BlatherWatch

ten stupid things dr. laura did to mess up her career

We reported a while back that the evil scold, Dr. Laura Schlessinger was in 5th place in the somewhat dubious 2005 Talkers Magazine Talk Host Survey.

This unscientific poll is influential but kind of hinky; based on a mysterious and quirky process of interviews with listeners, radio professionals; tea leaves, nepotism, (or incest) and intrigue.

Dr. Laura, runs a moralistic, preacherly lifestyle advice show, based on her personal mysanthropy and Jewish fundamentalist principles. She's got a tongue sharper than a Henckels; a black belt in scorn and a master's in hauteur. She can kick, too.

The mean old killjoy has been pretty hot stuff in the past--in more ways than one.

Career-wise she's been to the very pinnacle of syndicated talk radio. As a fast rising star in the talk radio firmament, Premiere syndicated her show, and she was often paired with Rush Limbaugh on Clear Channel and other talk stations.

In 2000, she was second only to Rush Limbaugh, a perch now occupied by Sean Hannity.

But gravity, we hear, is starting to bring her down, in more ways than one. The word in the radio trade is that her show is slipping and slipping badly. Dr. Laura is going to smaller and smaller stations, markets, and to evenings and weekends at what should be to her, an alarming rate.

Her daytime TV show, cancelled in 2001, was supposed to propel her into the Oprah-strata of superstardom, but it turned out to be a bust.

It got a lot of attention when it premiered, because of gay & lesbian protests of her hard-ass stance on queers. She had called gays a "biological faux pas," claimed they're inferior parents; described gay sex as "deviant;" accused gay men of being "predatory on young boys," and recommended that gays and lesbians get themselves cured through "reparative therapy."

Some sponsors withdrew and there were scrumptious headlines which got her some smashing ratings at first. Though gays credit their boycott for her downfall, the real story is that when the dust settled, it became obvious that her show was simply awful and it went down in a few months with hardly a whimper.

Laura has a lot of baggage. Her public image wasn't enhanced much--especially with her religious fanbase--when a batch of nude photos   surfaced in the mid-'90's which had been taken by Bill Ballance, the general manager of a California radio station who'd given her start in radio.

The 28-year-old married Miss Laura was having an affair with Ballance in the 1970's, and she was so in love with the way she looked she asked him to take the shots later heard round the world.

Ballance, who was by then 80 yrs old, sold them to Seattle pornographer, Seth Warshavsky for $50k. Dr. Laura sued, a judge upheld our sacred First Amendment rights and Laura’s perky T's & and round little A have been public domain ever since. (Gravity has since reared its ugly head again, according to sources).

In 2002, Her Kid's Mom turned out to be Not Her Mom's Kid when Dr. Laura's 77-year-old mother was found dead and decomposed in her Beverly Hills apartment. The family counselor and multi-millionaire radio personality had been estranged from her mom for years and when she died of what was later found to be natural causes, no one was around.

It was a little embarrassing for the self-appointed role model.

In 2003, her religious supporters couldn't have been overjoyed when she went on-air to renounce orthodox Judaism, saying she no longer found her adopted faith, "fulfilling."

She told listeners that while she still "considers" herself Jewish, "my identifying with this entity and my fulfilling the rituals, etc., of the entity - that has ended."

Of her conversion to Orthodox Judaism, Dr. Laura  told her 12 million listeners: "I felt that I was putting out a tremendous amount toward that mission, that end, and not feeling a return, not feeling connected, not feeling that inspired."

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, the outspoken Orthodox "rabbi to the Stars," was appalled, labelling her a "fair weather Jew," he wrote: "Dr. Laura's repudiation of her Judaism ranks as some of the shallowest renunciations of personal faith in all human history. It is surely unworthy of America's self-styled moral advocate."

A recent anonymous post in a radio trade chat board had this to say:

"Dr." Laura's problem is the same one that afflicts all of those who preach holier-than-thou rhetoric. First, her show started as a stealth religious indoctrination and graduated into something you'd expect from ITALFocus on the Family. Although many relished her trashing of stupid callers who disagreed with her, the rhetoric got heavier and heavier.

What brought her walls crashing down, however, were the various expose articles done revealing her trashy nude shots, her horrid relationship with her own mother, a not-so-hot home life, and the revelation that the woman was as qualified to provide professional therapy as Fluffy the Hamster.

OxyRush doesn't devote his three hours to rail against drug users, and Double Down Bill Bennett's own gambling addiction has never been the basis of his show. But when someone purports to tell you how to live your life and what poor judgment you used, and then the glossies turn up, the audience is going to flee for the hills.

george w. bush: puddin' packin' prez

Eric: Black pudding's very black today, mother...
Mum: Yes, it is very black today, dear.
Eric: That's very black, that is--even the white bits are black...
   --Michael Palin & Terry Jones in "Ripping Yarns."

We were underwhelmed Tuesday night with George W. Bush's speech. That's not news, of course, because we're liberals, and we think consider Bush is the worst president since Mickey Rooney. Always did.

Touted all day by talk radio GOP surrogates like Sean Hannity, (who got a special preview copy) the speech was to be political Viagara to help the American people get it up again over the Iraq war. 

It was to be a passionate stem-winder in the tradition of other inspirational conservatives such as Winston Churchill, Phineas T. Bluster or Senator Beauregard Claghorn. 

Instead, it was more dry, dispassionate speechifying written by someone with a better vocabulary than Bush; read badly in front of an ostensibly friendly military audience under orders to applaud or be shot as a traitor. Several of the boyz in uniform chose the latter, the popping of the firing squads out back woke us briefly.

The Fort Bragg audience only interrupted the President once with applause, and that was only when he mentioned pudding.

Local right-wing talk jocks John Carlson, Kirby Wilbur, and Bryan Suits, the conservative hallelujah choir down at KVI, did some commentary after the speech, and even they were unimpressed.

It was the same old talking points, the 9/11 references, the slop trough tropes about democracy in the Middle East. We had the feeling that, like a Sunday school kid reading the begats, Bush seemed to be just trying to get through it so he could get some of that pudding.

Never mind what those predictable negative nattering nabobs of the liberal media like us might say--if Carlson, Wilbur and Suits were complaining, the smirking Chimp-in-Chief and his ill-begotten wars are in even more trouble than the sinking poll numbers would indicate.

These right-wing talk hosts agreed that this was a missed opportunity by Bush to make his case in the face of the mounting skepticism about Iraq.

They bemoaned the points he could have made, they bemoaned the passion he didn't have, they bemoaned the inspiration, he couldn't provide; they bemoaned the pudding they didn't get.

Who did they think he was? Bill Clinton? Bush is many things, but inspiring he ain't--unless you count the inspiration to armed insurrection or to laugh until your beverage of choice squirts out your nose.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was none too inspiring himself last week. You can usually count on him to put a coherent sentence together and his jokes, unlike his boss' are usually intentional.

But the world was not thrilled when Rumsfeld said one day the insurgency was in its "death throes," only to later clarify: "...insurgencies tend to go on 5, 6, 8, 10, 12 years."

Bush's Tuesday speech was unsettlingly reminiscent of those periodic talks to the nation given by Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon telling us about how swell everything was going in Vietnam. Victory was always just around this corner, that corner...

Is there any of that pudding left?

lisa brown, good governing, bad broadcasting, fear, loathing, and sensible shoes...

Evergreen Politics' Lynn Allen spoke with the Lisa Brown, the Eastern Washington University professor of economics who is Senate Majority Leader (D-Spokane) and the only Democratic senator from Eastern Washington. Read her excellent interview here.

Lynn gives Brown a forum to go back and look at the 2005 legislature and take an inventory.

It came up looking pretty good.

(We talked with Brown a few times in 2001, as she was beginning in leadership as the new chair of the powerful Senate Ways & Means Committee. Her grasp of the numbers and the incumbent political situation was dazzling. And with all that wonk, she has great sense of humor and a down-to-earth lets-get-it-done attitude of a politician who's in it for a calling higher than her own ego. Brown is in the our state's proud lineage of smart women in power: Patty Murray, Maria Cantwell and Christine Gregoire. We, for one, hope she stays in politics and  continues to make her way up the food chain).

Brown talks about one of the most productive sessions in memory. They took risks, got a lot done. Some of it was bitter medicine for an ailing state hurting because of the gridlock of recent sessions with close majorities and dwindled revenues. Not all they accomplished will go down easy with the voters--brave solons from both parties have some 'splainin' to do in their districts.

It's the ability of Democrats to do the splainin' that worries us.

Lisa Brown says:

We have to be able to do a better job of telling our story. We grapple with the issue of communication. For example, the state is now faced with the possibility of this anti-tax initiative. We worked very hard to get support from community leaders, business leaders and labor across all the cities and counties in Washington State for passage of the Transportation Bill. The whole story about the importance of that bill and its support by such a wide group of people is not getting out. It is being characterized as a ten cent tax increase when we were very careful to phase in the additional taxes, a few cents at a time over several years.

This bill, was painfully worked out in a responsible, thoughtful, legislative sausage machine that included the usual public input, open hearings, spite, malice; plus uncommon give & take between Eastsiders/Westsiders, Democrats/Republicans, dog/cats, fish/fowl, stalkers and dreamers.

This not unminor miracle is being threatened by an opportunistic, faux populist uprising fired-up by neocon talk-jocks John Carlson and Kirby Wilbur.

They're not only pumping their listenership with fear and loathing, they're organizing and directing the logistics of the hurry-up signature gathering effort on-air.

They're both Republican operatives and county by county, the Grand Old Party is supporting this to spite their face...nothing new there--pass it with the left hand, smack it down with the right. This existential political strategy will bite them in the end, but for now it's working with a public seemingly afflicted with political attention deficit disorder.

The only Republicans to support it are the Mainstream Republicans, who haven't had any clout in the party since Reagan.

Conventional wisdom says the initiative will pass if it gets on the ballot. The opposition has little to counter all this other than some meager legal hopes that this may be found unfair or improper.

Meanwhile, the veto campaign romps through the legal loopholes.

Democrats have a communications problem right here in liberal Seattle, where where 60% of the state's electorate resides and a Republican can't get elected for love or money (though they haven't tried the former lately).

Instead, they run dual, but paradoxical messages over the right-wing airwaves of KVI and KTTH. In one ear they pound the rigorous drivel of hard-ass, narcissistic civic libertarianism that would cut the feet from beneath any public attempt to provide a safety net or any government help for individual citizens.

If they had their way, they'd take government out of education, highways, the environment. There'd be no Social Security, no food stamps, no help for the disabled, or families in financial crises. They want you all in your cars, but they won't fix the roads! 

Simultaneously, in your other ear, they're sermonizing away at your rights by preaching a hidebound, moralistic, loveless, faith-based, legalistic, anti-sex, antihuman message that strives to pass laws to stifle medical research, dictate your family's choices about life and death all based on their own religious dogma.

They want the government to be able to regulate what you can read, watch on TV, who you sleep with, and would withhold your rights, take away your birthday, or even lock you up if your choices might deviate from their secular mandates.

And somehow, the economic conservatives (who have the interests of business in their hearts) have convinced the Bible-thumpers, that their cold-blooded message is biblical!

These are the messages that talk radio is repeating day in and day out and has been for 15 years. Like reprogramming methods from a Chinese prison camp, the repetition over time changes the molecular structure of the brain cells of the unsuspecting, the under informed, the already pissed-off, and the naive.

Folks, there are no other loudspeakers out there worth talking about, here in act-locally country. The message they send to politicians is: if you act, you'll be punished, if you don't act, you'll be punished.

We're damn lucky we can attract anyone with the capabilities and commitment of a Lisa Brown to elected service. But how long can that last?

rabbi daniel lapin: "the man who stands by his scandal-ridden friends"

Rabbi Daniel Lapin came home Sunday night from Washington DC, just in time to take the microphone on his evening talk show (KTTH Sundays 7-10p) midway though it.

BlatherWatch was listening in hopes the good rebbi might address some of the questions brought up last week in the national press.

Lapin is the ultra-orthodox Seattle rabbi tangled in the unfolding influence-peddling-and-everything else scandal in the Capitol and swirling around his close political friends: disgraced superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, meaneocon Tom DeLay, Christian conprop guru Ralph Reed and, distantly, neocon theorist and activist Grover Norquist.

Lapin dismisses the scandal as an accounting error.

So far Lapin has been only peripheral to the affair, but it's provided some good laughs for us, and his proximity to it has sullied the pure and sanctimonious image he always tries to maintain.

Lapin is the darling of the Christian right; friends and co-conspirator with stalwart national conservative supernovae like Delay, Norquist, Reed, Newt Gingrich, Pat Robertson, and Rev. Ken Hutcherson. These are people with profound influence in Washington these days.

The Washington Post reports Lapin had a private Shabbat dinner with George W. Bush last year.

We've reported the rebbi's speckled past and his many interesting political ideas on many interesting issues, including some whimsical ones on The Holocaust.

We were not disappointed--and not surprised to hear Sunday night some fancy dissembling from the influential "show rabbi of the religious right," as NY Times Frank Rich calls him.

The Washington Post reported last week that Lapin's name had come up in the Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearings investigating Abramoff's dealings representing Indian casino interests.

In an email, Abramoff asked Lapin to help him sex-up his resume to help him get into the exclusive Cosmos Club whose members include Nobel laureates. "Most prospective members have received awards and I have received none," he whined. 

Lapin answered, "Let's organize your many prestigious awards so they're ready to 'hang on the wall.' "

Later that day, Lapin expounded, "Yes, I just need to know what needs to be produced ... letters? Plaques? Neither?"

Sunday, Lapin finally introduced the sordid Abramoff mess to his listeners by admitting that his old friend had become very powerful and done some things that were probably wrong.

But the emails promising to pad the resume? A "jocular interchange," he said in his haughty Afrikaner accent.

Then, amazingly, he blamed it all on the Post Intelligencer, the local daily whose Washington correspondent Charlie Pope reported the episode. Lapin never mentioned that the Washington Post's Dana Milbank wrote a similar report on the same day.

"They stripped out the smiley faces and other emoticons," he said on the radio. That was a change from his last week's story, when he told Charlie Pope he couldn't recall the exchange, "I wish I could help you, but no, I have no recollection."

The thought of the sarcastic Lapin and the cynical Washington shark Abramoff adorning their emails with those annoying little :)'s strains our credulity.

The story that it was all in jest is also questionable considering Abramoff's email the next day  detailing some instructions of deception:

"Probably just a few clever titles of awards, dates and that's it," he wrote. "As long as you can be the person to verify them (or we can have someone else verify one and you the other), we should be set. Do you have any creative titles or should I dip into my bag of tricks?"

Lapin didn't mention the original WAPO story because a less embarrassing piece, The Republicans' Rabbi-in-Arms: Christian Conservatives See a Soul Mate in the Man Who Stands by His Scandal-Ridden Friends by Hannah Rosin appeared in Saturday's Style section.

For evangelicals who are used to reading about Jews as God's chosen people, he solves an essential mystery: "A lot of people are surprised when they leave church and encounter essentially Dershowitz Judaism, Jews who are liberal . . . ," says conservative activist Grover Norquist, who is also a friend. "Lapin is the opposite of that."

For conservatives searching for biblical foundations for their political positions, Lapin is validation from the original source. His specialty is finding support in the Torah for what turns out to be the current Republican platform: lower taxes, decreased regulation, pro-traditional family policies.

"The principles of the Republican Party and the convictions of our president more closely parallel the moral vision of the God of Abraham than those of anyone else," Lapin said at the dinner with Bush, hosted by Ralph Reed.

Lapin is a man of great charm and rhetorical skill. "He could talk a dog off a meat wagon," says a former KVI producer.

And he sure is a loyal friend. Rosin writes:

In an earlier set of e-mails, Abramoff calls his Indian clients "morons" and "monkeys." For that, Daniel Lapin found the language to criticize his old friend, calling his insults "horrible, awful." But he stops short of saying what Medved does, that as an Orthodox Jew Abramoff "disgraced the Torah." Instead, he edges more toward pastoral forgiveness.

"Abramoff created an extremely effective ideological machine, and I think that bothered many people on the moderate side," says Lapin. "Nobody claims Abramoff did anything different than anyone else. He's a friend of mine and I've seen him do many, many wonderful and decent things. My argument is that a human being is a very complicated amalgam. We've all done things we're not proud of."

If Mr. Abramoff is found guilty of any crime, we're praying that the good rabbi will remain consistent and call for the same measure of mercy that he'd show any other common criminal: bupkus.

anti-roads repair I-912--grassroots or astroturf?

We were hoping someone would call the I-912 campaign on this travesty of democracy.

And by god, they have...

We speak of the amazing meat & potatoes promotion; the blatant smoke & mirrors misrepresentations; and the nuts & bolts campaign work done on talk radio to promote the anti-road repair initiative, I-912.

KVI drive time jocks, and Republican activists, Kirby Wilbur and John Carlson thought up this initiative, and have been shamelessly tub-thumping it on their popular right-wing talk shows.

Born of the rage over the failed Rossi for governor campaign which irresponsible R's dragged into court and decisively lost, this initiative is designed to be a stick in the eye for the Democratic Legislature and Governor Gregoire. It's tailored to usurp the power of a duly elected legislature, to which the Republicans could not get duly elected.

Sound suspicious? That's because these phony grassroots are actually AstroTurf manufactured by partisan Republicans.   

The massive bill was passed with help of some very brave Republicans--now being savaged daily on KVI.

KVI talkers not only advocate the hell out of their negative, obstructionist spoiler, but do all manner of organizing--like arranging for initiative drops, letting campaign workers network logistics on-air and generally broadcast as a clearing house for all things 9-12.

The opposition, Keep Washington Rolling under the auspices of San Juan County and the cities of Auburn, Kent and Seattle asked a judge Wednesday to stop gas tax increase foes from raising and spending money. Their suit alleges, among other things, that the hours of radio time given by Fisher Broadcasting to this campaign were in fact, unreported campaign contributions.

The suit also seeks a preliminary injunction and penalties to stop I-912 campaign organizers from spending money from unidentified sources. A hearing is set for July 1.

We're not sure if this is a legal or regulatory problem for them or not, the judge will decide. But we're sure that all this airtime being used for free for this Republican agenda item is, on the face of it, unfair. BlatherWatch doesn't advocate re-invoking the Fairness Doctrine, but this is the kind of political abuse on the public airwaves that it was written to prevent.
 
For us, this points up the need for local progressive talkers unafraid to talk in depth about local issues.

No opposition could afford to pay for the hours and hours of radio time to match those given to this campaign by Wilbur, Carlson and Fisher Broadcasting.

Carlson says this bill is vague, "I just want to know where my money is being spent." Duane, our regular reader and loyal opposition, listens to this crap and writes,: "I signed the anti-gas tax initiative today...tax me when you actually have some PLANS for the money you want to collect."

We suggest to Duane and everyone else who has made up their minds by listening to Carlson & Co., to click on this and actually read the very specific projects named in the roads repair bill.

The list is long with roads and bridges projects long overdue. Every county in the state is included...you don't think those Republicans (and Democrats) would take all this political risk if they weren't getting something very real for their districts?

By the way, the Keep Washington Rolling people, (who might be too little, too late) is a bipartisan collection of business, labor, environmentalists, Republican legislators and citizens like former Republican governor, Dan "Straight Arrow" Evans who are concerned that this good and brave legislative work will be undone by these negative anti-tax demagogues who truly offer no alternative.

Please, don't sign I-912.                                                                                                    NWPT54

rabbi daniel lapin: more national embarrassment

We've been telling you about him for months. He's Rabbi Daniel Lapin, the situationally ethical KTTH talk host (Sundays 7-10p) and "show rabbi" for the Christian right.

The Mercer Island ultraconservative famously introduced Tom Delay, the scandal-plagued House Majority Leader to now disgraced superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, who sits on the board (with talk jock Michael Medved) of Lapin's charity, Toward Tradition. Read blatherWatch's The Rabbi With The Tinfoil Yarmulke (And We Thought He Was Just Boring...)

Abramoff is being investigated by the Senate, the House, the Justice Department, and a federal grand jury for a plethora of questionable business practices and shady political dealings.

In Wednesday's Senate hearing into Abramoff's alleged defrauding of Indian tribes, the verity of Lapin's skewed moral compass was again exposed, this time revealing the trivial deceptive natures of both of these allegedly religious men.

Washington Post reporter Dana Milbank reported an email exchange between Abramoff and Lapin read in the hearing with Lapin agreeing to help pad Abramoff's resume: 

"I hate to ask you for your help with something so silly but I've been nominated for membership in the Cosmos Club, which is a very distinguished club in Washington, DC, comprised of Nobel Prize winners, etc.," Abramoff wrote.

"Problem for me is that most prospective members have received awards and I have received none. I was wondering if you thought it possible that I could put that I have received an award from Toward Tradition with a sufficiently academic title, perhaps something like Scholar of Talmudic Studies?"

There were titters in the audience as Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.) read aloud the email, then outright laughter as he continued reading: "Indeed, it would be even better if it were possible that I received these in years past, if you know what I mean."

The rabbi, conservative radio host Daniel Lapin, gave his blessing. "I just need to know what needs to be produced," he wrote. "Letters? Plaques?"

Read more details of this silly, ass-kissing deception in this Seattle Post Intelligencer report.

Lapin is a leader in the national Values Community; friend of Rev. Ken Hutcherson, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Watergate felon turned preacher, Charles Colson, "spiritual advisor" of Newt Gingrich and a hard-ass, pompous, self-aggrandizing, social conservative.

He helped Hutcherson organize and spoke at last year's antigay "Mayday for Marriage " rallies in Seattle and Washington DC, that proved so influential in the November election of George W. Bush.

The haughty silver-tongued former South African buys his own radio time Sunday evenings (7-10p) from Entercom’s local KTTH. His talk show is a folksy, “(Everybody needs a rabbi,” he always says) kulturkampf, interlaced with schmaltz, advice to the lovelorn and diatribing political monologues.

He's a champion of marriage between people of the same faith, same species, but different genders, of course.

He’s didactic and condescending and speaks in paragraphs--long paragraphs. Once syndicated, his talk show proved too boring for mass consumption, so now it’s vanity radio paid for by Toward Tradition.

Pacific Northwest goyim in general have little contact with Jews, especially religious ones, so listeners gush on-air and treat him like an exotic animal--sort of their pet Jew.

This man of god not only supports family values, faithfulness, integrity, and arranged marriages; but he's also for tax cuts, property rights, cuts for social programs, and capital punishment. He opposes promiscuity, abortion, homosexuality, welfare, crime, funding the arts, gun control, environmental regulations, and recycling.

He denies that poverty exists in the U.S.; and says Terri Schiavo’s death was "premeditated murder," and that Living Wills are suicide notes. To love your pets too much, by his lights, is unbiblical; and tattoos, birth control, piercing, abortions and assisted suicide are immorally equivalent.

Paid $165,000 a year by Toward Tradition according to a 2003 IRS filing, Lapin calls his Mercer Island organization a coalition of Jews and Christians formed to counter anti religious bigotry and preserve the social fabric. He is also co-chair of American Alliance of Jews and Christians, created with former GOP presidential also-ran Gary Bauer.

Its board of advisers includes Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Watergate conspirator Charles Colson, Abramoff, and Lapin's longtime friend and fellow radio talker Michael Medved.

He addressed the 1996 Republican Convention, after moving to the Seattle area and declaring personal bankruptcy after his Los Angeles investment company whose investors were his members of his synagogue went bust.

Click here for the blatherWatch opus: Rabbi Daniel Lapin, A Long Look Backward for the whole story on this troubling, divisive character.

Will the good rabbi apologize on his show, Sunday next? Probably not. Humility and contrition don't seem to be part of this religious zealot's psyche...but just in case, blatherWatch will be listening.

save the flag, burn the constitution

The US Congress seems to be in line to amend the First Amendment--you know that one about freedom of speech?

The House passed a constitutional amendment Wednesday allowing Congress to prohibit the desecration of the American flag.

It'll go to the Senate, where the vote is too close to call.

No one can recall when a flag was last burned in protest here in the US, (it might have been when those evangelical Christians were mad because they had to take the 10 Commandments monument out of that Alabama state building) but they're burned regularly on the streets of Baghdad, where our boys seem to be losing a war the Administration pretends is a game of Monopoly.

Republicans are a wily race...they've found another "issue" to plump up their patriotically correct base and give the Democrats a wedgie.

The wedge comes between the Dem's and Americans who view Old Glory as Moslems do the Koran--unusable as toilet paper or kindling or as a potent form of political speech.

The wedge is a public anal exam of patriotism for Democrats administered by the Republicans. "Bend over, please."

It's another brickbat of righteousness to smack future candidates like Senators Hillary Clinton or Maria Cantwell over the head with if they vote against it; or to stir up shit with their base if they vote for it.

Democrats bitterly remember the 2002 Georgia Senate race when Sen. Max Cleland, who lost both legs and an arm in Vietnam, lost re-election after Republicans assaulted his patriotism. They smeared him by running ads with pictures of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein and blamed him for thwarting plans for a Homeland Security Department.

A totally meaningless, feel-good non-issue, it's another nasty-but-nice little distraction from the war we're losing in Iraq; the widening prisoner torture scandal; the uptick of media attention to the Downing Street memos; the failed nomination of John Bolton and the Bush Social Security "reforms" that Americans seem to reject in larger numbers each day.

Most American flags, these days are a manufactured in China, one of the few "Communist" nations left on earth. They need the trade, they say, in order to buy up American corporations and to finance our burgeoning national debt.

Thank god Congress has mitigated, if not completely eliminated the urgent problems before them. Otherwise we'd have to conclude this was just an indulgent and cynical partisan political move.

rev. rush limbaugh: will he atone for his sins?

The editorial in Sunday's Palm Beach Post led: "Rush Limbaugh's attorney keeps saying that his client is innocent. So why does he keep acting as though his client is guilty?"

The right Rev. Rush Limbaugh, spokesman and spiritual mentor for the religious right and towering presence in the Values Community, may even face a drug charge one of these days.

Florida justice moves slow, especially when it's being stymied by Limbaugh's Miami celebrity lawyer, Roy Black, the guy who got William Kennedy Smith off on a rape charge in Palm Beach back in the 90's.

Outside of South Florida, we don't hear much about this, because Black has been able to stall criminal investigation of the allegations that Big Pants bought OxyContin and Vicodin by "doctor shopping," the illegal deception of multiple doctors to write overlapping prescriptions.

Investigators seized the the Flatulent Fulminator's medical records with search warrants in 2003, but they've remained sealed because Limbaugh appealed, arguing that the case threatened his privacy rights. He lost at the Circuit and appellate court levels, and the Florida Supreme Court declined to hear the case.

But appeals by the wealthy blabber magnate, who lives in a mansion with 15 bathrooms, successfully stalled the investigation for more than 18 months.

Regular people have been complaining these 18 months that if you're not a big, fat idiot with a big, fat ass; a big, fat radio show; a big fat bank account; and a lot of big fat friends...you get busted when you get busted.

The Palm Beach Post writes:

Despite what the talk-show host has claimed, as he tries to shift attention from himself, [the prosecutor's] office seeks neither to embarrass Mr. Limbaugh nor to score political points. The investigation led to Mr. Limbaugh. After his housekeeper told The National Enquirer that she gave Mr. Limbaugh large quantities of pills, the host underwent treatment for addiction.

The cops seized the records after reading in the papers that Limbaugh received about 2,000 painkillers, prescribed by four doctors in six months, at a pharmacy near his Palm Beach mansion.

Though he hasn't been charged with a crime, he's proclaimed his innocence--even while simultaneously acknowledging his addiction. He took a very public five month leave from his weekdaily show for rehab in 2003.

Rev. Limbaugh, a crossing attendant in the busy intersection of church and state, screeds interminably on the radio against drug users, and drug dealers and advocates harsh punishments. He's been a hawk in the war on drugs.

Though a harsh family values advocate, and Bible-believing Christian, he recently left his third wife for beautiful CNN anchor Daryn Kagan. You gotta hand it to him--she's quite a catch for a guy with the sex appeal (and a lot of the other attributes) of Major Hoople. Fap!

Loyal fans--usually hold 'em-accountable-advocates--are characteristically permissive when it comes to the Maha Rushee. During his rehab they decried the liberal glee at seeing the bombastic hypocrite go down so ignominiously. "Addiction's a disease," they said. "The pills were prescribed by a doctor."

Yeah, but he liked to get high just like any junkie downtown.

A designated liar for the Republican Party, Limbaugh is an unabashed Bush Administration flack willing to say the stuff the administration really thinks or wants you to think but won't say out loud.

Monday, he repeated baseless Internet rumors that the Downing Street memos were faked, is selling on his website "Club G'itmo" T-shirts that read "I Got My Free Koran and Prayer Rug at G'itmo," "Your Tropical Retreat from the Stress of Jihad," "My Mullah went to Club G'itmo and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt," and "What Happens in G'itmo Stays in G'itmo."

Time will tell Limbaugh will get the same treatment as any other junkie; so far, he's been treated like one of those elitest Kennedy's he's so envious of.

kiro wins a edward r. murrow award...posthumously

Not surprising that KIRO's Dave Ross (m-f, 3-6p) won a national first place for "Best Writing" for his CBS Commentary when the national radio trade Radio-Television News Directors Association (RTNDA) gave out its coveted Edward R. Murrow Awards, recently.

Ross is the most singularly talented talk personality in this town; AND he's funny, AND he's a liberal; AND...he can sing.

KIRO should be proud--but they won another Murrow they're not puffing about. It was first place for Newscast In A Large Market for a story about last year's Vashon Island oil spill. Why so mum? Because it was done in PM drive news by Val Stouffer and Tony Miner--long time talent summarily booted when Program Director Tom Clendening and Mr. Pridemore killed that very newscast in January.

Oops.

Some say RTNDA's awarding this posthumous honor to the newscast was to send a message to KIRO about dismantling its once mighty news gathering operation. These kudos were for last year--KIRO's so far out of the news business, sources say it's doubtful they'll be winning more news awards any time soon.

A lot of the ratings problems suffered by KIRO (locked into first place for years, and now stuck in 6th) has to do with, not only disastrous talk programming, but because they cut the long established noon and drive-time news hours like that late, great one by Val & Tony. It was just another gift they gave to Fisher's KOMO AM.

In a piece about the across-the-board ratings softening of Seattle talk radio, former Seattle talker (KVI, KIRO) conservative blogger Brian Maloney writes about KIRO's problems. The Equalizer and blatherWatch don't agree much about politics, but Maloney writes authoritatively when analyzing radio. Like blatherWatch, he calls 'em like he sees 'em, right or left. He says:

What's key to KIRO's survival, by the way, is not how any of the talk shows are performing, but whether the morning news program's ratings hold up. Recently, those had begun to slide for the first time. That's where the money is made, so any real drop there, would hurt KIRO badly.

KIRO's real competition is a news station, KOMO-AM, which stole the Mariners radio broadcasts away from the station several years ago. With the team not faring much better than last year, KOMO hasn't seen the big ratings surge expected, at least not yet. That's more likely to change as the summer figures emerge.

We disagree with Maloney when he posits that KIRO's overrepresentation of liberals is a major factor in its problems. He says it's a "sandwich," one conservative (Dori Monson) between two liberals Allen Prell and Dave Ross. We believe it's the choice of liberals (Prell's a disaster) or an ill-chosen time slot: Dave Ross is up against NPR's highly rated news, "All Things Considered," and a very well loyal John Carlson audience.
~~
Here's the list of the recent KIRO awards...they should be proud of their news staff's performance...(Memo to Mr. Clendening: don't let anything happen to Heather Bosch).

Overall Excellence
Best Newscast: "5pm Oil Spill coverage" Val Stouffer, Tony Miner 
Best Continuing Coverage: "Governor's Race"
Best Investigative Reporting: "Housing Discrimination" by Heather Bosch
Best Spot News: "Felon on the Run" by Chris Sullivan
Best Feature: "Let's Talk About Britney" by Tom Tangney
Best Series: "Citizen Soldier" by Heather Bosch
Best Use of Sound: "Dock Dogs" by Heather Bosch
Best Writing: "Wardrobe Malfunction" by Dave Ross
Best Website

there oughta be a law...kvi, john carlson, & kirby wilbur's dirty anti-road repair I-912 campaign

We're not lawyers, but can this heavy stumping for the No Road Repairs Initiative heard daily on KVI's morning and evening drive time talk shows by Kirby Wilbur (m-f, 5-9a) and John Carlson (m-f, 3-6p) be legal?

These guys, both long time GOP operatives, are not only drumming their message--that this is about gas taxes--into the heads of 1000's day in and day out, but they're organizing and brainstorming petition distribution; making signature-gathering plans and strategies with the campaign workers and volunteers among their listeners. 

This is grossly unfair. The opposition couldn't buy this valuable airtime--no activist group could afford even a fraction of the continuous daily political infomercials afforded the Just Say No To Roads campaign by these talk shows.

These are public airwaves, they do not belong to this Republican cabal bent on vetoing a roads repair package passed painfully by a Legislature who, for once, did something both important and brave. 

The fact is, there's a billion dollars and decades worth of work needed on state roads and only two legal ways to fix or build roads and bridges: car tabs and gas taxes. Tim Eyman neutralized the car tab option years ago, leaving only gas taxes.

Even though some brave Republicans (now being savaged on KVI) helped pass this much needed package, the GOP is endorsing the anti-roads bill county by county.

It's a cynical Karl Rove neocon strategy in micro, using talk radio to demagogue an issue making Democrats look bad in a state where R's can't get elected--and damn the consequences.

Here's what this is really about:

I-912 is designed to embarrass a Democratic Legislature and Governor Gregoire.

I-912 is meant to win Republicans power and influence disproportionate to their minority status.

I-912 is made to drive up Carlson and Wilbur's already considerable clout in the Republican Party.

I-9-12 is designed to keep government barefoot and pregnant---at least while the Democrats are in charge.

I-912 is to defeat Democrats and elect Republicans.

KVI has been used as a mouthpiece for illegal or questionable political campaigning before. Mike Siegel,(KTTH m-f,6-9a) on KVI back in the '90's, ran an entire (losing) campaign for a pissed-off woman running against a legislator who Siegel hated. He's not helping with I-912, (too many pother huge egos in the room for him) but he's tub-thumping Tim Eyman's latest initiative (something to do with monkeys) and riding the coattails of the Carlson/Wilbur efforts. Many signature gatherers carry both petitions, according to what callers say on the Carlson show.

In 1997, Carlson tried to run the anti-affirmative action initiative campaign on-air from KVI even though he was being paid by them. When 2,500 mostly black high schoolers marched around the station with signs reading "KKK: KVI, Karlson, KOMO," Fisher Broadcasting, faced with a broadside of blistering editorials and retreating advertisers, fired him.

But Carlson came back to KVI a hero and victim of political persecution after the measure passed--as if winning exonerated him for the unfair and illegal practices that got him fired.

The opposition is led by Citizens led by Republican ex-Governor Dan Evans, and former Democratic Seattle Mayor Wes Uhlman (an ex-Assoc. of Washington Business President) and Richland Republican Rep. Shirley Hankins.

Carlson's usual allies, like the business community, are joining environmentalists, labor and responsible Republicans to fight this irresponsible partisan maneuver.

Carlson slurs them as "elites," but no matter how elite they are, they're at a tremendous and unfair disadvantage trying to counter in kind the unfair way this is being promoted gratis on the radio.

We beg the Public Disclosure Commission to look at this. Initiatives have become potent political tools for special interests---this time, for Republican partisan surrogates. NWPT54