NYC Utterly Replaces NPR In My Acronym Reference List

Fig. 1 These are they who guard the treasure of the Globalisms. No, this is NOT the re-staging of an old vaudeville routine


Fig. 2 See? Note the location. Click on photo and enlarge to see what the Big Guy guarding the treasure is doing (photos: mine own)


Hey folks, I just got back from a couple weeks in NYC (one acronym that actually stands for something), without a single Nothing Public Radio moment. I’m chipper as a Central Park squirrel, and more mature than ever to dump NPR for good.

While it is a certainty that the corporate media is a corrupting force, one can survive quite readily and be immune from it while being in the very center of its headquarters (Times Square excepted). Capitalist monolith that it is, the Big Apple’s diversity has sewn the seeds of that very system’s mutation into something yet unknown. I get the feeling that things is gonna be somewhat different in the near future.

Plutocrats have been circling the wagons ever since Reagan gave them the go-ahead, but them axles ain’t as properly greased as has been estimated. One gentleman in the subway was heard to vent his frustration and anger thusly: ‘This town needs a tsunami. Washington DC needs an earthquake.’ I think we know what he meant, eh?

A few amateur media observations (with apologies to infinitely more hip native New Yorkers): In the general city scene, almost no newspaper presence. A few had the Daily News in the subway. I saw ONE person reading the NYT – and that was in Newark! Bob Herbert told ‘em where to stuff it and is moving on to more purposeful things. No WSJ mightiness either, and I hung out for a time in the canyons of Wall St.

No, anyone who is anyone has a pod/phone device, and I’ll bet the percentage of people utilizing any old NPR app at any one time is severely low. Why would you even bother with an NPR? Can you imagine commuting to Queens while listening to – gulp – Melissa Blockhead?? NPR’s for scared middle and upper class white folks who are scared that poor and angry people are going to take everything away from them. This, while being fleeced and zombified by the corporate edifice they think is their comfort zone.

I’ve had a hunch that NPR’s on the way out for some time now. Like newspapers. I’m convinced that, despite the flaunted PR that their listenership is bigger than ever – along with their influence - all such advertisement is grossly over-produced in fine MSM fashion.

One pallid bright spot: CBS’ Early Show on Sunday still has some elements of Good Television in it. Not cutting edge, but easy to take traces of the CBS of old. Of course, their audience is literally dying out.

NPR’s, on the other hand, doesn’t necessarily need NPR anymore. I mean, taking NPR seriously is like believing every word that some nobody like Ann Coulter says. Beyond preposterous. They’ve even got Inskreep tossing in little National (self)Promotional Radio maxims like ‘Not letting go of older stories – that’s the kind of thing you get on NPR…’ or some such desperate BS.

Listening for about a minute after two weeks’ sanity, it’s just too painfully obvious what a godawful thing NPR is - just to HEAR, let alone ‘consider’. Even with agendas aside, NPR is a failure. Empires that are late in their cycles brush aside such failures, which are quickly forgotten.

So, to paraphrase Snoop Dogg, I’m taking this ‘New York minute’ opportunity, to consign NPR to da project dumpster’s bottom, where it belongs.

Staying untuned…

2011: ARAB WORLD IN CRISIS - CAUSES NPR TO GO INTO CRISIS MODE

As everyone knows by now, our beloved NPR has been gripped by those who would commit war terror within these here shores. The following is a headlong compendium of yakkage that attempts to find some 'narration' to explain NPR's fall from sacredness.

To chart a way through this, the Reader will already have to be aware of the events themselves, as I can't possibly provide all the relevant background details during such a time of storm and stress, tribulation and equivocation, not to mention boils and tears.

WARNING: Please forgive me for not providing hip links to the URLs below. In our former cut-'n-paste culture, a few more steps in reaching the goal seemed to be the ultimate in magical realism, but alas, I am regularly left in the dusts of regret for having been out of step, as usual. Please, forgive!

- So here goes:

NPR was going on as usual. Their prize-winning fussbudget, Ari Supremo, was at his constricted-vocal-cords best (I always have to turn down the treble control when he comes on). Feeling his freedom in playing NPR's token 'out' role, he's getting a little too gooey-swishy for comfort. However, he's just complying with the house rules to indulge in word porn for the thinking masses.

Meanwhile, the conceited social club that is NPR continued with the fluttery vanity of Blob Siegel making verbal love with DAVID BROOKS, who 'cares most about education'. He's always at his worst when he's posing as a 'liberal intellectual'.

Then, there's FRANK LUNTZ, facilitated by Neil Conman, eager to sell yet another NYT year-long best seller. He actually has the audacity to mock Charlie Sheen. Like the Neocon superstars, Luntz is a poster boy for the great American comeback. Another lovey-dovey lovefest between club members. During the interview, I was wondering how Frank's hair is doing. I hope it's OK.

I think I'm more comfortable with a Charlie Sheen than I am with these offensive, pompous fakes. Speaking of comebacks: Goebbels-ism flourishes in the midst of mediocrity.

How I weep for the decline of my country!

- OK, nothing unusual there. BUT THEN...

This just in:

"NPR ‘appalled’ by former exec’s comments"

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thecutline/20110308/ts_yblog_thecutline/npr-appalled-by-former-execs-comments
3/8/11 11:07 AM

AND:

Ron Schiller, Viv Schiller. Supposedly 'no relation'. Uh-huh. Very collegiate.

All sorts of uniformed discussion about NPR erupting. Hillary didn't include NPR in her critique of US media. Bob McChesney praises VOA! Teabaggers think NPR is 'National Palestinian Radio'! Squabbling about how much fed money ACTUALLY goes to NPR (News) Uh-huh again. And so on, too many examples to cite.

NPR Check is needed more than ever to clear up all this bozo talk.

Michael Moore got it right without even naming any news outlet: the corporate-controlled media plays the same program all the time: don't rock the boat because some day you too may be rich, so don't harm the rich for providing that possibility. The US media constantly implies that you too can and should be rich if only you'd just be more 'American' in going about it.

Result: passive population, ripe for permanent exploitation.

I agree with Ron Shill-er: sever fed funding from NPR. It's a scam anyway, no matter what teabaggy types say.
3/8/11 11:21 AM

PS: Interesting 'appalling' video. When Ron takes his NPR hat off, no wonder NPR is appalled. Check it out...
3/8/11 11:28 AM

AND:

MEMO TO WYNHAM/COCHRANE: LEAD WITH VIVIAN SCHILLER RESIGNATION

She’s OUT, baby, OUT.

Welcome to the Post-Schiller Era at NPR. Ron out, Viv out (and they insist there's 'no relation'!)

Nevertheless, the on-air talent is above such things. ME was bouncier than ever this morn. Inskreep of Cairo was able to crow 'From Cairo,' (pause) 'this is Morning Edition'. (Haven't those poor people suffered enough under Mubarak?). Blob Siegel's positively bubbly in a promo for his latest hobby: chatting with 'philosophical' authors about pop/kitschy book promotions, and Ari 'n Renaay are as breezy as ever.

Larry Abramson gave absolutely NO connective background as to why Viv resigned. Their strategy is to just show what a traitor the Schiller with some honesty (Ron) has been to the mother organization. Viv will be portrayed as a victim - who was 'squeezed out' and all of that. Plus, even though rightwingnut James O'Keeffe staged the Ron sting, it's the MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD factor in said sting that will be retained in the minds of NPR's thinking masses. Mission accomplished with style and panache.

There will of course be no change in tone or agenda to be detected on the air at NPR. Schillers come and go, but the Imperative will remain the same. Why wreck a good thing?

AND EVEN…

FYI: (no joke):

At Al Jazeera, I did a search:

'npr vivian schiller'

Results:

'Did you mean "npr vivian shiller"?
3/9/11 2:09 PM

AND:

Diane R. has the fabulous TUCKER CARLSON, who broke the story!

http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-03-09/nprs-ceo-resigns
3/9/11 2:05 PM

AND:

Listen to the way Alicia Shepherd TALKS; she's a real Nurse Ratched.

AND:

One more FYI:

Viv Schiller's dad is named RON!

(Source: Wikipædia)

AND:

OK, one more:

Wonkette's take:

http://wonkette.com/440099/
breaking-npr-person-a-human-being-has-personal-opinions-on-politics

AND:

http://wonkette.com/440168/tea-party-racists-will-all-start-listening-to-npr-now

AND:

A significant moment on the Diane R. show though:
Brooke Gladstone asserts that liberal commentators are not in the majority at NPR.
Interesting what comes out when the gun’s to the head.


AND

Typically, like any decent corporation in need of corporate welfare, NPR wants it both ways. They say that only 1-2% is what they get from gub'ment, and it's no big deal. Then they say they can't survive without it.

James O'Keeffe takes notes from NPR's playbook.

Solution: dump your salary hogs (the NPR superstars) and go grassroots. Sure, sure they will...

The Diane Rehm show was a predictable waste of on-air time, with the guests filling it up with gobbledygook. Viv as victim, of course, as she's done SO MUCH for NPR. And naturally 'Lisa' Shepherd was distancing herself cuz she's 'not influenced' by NPR in any way.

Another average day in the decline of the empire.

Since Broder blew out, why not nominate Mara Liarsson to take up the mantle? (She may need the gig...)

AND THIS to 'Wonkette', in order to help Wonkettes understand just what NPR is:

Nationalist/Narcissist Propaganda/Pentagon/Palestinian Radiation/Relations (aka 'NPR') is the ONLY possible news outlet for America's Thinking Masses. The purse-lipped intellectual wit of Blob Siegel, the smoky sexiness of MeeShill Norris, the brilliant motormouthing of Steve Inskreep and the urbane mall-rat perspectives of Renaay Mundane are guiding lights for the future saviors of the American Empire, who pant for fun, even cheerful digestion of the world today.

NPR is America's Storyteller. People, if you'd only BELIEVE!

Hope This Helps (TM)

AND:

All of this discussion (on its many levels) strikes me as valid because, like Wikileaks, genuine facts about NPR are being tossed out into the public sphere.

And, as Julian Assange so simply put it, the embarrassment that results is gigantic. The truthinesses that previously existed concerning NPR are now being replaced by notions that listeners will have to decide on. That is, if they choose to.

AND:

Who then, shall we get to take up the great Broderian mantle?

Well, how about that soon-to-be NPR orphan, Mara Liarsson? She's smart, sexy, savvy, wears turtlenecks, and makes pop-eyed grimaces on Fox 'n Friends. Plus, she has an attention-getting speaking style that suggests she's masticating her own vomit.

AND:

This, the first day in the Post-Schiller(s) Era, has been a real jungle.

I'm writhing off to bed now. Bedtime reading? Perhaps some Schiller. Friedrich Schiller. No relation. 'Ode To Joy'....

AND:

Thoughts on Ron Schiller's closed doors as the Aspen Institute reminded me of the Dodge Aspen, which was Lee Iacocca's bid to revitalize the MoPar Corp. However, I nominate the following as Worst Car Ever: Leave us not forget: the Chevy Vega. The only car that worked up to being totaled via natural causes.

AND, THE NEXT MORNING:

The Peter King 'hearings' are keeping the great HUAC tradition alive.

As we know, ever since the Commie/Soviet Industry went out of business, things Muslim have been the perfect elements for a segue into a #1 Enemy, whose mission is to infiltrate and destroy the American Way of Life. Soon an Evil Caliph will emerge from, say, all-American Chiggston, Iowa, with a new jihadist cry: 'WE'LL BURY YOU!'

Thus, a Prime Directive to justify our preeminence as a meaningful Empire. It's that loony. Glenn Beck's a children's birthday party entertainer in comparison.

I mean, the US talks a lot about North Korea having to have an enemy in order to justify its existence. Pot calling kettle black, naturally.

There's no reason to tie in NPR to any of this. Their influence is waning by the moment. At Wonkette, I loved Ken Layne's description of NPR as:

"... a dull yuppie news network primarily funded by the industrial food and chemical conglomerates that keep the Tea Party people so plump and diabetic, so of course NPR is catering not to its listeners (liberal yuppies who ignore the Archer Daniels Midland sponsorship messages that bookend basically every NPR program) in this situation, but to Tea Party people and their cynical performers in the House of Representatives. Tea Party people don’t listen to NPR news, obviously."

AND:

Can't resist this one:

According to NPR's Standards & Morals:

- Juan Williams can't make bozo statements on another channel.

- Ron Schiller can't offer his personal opinions at a private lunch.

BUT, Dina's Temple of Doom CAN:

- Refer to an ethnic Chinese man (who converted to Islam) as having a 'Fu Manchu' beard.

I don't know, it all seems kind of, you know . . . funny. I guess it's just entertaining trivia. No big deal. I'm forgetting about the 'new' NPR, and what that means.

What it means is that NPR WENT COMMERCIAL a long time ago. We all know that. And after you go commercial, you can't expect to keep playing this 'moral high-ground' BS trip that NPR purports to exploit.

You've been 'Wikileaked', NPR. Now the public has more of an inkling of your true nature. Judging from the many comments I've scanned, from Wonkette (yes, there are plenty of serious comments there), to HuffPost, C&L and NPR itself, it seems like there are significant numbers of listeners who are fed up. Indeed, many have been for some time, and this latest dust-up just confirms it.

And those commentators who defend NPR as the liberal beacon that it is? Hey, they NEED that NPR gig. They'll say anything in order to keep getting that easy 3-minute segment at NPR HQ, plus maybe a free lunch - or if it's cocktail hour, a designer martini. Keep an eye out for a James O'Keefe 'stinger' though. (No doubt a future cocktail name...)

Meanwhile, back at on-air NPR, the oblivious party continues. Never show any weakness. Ari tries to outdo Chris Rock in the jokey dept (fails - Rock prefers to do it straight), and Dave Greene's still doing those smiley-talk travelogues from 'colorful' Tunisia. Way-too-valuable Gjelten was just there for a show-off cameo, y'know. He's safe back in Chantilly now, but got in a fun junket to 'colorful' N. Africa, 1 to 2% of which was paid for by US taxpayers. Did we get our money's worth, gang?

Oh, and Barbie's not that popular in China. Oh, oh, and the late Dean Broder gets a tacit nod for doing 'shoe-leather' journalism as an old fart.

And stay tuned for DAVID BROOKS, who's getting a full hour of book promotion on Diane Rehm, as is his birthright.

- Leave us leave off there, shall we?

From Doha Comes . . .

Hillary speaks the overwhelmingly obvious (from DN!):

"Hillary Clinton Praises Al Jazeera as "Real News"

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has surprised many after she praised the news programming on Al Jazeera, while she criticized the over-commercialization of news programs in the United States. Speaking before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Clinton said the United States is losing the "information war."

Hillary Clinton: "Viewership of Al Jazeera is going up in the United States because it’s real news. You may not agree with it, but you feel like you’re getting real news around the clock instead of a million commercials and, you know, arguments between talking heads and the kind of stuff that we do on our news, which, you know, is not particularly informative to us, let alone foreigners."

While Al Jazeera English is broadcast to more than 200 million homes around the world, it is hardly available in the United States due to what critics have described as a media blackout by U.S. cable and satellite providers.
"
(end quote)

We all know about NPR's contributions to commercial on-air clutter, so subliminally ushered into our brains by Frank Tavares' supposedly 'neutral' but extremely nasal pestering. However, I'd just like to mention the hours of wasted filler time that NPR (and the US MSM, natch) spends MAKING SURE we know who's speaking/reciting/acting/performing for your show biz pleasure at any one time, in their terribly important roles as America's Storytellers.

I mean, a perfect example is news reciter Craig Wyndham's crusade to 'personalize' his news slot by being chummy with his fellow creative writers. This morning, in the few seconds allotted to her segment, Craig said 'Tamara' four times: introducing Tamara Keith, exiting Tamara Keith, and 'communing' with Tamara Keith twice in the brief soundbyte 'report'. He of course is most famous for doing this with his inseparable workhorse buddy, Paul Brown. (e.g. 'Thanks Paul. That's NPR's Paul Brown'). I know, it's meant to imply collegiality, but to me it's the collegiality of Wall Street CEOs. Plus it makes for extremely tedious listening. I mean, who ARE these people?

OK, this is getting a little neurotic in the hair-splitting department, but the accumulated CLUTTER is in itself neuroses-inducing. Of course, with a passive public, they just absorb it all, then blow out down the line, I suppose.

BBC and Al Jaz hardly bother to be control freaks about making SURE that you know precisely at every second who the star personality of the moment is who's delivering the news. Their business isn't to keep you distracted into hopefully buying something. US media hates this reasonable neutrality, cuz they're convinced that 'personality-izing' the news brings in audiences, which naturally bring in money. You might say they're horribly addicted to this (Planet) monkey on their backs: win ratings or die.

This is not only a failed policy, it has made for some of the most worthless broadcasting ever to be conceived, and it's getting worse.

Al Jazeera, like the Jasmine Revolution movement (a current label of convenience), is a big threat to the US MSM, and you can bet there will be some pathetic attempts to 'Al Jaz-ize' their outfits, while others in the shadows will be plotting Al Jaz' demise (consultants: Wolfowitz, Perle, Xe & Partners, etc.).

Al Jaz chief Wadah Khanfar made an outstanding statement at TED, which makes meatloaf out of Hillary's obviousness:

http://english.aljazeera.net/
indepth/opinion/2011/03/20113341535651130.html

PS: Patty Culhane, Al Jaz's WH correspondent, makes anybody from NPR seem like a sick joke. Yes, I know her name, but she's cogent, serious, non-distracting, and plays no games.

That's all this child wants and needs in his news-gathering.

Actual Contents Of An NPR Diaper Considered

A full diaper-load on Morn Ed this morn. Forgive the onslaught, please.

OK, two US airmen were shot dead in Frankfurt, presumably, says NPR, by an Islamofabulist. An act of terrorism, certainly. Match this with the Davis affair in Lahorror, Pawkeestawn, when our ‘diplomat’ shot two creeps who were ‘trying to rob him’. Interesting how each situation is couched. Terrorism is OUR tool to use, not the other side’s. WE get to use terrorism to explain our M.O., while the Pakistanis get completely freaked out by a guy just defending himself from ruffians. National Praetorian Radio must serve the Imperium at all cost.

Personal: I myself have walked the streets and alleys of Lahore in depth. It is a sophisticated, cultured and fascinating city. And friendly, too, at least when my wife and I were there. A privilege to be there. As safe and as dangerous as New York. Any CIA/mercenary who packs heat in such a place is just looking for trouble. If Davis mucked up his ‘mission’, it’s just another example of US failure in the region. Dean Martin as secret agent Matt Helm would NEVER be so bumbling. In all seriousness, I hate Davis and his employers all the more for trashing the privilege that I once enjoyed.

Who knows, is the CIA involved in bumping off more western-sympathetic Pak officials, so as to stoke the crusade to deliver nukey-nervous Pakistan from sharia terror?
AND
Bill Ford of FoMoCo was interviewed by a typically casual Renaay M. He sounds like a Whole Earth Catalog nerd. I hope he is. He seems like he would be an enemy of the oil companies, but Renaay conveniently forgot to ask Bill if maybe the oil companies were having a problem with Ford’s uppityness in tilting away from fossil fueling. Amy Goodman would of course have asked that question. But she’s Amy Goodman and not mundane. NPR, in all its civilized behavior, does not make CEOs tapdance.

AND

Incredibly, today Renaay referred to Zimbabwe’s Bob Mugabe as ‘somewhat of a despot’. SOMEwhat? I mean, where has she BEEN? Mugabe is more universally despised than Gaddafi. (Muammar has oil. Bob doesn’t. Oil-less despots are more convenient to despise.)

Anyway, Renaay is final proof that NPR must have airheaded brains hosting their shows, as they are impervious to reality. Propaganda-ready mouthpieces cannot be moved to humanity, even though they’ve witnessed, firsthand, all sorts of hot spots. (Chris Hedges, hardline reporter, always has been a humanitarian.) Their job is to serve the specific sectors that their employers have defined, not to go off on some humanitarian bleeding heart lovefest.

But Renaay, honey, it’s official: MUGABE IS A DESPOT. Inflict your dumbass personality elsewhere, STARTING TONIGHT. Even Mattel’s PR dept. couldn’t use you.

AND

Morn Ed saves their cheerful crap for the end of the show, so as not to appear too disrespectful to the dark side of US imperialism. And in their ongoing service to America, they’re still helping us know what is really stupid in American pop culture, as opposed to what ISN’T really stupid in American pop culture.

For example: Barbie (and Ken)=good. Anna Nicole Smith=bad.

In London, Philip Reeves profiled the new opera, ‘Anna Nicole Smith’, and he didn’t apply any mockery to the story, just straightforward reporting. NPR HQ obviously disapproves of Anna Nicole, so they can smirk around Reeves’ story all they want. I daresay, Anna Nicole’s life is just as operatic as Lucia di Lammermoor’s. What’s wrong with giving it the Donizetti treatment?

Renaay: What’s a Don A. Zetti, Steve?
Inskreep: A pizza sold by an insurance agent! Har har!
(See? I kin doo kulturul eleet all by myself now!)
Inskreep’s own contribution involved him saying that Anna Nicole Smith being discussed in a British accent was so much better. Or something like that. (See why I get sarcastic?)

Even though Reeves has been sidelined on stories like this, he and Quist-Arcton still warm my heart. (Hey you two, they could use you both over at Al Jaz…)

We’re all little NPR-influenced pop culture critics now, aren’t we?

AND

One more NPR pop culture nightmare.

More examples: Justin Bieber=stupid/childish. Scott Simon=not stupid/not childish – but funny!
Our Morn Ed team was making gentle fun about a lock of Justin Bieber’s hair being auctioned off. Scott Simon wasn’t mentioned, but his spirit was there.

At any rate, they made it clear that the Bieber hair thang was sort of, you know, silly. They even implied that the charity the auction money would go to was sort of - silly.

My local morning hostess always likes to join in on the NPR HQ fun. She’s skillfully adopted the Inskreep Punchline Pause ™ wholesale, and today she expanded on the Justin Bieber mockery by deliberately calling him ‘Justin Timberlake’. Really funny stuff for the new listeners who are just discovering NPR!

It’s also funny how Bieber, a virtual Michael Jackson knockoff, gets the National Public Ridicule, while Jackson himself always seemed to get uncertain but ‘respectable’ treatment. Yeah, he’s dead and all, but is this because of some below-the-radar racial policy confusion, or just the fact that Michael was one sick puppy and Justin (Bieber) is jes’ plain wholesome and fun, so he can take a bit of harmless joshing?

Bieber=good, safe influence (so far). Jackson=dangerous influence, but so damn popular (proceed with caution).

White boys who just wanna be black will always be treated better on NPR than black boys who wanna be white.

Let NPR become just as stupid as they think they need to be. Because, to paraphrase architect Ralph Adams Cram, ‘the sooner we accomplish the destiny it so perfectly shadows, the sooner we shall be able to clear the ground and begin again.’

Wow, what a humungous burden it is to be America’s Storyteller. So much to decide on! So much to dictate! To paraphrase Harold on the ‘Red Green Show’, NPR is the ‘smartest person in the whole wide room’, as it were.

That’s our NPR – always doing their part to enforce a cultural elite (of dubious, dubious quality) on we the living.

NPR is so monumentally ‘stimulating’, it makes me digress within digressions. Shameful, I know.

AND finally, but most importantly:

Bradley Manning (admittedly erroneously labeled 'a marine' on NPR) is getting slammed further.

Get it from here, not NPR:

http://action.firedoglake.com/
page/s/manning_enemies?
source=em2011032b

We Can Relax, And I Can Get Busy: Paul's Back

The Neocons are primed for a renaissance. My good buddy Paul W.(olf-o-whatever) is ready to hang his comb in public again. Like Cincinnatus of old, he shall serve once more, out of sheer duty to democracy, if called.

He was treated with the respect he deserves by Fareed Zakaria on CNN recently. Interesting, huh? America's famous for giving psychopaths second chances. And hey, with Paul, it's about his tenth second chance. What a swell country!

Wolfie was at his best scoff-laughing through the interview w/o offering anything of value whatsoever. He's already signed his 'Saddam Moment' letter, demanding a repeat of history, with all its attendant failures.

More on my good buddy, just below.

AND

How did you like Debbie Amos’ little tour of Al Jazeera English? Finally deigning to fully acknowledge their importance, and defying the Olympian declaration from the Wolfowitz Center for American Strategic Wisdom that ‘Al Jazeera is no friend of the United States’, Debbie nevertheless ventured in to see what the ‘young Turks’ in Doha are up to. Her post-production narration was delivered with her typical ‘savvy woman’ dryness, but her on-the-scene voice was implying, ‘Do you guys REALLY think you’re a news organization to reckon with?’, or even ‘Now just WHO do you think you ARE??’ Meanwhile, at home, sitting in a REAL news organization, InskreepMundane were too cool to take it all seriously, and indeed, surrounded the story with trivialities. I’m sure they’re seething with professional jealousy. I’m sure Debbie’ll share a lot of snickers with the gang when she returns with relief to NPR Intergalactic HQ.

Yes Debbie, many of us in the US are accessing Al Jaz online. You might have implied that that says something: that US Media coverage of the region is propagandistic and largely worthless. But I know why you didn’t say it.

Warning to US Media: HANDS OFF Al Jazeera. No meddling or corporate weaseling-in allowed. Murdoch: don’t even THINK of a hostile takeover.

AND

I know I get stuck on style as far as on-air delivery is concerned, but here we have Juan Forero, covering the extremely important beat of S. America. I mean, does this guy sound like he’s just discovered Playboy magazine, and he’s telling us all about it while in a back alley, or what? Who would ever think that his orgazmatronic, ‘I’m-about-to-climax’ manner of speaking enhances his reportage? Well, I’m sure it’s the ‘CIA Thrill’ that turns him on, and he just can’t help himself.

Yeah, and I gotta bitch about Beardsley yet again. She’s really going into Freedom Fries mode now, adding a particularly sneering tone to her usual me-cool quack. Seems she’s in a mood to scoff at the nation that has been rather good to her these long years and imply that they haven’t been Neocon enough towards Libya. Cuz France has been in bed with Muammar (as if the US hasn’t), and so now France has got soufflé all over its face. Our Eleanor can really see through those Frogs’ BS, can’t she? My beloved dog produces excrement more aesthetically appealing that this horseshit.

Speaking of Wolfie, he’s all ready to repeat history, what with signing a ‘letter’ demanding an invasion of Libya to rescue its people from a tyrant. Sound familiar? Oh Paul! Deliver us from this current situation with your high intellect and proven success! Next stop: starring roles for Wolfie on many an NPR segment??

In the feature department, Susan Steeamberg wisely decided to ditch her gooey, overripe ‘sensuality’ in favor of doing a Best Behavior ™ interview and letting Jane Fonda take center stage for the segment, where she belongs. One of NPR’s many failures is to have decided to be ‘the nation’s storyteller’ by making its own personalities paramount instead of making them invisible, or as facilitators only. Instead we have Inskreep’s (or any other NPR star’s) virtual version of the world. To my mind, that alone is why the US Government should get out of the news biz, as NPR as it is now makes impartiality impossible.