Behold the official ABC Train, now leaving the station. Destination: wherever they tied their latest reality stars to the tracks.

http://www.realitytvworld.com/news/the-bachelor-star-ben-flajnik-reportedly-went-on-show-plug-wine-13171.php

We all know the station route, right? Become dissatisfied with lead, lead's choice, or both. Start planting stories in press using things either you knew all along (and were ignoring until now) or made up out of whole cloth in the happy knowledge that the contract prevents all lawsuits. Prepare exceptionally leading question sheet for The Contestants Tell What We Told Them To Say show that will make the eventual final couple look like the worst match since Michael Bay and coherent plotlines. Release still more stories and bribe editors to get covers while providing the least flattering cover photos imaginable. Hire actors to flirt with F2 in public, then report that. And when the breakup is finally announced, ignore public reaction and --

-- this is the most important part --

-- repeat.

Well, what kind of train would it be if it only made the trip once?

• RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 09:39 PM, 02-24-12
  • RE: And it always runs on time.,Round Robin, 02:56 AM, 02-25-12
    • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 06:38 AM, 02-25-12
    • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 07:59 AM, 02-25-12
      • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 10:27 AM, 02-25-12
        • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 10:53 AM, 02-25-12
          • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 11:07 AM, 02-25-12
            • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 11:12 AM, 02-25-12
      • RE: And it always runs on time.,Round Robin, 10:34 AM, 02-25-12
        • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 10:43 AM, 02-25-12
        • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 11:03 AM, 02-25-12
  • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 06:30 AM, 02-25-12
    • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 08:01 AM, 02-25-12
      • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 10:36 AM, 02-25-12
        • RE: And it always runs on time.,Round Robin, 10:49 AM, 02-25-12
          • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 11:00 AM, 02-25-12
            • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 11:09 AM, 02-25-12
              • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 11:17 AM, 02-25-12
                • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 11:38 AM, 02-25-12
        • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 11:06 AM, 02-25-12
          • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 11:11 AM, 02-25-12
• RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 11:42 AM, 02-25-12
  • RE: And it always runs on time.,Round Robin, 06:51 AM, 02-26-12
    • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 12:52 PM, 02-26-12
      • RE: And it always runs on time.,Round Robin, 02:38 AM, 02-27-12
        • RE: And it always runs on time.,Ants, 08:41 AM, 02-27-12
          • RE: And it always runs on time.,JoeGazillionaire, 08:50 AM, 02-27-12
• Choo-choo!,Estee, 07:07 PM, 02-27-12

I agree with the article. He did become a different person. He acts like royalty with his handmaidens in his royal palace. He turns me off, way off. I can't remember him being such a jack-$$ during Ashley's season.

Dating Jennifer Love Hewitt, who IMNVHO isn't really very pretty, went to Ben's head and f---ed him up. "Hey, look at me, I'm hot $hit, I dated a BIG STAR." Well, she's only any kind of a star because she has a pretty good rack and for no other reason. Now he thinks he's a bigshot star and every girl on the Bach should be happy as hell to spread her legs for him. Well, Kacie's parents might be hopelessly mired in yesterday, but her dad still knew a phony when he saw one, and Ben was as phony as a $3 bill. If ABC insiders are trying to take Ben down a peg by embarrassing him as badly as possible before he and Courtney split, they're doing a pretty damn bang-up job of it. But they're being pretty poor sports about it too, because Ben ain't the first guy to go on there for the wrong reasons, and if they keep doing this trash for any number of years, he won't be the last either.

>Dating Jennifer Love Hewitt, who IMNVHO
>isn't really very pretty, went
>to Ben's head and f---ed
>him up. "Hey, look at
>me, I'm hot $hit, I
>dated a BIG STAR." Well,
>she's only any kind of
>a star because she has
>a pretty good rack and
>for no other reason. Now
>he thinks he's a bigshot
>star and every girl on
>the Bach should be happy
>as hell to spread her
>legs for him. Well, Kacie's
>parents might be hopelessly mired
>in yesterday, but her dad
>still knew a phony when
>he saw one, and Ben
>was as phony as a
>$3 bill. If ABC insiders
>are trying to take Ben
>down a peg by embarrassing
>him as badly as possible
>before he and Courtney split,
>they're doing a pretty damn
>bang-up job of it. But
>they're being pretty poor sports
>about it too, because Ben
>ain't the first guy to
>go on there for the
>wrong reasons, and if they
>keep doing this trash for
>any number of years, he
>won't be the last either.
>

Well, I'll take her (Love Hewitt)...but I have way lower standards than you Robin. Jennifer Love Hewitt has dated the usual suspects of Hollywood celebrities like Enrique Iglesias and Carson Daly...some actors I can't remember, so I think it's gotten into Ben's head that he's in that league. But, many hollywood actresses have shown attention to guys on the bachelor, but wouldn't have otherwise. Would that soap opera actress had married Bob Guinea if he weren't on the show?

I just don't like the way the show ambushes the people on the show and then take a phony moral high ground, even though they knew early on about the news and are just waiting to set up the actor. Like Chris Harrison acting all high and mighty about blonde Casey... even though the show already knew about that fact--why wait weeks in to ambush her. Or setting up Ashley for the Bentley business...and then Chris Harrison acting all judgmental about Bentley, despite the fact that he facilitated the Hong Kong meeting and withheld it earlier to let Ahsley get jerked along.

Was that true about dating Hewitt? I thought that was tabloid crap. If it's true, it certainly did go to his head. If it's true, I don't know what she was thinking.

I don't blame ABC for 'punishing' Ben. He was (still is!) under contract to keep his mouth shut. Some of us want to watch it all without spoilers and that's why the contestants are supposed to STFU until it's all over.

Some people think Kacie's parents were over the top. Idk, that'd be my parents and that would be me about my own kids. I guess the only thing was the living together part. I'd let my daughters do that if they dated for a while first, then expressed interest in getting married. Don't shack up after knowing the guy for 2 months, though.

For sure, she went up to his winery to visit him....but not sure what came of it...probably not much. But, it certainly has gotten into his head. Girls like Erica gushing at him saying he's so cute and sexy doesn't help either. I'm not really a judge of male beauty....but isn't he quite a step down from Brad, no?

It's a double standard...but I wouldn't let my future kids do 1/100 of what I did...sorry. Especially my future pampered little princess who will have a playhouse 3 times the size of Emily Maynard's daughter. Kacie's parents can preach what they want but their daughter was swapping tongues with the shaggy haired Geico caveman after knowing him all of a few days.

FIRST OF ALL, my husband usually comes home to me watching the Bachelor and asks, "Why are you watching this crap?" I don't think it's crap. It's good entertainment, but I just had to comment here because he came home last Monday night and said, "Do you know who that guy looks like?!?!" I said, "The caveman?" He burst out laughing and said that yes, that's who Ben reminds him of. That may be mean, but I don't care because Caveman Ben is mean.

Second, who is Erica?

LOL, yeah, the idiot little brother of Geico the Caveman was my immediate thought when I first saw him in Ashley's season and scratched my head at Ashley thinking "sweet girl...bad taste in men." Oh, I'm way behind on my episodes...so Erica...(is that her name?) was the one that Ben said was the best kisser...might have her name wrong. Well, I don't consider reality tv shows to be crap. They show the human condition; are the new wave of entertainment; and are scripted exactly like a good drama or comedy. Shows like Survivor are better than almost anything on television. We all get sucked into romance reality shows like this because they show what we recognize in real life. I think there are quite a lot of male fans of the Bachelor...at least secretly.....we all got sucked in watching it with a girlfriend, etc....and then eventually liked it on our own.

Best kisser - Jennifer -- and I should have mentioned her as one of the better looking girls in Ben's season.

Ants, I don't think it was Ben who spilled the beans on anything, so nobody has any "spoiler" beef with him. It was some of those a$$holes who work on the show who don't like Ben and/or Courtney who are spilling the beans and/or planting this stuff. When they realized how much the viewers were starting to hate Courtney and then Ben, some of those yahoos started to intentionally embarrass Ben every way they knew how. Hell, Ellen DeGeneres knew he picked Courtney and she gave him $hit for it on her show! You'd think ABC would put the word out for nobody who works there to say anything in public about the show, but noooo, now that everybody knows he picked Courtney and we're seeing them both act like total self-centered donkeys on the show, every insider who can is leaking $hit and planting lies at every opportunity. Helloooo, if you don't like these kind of people, why the hell'd you pick them in the first place? It's your own damn fault!

It seems like it's just business as usual for the show's producers. They love to manufacture drama and scandal... other than a few of their stars like Emily who have cleaner storylines, the producers seem to opt for the scandal...so anyone going on that show should know that they'll probably be ambushed. It's kind of the worst kept secret in Hollywood that business, companies, etc...will often be leaking information to drum up business... For example, hollywood divorce attorneys are often the ones that call the tabloids to leak items just so that their law firm names will get publicity....all the while crying foul in public about how the media should respect their clients privacy. Publicity propels them to million dollar practice fee territory...so many of them do it.

Okay, I didn't know that. I thought I read that Ben is already flirting with other girls. Don't know if that's true or if that would be considered spilling the beans, but it shows that he ended up with no one. It sounds like the people who let things leak are immature, unprofessional babies, just like Ben. Yeah, if they don't like Ben, why did they pick him? Well, I guess that just goes back to the F2 formula. Gotta give the next Bach to the F2 no matter how much you don't like him/her.

To Joe's comment about drama: I get why the show does that. If you don't have drama, people complain, "Oh, geez, it's a snooze this season. Brad is boring . . ." I don't think they should throw anyone under the bus to stir up drama, but most people (Samantha, Bentley, etc.) get what they deserve.

LOL. Handmiadens...exactly. Even hotter guys like Brad Womack didn't act like they were too hot for their shirt. I felt at the beginning of the season that Ben was really wrapped up into Courtney being a model...because he's been kind of a nerd and wants a model to be totally into him.

Brad Womack is waaaaaaaaaaaaay hotter than Ben. He's also way more humble than King Ben. I'm sick of Ben. He has proven himself to be an a s s . As you've all said, he and Courtney deserve each other.

I kind of liked Brad... you could tell that he was tormented and struggling within himself to be a better man...ok, he lost that battle but hey he tried! Also, is it just me or did Brad have way better taste in women....his final 4 or 8 were all very nice girls... Emily, Ashley Chantal O all seem fairly sweet... I rarely saw them go out of their way to bad mouth another girl...and they generally stayed out of it. Who were the bad girls of his season? Can't even remember. Your Royal Highness Bejamin of Shaggyborough III, on the other hand, seems to have rewarded all the girls with bad behavior, other than Jenna. His final girls are so catty... In truth, the eye candy factor has worn off for me for this season....for some reason, I don't find the women as attractive as when they first stepped out of the limo, other than Casey S. Maybe, their personality quirks are starting to annoy me.

I think they had a lot of good looking women on this season, certainly much better looking than Little Ben deserves to get stuck into, but the cattiness level was higher than ever, and hell, that was leaked out even before the season started. They f---ed up when they picked Ben to be the Bach, though. What a turd!

Who do you consider to be the good looking women of this season? In terms of girls just my type, I'd say the Travis Stork most matched that....they did a bang up job for him casting wise.

Yeah, in that scene where Shawntel the Mortician came to win him, the girls were all getting upset and one girl gushed how cute and sexy he was....I was really trying to wrap my mind around it...but just chalked it up to the fact that I'm a guy and can't really judge male beauty. I believed it much more last year in Brad season that the girls would fight over him, for some reason. Guys like JFK Jr. and Tom Cruise are easier for me to judge... it's when we get into the Justin Timberlake territory where I go "Really?"

Good looking girls this season - Courtney, Kasie B., Kasie S. and a few others whose names I can't remember.

Justin Timberlake - I'm a woman and I don't get the attraction. I think he's effeminate.

Ants, we have the same taste in women...you have a good eye for talent. Casey S. (blonde) would have been my pick. Initially did think Courtney was good looking... but never liked Kacie B. And, if you wipe away the tears, Jenna was quite cute.

I remember my sister saying that she had a crush on Jude Law...and I was really surprised... like I had always thought of him as a skinny nerd....but, then she changed my mind and now I see him as good looking. There are some guys where you have to be talked into thinking they're good looking. Yeah, I'm surprised by the Justin Timberlake thing too...it's almost like that Twilight zone episode where all the people with pig noses tries to convince the main protagonist that the hot blonde was hideous...

I so remember that Twilight Zone episode!

I don't see anything physically attractive about Jude Law. Too skinny/scrawny and not especially good looking.

Brad had therapy for commitment issues. He should go back to therapy for anger management. I do like him and I think he wants to be a better person. I think some of Ben's girls are pretty.

All of Brad's issues seem to stem from one source....he's still a bit immature. Whenever Emily or one of the girls tries to get him down to the serious issues, you could see how uncomfortable he is... he just can't deal... There are so many grown men stuck in that boy-man stage. Some of Ben's girls are pretty...but not lasting pretty where you're stuck thinking about them. It's really worn off.

ANOTHER thing I meant to mention and totally forgot - go back and watch the fake wedding. When Courtney says her crap about all-consuming, can't-live-without-you love, Ben just eats it up. They zoomed in on his face a couple times. He actually sucks on his lower lip to stop from smiling too much. His eyes were lighted up, like a man head over heels.

He might have been head over heels then, but I wonder what Ben thinks of Courtney now after watching all these episodes? If After the Final Rose is live, I bet it's gonna be one uncomfortable night for the 2 of them.

Yeah, and I can't wait for that. They both deserve whatever they're gonna get.

No, they probably DON'T deserve everything they're gonna get, because what they're gonna get probably still will include additional gigs and money for those gigs. Not to mention the money they're scheduled to get paid for this season. Those 2 chumps probably got all the goodies they deserved in the form of the sex they had together. They are a pair of self-indulgent immature lowlives, and they each deserve to spend years stuck in a $hitty relationship, either with each other or with others of similar low quality. The already-eliminated women can mostly count their blessings they got the ax already, because most of them deserve better.

That does turn my stomach - the thought of them rolling in the cash of future gigs.

I get the feeling that even if they face some negativity, it won't really faze them.... they'll just filter it through their own reality and see it from their own point of view. During Ben's date with Rachel, Ben was doing his usual boring chit chat...and then he's doing his camera interview and complaining how "the conversation was lagging." What does he expect the poor girl to do? He wasn't giving her much to work with. For the guys who complain that it's hard to get a girl, Ben proves that you don't really need to be that great of a conversationalist or even funny... just some hype.

http://www.realitytvworld.com/news/the-bachelor-courtney-robertson-reportedly-had-nasty-names-for-other-girls-13181.php

Note the pot calling out the kettle at the end of the article. Wikipedia doesn't have much on this series -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_Island_%28show%29 -- but I'm sure more details will emerge. And given who's bringing them out, every last one will be dedicated to making Courtney look even worse.

Next week: Courtney eats a baby lemur! Live!