The Bureau Of Labor Statistics Scoops The Press

WATCH: Wrongfully Accused Elvis Impersonator Sing On CNN

Kevin Curtis, the Elvis impersonator wrongfully accused of mailing ricin-laced letters to Barack Obama and Senator Roger Wicker, had a long interview with Chris Cuomo on CNN which culminated with Curtis serenading Cuomo with a Randy Travis cover.

ESPN Hires Robert Lipsyte As New Ombudsman

Why did ESPN hire one of its most prominent critics to be its ombudsman?

Marc Tracy, co-editor of Jewish Jocks and writer for The New Republic, got an exclusive interview with ESPN’s new ombudsman, Robert Lipsyte, that was published Tuesday. In the interview, Lipsyte, a longtime sportswriter for the New York Times, dished candidly about his concerns about “the Worldwide Leader” and made clear that he won’t be pulling punches.

As Tracy notes:

Lipsyte, who has contributed to The New Republic, told me that he is fairly sure of what his central theme will be: “the interface of ESPN’s fiduciary relationship with the leagues and its commitment to coverage, to journalism.” In other words: conflict of interest. “I’ve spent 50-odd years in the business, believing that sports is one of the main currencies of communication in America, and still an important moral and social crucible, and that the media is critically important in the way it presents that,” he told me. “So here you have the most important presentation and media organization—and they both happen to be the same entity.”

While Tracy is somewhat skeptical of this—he thinks Lipsyte should be as concerned about the poor quality of some of ESPN’s journalism (i.e. Skip Bayless) as conflict of interests but others have fewer qualms.

WATCH: Barack Obama Threatens To Get A Tattoo

In an interview with Savannah Guthrie of NBC’s Today Show, Barack Obama shared his parenting wisdom about how the President and the First Lady plan on discouraging their daughters from getting tattoos. He said “What we’ve said to the girls is that ‘If you guys ever decide to get a tattoo, then Mommy and me will get the exact same tattoo, in the same place, and we’ll go on YouTube and show it off as a family tattoo.”

Did The Media Neglect The Texas Fertilizer Plant Explosion?

Last week, the Boston Marathon bombings dominated news. From the explosions on the finish line on Patriots Day through Friday’s dramatic manhunt, it was the biggest news event of the week. But it wasn’t the most deadly one.

While four people died as the result of the Tsarnaev brothers’ terrorist rampage (three victims from the bombings as well as MIT police officer Sean Collier who was murdered in cold blood on Thursday night), the explosion of a fertilizer plant in West, Texas last week killed 14, many of whom were first responders.

But not only did West, Texas receive less coverage, there was also less media outrage focused on the explosion. While countless ink has spilled wondering whose intelligence failure led to the Tsarnaev brothers going undetected by U.S. intelligence agencies, there has been far less focus on the Texas explosion so big that it registered on seismometers. As Mike Elk rages in the Washington Post:

The plant had 1,350 times the legally allowed amount of highly explosive ammonium nitrate, yet hadn’t informed the Department of Homeland Security of the danger. Likewise, the fertilizer plant did not have sprinklers, shut-off valves, fire alarms or legally required blast walls, all of which could have prevented the catastrophic damage done. And there was little chance that regulators would learn about the problems without the company reporting them: Not only had the Occupational Safety and Health Administration not inspected the plant since 1985 but also, because of underfunding, OSHA can inspect plants like the one in West on average only once every 129 years.