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Top Comments: Notebook #95: I've got rants and more rants [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2023-11-10
I have a few things to rant about tonight. Well, a couple of things.
Let’s do the less serious rant first.
Charlie Pappalardo/The Michigan Daily
In an announcement released late Friday afternoon, the Big Ten Conference announced that Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh has been suspended from in-game coaching for the remainder of the regular season for violation of the conference’s sportsmanship policy. The conference had previously sent the University a notice of disciplinary actionlast Saturday, alerting it that the school was likely to face punishment. Michigan responded Wednesday with a 10-page letter refuting Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti’s authority to suspend Harbaugh under the conference’s sportsmanship policy without first completing an investigation. The letter also questioned the impact that the alleged sign-stealing operation could have had. But Friday, the conference responded with a public statement announcing that Harbaugh would indeed be suspended, and barred from being on-site during games. “The Big Ten Conference announced today that the University of Michigan had been found in violation of the Big Ten Sportsmanship Policy for conducting an impermissible, in-person scouting operation over multiple years, resulting in an unfair competitive advantage that compromised the integrity of competition,” the statement read. “… As a penalty imposed on the institution, the University (of Michigan) football team must compete without its Head Football Coach for the games remaining in the 2023 regular-season effective immediately. … For clarity, the Head Football Coach shall not be present at the game venue on the dates of the games to which this disciplinary action applies.””
I’m not surprised that The Big Ten Conference disciplined the University of Michigan even as the NCAA continues its investigation into the sign-stealing accusations but it is ridiculous to suspend Coach Harbaugh only.
Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh is not being implicated by the NCAA in the alleged sign-stealing scandal at Michigan. According to Ross Dellenger and Dan Wetzel of Yahoo Sports, "The NCAA's findings do not connect the in-person scouting and recording of opponents' sidelines to Harbaugh, sources say, an absence of evidence essential to a potential lawsuit from the school and coach against the league."
Does the Big Ten Conference have evidence implicating Harbaugh in the sign-stealing scandal that the NCAA does not?
If you’re sanctioning the institution then sanction the institution. Don’t let Michigan play in the 2023 Big Ten Conference Championship game and the College Football Playoff can make its own decision under those circumstances. Sanction them for next year, if it means that much, ban them from winning the conference next year.
Instead, the Big 10 Conference decides not to impose a penalty on Harbaugh by...imposing a penalty on Harbaugh only without evidence that he had anything to do with the scandal
Bullshit.
After I tell you who we are and what we do here at Top Comments, on to the next rant...which is a much much more serious matter.
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A commenter posted a link in the comments section of Thursday’s Abbreviated Pundit Roundup relevant to the Israeli-Hamas conflict. You can find the comment and link here.
That sounded a bit too...juicy to be true and indeed it was. I found out that it was a satire independent of BBC News Verify researcher but, as the researcher found it before me, he deserves credit for debunking.
x Thread: Israel-Hamas war misinformation - Day 34
Claims that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's psychiatrist has committed suicide have gone viral on Twitter, shared by David Icke and others.
The false claim is based on a satirical blog post dating back to 2010. It's not true. pic.twitter.com/noudC0zQVq — Shayan Sardarizadeh (@Shayan86) November 9, 2023
The satirical blogpost Mr. Sardarizadeh is referencing is here.
I’m pretty sure that this Michael K. Smith is also the author of the 2003 book The Madness of King George.
Even in the comments of the original 2010 post some people can’t tell whether the Netanyahu post is satire or not so a week later Mr. Smith wrote a similar post about former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak.
(Frankly, the satire of the Barak post is much more evident...and it confirms the satire of the Netanyahu post.)
The Netanyahu piece was picked up by some Arab/Palestinian news blogs and has circulated every time Israel and Hamas is in conflict; the same story circulated in 2014, for example.
This piece has circulated on Twitter and TikTok as news.
And if that weren’t enough, I was dealing with another story circulating on Twitter the day before that was also too good to be true.
x A site calling itself "HonestReporting" saying "we do not claim to be a news organization" after starting a vicious disinfo campaign abt actual journalists reporting & dying in a war zone, & to see that disinfo parroted by some legit media outlets is just... there is no bottom
https://t.co/1IgsDFPNMT — Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) November 10, 2023
Both sides do it!
Look...I don’t expect that very many people really know “how to do their own research” and even if they do, there’s so many other things in their lives that need to be done. Most people don’t have the time to do it.
Most people accept what’s presented to them as news as...news.
It’s the job of the media and/or other sites that report it as news to verify, at the very least, that a story is plausible.
And sometimes, as with the bombing of Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza, even the mainstream media fails to do its due diligence (and don’t EVEN get me started on the American media reporting on American domestic politics in the past ten or so years).
Just...be careful you you are reading the news nowadays.
And when in doubt and you have time to research something that smells fishy, Bellingcat’s Charlotte Maher has some effective guidelines to follow.
Life is too serious for this bullshit.
Comments below the fold.
TOP COMMENTS
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From inkstainedwretch:
Mokurai’s reply to WolverineForTJatAW (one of MANY back-and-forths between these two) in Mokurai Good News Roundup diary. Great retitling of the 'right to work' BS that was a thumb, a wrist, a forearm, and an elbow on the scale measuring the relationship between Labor and Capitalism Run Amok.
TOP MOJO
Top Mojo for yesterday, Thursday, November 9, 2023, first comments and tip jars excluded. Thank you mik for the mojo magic! For those of you interested in How Top Mojo Works, please see his diary on FAQing Top Mojo.
TOP PICTURES
Top Pictures for yesterday, Thursday, November 9, 2023. Click any picture to be taken to the full comment or picture. Thank you to the wonderful dKos staff who made it possible to continue this feature in memory of jotter!
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