When the mayor of Bluff City couldn't afford to pay a $10,000 bill to a supplier, the supplier sued him to collect. There was no fraud. There was a bad economy and business projections fell. The mayor, who is also a businessman, is having financial problems like everyone else in this bad economy. But because he's the mayor, a simple civil issue has become front page news. Simply by putting this story of a legitimate business having legitimate problems in the paper, what was a civil case between businesses has become a very public embarassment. One reader responded to reporter Mac McLean's story. Mac, as you will recall, is the reporter who delighted in filming the breasts of local businesswomen in Danville and showing them around the newsroom. The reader wrote:
Mac Mclean has gone to far with this one. Why has Mclean and the Bristol Herald Courier picked Malone to exploit? Small business owners across the United States are really suffering with the bad economy. Articles like this should be viewed from a personal standpoint and not be made headline news. Mclean, what are you trying to prove picking on individuals that have good character that bad economic times
dealt a bad hand. Perhaps the Bristol Herald Courier will sell far less newspapers bringing a bad situation financially and then we can read about it in the Kingsport Times or the Johnson City Press. THe Herald Courier
needs to be more selective about what it prints pertaining to civil matters. This is no big deal considering the economy, the big deal is the 10.5 trillion the Fed has already given out in bailouts and should be called handouts. Mclean grabs for anything he can make a story from and the Bristol Herald Courier prints anything that can
help fill the pages of their skimpy newspaper.
Who is really served when a hometown newspaper starts making front page news of news that is already in the bankruptcies listings? If you fall behind, file bankruptcy, lose your job - is that really newsworthy? Apparently Media General thinks so. I'm not sure exactly how that benefits citizens or does anything more than generate fear mongering and sell newspapers. How sad a local paper does more to tear down businesses rather than help them find solutions.
Showing posts with label Mac McLean. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mac McLean. Show all posts
Friday, December 5, 2008
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Get Medication
"Sarah Arkin is not a Democrat. We've probed. Let it go. Get medication." If you check the comment boxes you'll see that's the message Kang has left. (see post below too). Thank you Kang. Kang also told me, "You realize you are totally insane."
That's so sad!!! How dare you talk about mental illness in such a demeaning and negative way when there are people at The Danville Register and Bee on "TERMINAL" doses of Prozac, clinging to life and happiness and bringing smiles and giggles to their co-workers through the sheer miracle of modern medicine. The Register and Bee wouldn't get produced every day if not for serotonin re-uptake inhibitors. Play nice now. If the Register and Bee had "done the right thing" and apologized to its readers for allowing reporter Mac McLean to film the breasts of a local businesswoman (and advertiser - yes, see how they treat you for spending money there) without her consent and flashing the video around the newsroom for managing editor Arnold Hendrix, Bernard Baker and Robert Benson to laugh at....and for publisher Steve Kaylor to deny it....well....maybe things would be different. But they're not....
Do check out Mac's website. He has a pretty photo of a sunflower. Guess that was in the days before he was taking photos of women's breasts.
Ah.....then half of Danville must be insane too, because I have so many readers who consistently tell me how glad they are to have this blog and how much they wish someone would start another newspaper. The Piedmont Shopper seems to be doing very, very, very well. And Danville Business, the FREE online news and info site for local businesses, is certainly picking up steam.
That's so sad!!! How dare you talk about mental illness in such a demeaning and negative way when there are people at The Danville Register and Bee on "TERMINAL" doses of Prozac, clinging to life and happiness and bringing smiles and giggles to their co-workers through the sheer miracle of modern medicine. The Register and Bee wouldn't get produced every day if not for serotonin re-uptake inhibitors. Play nice now. If the Register and Bee had "done the right thing" and apologized to its readers for allowing reporter Mac McLean to film the breasts of a local businesswoman (and advertiser - yes, see how they treat you for spending money there) without her consent and flashing the video around the newsroom for managing editor Arnold Hendrix, Bernard Baker and Robert Benson to laugh at....and for publisher Steve Kaylor to deny it....well....maybe things would be different. But they're not....
Do check out Mac's website. He has a pretty photo of a sunflower. Guess that was in the days before he was taking photos of women's breasts.
Ah.....then half of Danville must be insane too, because I have so many readers who consistently tell me how glad they are to have this blog and how much they wish someone would start another newspaper. The Piedmont Shopper seems to be doing very, very, very well. And Danville Business, the FREE online news and info site for local businesses, is certainly picking up steam.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Who is Mac McLean?
After all this time you've wondered what he looks like right? Here you go. The man who thinks vidotaping women's breasts without their consent, using Media General cameras and equipment on Media General Time and showing the resulting video to the newsroom and joking about it....laughing and yelling "Tits" across the newsroom...
Ladies and gentlemen...Mac McLean.
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Ladies and gentlemen...Mac McLean.
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Monday, July 14, 2008
Carrier guilty or innocent?
Hmmmm....letters to the editor in the Herald Courier claim Melvin Carrier is a foul-mouthed loser.
Seems like most of the folks there in Bluff City, if you read the newspaper anyway, don't care too much for him. I don't know and can't take sides. I just find it odd that the paper is so opposed to the behavior and mouth of a politician who reacted to a reporter who - at least when he was working in Danville, had a foul mouth and a foul attitude himself. Pot, meet kettle.
Seems like most of the folks there in Bluff City, if you read the newspaper anyway, don't care too much for him. I don't know and can't take sides. I just find it odd that the paper is so opposed to the behavior and mouth of a politician who reacted to a reporter who - at least when he was working in Danville, had a foul mouth and a foul attitude himself. Pot, meet kettle.
Carrier denies saying "Piss in your gut"...Mac lied?
Melvin Carrier's 93-year-old mother cried when she read Mac McLean's story about her son and Bluff City Alderman.
"I don't take the paper and she doesn't either," Carrier said in a telephone interview Monday night.
"Someone called and told her about it," he said. "And she cried. Then she got on my hind end," he explained.
Bluff City is a small town in East Tennessee, population about 1,500. It's a small enough town that neighbors know neighbors and remember each other's school history as well as the names of their neighbor's children and dogs. It's a town where something like a new parking lot light at the ramp to the put-in at the lake is a big deal. A town where things like a new recycling bin and junk cars are front-page news.
Carrier, now a politician in the town where he played high school football in the 50's, is proud of all he's helped accomplish there, and sorry that the cars he loved so much have caused so much of a ruckus.
"In 93 when I was on the board I helped get recycling bins down by the lake," he said, recounting a list of improvements he helped get in the city over the past two decades." But the good he has done was recently overshadowed by the rusting cars in his yard.
"I don't know," he said. "I just love old cars. I always have." But over time the townsfolk and one neighbor objected to them. Where Carrier saw his first car - the one he bought as a teen-ager for $50; his neighbors saw a junk heap. Where he saw his first wheels and the car he used to take he and his high school friends on a road trip to Gatlinburg and then over to Cherokee, NC his neighbors saw a broken hulk.
Where Carrier saw memories, the city saw an eyesore. Being in public office and having an eyesore in his yard and neighbors complaining about it meant Carrier was fair game for the local newspaper - The Bristol Herald Courier. (A Media General newspaper)
A Courier photographer and newspaper reporter Mac McLean took a photo of Carrier’s yard and the cars and ran the photo in the newspaper, along with some information Carrier said wasn't true.
"I never had words with my neighbor," Carrier said. "And he's been gone a month, sold his house and moved out. I waved at him a few times, but we never had words.”
Carrier admits his neighbor wrote City Hall about several of the vehicles that appeared to be abandoned or were sitting in his yard. The Bluff City Mayor Tom Anderson brought it up at a meeting, Carrier said.
According to the story in the Bristol Herald Courier, Anderson said city officials had little they could enforce because the city's current ordinance dealing with overgrown and dirty lots does not apply to owner-occupied property, like a yard at someone’s private residence. A proposed ordinance would change that and it would also make Carrier the first person in town to be cited.
Under the new law people could file a complaint with the board who could then determine whether it was necessary to take action. Carrier’s property was at the top of the list, so Carrier said, he moved the cars, but the neighbors have been gone a month and they did finally sell their home.
"They couldn't sell their house cause things are bad all over," he said. "It wasn't all the cars. It was the housing market."
What bothers Carrier the most about the whole affair is that Carrier said the paper reported he said he would "Piss on his gut," to Mac McLean. "I never said that," Carrier insisted.
"I confronted him about it (the story)," Carrier said when asked if he did indeed “bump” Mac. The two men were standing, Carrier said, in a meeting near the city recorder where Mac was talking to the city recorder.
"I don't got no craw-fish in me. I don't back up to nobody. I said are you the dude that put a picture in the paper about my property and my house. He said yes, and I said I don't appreciate it. It upset my family a whole bunch. I've been over the rocks enough it didn't bother me too much but it upset them and I'd appreciate it if you didn't do it no more. That's all I said to him," Carrier said.
"It said in the paper that I said I would piss on his guts. I told that to the city recorder and she said “That's a lie, that's a big lie. I was there and I heard what you said.”
Carrier denies saying it as well.
"I never said such a thing," he said. Carrier also said no one ever talked to him about the incident and that Editor Todd Foster, the editor of the paper never even got his side of the story. The article in the Courier said Foster attempted to contact Carrier, but couldn't reach him. Oh well - might as well go ahead and threaten the man. Good thing it was only a threat of using his name in a newspaper Carrier doesn't read.
"He don't have my cell phone number and I never talked to him. I wasn't here to answer the phone if he did call," Carrier said.
Carrier sighed and was quiet for a minute. “I just hope it settles down."
It may not. After all, Carrier’s name is now in the Bristol Herald Courier 14 times. In a small town like Bluff City, them's fighting words I suppose. And for the reporter who was so intimidated by being bumped...maybe he ought to go back to filming and humiliating women. Sad isn't it? All the men will defend each other, but don't seem to care so much about the abuse of women. Such is Media General. But before I accused a man of saying he was going to piss in my guts...I'd make sure the only witness to the incident at least confirmed it....at least before using his name 14 times in an editorial.
Media General staff may not respond to emails from me because they may - at some future time, but in court with me since I have filed an EEOC complaint - so this reporter was unable to contact them for comment. However, other bloggers may feel free to do so.
"I don't take the paper and she doesn't either," Carrier said in a telephone interview Monday night.
"Someone called and told her about it," he said. "And she cried. Then she got on my hind end," he explained.
Bluff City is a small town in East Tennessee, population about 1,500. It's a small enough town that neighbors know neighbors and remember each other's school history as well as the names of their neighbor's children and dogs. It's a town where something like a new parking lot light at the ramp to the put-in at the lake is a big deal. A town where things like a new recycling bin and junk cars are front-page news.
Carrier, now a politician in the town where he played high school football in the 50's, is proud of all he's helped accomplish there, and sorry that the cars he loved so much have caused so much of a ruckus.
"In 93 when I was on the board I helped get recycling bins down by the lake," he said, recounting a list of improvements he helped get in the city over the past two decades." But the good he has done was recently overshadowed by the rusting cars in his yard.
"I don't know," he said. "I just love old cars. I always have." But over time the townsfolk and one neighbor objected to them. Where Carrier saw his first car - the one he bought as a teen-ager for $50; his neighbors saw a junk heap. Where he saw his first wheels and the car he used to take he and his high school friends on a road trip to Gatlinburg and then over to Cherokee, NC his neighbors saw a broken hulk.
Where Carrier saw memories, the city saw an eyesore. Being in public office and having an eyesore in his yard and neighbors complaining about it meant Carrier was fair game for the local newspaper - The Bristol Herald Courier. (A Media General newspaper)
A Courier photographer and newspaper reporter Mac McLean took a photo of Carrier’s yard and the cars and ran the photo in the newspaper, along with some information Carrier said wasn't true.
"I never had words with my neighbor," Carrier said. "And he's been gone a month, sold his house and moved out. I waved at him a few times, but we never had words.”
Carrier admits his neighbor wrote City Hall about several of the vehicles that appeared to be abandoned or were sitting in his yard. The Bluff City Mayor Tom Anderson brought it up at a meeting, Carrier said.
According to the story in the Bristol Herald Courier, Anderson said city officials had little they could enforce because the city's current ordinance dealing with overgrown and dirty lots does not apply to owner-occupied property, like a yard at someone’s private residence. A proposed ordinance would change that and it would also make Carrier the first person in town to be cited.
Under the new law people could file a complaint with the board who could then determine whether it was necessary to take action. Carrier’s property was at the top of the list, so Carrier said, he moved the cars, but the neighbors have been gone a month and they did finally sell their home.
"They couldn't sell their house cause things are bad all over," he said. "It wasn't all the cars. It was the housing market."
What bothers Carrier the most about the whole affair is that Carrier said the paper reported he said he would "Piss on his gut," to Mac McLean. "I never said that," Carrier insisted.
"I confronted him about it (the story)," Carrier said when asked if he did indeed “bump” Mac. The two men were standing, Carrier said, in a meeting near the city recorder where Mac was talking to the city recorder.
"I don't got no craw-fish in me. I don't back up to nobody. I said are you the dude that put a picture in the paper about my property and my house. He said yes, and I said I don't appreciate it. It upset my family a whole bunch. I've been over the rocks enough it didn't bother me too much but it upset them and I'd appreciate it if you didn't do it no more. That's all I said to him," Carrier said.
"It said in the paper that I said I would piss on his guts. I told that to the city recorder and she said “That's a lie, that's a big lie. I was there and I heard what you said.”
Carrier denies saying it as well.
"I never said such a thing," he said. Carrier also said no one ever talked to him about the incident and that Editor Todd Foster, the editor of the paper never even got his side of the story. The article in the Courier said Foster attempted to contact Carrier, but couldn't reach him. Oh well - might as well go ahead and threaten the man. Good thing it was only a threat of using his name in a newspaper Carrier doesn't read.
"He don't have my cell phone number and I never talked to him. I wasn't here to answer the phone if he did call," Carrier said.
Carrier sighed and was quiet for a minute. “I just hope it settles down."
It may not. After all, Carrier’s name is now in the Bristol Herald Courier 14 times. In a small town like Bluff City, them's fighting words I suppose. And for the reporter who was so intimidated by being bumped...maybe he ought to go back to filming and humiliating women. Sad isn't it? All the men will defend each other, but don't seem to care so much about the abuse of women. Such is Media General. But before I accused a man of saying he was going to piss in my guts...I'd make sure the only witness to the incident at least confirmed it....at least before using his name 14 times in an editorial.
Media General staff may not respond to emails from me because they may - at some future time, but in court with me since I have filed an EEOC complaint - so this reporter was unable to contact them for comment. However, other bloggers may feel free to do so.
Send your sympathy cards....
Poor old Mac McLean was "bumped" by an Alderman. His boss, Todd Foster retaliated - and THREATENED said Alderman!
Jeff Foxworthy where are you when we really need you?
Foster, the editor of The Bristol Herald where Mac now works, has gone to the pages of the newspaper to defend Poor, helpless MAC MCLEAN. You'll recall dear readers that Mac is the reporter who video taped women's breasts without their knowledge or consent and flashed them around the newsroom and yelled "You can see their nipples!" ...much with the excitement a 12-year-old boy would have upon seeing his first women's underwear ad I assume... He can abuse women, but not stand up to an angry man. Yep...that's about right...
Now poor Mac has been "bumped" by a politician!!! Horrors!! Poor boy. His editor has taken up the sword (pen) and attacked back!!! Todd Foster is defending poor Mac...albeit in an editorial. Poor, poor helpless Mac. It's okay for HIM to attack women...but not to be bumped by a man who then called him a "dumbass"...according to Todd. Geesh....no matter where he goes....Read the whole editorial here.
Don't you just LOVE RED-NECK Media General? These are the folks reporting your news boys and girls....They defend the men, but abuse, humiliate and ignore the women. Too bad Steven Kaylor didn't have the "spine" to stand up for Mac's victim...but then...what do you expect....it's Media General's good-ole-boy-ism hard at work.
From Todd Foster's editorial:
McLEAN REPORTED the incident to me, and I fired off a letter to Carrier on May 21.
“Dear Alderman Carrier,” I wrote. “Reporter Mac McLean today informed me of an incident with you yesterday in which you warned him never to publish your name again and then bumped him. You lost any claim to privacy when you won public office. Furthermore, public disputes don’t even shield private citizens from publication. Should another incident of this sort happen again, I can assure you your name will be all over the Opinion page of this newspaper, and a possible call made to local law enforcement.”
I never heard back from Carrier. But McLean did. On June 3 at another meeting of the Bluff City Board of Aldermen, Carrier spotted the reporter and publicly declared “there’s that dumb ass right now.” He walked by McLean, and within earshot of other city officials, vowed to the reporter that he would “piss in your gut.”
I have no idea what Carrier meant by that threat to the reporter; it’s no Southern colloquialism I’ve ever heard of, but it’s safe to say it’s unbecoming of an alderman.
SO, AS promised, Carrier gets his name in this column – 14 times, by my count.
As a journalist, I hope Damascus, St. Paul and Bluff City remain the gifts that keep on giving. If I were a citizen, though, I’d be thankful they’re not in the same geographic room at the same time.
Insufferable can easily become combustible.
J. Todd Foster is managing editor of the Bristol Herald Courier. He may be reached at jfoster@bristolnews.com or (276) 645-2513.
Jeff Foxworthy where are you when we really need you?
Foster, the editor of The Bristol Herald where Mac now works, has gone to the pages of the newspaper to defend Poor, helpless MAC MCLEAN. You'll recall dear readers that Mac is the reporter who video taped women's breasts without their knowledge or consent and flashed them around the newsroom and yelled "You can see their nipples!" ...much with the excitement a 12-year-old boy would have upon seeing his first women's underwear ad I assume... He can abuse women, but not stand up to an angry man. Yep...that's about right...
Now poor Mac has been "bumped" by a politician!!! Horrors!! Poor boy. His editor has taken up the sword (pen) and attacked back!!! Todd Foster is defending poor Mac...albeit in an editorial. Poor, poor helpless Mac. It's okay for HIM to attack women...but not to be bumped by a man who then called him a "dumbass"...according to Todd. Geesh....no matter where he goes....Read the whole editorial here.
Don't you just LOVE RED-NECK Media General? These are the folks reporting your news boys and girls....They defend the men, but abuse, humiliate and ignore the women. Too bad Steven Kaylor didn't have the "spine" to stand up for Mac's victim...but then...what do you expect....it's Media General's good-ole-boy-ism hard at work.
From Todd Foster's editorial:
McLEAN REPORTED the incident to me, and I fired off a letter to Carrier on May 21.
“Dear Alderman Carrier,” I wrote. “Reporter Mac McLean today informed me of an incident with you yesterday in which you warned him never to publish your name again and then bumped him. You lost any claim to privacy when you won public office. Furthermore, public disputes don’t even shield private citizens from publication. Should another incident of this sort happen again, I can assure you your name will be all over the Opinion page of this newspaper, and a possible call made to local law enforcement.”
I never heard back from Carrier. But McLean did. On June 3 at another meeting of the Bluff City Board of Aldermen, Carrier spotted the reporter and publicly declared “there’s that dumb ass right now.” He walked by McLean, and within earshot of other city officials, vowed to the reporter that he would “piss in your gut.”
I have no idea what Carrier meant by that threat to the reporter; it’s no Southern colloquialism I’ve ever heard of, but it’s safe to say it’s unbecoming of an alderman.
SO, AS promised, Carrier gets his name in this column – 14 times, by my count.
As a journalist, I hope Damascus, St. Paul and Bluff City remain the gifts that keep on giving. If I were a citizen, though, I’d be thankful they’re not in the same geographic room at the same time.
Insufferable can easily become combustible.
J. Todd Foster is managing editor of the Bristol Herald Courier. He may be reached at jfoster@bristolnews.com or (276) 645-2513.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Apple fires employee for inappropriate poem
Apple fired this guy for a POEM about his attraction to a FedEx lady at an Apple Employee Talent Show. Pretty tame stuff compared to videotaping women's breasts and laughing at them and showing them around the office like Reporter Mac McLean did. I wonder what Apple would have done had he filmed her and showed the video around the office. Probably disemboweled him. But then again, APPLE, UNLIKE MEDIA GENERAL, understands what it REALLY MEANS to really enforce their policies. And I think they were probably MORE offended by the reference to stupid American customers.
emp
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Thursday, June 19, 2008
Were you filmed?
THESE PDFs POSTED AS EDUCATION AND REFERENCE UNDER FAIR USE ACT.
Last year then Danville Register & Bee reporter Mac McLean took a video camera out on an interview and filmed a local Danville Businesswoman. On returning to the newsroom he edited the footage and called other reporters over to his computer to laugh at the fact the woman's nipples were showing. Not everyone in the newsroom found the footage funny or his actions "no big deal." He later repeated the filming - filming yet another business woman. That's two I'm aware of. How many others were there? We'll never know. Since no action was taken - other than sending Mac to Media General's Bristol paper, no one searched his computer or the server. If they did, nothing was ever said and no action taken.
Men and women in the newsroom were offended by the incident. I emailed both Bonne Mahler at Media General's Richmond office and Publisher Steve Kaylor about how offensive I found the incident. No one said or did anything - not the managing editor, Arnold Hendrix or other managers who gathered around to laugh. No one in charge said, "That's inappropriate." Other news staff objected, but nothing was done.
Let me repeat...Publisher Steve Kaylor was told about the incident - and did nothing. Human Resources was told about the incident and did nothing. No one was fired - even though Media General has a zero tolerance (at least the handbook says they do) for obscenity.
Sure, someone MIGHT have "talked to" him but then they turned right around and posted these two stories to the front page afterward and he was promoted - hired at another Media General newspaper!!!
Click to enlarge the photos. They're here under the fair use act. In the one story he describes an alcoholic drink as "Hopefully this drink has enough alcohol in it to be a good panty dropper. It's like Viagra for women dude....Viagra for women." The managing editor was told the remark was offensive and should be dropped but ran it anyway. Why? Then he followed up that story with a front page story and questionable photo about sex in Danville. The reporter, an intern, was sent around to talk to people about how often they had sex, where, when, how etc. and that was touted as "front page news" along with a photo that appeared to readers to be a man in bed with a child. See for yourself. What do you think? Offensive? Maybe not in San Francisco, but certainly among conservative Christians in Danville, Virginia!! And readers let us know. The phone rang for weeks and emails came even longer.
Now the newspaper will say they "took action," but no one was fired and incidents just keep on happening. Apparently the lawyers say, "Well, if you talk to people then we can say you took action." But the fact is - no action has truly been taken if the workplace continues to be hostile. If the hostility doesn't stop, then nothing was truly done was it?
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