Posted by Following the pattern of many chicken-little, over the top predictions which never come to fruition, word came down yesterday that Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch will NOT be auctioned off after-all. SHOCK! Not.
McMillan is quoted in the Associated Press (AP) saying Jackson has reached a "confidential agreement with Fortress Investment Group" concerning the property.
"Neverland and MJ are fine", {tag L. Londell McMillan} said Thursday.
At least one news outlet is already ridiculously characterizing it as an “11th hour deal” which “saved Neverland”. Moreover, it seems like a bunch of people who previously ran off at the mouth are now trying to backtrack on the story; explaining it away in the most negative terms possible instead of just saying ‘Hey, we jumped to conclusions and made assumptions we shouldn’t have’.
What seems to make the most sense about this whole story is that Jackson was in the middle of dealing with this situation when someone took it upon themselves to try to publicly embarrass him or tried to thwart whatever financial deal Jackson’s people were working on to get this situation squared away.
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“Neverland and MJ are fine”
– L. Londell McMillan
Remember all the internet hysteria surrounding the possibility of Neverland being auctioned off a few weeks ago? Remember all the asinine jokes from nameless blogs and their ‘you too could own a piece of jacko’ posts? Remember how many internet sites and a few cable outlets picked up that story and ran around the room screaming as if it were a certainty? I do.
I’m sure the recent news is not what know-nothing glorified gossip columnists expected or wanted to happen. The question is why didn’t "they" see this coming before proclaiming the demise of Neverland while trying to be all up in Jackson’s financial kool-aid without knowing the flavor?
How many times has it happened where someone will absolutely revel with dreaded certainty in an allegedly grave situation, only later to change their tune and act like they knew it all along without admitting for a minute that the initial chicken-little report was at the very least one-sided in nature?
As I reported in MJEOL Bullet#327 (Hateful Revelry over Neverland Delayed:”Hateful Revelry over Neverland Delayed”:https://site2.mjeol.com/mjeol-bullet/hateful-revelry-over-neverland-delayed-mb-327-3.html ), 2008 marks the 7th year (at least) that certain news agencies have carried reports about Jackson being on the brink of some illusionary financial abyss. Certain media howler monkeys have been whining about what’s in Jackson’s pockets since long ago.
According to one borderline report from the BBC:”BBC(BBC report, if not entirely accurate, quotes Matt Fiddes)”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7295101.stm – itself making the unfounded and unconfirmed assumption that Jackson’s Neverland was “closed” in 2006 “after Mr. Jackson failed to pay its staff” – Matt Fiddes called the Neverland reports “exaggerated”.
Fiddes, a family friend, is quoted as saying, “I know for a fact that he wasn’t going to lose it… It’s not a problem – Michael’s keeping Neverland.”
Jackson himself will get his own situation straightened out, assuming there is anything to straighten out now. Again, as you read in Bullet#327, many people forget that Jackson may be still working to correct years worth of mismanagement by former employees and outright thievery by crooks who gained unfettered access to his funds.
Though, whatever he has to deal with, it’s HIS business to deal with it and not the business of endless numbers of lookey-loos pretending like they know what they’re talking about.
The 2700 acres of contiguous, prime California land was purchased by Jackson back in the late 1980s and turned into one of the most splendid pieces of property in existence.
But gone are the days of peaceful tranquility and free-everything for thousands of underprivileged, terminally ill kids and their parents.
Jackson hasn’t lived at Neverland since his acquittal on false allegations of molestation back in 2005 and as times goes on, it becomes less like that Neverland, in it’s pre-2003 form – pre-Bashir, pre-Arvizos, pre-media storm — will ever exist again.
Isn’t that what the collective media and know-nothing critics wanted anyway?