Only in ESPNland can Neil Boortz, Terrence Moore, Selena Roberts, and a jock, Terrence Mathis, be gathered and touted as an authoritative panel for a "town hall" meeting in Atlanta where the main topic is Michael Vick.

Boortz is a pro-Iraq War, pro-Patriot Act zealot. Moore is a black sports journalist who writes for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. His, straight off the plantation house negro, anti-black people rants in the form of AJC commentaries and ESPN television appearances relative to the Vick case are the stuff of legend. Terrence Mathis? Ummm, sure, whatever. And Selena Roberts of the New York Times has contributed exactly how many important pieces about Michael Vick and the investigation into Vick's participation into dog fighting? Well, she wrote a 917-word commentary about pit bulls, dog fighting, and athletes. Let me clarify that. She wrote about black athletes with a nod to Jay-Z. Roberts also wrote an 830-word commentary about Michael Vick, his friends and how many athletes like Vick surround themselves with people who have known them since their childhoods. In other words, Selena Roberts contributed next-to-nothing of worth to the Vick-dog fighting conversation. If you read her two commentaries you will find that she has actually provided her audience nothing of worth concerning Vick.

Perhaps this quote town hall meeting should be held in the Disney-created and once-Disney owned town of Celebration, Florida. It is a town built in the spirit of the alleged pursuit of perfection. Like the Vick town hall meeting, Celebration is perfect - perfectly dysfunctional. Only a Disney product - ESPN - could actually believe any good will come from what can only be a propaganda-filled production.

This dysfunction is borne out in the fact that, until informed by outside sources, some writers from ESPN.com had no idea that the television arm of ESPN is holding a town hall-type meeting. Maybe the din of the wailing in objection over the panel guests would have been too much for the management at the ESPN enterprises to handle.

After all, what good can come from this meeting?

The guests will provide a gawking television audience with overblown depictions of Vick in a sure attempt to reduce him to a "thing" lower on the evolutionary tree than any Simian primate. The panel will depict all black people who cried out for temperance rather than an automatic judgment of Vick's guilt before the facts of the investigation were known as a monolithic voice of unthinking emotional reactionaries in the tried-and-true tradition of loaded racist verbiage. There will be side discussions about various athletes who defended Vick and, in their rabies-laden eyes, downplayed dog fighting; side discussions about athletes - black athletes - in general and dog fighting. Perhaps the panelists will try to make a "cultural connection" to the rural South, black people, and dog fighting. 

The goal will be to render moot all voices that hoped to provide a broader context by which we can view the Vick investigation and case. Most of the panelists will deny that there were elements of racism in the reportage of the investigation and subsequent case. Any overtures made implying that race did play a factor in the reporting of Vick will be met with derision. Should cultural differences concerning the treatment of dogs be brought to light, they will be quickly and summarily extinguished with a jingoistic contrast between third-world countries and highly-developed countries like the United States and those of Europe. It will be made clear that WE do not engage in those types of activities because WE are a land of mostly civil people. And "people" is the correct identifier, not peoples.

And if there are any protestations from Mathis, they will be subordinated by the "authorities" Boortz, Moore, and Roberts.

This will be the tone and the probable subject matter of the town hall meeting. ESPN will have once again secured its place as the purveyor of all that is good and wholesome about sports. It will reinforce the image that there will be no swell of a negative undercurrent within the sporting segment of America under the vigilant, watchful eye of the Worldwide Leader in Sports.

Some see this town hall meeting as being held a month too late. But in actuality, the timing could not be any more perfect. The powers that be at ESPN waited patiently to put on this ruse of an event. They carefully measured the sporting nation's temperature for its sentiment about the Vick case before putting such a biased ruse before the American people. They hope this event acts as an effective end game gambit to entrap and mute any future voices that draw parallels between the media's treatment of Vick and that of other black athletes.

ESPN feels it began the comprehensive coverage of the Vick affair when Kelly Naqi conducted the now-infamous interview with the anonymous informant who tied Vick to dog fighting. They tugged at the public's heartstrings, manipulated conversation, and never took an opposite tack on the affair, if for nothing else, to provide the semblance of balance in conveying the issues in and around the investigation. They continued pounding the 'Vick is guilty' drumbeat in the face of their own reporter's pronouncement that the Atlanta Falcons quarterback would not be indicted by federal investigators. As it turned out, by hook or by crook, they were correct. 

And the panel member lineup at the town hall meeting in Atlanta is the in your face dunk letting America know just how good it feels to be the worldwide leader of propaganda in sports.