I was poking around James Hudnall’s blog and came across his post The Censorship Factor. While I agree with James about O’Reilly’s ego (and, after a brief look around his blog, probably everything else), this Olbermann guy (whom I’d never heard of) comes off as just as much of a jerk as O’Reilly does, but less mature. He also indicates shock jocks have an orchestrated annoy-a-radio-show-host campaign going on, which makes O’Reilly’s response less irrational. If some kid was crank calling you every day, would you call the local cops and report him? I probably would.
Also, most of what Olbermann’s guest said was nonsensical to the point of being deliberately misleading. She’s either a complete idiot or she thinks everyone else is. I mean, when I come home and find that my house has been broken into and items stolen, I call the police with the full expectation that they’ll act as my “personal henchmen” in the matter - that they’ll enforce the law on my behalf. The fact that you, I and Bill O’Reilly all have deliberately run wires with bells on the ends that anyone can ring from remote locations into our homes and businesses (probably constituting a general invitation to ring them), doesn’t mean telephones can’t be used for harassment.
And of course O’Reilly’s the arbiter of what goes on his show. As far as invoking the first amendment goes? I must have missed the part that says private companies have to pony up their own money to print or air whatever any clown in the country wants to gas off about, or even if the clown just wants to dish some shit to the host. So there’s nothing to be learned about O’Reilly in particular here - just more evidence of the incredibly low opinion “news” broadcasters have of their viewers.
(One good thing I can say about O’Reilly: at least he doesn’t talk like the typical network broadcaster, who seems to imitate the stereotypical Ugly American tourist, speaking slowly so the ignorant foreigner - by which I mean red-stater - will be able to understand him.)
Another thought: some blog or other I was reading speculated that the ignominious slide into irrelevance that TV news is experiencing is all about trust. Well, even if these guys were trustworthy, sitting in a chair watching some jerk with a room temperature IQ and a rug on his head read to me from the telepromter like I’m retarded is a big waste of my time, because the information density is too low. Online text, and occasionally short audio & video clips that I can consume whenever I want are much more convenient and efficient.