Religulous bill maher’s say it’s festival

My voice is still a bit shaky, PopWatchers, and my sleep schedule
remains all kinds of wackadoodle, but at least the remnants of Gustav
have finally (hopefully) pushed beyond the Ontario borders. That’s
right, the sun is shining bright on the Toronto International Film
Festival, which means I can at long last vlog outdoors! (Ooo. That
just sounds vaguely untoward, huh? It’s not, I promise.) So click on
to hear more about why I had to walk out of (starring Ben Kingsley and
21’s Jim Sturgess), what surprised Kevin Smith the most about Toronto,
what may be an advance look at a Religulous DVD extra courtesy Bill
Maher, and what some native Torontonians had to say about the film
festival that’s called their city home for over 30 years.

As a Torontonian who has been attending the festival for the last 8
years, I’d say that it definitely has changed. More star seekers, more
corporate and more expensive. But it’s still my favourite part of the
fall.

As to the celebrity question…I can’t imagine a case where I’d accost
someone on the street or stake out a hotel, but at the screenings
themselves I definitely grab my camera and take a picture or two.

First, let me comment on the obscene number of empty sponsor seats at
The Duchess gala premiere last night. What a waste. Dozens of people
would have loved to fill them. Secondly, I saw Religilous today and
LOVED IT! I haven’t laughed that hard in a while. (Wanted to post on
Bill Maher’s site but there’s nowhere to do that). Thank goodness for
people like Bill Maher who try to shake some common sense into the
general public and for exposing the ridiculousness of the belief
system. And it IS a system. Nice work, Bill!

Oh, Adam, Adam… Please learn fast because those vlogs are getting
hopeless. There’s potential, but most of us could probably get better
production value sitting at home filming ourselves with a cell phone.

If he did indeed give money to Obummer becase of a speech that the
next Vice President of the United States made, I have to ask if Billie
boy has a brain?

Isn’t it more scary that Obummer is as close to a Socialist that has
ever been running for president? Does he care that Obummer has Zero
experience (other than mimicking his preacher… oh yea that’s fine)
and changes his words (right in your face to Billy boy) to get the
vote?

Bill, I used to think you were funny and sharp. You blew it. I hope
that everyone boycotts your movie in October of this year. Since you
go with the buck, perhaps that will scare you more.

I couldn’t drag myself out of a Jim Sturgess movie if he was speaking
Klingon! Dude, REALLY.

The festival here in Toronto has definitely gotten a little out of
hand, but I think it’s chugging along at par with the rest of North
America’s celeb-obsessed culture, so it’s not really a surprise. It
was odd going to the see The Wrestler last night with tonnes of fans
lined up across the street, most likely with no clue about what they
were waiting for!

Yeah, I would probably check out all the celebrity happenings. But I
would also plan to go out and eat at a nearby restaurant, just to have
a legitimate excuse to be there.

My God! Is there any way you could possibly make watching these
“vlogs” any more boring!? Zero personality + nothing meaningful to say
= SNORE

ya need to hang out with more foreign english speakers to get to
understand them, I’m Irish and I live in Toronto and I hope people
understand me. I do find a big change here in TO with all the fuss, I
am a movie fanatic and it’s getting insane, I wouldn’t rush up to the
‘talent’ but thats just me, but the whole planet is celeb obsessive
now! I still wanna see the smaller movies, as I can see the
‘hollywood’ ones in a few weeks. I saw ‘Slum Dog Millionaire’ last
night and it was fantastic! best movie so far!

As an almost-native Torontian (I grew up in Mississauga, the city
immediately to Toronto’s west), and as one who had volunteered at the
festival for a few years, I can honestly say that, while I was
starstruck, I never approached any stars because I didn’t want to
bother them. That doesn’t mean I didn’t have any encounters, of course
–Emily Watson smiled at me, I was Farrah Fawcett’s seat holder, and
Brain de Palma even yelled at me–but I never initiated contact. The
only time I ever did that was with Ally Sheedy, and that’s because it
was my job at the time.

Bad Adam! That Word is officially verboten. Okay, let’s make a
deal…you don’t say That Word and I will stop using “verboten”. LOL

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Tim brown photography’s readers times palin

“I noticed you had on the top of the front page last week. You just
had to rain on her parade. You had better open your eyes to the fact
that there are conservatives who live in L.A. too,” read part of an
e-mail from Barbara Hardesty of Los Angeles.

The Times heard from the other side of the aisle as well, getting a
number of comments like this one from Pat Taylor of Calabasas: “I must
comment on the inclusion , printed not 24 hours after his nomination.
Your bias is showing and has been each day of the Democratic
convention.”

Most readers who took the time to contact The Times about coverage of
the conventions did so because they were unhappy. Those front-page
examinations of the vice presidential candidates were but two
specifics readers named. Dozens of others thought on Sarah Palin’s
daughter’s pregnancy was inappropriate; they thought the overall
coverage of the GOP vice presidential candidate was too negative.
Among complaints from the other side, a number of readers asked why
the Los Angeles Times hadn’t challenged a statement that Palin made in
her speech about Obama’s record in the Senate.

The point of the coverage of both Biden and Palin is to inform
citizens as fully as possible about the man or woman who might be the
next vice president of the United States.

Robin Michael of Manhattan Beach was one of several readers who called
the front-page report looking at Biden’s family ties “gotcha
journalism.” “Surely the article was ready for publication long before
Biden’s acceptance speech,” wrote Michael, who wondered why the story
ran on Aug. 28, the day after he formally became part of a Democratic
presidential ticket. National Editor Scott Kraft says they weren’t
timing the piece but put it in when it was ready: “The guy was
announced as Obama’s vice presidential candidate five days before we
put the piece in the paper. We’re good, but doing a piece like that
cannot be done in a day or even two.”

A greater number of readers considered the overall coverage of Alaska
Gov. Sarah Palin to be negative. On Aug. 30, The Times started
covering “John McCain’s surprise choice,” as the lead story put it,
with six stories in the main news section (those articles are linked
below). And even though the editorial pages are independent from the
news pages — the departments have separate staffs — it’s worth
noting that some readers included the opinion pages in their overall
assessments of Times coverage. That same day, there was an editorial,
two letters to the editor and a on Palin.

A look at the Times database shows 131 references Sarah Palin in news
stories over the past three years — almost all of them after McCain
announced her as his running mate. (There have been more than 400
references in news stories about Biden over the past three years.)
“She was a near-total unknown, and that alone justified a large amount
of reporting as quickly as possible,” says D.C. bureau chief Doyle
McManus. Concerns about coverage being negative have been leveled at
papers around the country, as a glance at reported, media coverage was
itself a topic at the GOP Convention. Perhaps the sheer level of
reporting, of reporters’ asking questions, comes across as naysaying?
“‘Inquisitive’ does not add up to ‘inquisitory,’ ” notes McManus.

Some readers also took issue with news coverage of Palin’s pregnant
teenager. Daniel A. Curry of Manhattan Beach wrote to say, “I was
surprised by the concerning the pregnancy of a 17-year-old girl. I was
under the false impression that The Times had an editorial policy
that: (A) caused it to refrain from identifying adolescents, even if
they were accused of heinous crimes; (B) protected the right of
privacy of individuals who were not public persona.” And Joseph
Picarelli of Rancho Palos Verdes said, “It is particularly poor to
show her in two pictures and refer to it as a ‘vetting’ issue.”

The practice of not naming juveniles is typically aimed at protecting
their privacy. In this case, though, the McCain campaign released an
official statement from the Palins saying their 17-year-old daughter,
Bristol, was pregnant. Says McManus, “We cannot pretend to protect a
juvenile’s privacy after her parents have issued a worldwide press
release with her name in it.” Steve Stroud, deputy director of
photography who oversees photos for the main section, says it was
valid to use both the image on Page A1 and the one inside: “She was
part of the news story that day that examined the vice presidential
candidate’s family values, an important part of any candidate’s public
profile. The candidate and the McCain campaign publicly lauded both
Palin and her daughter for the young couple’s decision to marry and
have the child.” Stroud adds, “We have also used on the front page and
elsewhere photos of the other candidates’ children from both political
parties.”

Among those who thought The Times was too easy on Palin were the
numerous readers who wrote apparently after seeing an item on a
website that calls itself a “progressive research and information
center.” Bill Dunn in Middleton, Wis., was among many who cited a ,
and wrote, “What is a newspaper’s responsibility to its readers? Is it
to merely print allegations, with no attempt at rebutting those
allegations when there is evidence on the record that the allegations
are untrue?” Dunn quoted Palin’s line about Obama, “Listening to him
speak, it’s easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two
memoirs but not a single major law or reform.” Dunn, like some two
dozen others, cited Obama’s legislative record, and asked, “How can
you let politicians get away with this?”Said McManus in an e-mail, “As
our readers know, we have reported at some length on Sen. Obama’s
legislative career in both Springfield and Washington.” He adds, “Gov.
Palin didn’t charge that Sen. Obama had never authored a law. She
asserted that he had never authored ‘a major law.’ That’s a debatable
point, of course, but whether it’s valid or not depends on the
definition of ‘major.’ For that reason, we viewed this sentence as a
bit of campaign rhetoric, not a factual charge.”

David Shields of San Dimas was one of the readers annoyed at the
letters page in the opinion section: “The letters selected were so
one-sided that I threw the whole paper in the trash. If The Times is
going to continue to be so one-sided and not ‘balanced,’ why should I
read anything beyond the Sports Page and crossword puzzle?” The answer
is one that Eryn Brown, who oversees the letters-to-the-editor page,
has reason to give readers quite often, because letter-writers tend to
take to their keyboards and pens more often when they’re unhappy: “As
always,” she wrote back, “the mix of letters selected for the page
reflects the mix of letters that we receive. Overwhelmingly, reaction
to Gov. Palin among our letter writers has been negative.”

–>
This forum is for questions, answers and commentary from L.A. Times
readers and staffers about The Times’ news coverage. The goals: to
help readers understand the thinking behind what appears in The Times;
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