Media Apathetic on Abuse Charges Against Soccer Star Hope Solo

Mediaite.com:

For those who know Peterson and Rice, the follow-up question is as follows: 

“Who is Hope Solo?” 

After getting a few lame jokes that she’s the daughter of Harrison Ford‘s Han Solo in the upcoming Star Wars reboot, perhaps four in ten will have a general idea of her existence (that was the number arrived at in my private survey). For those who don’t, Ms. Solo is the starting goalie for the U.S. national soccer team and has amazingly held this position since Bill Clinton was president (2000). Along the way, she’s won two gold medals and has recorded the most shutouts in U.S. women’s soccer history. She can add some distance to that record when the U.S. hosts Mexico in Rochester tonight. 

Solo is also a 33-year-old woman charged with two counts of misdemeanor domestic violence in the assault of her sister and teenage nephew. The Washington native has pleaded not guilty. Her trial is set to begin in two months. But unlike Rice and Peterson–who both absolutely deserve to be nowhere near a football field right now–Solo continues to play. 

Here’s the way USA Today described the moment she broke the U.S. women’s shutout record on September 13 in Sandy, Utah:

In the waning moments of the U.S. women’s rout of Mexico, the crowd behind Hope Solo’s goal began chanting her name. They knew she was on the verge of making history. With the 8-0 U.S. victory, Solo, playing while facing domestic violence charges in Washington, collected her record 72nd shutout with the national team.

“The best part about it is the best is yet to come,” she told cheering fans when the milestone was announced at Rio Tinto Stadium on Saturday night.

So while the star goalkeeper plays again tonight under the media radar, cable news and ESPN continue their soapbox sermons on the evil NFL, where if you weren’t paying attention, would conclude is the only organization in the country to employ characters like Peterson or Rice. The fact is that domestic and child abuse are epidemics in this country. If it takes two major athletes from America’s most popular sport to bring more attention to it, that’s only a good thing. But to pretend domestic and child abuse is a one-way street in terms of gender is another example of media twisting a narrative to satisfy the ends to the means. 

Is Solo guilty? Only three people–the ones directly involved–know that. But what if Solo played not for the U.S. women’s soccer team, but the National Football League as, say… a kicker (think of Kathy Ireland as a college kicker in the 1991 flick Necessary Roughness). Does she really get a free pass via being ignored? 

Does U.S. Soccer President Sunil Gulati avoid calls for his termination by almost every pundit in the country? Here’s what he had to say when a reporter–one of very few–actually asked a question about his decision to allow Solo to play recently: 

“We looked at all the facts that we had in front of us, we talked to Hope, and are going to wait until the legal proceedings come to a conclusion before we take any action, if it’s needed.” 

Adrian Peterson also has legal proceedings upcoming. No conclusion has been made in a court of law (the court of public opinion proving more powerful in the meantime).

RELATED: MSNBC Panel Erupts When Roland Martin Asks: Double Standard on Female Abuse Charges?

Bruce Levenson Isn’t a Racist; He’s a Businessman

TIME.com:

Sure, there are assumptions he makes that are cringeworthy—but the questions about how to attract more white fans were entirely reasonable.

Well, the pitchforks are already sharpened and the torches lit anyway, so rather than let them go to waste, why not drag another so-called racist before the court of public opinion and see how much ratings-grabbing, head-shaking and race-shaming we can squeeze out of it? After all, the media got so much gleeful, hand-wringing mileage out of Don Sterling and Michael Brown.

The only problem is that Atlanta Hawks controlling owner Bruce Levenson is no Donald Sterling. Nor is his email racist. In fact, his worst crime is misguided white guilt.

I read Levenson’s email. Here’s what I concluded: Levenson is a businessman asking reasonable questions about how to put customers in seats. In the email, addressed to Hawks president Danny Ferry, Levenson wonders whether (according to his observations) the emphasis on hip-hop and gospel music and the fact that the cheerleaders are black, the bars are filled with 90% blacks, kiss cams focus on black fans and time-out contestants are always black has an effect on keeping away white fans.

Seems reasonable to ask those questions. If his arena was filled mostly with whites and he wanted to attract blacks, wouldn’t he be asking how they could de-emphasize white culture and bias toward white contestants and cheerleaders? Don’t you think every corporation in America that is trying to attract a more diverse customer base is discussing how to feature more blacks or Asians or Latinos in their TV ads?

Back when the original Law & Order first launched, there was a cast shake-up that added more women, reportedly in an effort to attract more female viewers. MTV shows like Finding Carter and Teen Wolf can’t get through an emotional scene without a pop song coming in to sing to the viewer what they should be feeling, because that’s what their demographic wants. Car companies hire specialized advertising agencies to create ads to appeal specifically to women, blacks and Latinos. That’s business.

Sure, there are a few assumptions he makes that make me cringe a little. For example: “My theory is that the black crowd scared away the whites and there are simply not enough affluent black fans to build a significant season ticket base.” On the other hand, I have no evidence that he’s wrong on either count. Even if he is, the question still needed to be raised, because racism is a realistic possibility as to why whites in Atlanta may not be coming.

To Levenson’s credit, in that same paragraph, he dismisses fans who complained about the arena’s site as code for racist fear that “there are too many blacks at the games.” He further decries the white perception that even though the percentage of blacks in attendance had lessened, they still feel it’s higher and therefore somehow threatening. His outrage seems authentic.

Businesspeople should have the right to wonder how to appeal to diverse groups in order to increase business. They should even be able to make minor insensitive gaffes if there is no obvious animosity or racist intent. This is a business email that is pretty harmless in terms of insulting anyone — and pretty fascinating in terms of seeing how the business of running a team really works.

The thing that makes me mad is that Levenson was too quick to rend his clothing and shout mea culpa. In his apology, he wrote, “By focusing on race, I also sent the unintentional and hurtful message that our white fans are more valuable than our black fans.” But that’s not the message in the email at all. If the seats had been filled, even if by all blacks, the email wouldn’t have been written. He wasn’t valuing white fans over blacks; he was trying to figure out a way to change what he thought was the white perception in Atlanta so he could sell more tickets. That’s his job.

RELATED:  Atlanta Hawks owner stepping aside over racially charged email

Will 1st Gay President Barack Obama Call Roger Goodell And Demand He Gives Michael Sam A Job In NFL?

ESPN.com:

Sources close to Michael Sam say the defensive end has not been claimed on waivers.

Sam, who was waived Saturday by the St. Louis Rams as they cut their roster down to the maximum 53 players for the 2014 season, is now free to sign with an NFL team's practice squad.

Sam became the first openly gay player to be selected in the NFL draft when he was picked by the Rams in the seventh round.

He had been battling undrafted rookie Ethan Westbrooks for a final roster spot. Westbrooks was one of nine defensive linemen to make the team.

Sam tweeted thanks to the Rams on Saturday for giving him a chance to prove he can play in the NFL, saying in a series of tweets that he looks "forward to continuing to build on the progress I made here toward a long and successful career."

Throughout his terms 1st Gay President Barack Obama has never been afraid to exercise his "right" to ignore the Constitution and do what he wants, when he wants, however he wants, all in the name of advancing his Godless, radically-leftist agenda. So now with openly gay football player and white liberal cult hero Michael Sam (whom Obama weirdly took time off this busy schedule to call and congratulate after Sam was drafted by the Rams, unlike the hundreds of heterosexual players who were also drafted by NFL teams this year who received no such call from Barry) being cut from the St. Louis Rams the other day (as well as not being picked up on waivers by any team), the question now is will Obama get mad and demand action from NFL commish Roger Goodell so that Michael Sam can fulfill his lifelong dream of showering with 52 naked men as well as please Obama's main fanbase: the Gay Mafia? Only time will tell, but I imagine that with the impassioned nature of the Gay Mafia Barry will have to act soon.

RELATED: ESPN's Josina Anderson explains Michael Sam shower story

Stephen A. Smith Didn't Say Anything Wrong

CNN.com:

After football player Ray Rice was caught on video dragging his unconscious fiancee out of an elevator, his attorney called the incident a "very minor physical altercation." Where I'm from, when one combatant in a fight gets knocked out, that is no longer "minor."

Once the incident made the news, it was inevitable that there would be a "minor" kerfuffle over the story. I am not interested in discussing the incident itself. What I am interested in discussing is how this incident shows us that when emotional issues are involved, fair debate and discussion get knocked out, too.

ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith was nowhere near the elevator that day, but he just got knocked out by a chorus of voices and a spineless employer. When Smith commented on the issue, he clearly stated his position that Rice was dead wrong and deserved punishment. Without excusing it, Smith gave his opinion that, in general, when there is violence, sometimes it might be worth asking questions about provocation. He made it clear that there should never be violence, especially by a man against a woman.

For even suggesting that there could be provocation before a fight, Smith is now off the air. Mind you, Smith never tried to justify Rice's actions. Once the outcry began, Smith rushed to apologize.

I don't believe that Smith owed anyone an apology. If you listen to his entire statement, he said nothing to suggest that Rice's now-wife, Janay, "had it coming," nor did he make any excuses for Rice's behavior. The only offense he committed was that he blathered so incoherently that he made it hard to see how he managed to get a TV show in the first place.

So, if ESPN wants to take him off the air and replace him with a better commentator, I'm all for it. But I'm disgusted at the rancorous, politically correct swarm that descended upon Smith, and the spineless reaction of the management at ESPN.

And once the swarm gets into "beast mode," there is no recovery.

Why? Plain and simple: sexism.

Recall that a few months ago, Solange Knowles attacked Jay-Z. When that happened, the feminist site Jezebel had this take: "The real tea isn't the fight itself, but what could have possibly gone down between the two to make Solange kick her sister's husband in the balls." In other words, "if she hit him, he must have done something to have it coming." And this was not an outlier view.

Nobody's outrage meter spiked there. No, it was "funny."

I'm not defending Ray Rice. But there's definitely a "sit down and shut up" double standard among those who seek to promote one side of this issue -- and this is less about Smith's comments being inappropriate. The gleeful rush to call for Smith's head is far more inappropriate.

Yes, there's a difference between a physically huge NFL player beating up his fiancee and a wisp of a woman kicking Jay-Z in the crotch. But what's really going on here?

What's really going on here is that one side of the debate wants to make it impermissible for the other to speak. At all.

Take this in the context of how gender issues are presented when there are voices that dare to deviate from the feminist narrative.

Here's an example: Recently, there was a conference in Detroit for the "A Voice For Men" blog and its readers. That controversial website has the audacity to question certain issues from a man's perspective. As a result, according to news reports, this political meeting was the target of threats of violence that, in any other context, would have been called "terrorism."

Organizers said the conference moved from the hotel where it was to be held. Did you hear about that? It didn't get very much press coverage. Nobody called for a candlelight vigil. Could you imagine if this had been the annual meeting of the National Organization for Women?

Perhaps Smith is a complete ignoramus. Or, perhaps he was misunderstood. And next to that, we must concede that there was very little criticism of those who said that Jay-Z must have done something to provoke violence against him. There was no real outcry when A Voice For Men was the victim of what would be called "terroristic threats" if it was any other viewpoint.

Listen to comedian Bill Burr. In a routine, he discusses the statement "there's no reason to hit a woman." He's doing comedy, but he makes a really cogent point -- perhaps there is no justification for it, but why is it so taboo to ask about what happened before the violence?

"When you say there's no reason, that kills any sort of examination as to how two people ended up at that place. If you say there's no reason, you cut out the build-up, you're just left with the act. How are you going to solve it if you don't figure it out?" he said.

RELATED:  Was Stephen A. Smith really wrong?

Al Michaels: Washington Redskins Name Change Talk Is 'Nuts'

Finally, a sports journalist refusing to bow down to the politically-correct geniuses/hypocrites on the Left. And why doesn't hardly anyone mention that all those 50 senators calling for the Redskins to change their name just happen to be Democrats?:

Longtime play-by-play announcer Al Michaels called the heated debate over the Washington Redskins' team name "nuts," and feels team owner Dan Snyder isn't likely to bow to public pressure.
"It seems to me as if he is going to hold on," Michaels told the "Jim Rome on Showtime" program this week, according to The Washington Post.
"I mean all of a sudden — I mean, for 70-some-odd years this was a zero issue, and then it became an issue. I understand we live in this politically correct environment. It's crazier than ever; you know, senators want to weigh in on this, like there's nothing better to do in Congress. This becomes a big issue. I mean, I just think it's nuts. And I do know, I've talked to Snyder about it — not recently but when we were in Washington last year — and he basically said 'over my dead body.'"
The push to change the Redskins' name has raged for some time. Last month, 50 United States senators sent a letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell asking him to act and argued that the name was a racist slur to Native Americans.
Team President Bruce Allen responded to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid a few days later.

"Our use of 'Redskins' as the name of our football team for more than 80 years has always been respectful of and shown reverence toward the proud legacy and traditions of Native Americans," Allen wrote in a letter that was released by the team.
Allen's response cites research that "Redskins originated as a Native American expression of solidarity," and explained that the logo was designed by Native American leaders.

RELATED: Beck Tears Into ‘Sanctimonious Piece of Crap’ Bob Costas for Redskins Commentary

Stephen A. Smith Goes on EPIC Rant About Mark Cuban and Race After Being Labeled an ‘Uncle Tom’

TheBlaze.com:

ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith refused to backdown on Friday after he came under fire for defending Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban’s comments about bigotry in a recent interview. Despite being labeled an “Uncle Tom” and a “sellout” by some in the black community, Smith made it clear that he stands by what he said “100-fold.”

“‘Stephen A. Smith is a sellout,’ ‘Stephen A. Smith is an Uncle Tom,’ ‘Stephen A. Smith ain’t black,’ ‘you ain’t one of us’ — these are the kinds of things that were said to me yesterday,” Smith said on ESPN’s “First Take” Friday.

Regardless, he said he doesn’t care who disagrees with him and they would be smart not to expect an apology.

“When I say I don’t give a damn… that does it no justice,” Smith said. “I stand by everything that I said yesterday tenfold, 100-fold. And I don’t care who in the black community disagrees with me — I’m not interested in their disagreement on this particular issue because they are not looking at the bigger picture here.”

While Cuban did say he’d “cross the street” if he saw a black kid in a hoodie at night, he also said “in the same breath” that he’d have reservations about a bald guy with tattoos all over his body, he continued.

“Everybody wants to ignore that,” Smith said. “I don’t want to say everybody because I’m not speaking for everybody. … We want to pounce on him making this statement and alluding the black folks or talking about somebody in a hoodie that happens to be black… He talked about the prejudices that exist in all spectrums by all of us. Are we going to sit here and literally act like we don’t have any prejudices?”

Smith went on to argue that what Cuban said is “100 percent correct.” The commentator also addressed the “elephant in the room,” which he said many white people won’t talk about out of fear of being labeled “racist.”

“I look at our unemployment rate consistently being double that of folks in white America. I do understand that, to some degree, there’s a level of racism that we all have to overcome… but that doesn’t mean every single issue is race related,” he said. “Sometimes it is about how you represent yourself, it is about how you present yourself.”

He wasn’t even close to done:

“When I talk about not having a command of the English language, and still you want a job, and you want to have a career, but you don’t want to get your education, you don’t want to go out there and pound that pavement. Everything’s about the sprint, it’s not about the marathon, it’s not about you putting forth the necessary effort and due diligence over the long haul to get the thing you need. That’s a reality in our community.”

Smith also explained that not everyone in the black community can be Lebron James, Jay Z or Dwayne Wade — because they are “special.”

The rappers and professional athletes don’t represent the real “American dream,” they represent a “fantasy turned reality,” he added. Rather, Smith said he looks at himself as a good representation of that dream.

“Queens, New York City, left back in the fourth grade, grew up poor, the lever of education that I had was a public school system, I ultimately graduate from high school, I go to a historically black institution like Winston-Salem State University, I graduate with honors, there is no journalism program, I still graduate with honors, I still beat out thousands of people to get an internship… and I’m on national TV everyday.”

RELATED: Is Mark Cuban ‘Racist’? CNN’s Don Lemon and Marc Lamont Hill Hash It Out

Why Michael Sam’s Draft Position Makes Sense

Of course, since liberals don't deal well with facts, if Sam doesn't make the Rams roster they'll all collectively scream that it's because of who chooses to engage in sexual intercourse with:

TheFederalist.com:

“Before Sam came off the board, the writers and analysts who make up the broader NFL community on Twitter were becoming more and more furious. I got texts from friends who barely care about football, seriously concerned that Sam was going to go undrafted. A narrative was emerging: The league was avoiding Sam because of his sexuality. It’s unknowable what motivated individual teams, but the possibility is absolutely worthy of consideration. However, the most frequently cited evidence is, if I’m being honest, a little disingenuous. If you were following the story, you’ve probably heard it: Sam was named SEC Defensive Player of the Year (co–Defensive Player of the Year with C.J. Mosley, actually). Mosley went off the board 17th, continuing an eight-year run of SEC Defensive Players of the Year coming off the board in the first round. If the SEC Defensive Player of the Year always comes off the board in the first round, then why not Sam — if not in the first round, then at least in the middle of the draft?” 

“Well, because that’s not a very substantial sample, nor one that means much in terms of predictive value — that award has been around only since 2003. There are actually plenty of examples of players who found themselves in similar situations. For a seven-year stretch from 2002 to 2008, the six players1 who won the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year award were all drafted in the first round. The 2009 award winner, Michigan State linebacker Greg Jones, was drafted in the sixth round, 185th overall. The Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year award went to players who would be taken within the top 37 selections five years in a row, from 2000 to 2004. The 2005 DPOY was Nick Reid, and he went undrafted. An even more appropriate comparison might be one of the co–Big 12 Defensive Players of the Year this season, Texas lineman Jackson Jeffcoat. Jeffcoat, who had 13 sacks, was one of the two Associated Press All-Americans at defensive end this year. The other was Michael Sam. Despite that strong résumé, Jeffcoat went unselected in New York.”

And Pro Football Talk echoes the comparison: “Maybe Jeffcoat, who signed as an undrafted free agent with the Seahawks, will prove the teams that passed on him wrong and play like a guy who should have gone in the first three rounds. And maybe Sam will prove everyone wrong, too. But I believe Sam was a seventh-round pick because he’s a seventh-round talent.” Indeed, in a sense, it was a good thing Sam even got drafted, given how poorly he performed at the NFL Combine.

“The silent story in Indianapolis was the horrific performance by Michael Sam. He finished with the sixth-lowest grade of all 268 players, only besting three quarterbacks, an FCS offensive lineman, and a linebacker on one of the worst defenses in the Big Ten. Sam’s story is a polarizing one even though it shouldn’t be — your author is rooting for him — but the combine is the ultimate objective test, and Sam clearly failed this one. Everyone knows that the combine bears only tangential reality to playing football, but a miserable showing in Indianapolis won’t do anything to dissuade fears that Sam doesn’t have the physical ability to be a starting defensive end or outside linebacker in the pros.”

 RELATED: Fox’s Eric Bolling: Michael Sam Was Only Drafted Because He Is Gay

Dolphins Player Fined, Sent for "Educational Training" After Tweet About Michael Sam

HotAir.com:

I wonder if any other front office in the league would have cracked down this swiftly. Miami sweated through an endless PR forest fire last year over bullying and “locker-room culture” with the Richie Incognito and Jonathan Martin mess. They probably decided early vis-a-vis Sam that they weren’t going to tolerate the smallest spark.

And this spark was small. Don Jones’s crime was two tweets, each exactly one word long, after Sam was chosen by St. Louis in the seventh round: “OMG” and “Horrible.” Maybe that was about the pick itself, maybe it was about Sam kissing his boyfriend on TV after he got the call. Either way, after rapidly being fined, barred from team activities until he attends “educational training,” and publicly scolded in separate statements by his coach and GM, Jones issued a formal apology crafted in fluent publicist-ese:

“I want to apologize to Michael Sam for the inappropriate comments that I made last night on social media. I take full responsibility for them and I regret that these tweets took away from his draft moment. I remember last year when I was drafted in the seventh round and all of the emotions and happiness I felt when I received the call that gave me an opportunity to play for an NFL team and I wish him all the best in his NFL career. I sincerely apologize to Mr. Ross, my teammates, coaches, staff and fans for these tweets. I am committed to represent the values of the Miami Dolphins organization and appreciate the opportunity I have been given to do so going forward.”

No doubt the NFL leaned on the Dolphins to hit Jones hard in the interest of sending a zero-tolerance message to the broader league, but like I said up top, I’m sure they didn’t have to lean heavily. People were grumbling on Twitter yesterday that even the slightest criticism of Sam for being gay is now verboten whereas it was A-OK to mock Tim Tebow for his faith, even on the field during the game. Right, but that’s simple economics. Gay-rights activists are organized and willing to use their economic power to punish the NFL if it doesn’t protect one of their own; social conservatives really aren’t beyond statements of disapproval from the Family Research Council etc. Mozilla made the same, perfectly rational judgment in choosing to, ahem, accept Brendan Eich’s “resignation.” Keeping Eich on could have triggered boycotts, caused business deals to collapse, and given the company a lingering black eye in its industry. Firing him wouldn’t. There was, I’m sure, an initial backlash of thousands of social conservatives uninstalling the browser, but after a few weeks the company’s survived the storm and has clear sailing ahead. That wouldn’t have been the case if they’d kept Eich. The NFL understands that.

Tough spot now for the Rams, as Jazz noted yesterday. Do they dare cut Sam if he doesn’t play well in training camp, as often happens to seventh-round picks? Sam claimed this weekend that he should have been taken in the first three rounds (notwithstanding his underwhelming performance during the combine); he didn’t say explicitly that he thought teams had bypassed him because he’s gay, but then Don Jones didn’t explicitly mention Sam’s orientation when tweeting “Horrible” and everyone seems to have read behind the lines on that one just fine. If the Rams end up cutting him, how much grief will they get — including from Sam himself, maybe — for not giving him a chance? 

RELATED:  Trump Decries ‘Double Standard’ for Tim Tebow and Michael Sam

The Unbearable Whiteness of Liberal Media

Prospect.org:

On the staff of The American Prospect, I’m the only member of an ethnic minority. That's not because I bring all the variety the magazine needs, or because the editors don't think diversity is valuable. Everyone on the masthead of this liberal publication is committed to being inclusive—not just of racial and ethnic minorities but of women; gays, lesbians, and transgender people; and the poor.

It's not just the Prospect. Journalism upstarts like Vox Media and FiveThirtyEight have come under fire recently for lack of diversity in their hires, but that's largely because they are drawing from the milky-white pool of “existing talent.” In the corner of the publishing industry that caters to college-educated wonks—a slightly fuzzy designation, but I've included most of the publications my colleagues and I read on a daily basis—racial and ethnic diversity is abysmal.

Nearly 40 percent of the country is non-white and/or Hispanic, but the number of minorities at the outlets included in this article's tally—most of them self-identified as liberal or progressive—hovers around 10 percent. The Washington Monthly can boast 20 percent, but that's because it only has nine staffers in total, two of whom belong to minority groups. Dissent, like the Prospect, has one. Given the broad commitment to diversity in our corner of the publishing world, why is the track record so poor?

Corporate America long ago signed on to the idea that diversity—besides being a noble goal in itself—is good for business. Companies with diverse workforces consistently outperform their competitors; diversity drives innovation, and workers tend to be happier at companies that value inclusiveness. But it's even more important in journalism than, say, at an accounting firm. When you're in the business of telling stories, lacking diversity means you're limited in the sorts of stories you can tell—or even think of telling. A newsroom filled with white guys simply lacks the same imagination as one with people from an array of backgrounds. One editor I spoke with stressed that they "choose staff for what they can bring to the magazine, first and foremost," but lacking diversity is actually a prime indicator that you're failing to attract the top talent.
A large part of the problem is simply that no one is keeping track. Unlike the National Association of News Editors, the American Society of Magazine Editors does not track the number of minorities among magazine staff.

Most of the editors I spoke with conceded up front that their record of hiring and retaining people of color was poor, but few knew the number off-hand. Most, however, knew their VIDA score—and remember answering for it. Since it launched in 2009, the organization VIDA: Women in Literary Arts has tallied the number of women on staff and in the pages of literary publications each year, releasing its counts in January. The organization's name-and-shame strategy has been highly successful.

"When VIDA publishes those numbers, it rattles around your head," says Franklin Foer, editor of The New Republic. 

 

"When VIDA publishes those numbers, it rattles around your head," says Franklin Foer, editor of The New Republic. "It’s a form of shaming I think is actually fairly effective." Foer, who returned to helm the magazine in 2012 after leaving the post in 2010, says after the most recent VIDA count, he and his staff began keeping tabs on the number of male and female bylines in each issue and established a goal they want to reach before next year's numbers come out. Other publications—including the Prospect—have made inroads on the problem after the VIDA counts. "Having analytics and goals and knowing that it’ll just be embarrassing if you don’t do better next year is a pretty strong guarantee that things will be better," Foer says. In my survey, the center-left New Republic scored higher on the racial and ethnic-diversity scale than the rest of its more progressive counterparts save Mother Jones, with 12.5 percent of staff members hailing from minority groups.

RELATED:  The White World of Sports Journalism

Godless POTUS Barack Obama and Liberal Media Celebrate Michael Sam Becoming The First Openly Gay Player to be Drafted By NFL

Don't recall this kind of reaction when Tim Tebow got drafted, yunno, the same former Heisman trophy winner that they would later run out of the league. To think, Sam put on a horrible show during NFL combine drills, but what do skills matter when the liberal media loves you for choosing homosexuality over God:

Over seven rounds of the National Football League draft, teams chose more than 200 players, from surefire stars to kickers and all-but-anonymous players from tiny Division II programs.

One player who was repeatedly passed over was Michael Sam, a consensus all-American at Missouri and The Associated Press’s defensive player of the year in the Southeastern Conference, considered college football’s most competitive conference. Sam was also the first publicly gay player waiting to be drafted.

Finally, after nearly seven hours of picks on Saturday, the third and final day of the draft, Mike Kensil, the N.F.L.’s vice president for game operations, walked to the lectern and read Sam’s name. Cheers erupted among the several hundred fans left at Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan, the site of the draft.

Sam, a defensive end, was the 249th player selected. Only seven players followed. Then the draft was over.

Sam’s draft status was seen as a barometer of whether the N.F.L. was ready to accept an openly gay player, particularly because the National Basketball Association broke that barrier in February when Jason Collins joined the Nets.

“Thank you to the St. Louis Rams and the whole city of St. Louis,” Sam wrote on Twitter not long after he was picked.

“I’m using every once of this to achieve greatness!!” he continued, correcting himself shortly afterward to say “ounce.”

Later, speaking to reporters, Sam said he had a chip on his shoulder because he was chosen so late in the draft.

“I knew I was going to get picked somewhere,” he said. “Every team that passed me, I was thinking how I’m going to sack their quarterback.”

RELATED:  Obama Congratulates First Openly Gay NFL Draftee Michael Sam