On the scene with Mary Beth

Blogger and former Daily Journal reporter Daniel Evans and his wife walked down to the corner store in Burbank tonight and spotted two TV news trucks. As they feared, the clerk had been robbed and beaten. The victim had a pretty good attitude about it, but for Evans the worse news came in his encounter with CBS2/KCAL9 reporter Mary Beth McDade.

The clerk told McDade that he put one of the preps [sic] in a headlock, and that he got punched for his trouble.

"But I've seen worse," he said. "I'm from Cambodia. I escaped from far worse people."

Whoa.

"You mean Pol Pot?" I asked.

He nodded.

"Who?" asked the reporter.

"The dictator," I said. "The Khmer Rouge. You know?"

"No," said the reporter.

"Yeah," said the clerk, lifting up his shirt to show a constellation of long-ago scarred burn marks. "They did this. Those kids, they nothing."

"Uh-huh," said the reporter. "Now, where were you standing when they came in again?"

Groan. For what it's worth, McDade's Channel 2/9 bio says she "began her career with internships at 'Live with Regis and Kathie Lee' and at 'Good Morning America.' These internships helped her land her first television job at 'Good Morning America.' As an Assistant Producer, she had the opportunity to cover such big events as the O.J. Simpson Trial and the First Million Man March."