The Horror, the HORROR!!

Nevermind the wars, the economic collapse or even the imminent (OMG) maybe-it's-a-satellite-maybe-it's-a-nuke (SHRIEK! WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!) rocket launch by North Korea, Japan's largest national daily newspaper, the biggest newspaper in the world, knows horror and know what kind of information its 10 million readers crave:

School baseball player insulted rivals on blog
The Yomiuri Shimbun
A high school student who participated in the current National High School Invitational Baseball Tournament posted comments insulting one of his team's opponents on his blog, prompting complaints to be made to his school, it has been learned.
Though the student quickly deleted the comments, the manager of his baseball team said the school was considering apologizing to the rival team and reporting the matter to the Japan High School Baseball Federation.
According to the school and its baseball team, the student posted insulting comments about his opponents, such as: "They all look ugly. (Laugh out loud)." and "They look like they're from the Showa era [1926-1989]."
His school received several complaints by e-mail on the day of the game and afterward, one of which said the comments were inconsiderate.

Heavens to Mugatroid, someone is being mean on the Internets! We must alert the populace! Won't someone think of the children?

Ask not why the humble inkstained wretch drinks, ask why it doesn't drink more.

UPDATE: Stop the presses! We have a scoop! Breaking news! Read all about it! Extra! Extra! Knob says something mean and stupid on the Internet! Oh my stars and garters, will this unendurable horror never end? Someone push me toward the couch, I feel faint!

Asahi Shimbun employee posted offensive remarks

The Yomiuri Shimbun
A 49-year-old male employee of The Asahi Shimbun's Tokyo headquarters posted discriminatory remarks about historically marginalized communities on an Internet bulletin board, the newspaper company said Tuesday.
According to the company, the employee, from the editorial bureau's proofreading department, repeatedly posted messages seen as encouraging discrimination against marginalized communities and people with mental disorders on the popular online bulletin board "2 channel." All of his messages were composed and posted using a company computer during working hours.
A spokesperson for the company said the man had admitted to writing the messages after his postings had drawn attention from readers of the bulletin board.
"[The tone of the postings] intensified during an exchange with another person. I've done something bad," the man was quoted as saying during an internal investigation.

(Sniff, sniff) Can you smell that? It smells like ......Pulitzer!

And we wonder why circulation is dropping. I've checked the gauges and the dipstick and I think I'm down a quart -- pass the scotch.