Popular Media (Lindsay dunks over LeBron!)

Over the past couple of weeks I have watched a non-story grow into a full blown international media production: "Where will LeBron James play basketball next year?" Or, perhaps the title should be "Where
goes the King?" This basketball player's designation as "King James" is one of the stupidest and most witless examples yet of contemporary sports hype/marketing. But I suppose also fabulously profitable. Only hardcore NBA fans (and that's a pretty small demographic) really care about James' contract status, but if you expose yourself to popular media you cannot escape the constant attention given to the question of where this guy will end up playing basketball next year. Such is the degree of overblown hype that James is teaming up with ESPN to present his very own prime time program tonight, sixty minutes of air time dedicated to revealing the answer to this fabulous mystery. Insufferable.

I confess I find of greater interest the latest woes of Lindsey Lohan. Off to jail! (And everyone cheers.) It's hard to imagine this impetuous little brat ever growing up. And that's the sad part. Clearly no one ever gave her an education.

Back to sports: in this morning's EL PAIS José Samaño refers to Carles Puyol's winning header yesterday against Germany as a "gol racial". You've got to be kidding me! José, what the hell is a "racial goal"? Is this related to the "furia española"? Such nonsense. (And yesterday the ESPN announcers made some stupid comment about the Spanish players not singing the national anthem and suggesting it might have something to do with nationalist politics, you know, many of the national team's players are on the Barcelona club team... hey idiots: Spain's anthem has no lyrics!! That's why they don't sing.) The notion that there is something essentialist going on here is truly repugnant. EL PAIS used to be a serious newspaper and it played a magnificent role in Spain's transition to democracy in the late seventies. Don't they have any editors? (Doesn't Puyol look a little like Jim Morrison?)