I'm only sure of three things Rupert Murdoch has done worthy of kudos. He gave us The Simpsons, he sold the Dodgers, and now he won't sell O.J.'s book.
Those three great civic acts span many years. If even a stuck clock is right twice a day, it's worth inquiring what else Murdoch has been doing all this time. But I won't retrace others' footsteps.
That sound you heard Monday was tens of millions of people exhaling, feeling maybe there is some justice. Some.
Last week, we heard that this Simpson media megaevent was coming. We recoiled, then we read more, then we mulled, got angry, talked it up, and checked our calendars to set aside time to watch this unmissable, evil spectacle. How could you not? (At least you knew you'd read about the substance.)
You had to think of the Martin Bashir documentary on Michael Jackson from 2003, when Michael proclaimed his ongoing love for sleeping with young boys. His half-hearted self-correction ("it's not sexual; we're going to sleep") hardly washed away the shock. He was guilty and proud.
So now what would you expect from Simpson? Was it to be the same sort of thing?
Guilty with an explanation, or maybe some new mitigating circumstances?
Not guilty, still, but willing to waste two nights of prime time to mug and chuckle about golf? Would he have news about his search for "the real killer?"
Or would Simpson just put it out there -- guilty with all the gory details, because that's the only marketable commodity he had left after a dozen years? That was my bet. (Especially after a teaser quote was released in which Simpson says, "I have never seen so much blood in my life.")
Alas we will not, apparently, be subject to this "ill-considered project" (Murdoch's words). Well, not as scheduled.
AP writer David Bauder said, "For the publishing industry, the cancellation of 'If I Did It' was an astonishing end to a story like no other."
But don't bet on this being the end. Truth comes out.
If someone can get the substance out while guaranteeing that Simpson does not profit a dime, many will feel that the right balance has been struck. The world gets a plain Simpson confession and he gets nothing. And if you can keep it off the public airwaves, make people search for it if they must on YouTube, or the Smoking Gun, so much the better.
But don't ignore Simpson's real motive here. The money -- if he could get it -- was for his kids. The camera time was for him. If we watch, he wins.
I see just one positive here. I had wondered idly all these years whether the O.J. of the suicide note would ever start speaking again to the O.J. of the not-guilty plea. It seems they are on good terms now.
Suicide O.J. doesn't feel quite so bad anymore, but not-guilty O.J. is having some trouble meeting his needs. Where the two Simpsons meet in the middle, the killer lives in hell, and that's O.K., if that's the best anyone can do.