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Howie column ping—live from Florida!

Debacle doesn’t reverse Curse of Channel 7
By Howie Carr | Wednesday, April 23, 2008 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Columnists

The Curse of Channel 7 lives.

Its baaaaack . . . only this time, it isn’t sports anchors, or ex-anchors, or airhead reporters getting bagged for, respectively, drunken driving, kiddie porn or shoplifting.

This time it’s the non-head-turning blond, female general manager, screaming (what else?), “Do you know who the (bleep) I am?”

As a matter of fact, Randi Goldklank, very few of us knew who the bleep you were until yesterday morning. Even those of us who belong to Boston’s largest alumni association - the “Fired From 7 Club” - couldn’t have picked you out of a lineup.

But we can now, baby. You’re a legend in your own time. And as the old saying goes, people who become legends in their own time usually don’t have much time left.

She’s just another Sunbeam blow-in from Florida who drifted into 7 Bulfinch Place. Nobody knew anything about her, unless you could match boldface names with blind items in the Inside Track.

My favorite part of the police report is when they ask her how many drinks she’s had and she answers “about three dozen.”

Bob Gamere could not be reached for comment. But remember, his nickname was “Two Beer” and he got clipped.

Hey, so what if Randi got a bad ice cube - or 36.

“I’m a big shot in Boston and I’ll have your (bleeping) jobs.”

She’s lucky she wasn’t also charged with impersonating a Kennedy.

When I went to work at Channel 7, the oldtimers used to tell us that the station had been built on an old Indian burial ground, and that anyone who violated the consecrated land - meaning us - would be cursed. Hey, it sounded semibelievable. After all, there had to be some explanation for the wretched luck that kept befalling the station, year after year after decade.

Once they caught a break with a new young anchor named Chuck Scarborough. He went to No. 1, and then on the night the good news became official, he quit to move to New York. His explanation, which he has since confirmed to me, was classic Channel 7. “In this business,” he told a cameraman, “you gotta (bleep) them before they (bleep) you.”

Too late, Randi!

But since Ed Ansin bought the station, the curse of 7 Bulfinch Place seems to have receded. After all, Jeff Derderian quit and went to work in Rhode Island just before The Station nightclub fire that killed 100 people. Gerry Grant was long gone to San Antonio before he pleaded guilty to buying kiddie porn from the woman who later was paralyzed in the traditional unrelated shooting.

Paula Zahn had a semidecent run at CNN before fellow Ch. 7 alum Bill O’Reilly knocked her off and the tabloid headlines about her third-rate romances and low-rent rendezvous started appearing.

But lately, Channel 7 has been drooping. Channel 25 is the new Channel 7 - flashier, with hotter anchor cupcakes, which is all that really matters in local TV news anyway. The fact that 7 had to hire Linda Ergas from 25 to up their fading babe quotient tells you all you need to know about which way the wind is blowing.

And now La Goldklank has been caught looking for love in all the wrong places. She claims she was groped on her flight by a male passenger who seems not to have existed. Who knew D.B. Cooper was back flying the friendly skies again? And apparently at least one of her 36 cocktails was Love Potion No. 9.

“You think I’m cute and I think you’re cute,” she reportedly told a cop. “Just drive me home.”

They say history first repeats itself as tragedy, then as farce. At Channel 7, it’s farce and then more farce. And if you don’t believe me, just ask a certain dead Indian chief.
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1088972