[Am-info] Dr. Bombay: Everything but MS is irrelevant

[T. Guilbert]

In a message dated 2003 September 12 (Friday), timestamp 10:16 PM, 
   on the topic Re: [Am-info] Dr. Bombay:  Everything but MS is
irrelevant,
   "Erick Andrews" <eandrews@star.net> wrote:

"|>You are preaching to the choir, Erick.  More effective would be to
"|>send an email to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram with a tightly reasoned
"|>and focused but nonemotional exposition of his error(s).  This guy's
"|>column gets published in hundreds of newspapers; the trick is to
"|>figure out how to borrow some of his column inches to get the truth
"|>out. 

"|I'd like to believe you're right.  [but with a useless moan, here]

"|I think that the *real* trick is figure out how to effect my (or
"|your) column  micrometers into column inches.  It's just not my
"|forté to do so with his  likes, with his grandstanding, with those
"|who support his rhetoric, and with  his broad syndication.  I think
"|it sad, but true.  So here is our little radio station.

Oh, for goodness sake, stop whining.  <g> 

"Dr. Emilio Bombay" is really Michael Gerst, a garden variety
journalist with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.  He knows how to set his
VCR for timed recording, so he is an expert on consumer electronics;
he has mastered the initial learning curve of Windows, so he is an
expert on computers.  You can Google "Michael Gerst" yourself if you
need to know more. 

He, of all people, is very mnuch aware of just how little he really
knows.  He is the man behind the curtain in Oz.  He also needs to fill
a weekly column:  it puts bread on the table and pays for the kids'
soccer uniforms. 

All you need to do is fashion a foil for him to make a column out of
it.  Far from resenting you for doing it, he will bless you for giving
him the germ of ideas for his weekly column (ask Mitch Stone:  coming
up with fresh material is much harder than it looks).  Of course, he
will have to make the published material come out with you as the
novice and him as the guru:  guruness is what he sells, after all.  

But, down deep -- maybe just below the surface, in fact -- he is just
a newspaper writer with a weekly column inch quota, and he actually
_welcomes_ the education you can give him, and the fodder for his
column.  Just treat him nicely, and you and he can establish a
symbiotic relationship.  The lions in the Roman Coliseum were well
fed, after all. 

"|I think you may be suggesting an honourable strategy, but do you
"|honestly  think your tactic could prevail?  Am I self defeating? 
"|Not 100% sure, but  I basically don't think that writing back to him
"|will make reason.  What have *you* written to him and got back, if
"|anything?

Not this guy, but I have provided many columnists with weekly fodder
in my life.  It can be real fun, actually. 

"|He's got a megaphone; I've only got an ear-trumpet.  I ain't gonna
"|give him my e-mail address, either.  

I'd hardly worry about that.  If you are really paranoid, ask Gene
Gaines if you can use the list as your return address.  (I, for one,
would enjoy reading his not-for-publication raw responses.)  In any
event, you would be covered by the Star-Telegram's omnibus privacy
policy. 

Besides, AM-INFO shows up in Google Groups.  Your email address is
"out there," whether you intended it to be so or not. 

-- 
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