I love his act, and I agree with you. If you listen closely, you can hear him laughing at the end of some of his rants. He hams it up a lot.
I find Savage at his most brilliant when he goes off topic into a personal anecdote, or a short history lesson. He develops it and then applies the moral or the metaphor to the big news item of the day. It's usually very good, but sometimes its remarkable and truly brilliant.
Savage is AOK. By the way, 56 mins into todays show and still an 'encore.' :(
From an e-mail I sent several days ago:
subject: pointy shoes, drugs, sex, rock & roll
Dr Savage -
Since I tried to call your program and the lines were busy, I thought I would e-mail.
About two weeks ago, you did the pointy shoes shtick which darn near split my gut. I thought that introducing "pointy shoes" as a sub theme (almost what could be called a computer subroutine in geek talk), then continuing your topic for a dozen words or so, and going back to "pointy shoes", then to the topic and back was absolutely brilliant and I congratulate you.......................
"Savage is AOK. By the way, 56 mins into todays show and still an 'encore.' :("
Larry Morena (sp?) is sitting in for him tonight so it's a new show here. Of course, I can't remember what I had for lunch so take that for what it;s worth ;-)