"It's a shame. He took over management in 2008 and he turned the team around, getting into the playoffs..."

"... but they just can't win in the playoffs. That's very important. That's baseball. They say that about all kinds of things, but when a team does not advance, then it's management. I'm sad for Dusty, because I think this will be the end of his career. He had that heart attack last season, and he's 65 or 64, and now, if you'll excuse me, I have things I need to know, like 5 things I need to know about Jodie Foster's new girlfriend."

That's what Meade said when I requested a quote on the occasion of the Cincinnati Reds firing Dusty Baker. Meade, who moved to Madison from Cincinnati, has been a Reds fan since 1972, when the Reds were in the World Series and — Meade starts talking again — "they were just an exciting team. That was the beginning of The Big Red Machine. Probably what really drew me to them in 1972 was Pete Rose. I kind of hated him, but I was fascinated by him."

"So have you learned anything about Jodie Foster's new girlfriend?"

"Yeah, she's Ellen DeGeneres's old girlfriend...."

"Anything else?"

"She's tall, dark, and handsome."

"That might offend people. Is that in the article?"

"Yeah. No."

Jodie Foster's Golden Globes speech isn't nutty or incoherent.

That's my working theory. Maybe you disagree. Transcript here. Highlights:

"So while I’m here being all confessional, I guess I have a sudden urge to say something that I’ve never really been able to air in public.... I am single. Yes I am, I am single...."

That is, she rejects the yep-I'm-gay routine. She's not being all confessional, like these other people.

"... But now I’m told, apparently that every celebrity is expected to honor the details of their private life with a press conference, a fragrance and a prime-time reality show.....

"But seriously, if you had been a public figure from the time that you were a toddler, if you’d had to fight for a life that felt real and honest and normal against all odds, then maybe you too might value privacy above all else. Privacy.  Some day, in the future, people will look back and remember how beautiful it once was."

Well said. That's rather old-fashioned and not what the pop-culture media have been telling us is the right way to be these days.

ADDED: Andrew Sullivan says: "What unadulterated bullshit."