Posted on 12/12/2002 1:14:30 PM PST by mountaineer
It's been almost 20 years since the last time I heard Jeff Christie on a Pittsburgh Top 40 radio station.
He was one of KQV-AM's "Top Pop 5," which is how the station referred to its first-string disc jockeys. At the time, KQV was losing ratings to competitor 13Q, so KQV brought in a new program director named Joey Reynolds.
Commercial radio stations, then as now, were tightly formatted. In a bid to shake things up, Reynolds tossed the format notebook into the Dumpster.
The DJs responded in a number of ways to their new-found freedom. They began spinning a more innovative playlist of songs. Some would make fun of the station's commercials while they were airing.
Jeff Christie started spouting off between records, describing the ways in which he believed the world was going to pieces. Since his views didn't jibe much with mine, I would give him about 30 seconds to play another record, then change the channel.
The unformatted approach ended KQV's career as a Top 40 station, but not Jeff Christie's. Today he's heard everywhere under his real name, Rush Limbaugh.
Rush's schtick today remains pretty much as it was in those days, when he was winging it between "The Night Chicago Died" by Paper Lace and "How Do You Do" by Mouth and MacNeil. He didn't know what he was talking about half the time then - and he still doesn't.
One could indulge him a bit in the Christie days, when it was just him, the seat of his pants and a microphone. But nowadays he's got this whole Excellence In Broadcasting operation, with a host of aides screening his calls and putting up his website.
Somewhere among all those employees must be someone who can spare a moment for fact-checking. Even first-graders know how to search Google.com.
This might have prevented him from once declaring that there are more trees in America today than there were in 1787... that the occasional eruption of a single volcano causes more permanent damage to the ozone layer than the constant assault of industrial pollution.... or that the New York Times buried a news story about positive Republican prospects in the just-passed election to serve some supposed liberal bias. This would have come as a surprise to anyone who had read that day's Times and saw the "buried" story in the lead position of page 1.
Accuracy isn't a big part of the Limbaugh ethos.
Despite his protestations to the contrary, name-calling is- unless you can show me a scholarly paper with this attribution: "Daschle, Sen. Thomas, see also Satan, Hanoi Tom." Those are actual names the non-name-calling Limbaugh called Daschle.
Or explain what wrong-headed governmental policy was criticized when, in talking about presidential pets, he described a 12-year-old Chelsea Clinton as "the White House dog." I once listened to Rush berate another 12-year-old, a Kansas girl who won a statewide academic contest with an essay about protecting the environment.
This is what Limbaugh and his defenders claim is "just entertainment." I must have skipped literature class the day they explained the humor in an adult's rantings about 12-year-old girls' appearance and intellect. Or how a senator who actually fought honorably for Limbaugh's country in Vietnam could logically be called a traitor in that very conflict.
The announcer himself was classified 4-F with an infected cyst on his rear end when that war was going on, by the way.
Yes, I know that Rush is popular. So is "Jackass The Movie." And the two phenomena are not dissimilar, except that fans of the movie aren't using its escapades to form opinions about federal legislation or foreign policy.
Ultimately, what Rush's listeners get out of his show is reinforcement of their already-held beliefs. Three hours a day of some big important guy telling you you're right about everything is seductive, after all.
But democracy, not to mention society, doesn't work well when everybody has a closed mind. In that respect, Rush doesn't just set the lock; he throws away the key. Ask any caller who tried to get past his call-screeners to tell him when something he said was wrong.
The current crop of Rush imitators on AM radio and cable TV's screaming-head shows aren't worried about being factually correct, however. All they care about is being heard over everybody else.
Maybe they should all have a "Jackass"-style disclaimer put on their shows: "Applying the views heard on this show to real life may be injurious to the body politic."
It's called research, Francis. It's not that hard. A child can do it. Try a Google search.
Hey, I resemble that remark. I squat to pee when I get up in the middle of the nite... nevermind.
I disagree with you. Rush did get it right. Chelsea IS a bow-wow babe.
Anybody can do a google search; everybody who has an opinion--right or wrong--can insert info into the library; not many can, or will, look deeply, beyond prejudice, and verify, verify, verify.
Of course he occasionally makes mistakes. Then he corrects them. BTW, the tree thing is true. Sorry, Francis.
I love your comment!! LOL
Actually, Rush did NOT say that... he reported it being said on network latenight TV and denounced those who said it.
I've always believed liberals just can't prove their case if they have to stick to facts, which is why we see them misstating them so often.
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