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01/04/07 |
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A Review of Radio Talk Show HostsI'm really fascinated by talk radio, which, for the most part, is conservative propaganda. There is liberal propaganda on the airwaves, but so far it's hard to find in my area. I live in a "red" state (New York), and never heard anything from Air America until I traveled to Iowa, in America's Heartland. Conservative or liberal, the hosts share the desire to convince you that they're right, and do so with debate techniques, faulty logic, shoutdowns, mockery, out-of-context sound bites, and one-sided interviews. For reference, here's my own political position:
The talk show hosts themselves have certain common characteristics and unique quirks. I'll go into the standard characteristics before I wander off into a review of the hosts themselves. I'm here to discuss style, not the politics or beliefs of these people. I am limiting my review to those hosts I've actually had a chance to listen to, as a way of being fair. I'm going to make an effort to listen to more of these folks, and even try to hunt down a few of those rare liberal hosts, to see what patterns I can discover. Characteristics. I started out with a vision of a neatly-ordered set of criteria that I would use to rate these guy. But I said to myself, "Self, you're planning arbitrary and subjective opinions here, laced with biting and incisive commentary!" So, I ditched that lame idea after a couple of reviews. Any categories listed in the reviews are there because they struck my fancy. The Hosts. Here's a list of hosts I know well enough to review. Reviews are linked when complete. On with the show! Glenn Beck. Sean Hannity. Phil Hendrie. Michael Savage. Andrew Wilkow. |
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