Talk Radio

pstrongBy Dee, Co-Editor, POOR Magazine; Co-Director, New Media Studies Program at POOR/strong/p pDIV align="left" TABLE cellpadding="5"TR VALIGN="TOP"TD/td/trTR VALIGN="TOP"TD/td/trTR VALIGN="TOP"TDTR VALIGN="TOP"TD pby PNN Staff/p pCall-in Talk Radio shows have been concerned exclusively with the tragedy and crisis that began September 11th. Rather than providing open forums for discussion and debate, many radio personalities wish only to fan the flames of fevered patriotism. Despite what we are encouraged to believe, there are those of us who hesitate to wave our flags in a war of vengeance, who cannot make sense of this horror by turning it into a simple game of Good Guys vs. Bad Guys./p pSome examples:br / (All quotes are paraphrased-not exact)/p pbKGO/b disallows dissention from listeners! I was personally cut off on the bJon Rothman/b show-/p pMe: I would not want to live like Israel, in a continuous state of war... (I was going to add "in my backyard," but Jon cut me off, then turned me off...)/p pJ.R.: i(swiftly interrupting)/i We bARE/b in a war, etc. etc. etc./p pOn another show, bPete Wilson/b cannot understand why the political voices that say the U.S. is to blame for what happened are heard only in San Francisco, referring to statements by made by clergy at Monday's Remembrance in San Francisco./p pWhat I would like to know is why Pete Wilson lives in San Francisco, and not Orange County!?!/p pAnd on another show, bBill Wattenberg/b, sitting in for Ron Owens. A caller suggested that our need for oil is the cause of our problems in the Middle East, and that he knew of a battery to use in electric cars that might be a way to solve this issue./p pBill became so impatient and annoyed with the caller for even suggesting such an iinane thing/i. He huffily explained that batteries use fossil fuel in order to be recharged and that the caller, like any "bunghole," should know this.br / /p/td/tr/td/tr/table/div/p