame, vilify and insult this public servant (or would that be *too* fair and equitable?).

Posted by: billthecat at 28 October 2005

Jackson:

I couldn’t agree more with Bill the Cat. As a journalist, I find your pretension to fairness and journalistic integrity to be ridiculous and annoying. Your job is not to create the news, nor to provide links to scurrilous rants by passive-aggressive cowardly bait-and-switch artists who haven't the guts to say such things to their victims' faces. (Peter Coyote may indeed be an ‘asshole.’ I wouldn’t know, but I’d be the first to block the door while he punched Drew’s lights out.) Out of laziness or stupidity or simple meanness, you’ve dismissed a viable story while turning it into a footnote for a sordid anecdote that feeds your own pretensions.

KS' missive doesn't sound like a 'letter to the editor' to be read by the world. It sounds like a tip from a source in the SF ‘inner circle’ who probably knows the editor he sent it to.

So, Mr Yellow Journalist, you’ve only mimicked Hearst: "Give me the pictures and I'll give you a war." Only this little teapot tempest isn't worth the effort. There are stories here, stories that a real journalist would be out covering: people ready to resign in despair, people packing their bags to look for work in another city because they see the end of an industry here, people disgusted with themselves for trusting ‘a new set of rascals.’ [And it’s true enough that Newsom did let Coyote ‘dangle’ (to use KS’ highly-descriptive term) last year in the ‘brouhaha’ (your much less descriptive and overused term); Newsom should have had the guts to end the nonsense months earlier.]

Who cares who Kaiser Soze is, anyway? The real story is in SF’s City Hall. It’s in the offices of film-makers afraid they’ll have to shutter their businesses. And it’s in the homes of workers worried that there’ll still be a lot of month at the end of the money. But you lack the journalistic guts or mentality to go get it, so you do the easy thing, the lazy thing, the thing that might be expected from a slacker, from a yellow slacker journalist: you sit at your desk and try to create a story. Bravo, Jackson. That’s why you can’t get work at the Chron, or the Examiner, or even the Independent. It’s true: water finds its own level.

To echo KS, you're no Mencken, you're no Woodward or Bernstein, Turkel or Trillin. You're not in sight of Goodman or even Matt Smith. You’re a marginal little trouble-maker. If you had any of the integrity that you pretend to, you'd remove the link to Drew's atrocious and vile attack. Then you'd get out of your comfy chair and go find the story (or any of the many stories within the story). But that's a dare you probably won't take.

Posted by: Shahad Bazi at 30 October 2005

Where exactly is the link to my blog that Jackson should be racing to remove, Shahad? Sure, my signature in a comment is also a link, but that's hardly Jackson's fault/responsibility. I'm not sure if I understand where all your fire comes from, but if you think sucking up to the star of Return of the Living Dead is what will suit the city's interests, then be my guest. Whatever. And if water finds its own level, enjoy sailing the seas of the comments section of this blog, Captain...

Posted by: drew at 31 October 2005

OK, Drew, I’m sorry that I said it was a link to a “scurrilous rant by passive-aggressive a cowardly bait-and-switch artist who hasn't the guts to say such things to his victims' faces.” Indeed, I was misspeaking.

What I actually did mean to say was you are a “vile, gutless, moronic and cowardly eunuch who hides his abject fear of women behind internet attacks.” Coward. You are a despicable coward, Drew, less than smegma or pond scum. I’m sucking up not to anyone, and I give a rat’s ass about Peter Coyote, but you are really beneath contempt.

In my world, journalists have a purpose, and both of you are shallow pretenders, “trickortreat” reporters. I did only read this crap because I have friends whose careers are dying out there, but you seem to make a “life” of it.

Posted by: Shahad Bazi at 1 November 2005

Oh Shahad... What a pity that you're seemingly too young or uneducated to realize how utterly hypocritical you seem engaging in a string of cut and pasted Ad Hominem attacks from whatever high school message board you frequent in a feeble attempt to classify me as a jerk.

Since it's fairly obvious that you're new to the world of the 'internets', perhaps you can get one of your many friends in the entertainment business to explain the difference between the New York Times and a personal bullshit blog like the one that seems to have lit such a fire under your ass. I agree with you that journalists have a purpose, but if you're going to treat every single word you ever read in your whole life as 'journalism', I'm afraid you're going to find yourself mired in all kinds of hissy fits like this in the future.

Oh, and BTW, 'less than pond scum' was a funny insult about 30 years ago. Ask your parents...

Posted by: drew at 1 November 2005