CNN Ali Velshi's Mean Twitter Tweets Stop: Ali Says Feud Over

A weird kind of feud with CNN's Ali Velshi that I never started is over. And the whole deal resulted in a tweet that was an acknowledged an error on his part, and another one expressing a plan to meet at 21 Club in New York, where this video-blogger will enjoy drinks with CNN's business anchor.

It started when - as I explained here - I simply sent a Twitter tweet that a guest Ali had on his Saturday show was long winded, and talked over Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter.

Ali responded in a tweet-testy way, asking who made me the timekeeper. I tweeted back that I did, and decided to use the tweets as a lesson in social media.

On Sunday, after my epic blog post on this matter, and airing some issues with how CNN tends to not present black pundits, I learned that Ali was involved in a bit of a Twitter snit with a 99ers blogger named "Paladenette," who just happens to blog at Zennie62.com, and that I didn't know about before. (If you don't know, 99ers are those who need unemployment insurance beyond the 99 day limit.)

So, I sent Ali this tweet:

@zennie62 Zennie Abraham
@AliVelshi @paladinette But that's the point, Ali, I don't have ANYTHING against you. You just went off! No good reason
17 hours ago

To which Ali responded back with this:

@AliVelshi Ali Velshi
@zennie62 I got you, Zennie. I grant you a SuperBowl Sunday pardon :-)
17 hours ago

And at that point, I proposed we meet at my favorite restaurant in America: The 21 Club, at 21 West 52nd Street, in New York City.

@AliVelshi Ali Velshi
@zennie62 ok deal - next time we're in the same place, drinks on me (if you don't mind having a racist buy you a drink :-( )
17 hours ago

As I tweeted, I don't think Ali's racist, and my post was more complicated that that by far. I think there are still race-based issues to talk about with how blacks are presented on television. To put it simply, when an expert on something is needed, the pundit tends to be white, and we hear and see blacks still more often than not on black issues.

That's why ESPN is a refreshing change. Because they call on athletes as anchors, regardless of color, you get a wide range of views. And ESPN's not afraid to take on the issue of "the black athlete."

I think CNN has good intentions, but there's this issue I have of CNN all too often having blacks as "window dressing" rather than as engaging participants on a panel. Sometimes that's the fault of the black participant, waiting to be asked a question. And waiting.

But in the case of an elected official, you don't make them wait, you make sure they get a chance to talk, even if you have to draw them out. That's just protocol.

Well, that aside, the overall lesson was in how to develop buzz and content. This matter started to pick up traction because Ali's a public figure, and to a lesser extent so am I. Personally, I think we should have played out the feud for ratings.

21 Club, here we come!