Friday, November 23, 2007

Open Thread

NPR related comments welcomed.

6 comments:

Porter Melmoth said...

ME (Mourning Addiction - ha ha) is starting to bog me down again. After the relentless bossiness of being told to hog out at the T'giving table (and then maybe take a walk or something afterwards), and the stentorian commands to SHOP on this, the day after (we have a local announcer that's cuter than Missy Block), I can only respond to two stories.

One I found insulting in the extreme. Smirks 'n giggles accompanied a clever segue from bloated chow-downers at holiday tables to 'bloated' classical music works. Some clown chose Mahler's 8th symphony as something to laugh at. Fortunately, the greatness of Mahler's music doesn't have to be proven to people at NPR who can't even begin to understand it. Renee feels more comfortable with 'circus music'. Probably because she's ringmaster in one. Some twit, who's an actual musician, helps Renee through early 20th century composers with a definite 'Classical Music Can Be Fun! - Well, Some Of It Anyway' tone, and it's all just a shameful waste of soundwaves. Now I ask you, what the hell was the actual PURPOSE of this pathetic mess of a segment? I have my own private CD of Mahler's 8th, and I will interpret it without any help from 'It's Morning Edition', thank you very much. Proudly then, do I feel myself culturally superior to these waste-of-time broadcasting peasants!

And briefly, if there's one single reason to abandon and abolish NPR News, it was the appalling 'profile' of Keith Olbermann that was another attempt to poke fun, NPR-style at someone of value. I won't waste any more time in trying to describe something really awful. Yes, it made me spittin' mad, mainly because of the stupid attempt to 'outsmart' Keith's Countdown format. In short, it didn't work. NPR obviously hates Keith. Renee gave a little 'let them eat cake'-style exit remark, that was meant to show her disapproval of the popular Olbermann.

Anonymous said...

Sounds like jealousy to me - contempt for someone (K.O.) telling it like it T-I is with an incisive wit that NPR McNews can only snidely mimic in their chronically drab style; absolutely ineffectual. Reminded now of some 'bottom-of-the-hour' lite news thing like they always do with requisite hip-jiggling white-bread music, about Bush & Cheney's Halloween costumes (almost predictably, the by-now tired old Darth Vader schtick was worked in). Boy, what cut-ups. I was in hysterics with that little driveway moment. -yawn- Suppose it was funny to those either late to the party, or who will guffaw and applaud to anything.

Mytwords said...

I have to agree with you Porter about the Keith Olbermann slime job adminstered Friday am by Folkenflik. Especially disgraceful was his attempt to portray Olbermann as nothing but a mirror image of Bill O'Reily - as if challenging the abuses of power is just a "liberal" version of advocating and supporting the abuses of power. Of course since NPR news usually does the latter, it's no surprise that they don't ask the obvious question: "Whose opinions are borne out by facts?"

Anonymous said...

Porter Melmoth,
I enjoyed your comment, EXCEPT- please do not use 'peasant' as a synonym for 'stupid person' as in
"waste-of-time broadcasting peasants"

I am of peasant stock (Ashkenazi Jew) and proud of it, likewise my mother, who, with just a high school education, was one of the smartest people I knew.

Take it back!

ellen r

Porter Melmoth said...

Fear not, Ellen, I cheerfully take back any implication of peasants being vacuous and shallow NPR-like creatures, who do not have much ability to sense the wonder of the world around them. Yes, I was being snide in sort of an old fashioned way. I am snide (or, I believe the preferred 'net term is 'snarky') because, in the face of NPR's insistence in being mockable, I find snide reactions sadly satisfying. When you face an unfeeling media monolith like NPR, I've got to attempt some sort of response like sarcasm, because the reality of NPR and what they're doing to the listening public is hard to accept. Believe me, I am, in actuality, down on the ground with the rest of us, gazing in stupefaction at the hot-air bloat factor of the NPR chatterers, and I marvel at how they make fools of themselves as they purport to broadcast their 'preferred' tastes in things. It's a big wide world out there, but NPR doesn't seem to know it.

Anonymous said...

I'm with you, Porter. :)


ellenr