By EDUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
BROWNSVILLE, Texas | For a brief boring moment in town, it was the volatile story of the decade here. HUGE scandal at Texas Southmost College! Like, one more fact and the institution would crash to the ground. That was the promise offered daily by retired, aging bloggers El Jerry McHale and Jimmy Barton.
Nothing came of it.
The trouble/problem/crap going at in the college's welding program seems to have fizzled.
The boys didn't have the legs to stretch that bunt right back to the pitcher into a single. TSC is still standing.
It's been almost a week and neither excitable blogger has come forth with another breathless report on why the TSC welding certificate is meaningless. (Education is never meaningless.)
Yesterday, 73-year-old Blogger El Jerry updated the saga by now praising TSC Trustee Tony Zavaleta, the same trustee he had horse-collared for days on end, calling him a "Zit" and adding that all Tony was was a "seeing-eye dog" for TSC Chair Adela Garza.
Yesterday, a likely remorseful (or still mischievous) El Jerry labeled Tony Zavaleta a much-admired human being and a "Renaissance" man. Go figure. The effects of what medicine? Yeah.
As for lesser typist Barton, well, he went on to inform his dwindling readership how some people measure the height of mountains (there is not one mountain for hundreds of miles from here). And then the unemployed 75-year-old house husband charged out of the chute like a crazed banshee one more time to take TSC President Dr. Jesus Rodriguez to task for daring to hire an assistant from the Rio Grande Valley and not from New York.
Barton does not have a college degree, Dr. Rodriguez has several.
It is the let-down of the year! Readers expected some police raids, an arrest or two and some indictments, fer chrissakes. Nothing of the sort has happened.
TSC buckled down and went about its business. If there is a problem with the welding program, well, they're dealing with it internally.
The bloggers tucked their tails between their legs and ambled off lamely.
Neither has serious experience as news reporters, El Jerry one measly year as a sportswriter for The Herald, balding Barton years as grocery store cashier/bagger, a motel clerk and a shrimp boat unloader. They just didn't know how to handle it, how to work the sources, how to pressure TSC administrators, how to keep the story fluid, how to connect the fuckin' dots!
In the end, El Jerry and his tonto Barton simply did not have the skill.
So much for high (anxiety) excitement in The City That Always Sleeps...
-30-
[EDITOR'S NOTE:...Photo of substandard bloggers El Jerry and Jimmy Barton above was taken like 10 years ago. But it shows them together, so...]
Ouch. But to be expected. These Bloggers do this all the time, especially Barton who has no formal education. Groan.
ReplyDeleteI do believe there was something to report, only it required a bit of thought & leg work. These bloggers did not wish to exert themselves. They are used to covering the very top layer of a story and winging it. A photo and headline often does it for them, or a string of hollow paragraphs and that's that. Sad, I know...
ReplyDeleteThere are no credentials needed for blogging. That's the problem.
ReplyDeleteThese bloggers, like most others, have no pride in their work. They just throw out crap willy-nilly. That's why only idiots stay with them.
DeleteNot familiar with those bloggers. I live in McAllen. But your post is damning. Poor dudes. They are made to look like clowns, idiots almost. LOL
ReplyDeleteno sympathy here. They act tough and then they go out like pussies. Always. never fails.
DeleteSo, Jim Barton is a house husband? His wife works and he doesn't? LMFAO!!!!
ReplyDeleteHe's 75-plus years old! Where's he going to apply for work? 75 is just about gone, isn't it? Just saying.
DeleteHe's never had a job that wasn't minimum wage, is what they say about Barton. He was of draft age during the Vietnam war, but he didn't serve. Why not, Jimmy Boy?
DeleteWe have grown tired of asking Barton why he didn't serve his country (he was of age for Vietnam), but he won't answer. And we've asked him why his family moved from the state of Washington to Brownsville when he was 18 years old and, again, he won't answer. Must be something there, in both cases...
DeletePeople don't answer questions for a reason - they want to hide from them! Saying for a friend.
ReplyDeleteEcho that.
DeleteBlogging died like 10 years ago and no one told you guys. What's the point? Brownsville bloggers are liars. Untrustworthy and sometimes sick. This one at least has some intelligence you don't see in the others. But who blogs anymore?
ReplyDeleteBrownsville Blogger Jim Barton hasn't had a paying job in 25 years! Blogging is the height of his existence. He's a do-nothing, unaccomplished loser who donated his wife Nena's body to science. Heh heh. No funeral expenses, Jim? You don't even know where she went!
DeleteThat's wild? Was she Hispanic? I've never heard it happening in the Hispanic community. Where do you hand over the body? How much cash do you get? Crazy stuff. I mean, your wife?
DeletePoor guy. I say leave him alone. he's 75.
DeleteThat would be for the best, yes. I actually pity Jimmy Barton. It must be some kind of Hell to think back to the day he handed his dead wife's body to science. I couldn't do it. We wish him the best battling that kind of regret...
DeleteNo football news this weekend?
ReplyDeleteThere are some good games, like Texas vs. OU and Colorado vs. one of the Arizona schools. We'll wait on the playoffs. Mid-season games are usually boring. Plus, we're also not doing much with the NFL, which we believe is rigged...
DeleteI hear you on the NFL. Weird stuff going on.
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