Jerry Springer lives!
BY PHILLIPE & JORGE
The old explanation that "it was a slow news day" hardly explains why the
BeloJo has chosen to run a series of prominent stories about the talk radio
urination contest between Ahh-lene and Swiss Family Bud-I. The whole brouhaha
would have been just a blip in the isolated and angry world of talk radio if
the Urinal and the television stations hadn't decided this was an important
tale. Sure, it's news, but it's soap opera stuff that, P&J believe, belongs
more rightly as a small item in the "People" section of LifeBleat. It's not as
if the entire state is glued to talk radio or (more to the point) this is a
story that has any real gravitas.
Underscoring this was a statistical fact buried deep in Ed Fitzpatrick and
Scotty MacKay's talk radio sidebar in the Urinal of Saturday, November 23. They
pointed out that "about 14,000 people in Rhode Island and southeastern
Massachusetts listen to WHJJ for about five minutes during [John] DePetro's
time slot while about 10,500 listened to WPRO during Steve Kass's time slot,"
according to the spring 2002 Arbitron figures. Thanks to the copious television
and print coverage, talk radio is no doubt experiencing a bump during the past
week.
Listening to John "The Journalist" DePetro's show last Friday, November 22,
reminded your superior correspondents of a term that crops up in Psychology
101: transference -- a situation in which one sometimes transfers those traits
abhorred in oneself to another. DePetro's performance, in which he castigated
the Bud-I as "desperate," "pathetic," and "shameful" (not to mention calling
him an "animal" and a "pathological liar"), sounded desperate, pathetic, and
shameful. Hardly "issue-oriented," this mean-spirited display of ad
hominem pique left P&J with the immediate desire to take a shower. It
also revealed far more about DePetro than the Bud-I, or Ahh-lene, two people we
all know well and already have well-formed opinions about.
Since most of the talk centered on perceived motives -- and perhaps
subconscious ones, too -- no one really learns anything new or newsworthy. But
we do know this: The Journalist claimed at various times that any pro-Bud-I
calls made to WHJJ were plants or "coming from a phone bank." Making this claim
was a tactic used by the Bud-I himself during his late '80s show, with
assertions that he knew that the callers were phonies and really in league with
his enemies or nemeses. In such instances, the Bud-I was, and DePetro is,
blowing it out their buttocks.
The Journalist also suggested that the FCC take action to remove Cianci from
the airwaves because he's a "pathological liar." Gee, we thought DePetro was a
fan of Rush Limbaugh! If the FCC adopted this "Brave New Standard," Rush would
have to be one of the first to go. Jorge (who hosted a program aired after
Rush's in the mid '90s) recalls sitting with paper and pen while listening to
the last half of Rush's show, writing down all the exaggerations, outright
untruths, and unproven hypotheses presented as fact that Rush would regurgitate
daily. The list always went to two pages and this was just in a half-hour.
Actually, DePetro has mastered quite a few Goebbels-like tricks himself.
A coat for a coat
Don't forget that Friday, November 29, the day after Thanksgiving, is
the annual Buy Nothing/free coat exchange day. Taking place, as usual, right
across the street from the Providence Place Mall (when you're dealing with
something as massively insidious as materialistic excess, the blatant symbolism
of setting up on the lawn between the State House and the mall is a virtual
necessity), the coat exchange is co-sponsored by dozens of fine community
groups.
This is an opportunity for those who have warm winter clothing that they may
no longer be using to share it with a needy neighbor. It has been a big success
in past years, and considering the level of need in the state right now, we
expect a larger than usual turnout of folks looking for coats. If you've got a
winter coat you're not using, just drop it off that day. Kids' sizes are
especially needed.
Black humor
A big week for morgues in the media, and we're not talking about
coverage of just what's going on in Lincoln Almond's office.
First was the report from London of a doctor performing a public autopsy --
the first in England in 170 years -- for an audience of 140 ghoulish patrons
who paid for the privilege of seeing a human being dissected. This anatomical
performance piece was carried out by a doctor nattily attired in a blue
surgical gown and fedora and included the passing around of organs for the
crowd to examine. More like passing out, P&J would suspect.
This little demo makes controversial YBA (Young British Artist, for the
hopelessly uncool) Damien Hirst's slicing up of a cow in sections and setting
them in amber, which scandalized Britain a few years back, seem fairly tame by
comparison. Perhaps it's time for some budding artist who wishes to gain
international fame to do a gallery opening tribute to the late Dr. Christian
Barnard, who performed the first successful heart transplant, and remove the
organs of someone who is not dead quite yet.
We also had the rather intriguing article in the Sunday Urinal of November 24
on the former morgue in Miami, Florida, which is now the Joseph H. Davis Center
for Forensic Pathology and the local medical examiner's office. The at-times
gruesome piece explained the fact and fiction of what a modern day Quincy can
accomplish at death and crime scenes with new technology. But what caught
Phillipe and Jorge's eye was the address of this gloomy place, just reeking of
the seriousness of the medical detectives' work: One Bob Hope Road. This in
honor of all stand-up comedians who ever boasted after a show, "I killed
them!", or those who simply died out there, we suspect.
Wag the dog
Well, isn't it just hunky-dory how we're being led into war by professional and
even wannabe ad men and spin doctors? Former GOP enfant terrible Lee
Atwater would be green with envy about this kind of massive political
deception.
First, years ago, we had the phrase "weapons of mass destruction" crammed down
our throats when the government couldn't find any nuclear weapons in Iraq and
had to still maintain a certain fear quotient. Is there any criteria for
something being declared a "weapon of mass destruction," other than that it
kills a lot of people? Do commercial airliners fall into this category? But
this vagary is now an essential part of any scare-mongering statement in which
justification for war needs to be made. (You can fool some of the people . . .
)
As the UN weapons inspectors move into Iraq, the pimps and pundits are
preparing to outdo themselves. As Raymond Zilinskas of the Monterey Institute
for International Studies, and a former UN weapons inspector, described the
suspected behind-the-scenes thinking to justify invading Iraq, "The strategy is
to come up with a dossier of deception." Dossier of deception? Eureka! Well,
you know this had reporters slapping their foreheads because they didn't come
up with the phrase first, and Dubya, Big Time Cheney, and Rummy Rumsfeld
sending off a check to Zilinskas for a few hundred thousand, because, well, he
did.
David Albright, another former weapons inspector with the Institute for
Science and International Security, explained, while eating a sandwich from his
Ilya Kuryakin/Napoleon Solo lunchbox, that the weapons sites in Iraq are
cleverly concealed: "It would be like something from The Man from
U.N.C.L.E., where you go in a plain storefront and suddenly find yourself
in a weapons lab." And there's a guy sitting in one corner in a white suit
stroking a cat and another with a look-a-like named Mini-Me, right Dave?
Well, maybe it is time to see just how many fancy phrases and fictional
explanations the US public is ready to swallow. Based on our past experience,
this appear to be enough to choke a horse. In a truth-seeking effort, Phillipe
and Jorge took to the streets to get feedback from average Americans. We have
here with us Murphy Brown, a single mother . . .
Quality of place
There is reason for optimism, fellow Vo Dilunduhs! Last Saturday's convocation
on Quality of Place, held at URI's Narragansett Bay Campus, brought together
about 125 of the Biggest Little's smartest and most creative minds to address
the issue of how to spur economic development while retaining and enhancing our
inherent natural resources. By inherent resources, the group meant the
cultural, physical, and historic assets that we have in abundance, relating
primarily to historic buildings and the environment.
The gathering was sponsored by the Rhode Island Economic Policy Council, Grow
Smart Rhode Island, RIPEC, the state Senate policy office, and the Rhode Island
Foundation. These folks understand that economic development must operate
within the context of environmental preservation to truly flourish and maintain
Vo Dilun's status as a distinct and attractive place. Governor-elect Carcieri
was there, pleasing participants with a brief talk indicating that he "got it"
(explaining how his long-standing opposition to the Quonset Point megaport
project is based on these very factors).
Selling this message -- that we can grow economically and responsibly at the
same time if we recognize and embrace the essential natural beauty and culture
of our state -- will be the major challenge of the next few years. It was
especially heartening to hear from a majority of the participants their firm
belief that none of this can be done without successfully tackling the growing
gap between rich and poor. It was a good start and a positive message. Now, in
terms of planning, all these folks have to do is figure out how to order enough
coffee to last longer than the first eight minutes of the conference.
Send pumpkin pie and Pulitzer-grade tips to p&j[a]phx.com.
Issue Date: November 22 - 28, 2002
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