Lookin' for hate on talk radio
By Jaime O'Neill
In a recent column, the editor of this paper wrote a defense of right
wing talk radio.
That's a bit redundant since almost all talk radio is right wing.
According to the editor, talk radio is misunderstood by what the calls
"the media."
Except for him, apparently.
According to him, "the media," especially the dreaded "liberal media,"
find lots of hate speech when they tune in to Rush, or Sean Hannity,
or Michael Savage, or the armies of right wing clones of those guys on
local radio stations from coast to coast.
But all the editor can find on those radio shows is simple
disagreement with fashionable liberal orthodoxy.
However, ever since the Fairness Doctrine was eliminated by the FCC
during the Reagan years, right wing voices have served as the
propaganda arm of the conservative wing of the Republican Party with
no requirement that their commentary be civil, fair, balanced, or
factual.
Mostly those radio blatherers have maintained popularity by being
provocative, by being willing to say almost anything, and by spreading
hate, much as guys like Father Coughlin did back in the 1930s when
that precursor to Rush-style hatemongering was spewing anti-Semitism
and anti-liberal viciousness from coast to coast.
But, though the editor of this paper is a news gatherer, and though he
listens to talk radio quite a bit, he just can't seem to find any hate
on those programs at all, try as he might.
Instead, he sees the hate being directed toward those talk radio hosts
by those who "hate it with a passion," because such people think that
"simply disagreeing is a sign of hate."
Disagreement is one thing, however, and hate is another.
How the editor of this paper can miss the daily outpouring of hate for
fellow Americans who don't share the views of those talk show "hosts"
is a bit of a mystery.
But, since he can't find that hate, I thought I'd help him out with
just a few examples of it.
I think most people would agree that these comments go beyond mere
disagreement on ideas or policy.
Here's Randall Terry, the anti-abortion demagogue, offering his
tempered view of things on talk radio:
"I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good"
he said.
Terry, incidentally, claims the God of love as his source of
inspiration.
Here's Rush Limbaugh, expressing similar "opinions" of his fellow
Americans.
"I tell people don't kill all the liberals. Leave enough around so we
can have two on every campus - living fossils - so we will never
forget what these people stood for."
Want more love and compassion from talk radio?
Here's Rush's love and compassion for a fellow drug abuser, Kurt
Cobain.
Immediately after Cobain's drug-fueled suicide, Limbaugh, the
Oxycontin junkie, said that Cobain was "just a worthless shred of
human debris."
No hate there, I guess, just an honest difference of opinion.
Here's that master of reasoned discourse, Michael Savage, disagreeing
with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, calling her "a radical
left-wing buck-toothed hag."
And when a gay caller disagreed with Mr. Savage, he responded by
saying:
"You should only get AIDS and die, you pig. How's that? Why don't you
see if you can sue me, you pig. You got nothing better than to put me
down, you piece of garbage. You have got nothing to do today, go eat a
sausage and choke on it."
Here's KSFO radio's Michelle Morgan, welcoming Nancy Pelosi as the
first woman Speaker of the House of Representatives.
"We've got a bull's-eye painted on her big, wide, laughing eyes."
And here's that same Michelle Morgan, offering her way of disagreeing
with editors at the New York Times:
"Hang 'em," she said, in June of 2006, echoing the sentiments of the
lovely Ann Coulter, who said:
"My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York
Times Building."
McVeigh, you'll recall, was the guy who blew up that big federal
office building in Oklahoma a few years back, killing 149 adults and
19 children.
KSFO radio listeners have also heard talk show hosts speak of
"lynching a few liberals" and encouraging their audience to "shoot
illegal immigrants who come across the border.'"
They're awfully loose with talk of violence against people they don't
like.
Here's Michael Savage, calling for bombing of world leaders at the
United Nations:
"I don't know why we don't use a bunker-buster bomb when he comes to
the U.N. and just take [Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadine-jad] out
with everyone in there."
And here's nationally syndicated talk show host Neal Boortz describing
Cynthia McKinney, an African-American congresswoman from Georgia:
"She looks like a ghetto slut. ... It looks like an explosion in a
Brillo pad factory. ... She looks like Tina Turner peeing on an
electric fence. ... She looks like a shih tzu!"
And here's Glenn Beck talking about Cindy Sheehan:
"That's a pretty big prostitute there, you know what I mean."
However one might feel about Cindy Sheehan's politics, she is the
mother of a soldier lost in George Bush's war.
These talk show hosts often proclaim their support for the troops, and
the families of fallen soldiers, but that support and compassion tends
to dry up right quick when those troops or those families don't share
the opinions of these blowhards, all of whom avoided military service
themselves, most notably Rush Limbaugh, an armchair patriot if ever
there was one.
His own reluctance to serve didn't stop Limbaugh from referring to
Iraq War vets who opposed the war as "phony soldiers."
Many of those "phony soldiers" had sustained serious and life-changing
injuries while wearing the nation's uniform, and while fighting for
their own right to disagree with guys like Rush Limbaugh.
If you can't find hate on talk radio, you probably couldn't find
chicken at KFC. |
