Juan Williams Fired from NPR

The BBC is generally good & its government funding allows them to cover stories that might otherwise go untold, but the BBC is not free from charges of conflicts of interest:

 

Sure. But allegations of potential conflicts of interest aren't the same as biased news. Presumably anybody who funds news is going to sometimes themselves be news.

 

I'm not trying to equate the two. It's a question of being open to opinions/commentary that you would not normally listen too.

I've spouted off about NPR, but don't listen to it. Lot's of people have opinions about Rush, but don't listen to him.

Also, I do listen to Rush. So, I would be listening to NPR instead.

It's my challenge. I'm willing to listen to NPR. Who's willing to listen to Rush? (And Dick, you don't count anyway since you're no where near as far left as I am far right.)

And, no, Savage doesn't count. He's nuts. (So is Beck*.) The point is, that I think you might actually change your opinion of Rush if you listened to him.

Plus, I'll need someone to listen to him for me & post what he said since I'll be busy listening to NPR.


*And Hannity is boring, repetitive, and not so bright. I'd recommend Michael Medved or even Hugh Hewitt (though he's an unabashed Republican shill) if you wanted to listen to some reasonable right wing radio, but the challenge remains NPR for Rush.

 

Pipsqueaky Mark Levin is the right-wing bloviator equivalent of Diane Rehm's annoying voice.

 

Also, even if NPR's programming is smart, clever, and witty, it remains an open question as to whether it should receive government funds.

And it doesn't mean that they handled the Juan Williams comments well.

 

I kind of get a kick out of Levin. He's smart & can be pretty funny, but I'm always asking myself, "why is this guy yelling at me?" every time I listen to him.

 

I've listened to Rush before and don't care for what he puts out, but I certainly wouldn't mind listening to his show for a week for the purposes of an intellectual exercise (provided he's available online, which I'm sure it is). My opinion of Rush has always been that he's a talented broadcaster who skillfully targets his show at a specific audience (to which I don't belong).

A week of one FOX News show per night might be a better comparison, both in terms of allowing one to sample a wide variety of content and in terms of the Juan Williams discussion. Even if one tried to cherry-pick by tuning into Glenn Beck...well, I suspect no semi-coherent person could actually watch a straight week of Glenn Beck, so that's probably not a concern.

 

I stream Rush off of WABCRadio.com or listen to him on WABC's iPhone app. So, he's available.

I'm guessing that I could similarly listen to NPR.

 

Yep, I can stream WBEZ 91.5 and I've downloaded the iPhone app which allows me to listen live.

Sort of funny story. I sometimes listen to Rush when fixing an espresso or coffee machine in a store. Cute girl asks me one day what I was listening to.

I'm sure the right answer would have been some current, hip band. Unfortunately, my answer was, "talk radio."

Luckily, I already have a girlfriend.

 

"Fresh Air," "The Splendid Table" and other programs are also good.

"The Takeaway" is also an interesting news show, but John Hockenbury seems to try to hard to be edgy and comes across as liberal-slanted.

It would eb interesting to see how NPR might do without government funding. I think that listeners would rise to the cause. The federal government share of funding for most stations has fallen to where it might easily be made up.

There was a time in my life when I had no choice but to listen to Rush Limbaugh. It was either him, country music or Mexican music. That was back in the days when he was pimping for Snapple.

It got to the point sometimes that his relentless self-promotion got so bad that I decided to switch over and brush up on my Spanish.

And Diane Rehm has some sort of medical problem with her voice, but that doesn't change the fact that she can be not much fun to listen to.

 

Beck and Hannity are much more relentless in their self promotion.

 

I'm curious how this will shake out for NPR. I figure the Fox News crowd aren't big donators anyway. But NPR could reap a big winfall if people think that Fox is going after NPR.
I don't see a lot of audience crossover.