Per TMZ. Also per @BreakingNews, which states: “FLASH — LOS ANGELES — “KING OF POP” MICHAEL JACKSON HAS DIED.” He was 50.
UPDATE: The L.A. Times confirms.
After the jump, I’ve posted a screenshot of the Times‘s homepage right now. Top story: Michael Jackson dies. Second story: Farrah Fawcett dies. Third story: the fiscal crisis that is about to cause the state of California to run out of money.
Relegated to the headline-only sidebar: an important constitutional law decision by the Supreme Court today. (But hey, at least that story beat out Mark Sanford!)
Nowhere to be seen: news about Iran. The uprising there, and the government’s butchery of its citizens, isn’t even more newsworthy than Shaq, apparently. As @grantslater put it:
Sanford, Jackson and Fawcett… It was nice knowing you Iran. Come again some other news cycle. #iranelection #fb
Relatedly, #iranelection has just been surpassed on the “trending Twitter topic” list by Michael Jackson. *sigh*
[Yeah, and what’s the top post on your blog right now, buddy boy? -ed. Shut up.]
I always felt kinda sorry for him, he lead such a messed up life and it wasn’t all his fault. Still, despite how messed up he was he was an amazing singer and performer.
I’m startin’ with the man in the mirror
I’m asking him to change his ways
no message could have been any clearer
if you wanna make the world
a better place
take a look at yourself
and then make a change
~~This was definitely one of the more influential songs in my elementary school days… Yes, as an elementary schooler, I got the point…
CNN is reporting that he is in a coma, not dead yet.
Now CNN is trying to confirm the L.A. Times info.
Wow, Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, and Michael Jackson. They say it happens in threes…
I bought the Jackson Five’s third album while I was still living in Illinois, probably in 1971. ‘I’ll be there’ was the enduring song on that album. It is currently playing (excerpted) on a public service spot. Jackson was an extremely talented sub-teenager in 1971, attractive, engaging, with a beautiful voice. It was easy to like him. Those of you who know him by his child molestation trial or his excessive plastic surgeries missed the best part of him. Even before ‘Thriller’, even when he was just one of five, he was a star. Listen to ‘Ben’. Listen to ‘I’ll be there’. RIP Michael Jackson. I hope you have found your childhood at last.
Gov. Sanford = happy
Joe Mama – I thought the same thing while scanning the headlines.
A quick rejoinder to your complaining about the headlines – I agree that the Iran situation should be more prominent. But for the LA Times, at least, celebrity deaths are huge local stories. What gets me is Michael Jackson taking up all the space in the Washington Post’s main picture box. Its a big story, but is it the most important event in DC? Methinks not.
I actually agree with you, B. Minich. If I were the editor of the L.A. Times, I would have made the same editorial judgment, at least roughly. (Though I’d like to think there would be SOME story about Iran in there, perhaps above the Shaq trade.) This is more a broad commentary on the values of American society and American journalism in general — and, even more broadly, a bit of implicit grousing about human nature — than a criticism of the L.A. Times in particular. They just made a convenient foil. 🙂
It’s also relevant that there was no especially significant *new* news out of Iran yesterday, or at least no news could be confirmed independently. Trying to cover that story is a monumental newsgathering challenge, because it’s an incredibly important story that we have very limited ability to gather reliable information on. You obviously can’t trust what the regime says; just as obviously, you can’t trust something just because it’s posted on Twitter; and you can’t find out for yourself because the regime will arrest you if you try. Unfortunately, the mullahs pretty much have the world journalism establishment by the balls in this situation. It’s incredibly frustrating. Totalitarianism sucks.
I don’t think having this be the front page story for one day is all that bad, he was a huge pop culture icon around the world. His impact in the music industry and his success there was profound. Now if it keeps being the story day after day after day, well then we can talk. Plus it has the added benefit of bumping Jon and Kate off the news!
David: this is one of the few times I agree with you 100%. Especially with Jon and Kate. Who are they, and why do we care again?
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