Defending the Herald: Diane Patrick got it wrong--updated!

Finneran's folly

Dowd's bogus case for Kennedy

11 Comments

• aging cynic said:

  Good analysis Adam. It's the combination of smug superiority and appointments like the $120k/yr. real estate expert/neighbor without a job description, at a time when existing jobs are unfilled and people are being laid off, (I know whereof I speak). He told us he would be different. He isn't.

  January 7, 2009 6:00 PM

• Dan Kennedy said:

  Are you using "D. Patrick" to help us distinguish her from, uh, "D. Patrick"? ;-)

  January 7, 2009 6:43 PM

• Adam said:

  Hmm, good point about that useless first initial. I'd better revise...

  January 7, 2009 7:28 PM

• Ryan said:

  Are we really still talking about the Caddy and the Drapes?

  January 7, 2009 8:21 PM

• Hillary said:

  Hi Adam,

  Great post, and good to hear you on Michele McPhee. I just wanted to clarify one thing, I did mention that Patrick admitted his mistake at the time and made good on the Cadillac in my story today. The no comment from his office, of course, was on his wife's most recent statements.

  January 7, 2009 8:38 PM

• Adam said:

  Hillary, I apologize. It's too late for radio, obviously, but I'll rectify online.

  January 7, 2009 8:50 PM

• Buster Hyman said:

  To say the phrase "tricked out" is racist is like saying "Fat Albert" is an insult to overweight people. And blacks. Get over yourself, lady.

  Reclaim our nation's sense of humor!

  -- BH

  January 8, 2009 12:01 PM

• James said:

  Hmmm ... is she saying "tricked out" is itself racist, or that it was bigoted to describe the Caddy as "tricked out" when it actually wasn't? I can't say i've ever thought of the description as having any racial connotation. I do recall, with significant embarrassment, once using the phrase in a highly misguided attempt to compliment a colleague (at a Boston-based magazine where i once worked) who had come to work looking unusually dressy. I was certainly being an oaf, but i don't believe i was being racist, since the person in question was white.

  (Her tart response: "It makes me sound like a truck or something.")

  January 8, 2009 12:26 PM

• GL said:

  As a member of the hip hop generation and a member of the media... the term tricked out is a common term that is associated with black people and the lexicon of today's kids. That's how the First Lady interpreted.

  January 8, 2009 1:57 PM

• Hillary said:

  Ack! Sorry for the wicked late response, but thanks for your update Adam!

  H

  January 8, 2009 8:34 PM

• X. Globie said:

  It seems to me that the state's First Lady was mistaking "tricked out" with "pimped out" -- which itself would be a stretch to call racist, but less so.

  That said, Adam, your throwing in the stuff about drapes and furntiture seems unfair because Ms. Patrick didn't say the criticism of all those unwise purchases was racially tinged -- just the Herald's use of "tricked out."

  And for what it's worth, using the term tricked out kind of implied that Patrick was a gear head who gets greasy in the driveway tinkering with his ride. If anything, it was a downgrading of the First Family's CLASS, and not a comment on her race, that may have really bugged her. After all, look at their big fat houses, alma maters, and so forth. The Herald was, in my opinion, a bit casual with its word choice here, but not racist.

  January 9, 2009 3:31 PM

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