BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud

Subject: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: SINSULL
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 08:50 AM

Last night, in Final Jeopardy, a contestant didn't have a clue to the answer and wrote "42". Trebek looked at him blankly and said "It must be some secret code." He didn't have a clue. And he works with trivia for a living. Wonder if he ever read a book or even watched a movie. It's easy to act superior when you have the answers written down for you.
Rant over.
SINS

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Rapparee
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:12 AM

I thought he was Canadian.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Charmion
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:22 AM

I'm sure he still has the passport, but he hasn't lived in Canada in a very long time. What's more, he's a Northern Ontario francophone, so I doubt that recherche anglo culture impinges on him much.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Rapparee
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:24 AM

Perhaps if the contestant had written "Quatorze-deux"?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 09:59 AM

I like the contestant, though! (Quarante-deux, that is...)

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: bobad
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:29 AM

"Trebek was born in Sudbury, Ontario, the son of Lucille (née Lagacé), a Franco-Ontarian, and George Edward Trebek, a Ukrainian-Canadian immigrant. He was educated at a Jesuit school before graduating from Toronto's Malvern Collegiate Institute in 1958, and later the University of Ottawa with a degree in philosophy. As a student at the University of Ottawa he was a member of the English Debating Society. Interested in a career in broadcast news, he began his broadcasting career working for the CBC as a newscaster and sportscaster. Trebek specialized in national news and covering a wide range of special events for the CBC's radio and television divisions, including curling[2] and horse racing.[3]"

Wikipedia

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: maeve
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:35 AM

I guess Alex Trebek isn't perfect. Who'd a thunk it? We enjoy his handling of the game and haven't felt he acts in a haughty way. There are many otherwise intelligent people who would not recognize that reference. I did- I enjoyed the books. My husband didn't- he didn't care for them.

maeve

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: MMario
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:36 AM

This is outrageous! Even if whasshisname didn't know it, the JUDGES should know that 42 is the answer to EVERY Question....

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: SINSULL
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:36 AM

LOL Canadian - that explains it.


CELLAR! SINS

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:45 AM

I think I have some intelligence and I haven't a clue what it refers to!

It bugs me when he mispronounces Latin, according to what Mrs. Worcester taught us, and he does seem a little snooty, but I still enjoy the show. I think he secretly wants more bells and whistles and a beautiful woman to turn over the clues so he can have more fun and lighten up.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:49 AM

It refers to something in that silly darned book "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". People either love it to death or they're just not interested. ;-) I fall into the latter category. And I'm Canadian.

What the contestant should have written was: "Shatner is all there is."

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Wyrd Sister
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:51 AM

But does he have a brain the size of a planet?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:58 AM

No........

But his body is beginning to approach that dimension.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: meself
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 10:59 AM

A "fraud"? You mean we were supposed to believe that Alex Trebek has a brain the size of a planet and actually has all those facts just sitting there waiting to be called upon? Call me skeptical, but I always assumed he is just a suave guy whose job is to read answers off a piece of paper, and to keep the show rolling along.

It's easy to act superior when you happen to know some incosequential bit of trivia that someone else doesn't know, or has forgotten.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 11:21 AM

I gave up on Jeopardy long ago. I am now hooked on Cash Cab. At first I thought it was the dumbest idea I had ever ever heard but its really a funny show AND Ben Bailey would know 42, I guarantee................Try it!


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 11:30 AM

I might add...it was Mr Shatner I was referring to above, not Alex Trebek. I've never even seen Alex Trebek. I didn't know he existed till today.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Bill D
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 11:40 AM

Long before "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", the ***answer*** to stuff like 'the meaning of life' was "a three-legged kettle"...(and several other items like 'a fountain'.) But those never got into a cult book....

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: MMario
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 12:42 PM

But Bill - we are now in the century of the anchovy...time moves on...

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 01:22 PM

Ah, but he doesn't carry a towel, so how could he be expected to know the reference? (Never read the book, enjoyed the electronic show.:-)

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Don Firth
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 01:51 PM

For those few who have never read the book and/or were vacationing on the third moon of Acturus IV when the radio and television dramatizations were aired.

From Douglas Adam's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (I don't have the book in front of me at the moment, so I am paraphrasing as I remember it):

The question is put to "Deep Thought," the most powerful computer ever built, "What is the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything?"

Deep Thought hums a lot and its lights flash frantically—for seven years. At the end of that time, it says "42."

Those who asked the question say, "I don't understand the answer."

Deep Thought responds by saying, "No. You don't understand the question!"

At the very end, our two protagonists, Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect find a carving in a stone that says

6 x 9 = 42

They absorb this for several minutes, then as they are walking away, one says to the other, "You know, I always thought there was something fundamentally wrong with the universe."

So—if one keeps this in mind and if one knows where one's towel is, one should be able to muddle through reasonably well

Words to live by.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: gnu
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 02:11 PM

Wrong... it's two fifths of five eigths of fuck all. Jeepers!

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Don Firth
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 02:20 PM

Pardon me. Deep Thought pondered the question for 7 1/2 million years, not just seven years.

(Misplaced my towel for a moment. . . .)

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: wysiwyg
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 02:53 PM

Trebek is a TV show host, not a trivia expert personally.

Bert Convy wasn't a great Password player, but was a great host. Bert Parks wasn't Miss America, either....

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: SINSULL
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 03:02 PM

Wait a minute!!!! Are you all trying to tell me that Vanna White can't spell??????? Oh the Humanity!





Get the reference?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: bankley
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 03:15 PM

but Howie Mandel has a lot of cute women on his show... even if he has less hair than Trebek

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 03:26 PM

A girl from my home town in Virginia used to research and write the answers for Jeopardy. She went to Cali to work in television or movies or some such and that is the job she landed.   I think that would be a great job. What fun.

I know what 42 is too. A rodent told me.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: HuwG
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 03:31 PM

Not knowing who on Earth Alex Trebek is or why his supposed ignorance should generate such ire, I will give the example of my father as defence.

My Dad, in his later years, taught IT at a private school. Partly for reasons connected with his work and partly for his own interest, he contributed to a usenet group with "42" in the title.

He contributed articles, participated in discussions, and generally became a known member of the newsgroup, and was asked for his opinion on several subjects. Then he made the mistake of asking, "Why 42?" His inbox was deluged with explanations, and even more abuse. He confessed his woes to me, and I was happy to oblige with a few radio and BBC episodes. He commented, "I still don't get it, but I like the banjo chords."

Ignorance is bliss sometimes. Knowledge is power, only if you're an idiot savant.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Bill Hahn//\\
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 03:43 PM

Alex Trebek is a bore---- and that requires a certain talent to be boring some 5 times a day to tape the shows so as to make the show and the contestants the center of attention.

The only thing that bothers me is the new format, set, and his enthusiasm for a big winner which is usually peanuts compared to his pay.

Frankly, the only intelligent quiz show on TV--not the tripe of Millionaire, Price is Right, Anything with Howie Mandel.

For a terrific radio quize show with great humor---NPRs Wait Wait Don't tell Me.

Bill Hahn

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: SINSULL
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 03:48 PM

i was joking. this whole thread is supposed to be humorous. SIGH!


I do like Wait Wait Don't tell Me but I am also amused by the car guys.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Little Hawk
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 04:02 PM

"I know what 42 is too. A rodent told me."

Corridus?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: pdq
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 04:11 PM

42?

A relative of Kiefer Sutherland?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: gnu
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 04:46 PM

Yet another Canuck? Must you?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: gnu
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 04:52 PM

Here's yet another one... with a game show.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Ed T
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 08:23 PM

In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, 42 was the ultimate answer to Life, the Universe and Everything.


Or, maybe he meant this?

http://www.betemunah.org/fortytwo.html

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: robomatic
Date: 22 Sep 09 - 11:24 PM

Saturday Night Live did several skits with the continuing theme of a showdown between Trebek and a drunk blasphemous Sean Connery (way hammed up by Darrel Hammond). They have no redeeming social value and are hilarious.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: DougR
Date: 23 Sep 09 - 01:18 AM

Hang him.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: GUEST,Chongo Chimp
Date: 23 Sep 09 - 01:50 AM

Throw poop at him.

- Chongo

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: SINSULL
Date: 23 Sep 09 - 08:33 AM

Threeve.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Art Thieme
Date: 23 Sep 09 - 05:48 PM

I don't think he is Freud. I also doubt he ever thought he was him.

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: gnu
Date: 23 Sep 09 - 05:58 PM

A slip up?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: GUEST,Guest_Alex_Trebek
Date: 23 Sep 09 - 09:07 PM

Well and I always spoke so highly of you folks. One of the answers I once gave was .. "It is the name of the famous folk music website"

and yes it was 47

and here you are ... Mary ... talking smack about me ... OH ... I am so shocked











LOL
gotcha .. olddude !!

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: SINSULL
Date: 24 Sep 09 - 08:04 AM

My point exactly, Alex. The answer is "42".

Really hit your head when you fell off that bike, eh, Dude?

Subject: RE: BS: Alex Trebek is a Fraud
From: Mooh
Date: 24 Sep 09 - 10:03 AM

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrases_from_The_Hitchhiker%27s_Guide_to_the_Galaxy

..was the first thing that came up when I Googled 42.

Will you still need me,
Will you still feed me,
When I'm 42?

Peace, Mooh.