I'm no authority on whether or not people should care about the boy and balloon story but I do know that they DO care. People often do care about other people, especially kids. Apparently Arianna is having one of those moments that occasionally befall media figures wherein they say something oh so outrageous (Joe Biden should resign!) to get attention and is annoyed that her attention quota is being usurped.

Arrianna Huffington has become a major pain in the ass. Now she is criticizing Ed Shultz for his programming. Have you checked out the garbage on her site lately?

She has also become the leader of the lefty whiners.

"I want Obama to get my agenda done! Now! Waaaaaahh!"

I am sick of this crap. Our President is multi-tasking our way out of the Bush debacle, He has been at it for 10 months!

I am quite sure that Arrianna's program here is to splash big headlines on her website, feature some nudity, and then go on the media and be the big whiner-bitch. It's a sure-fire way to get MSM attention and make mucho mas dinero.

Don't bother to post any criticism on her site. Her army of free speech advocates will vaporize it.

I've noticed her headlines are way over the top lately and it's true that she's constantly in complain mode. I rarely read anything that she herself writes on the huffington post because I already know where she's going. That Biden should resign bullshit kinda sealed it. It's become quite old!

Regardless of what you might think about Arianna (I wouldn't be doing this were it not for her giving me a shot), the fact remains that this balloon boy story didn't deserve wall-to-wall coverage. Balloon Boy won't solve healthcare or fix the economy.

Jon Stewart will be all over this soon.

Bob

The idea of a little boy in a balloon had a lot of people (our paranoid voters) nearly hysterical. My mother-in-law was almost in tears.

Was it a publicity stunt? Like landing on an aircraft carrier with a sock in your flight suit?

(I will still go to the Huffington site when you post).

I wouldn't be Bob's Awesome Blog if it weren't for Arianna, so I'm not going to talk smack about her.

And quite frankly, I agree with Arianna and Bob. There's alot of other issues that are much more newsworthy and deserve wall-to-wall coverage.

The insurance cartel is one that comes to mind....

@ lovetheblue

How does Arianna Limbaugh get a pass on criticism?

I get her point, but she shouldn't talk about running useless stories.

I agree that the news all too often goes nuts over undeserving stories like car chases or celebrity deaths. But I think this story did deserve a lot of coverage. A small boy in a balloon thousands of feet in the air really is news. Thank goodness he really wasn't in it, but until we knew he was fine I was very upset and kept checking back to see if he was safe.

I also think it is ludicrous for Adrianna to be calling out anyone for stupid news stories. She relies on awful celebrity stories and overblown headlines to draw traffic to her site. She is becoming Drudge with good graphics. Her favorite headlines are often about HER. "Joe Biden Should Resign" is a very puke-worthy headline.

I come to this blog and others to get away from Huffington Post. It does have good opinion pieces, like yours Bob, but I cannot stand the tabloid style it has adopted.

@ Hielo

HuffPo annoys me at times; she annoys me at times - I just wanted to state that I agree with her and Bob on the overkill.

As I said, if it weren't for HuffPo I never would have discovered this Awesome Blog and kept my sanity during the election months.

I'm counting on Bob to help me keep my sanity while President Obama is in office.....

@ lovetheblue

I don't know what "overkill" means these days. The "news cycles" will drive you nuts on the MSM. I only watch MSNBC and my computer.

We definitely agree about the incredibly lucid stuff that Bob delivers.

It also appears that most of the bloggers tonight agree with my assessment of Arianna. ( I was, at one time, a big fan).

I say all Eve says exactly - so I will "leave it there".

While I am critical of Huffpo and Arianna, I still admire her. Even if I much preferred Huffpo before it became a celebrity magazine, Arianna is a very successful internet entrepreneur.

I don't normally have a problem with Arianna and I did find affinity with Sir Cesca on Huffpo.
BUT, Huffpo is slowly disintegrating into a tabloid rag site with misleading headlines and silly stories, AND,why did Arianna feel she needed to do the Joe Biden thing and take it to CNN to boot. A tad precocious and out of line perhaps? However, she has been bitching forever on the bailouts,banks and Wall Street set, etc etc.
She needs to get to the business of checking on Huffpo a bit more diligently, than going around being so overcritical and hearing herself talk.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't see how this was worthy of coverage to begin with. Maybe a 30 second mention and a "we'll let you know when we hear something" before throwing to commercial would have been sufficient.

@Hielo - Yeah, the comment deletion on Huffingtonpost is pretty weak, but since the 1st Amendment only forbids the government from abridging free speech, I guess that's her perogative.

Also, that's a great point you made about the type of stuff that's been appearing on her site lately. Pretty hypocritical of her. I went there today and the 2nd most popular story was "Shauna Sands' raunchy sex tape" or some bullshit. Apparently that's newsworthy because she used to be married to Lorenzo Lamas. The problem is, nobody knows who the fuck Lorenzo Lamas is either. They're posting the type of stories you'd see on TMZ about some random celebrity getting nailed on camera.

I guess that's the way the news outlets work now...whether any of us like it or not, people of all political persuasions seem to care about some kid named "Falcon" going missing and random gals getting nailed on camera.

@ Rogect8

I really hate to see the HP trashed just to add traffic. It was number 2 under Bob Cesca on my bookmarks (Apple). Now it is gone.

I have this very uneasy feeling that Arianna has caught the Limbaugh flu.

Capitalism can make a buzzard puke when that happens.

I thought it was all about the Seinfeld episode "The Bubble Boy" for a couple hours.

Then I wondered what kind of family has a balloon designed for quick get-aways moored in their back yard? With no safety devices to keep kids out? Ready to go at a moment's notice?
The problem was that no one asked the "tough" questions.

I have been saying the same things about Arianna as others on here.

I am sorry, she can't say anything about The Ed Show. Her publication has been pretty problematic and Drudge like for a while.

I can't her seriously. There are a few writers that I will read on there, but my visits are few and far.

I'm surprised that anyone is surprised by the amount of coverage. For one thing, by today's metrics, this certainly deserved as much if not more coverage than Jon & Kate. Second, does no one remember Baby Jessica? Long before 24 hour news or blogs or obsessions with "news cycles", that was wall-to-wall nonstop coverage of...a hole in the ground.

Plus, this backlash really is a case of Monday morning quarterbacking--if that boy had been in there, or really had fallen out to his death, no one would be bashing the coverage in this way.

I for one cannot believe that Ed had this hysterical bullshit on his show. Let Wolfie drone on in his so-called situation room as he did even after the boy was found. Ed should realize that we have more serious matters to discuss. Ariana was right on! Get it together Ed.