A Big Week

Aired 11/27/06 A Big Week

On Sunday the War in Iraq passed the duration of our involvement in World War 2. And the first week past that threshold looks to be a very significant one, with reports, summits, and new developments on the ground.

Tags: Bush, Media, Maliki, James Baker, Al-Sadr, Iraq, Politics, Podcast

Public and Private

Aired 11/24/06 Public and Private

The Decision by Rupert Murdoch's media empire to drop the OJ Simpson hypothetical-tell-all book and interview was seen as his finally having pushed the envelope of taste too far. But I am not so sure. On their own enough people would have still tuned it to make it a ratings win for Fox in the time period, which was the whole point of it. They might not have admitted seeing it to anybody afterword, but they would have looked at it anyway.

The sequence of events told a slightly different story. it was an advertizer abandonment of the show that started the ball rolling. Compared to watching a show having your ad appear during it is a public act. You can't pretend that you weren't there the next day.

Tags: OJ Simpson, Media, Rupert Murdoch, Politics, Podcast

The Imp of the Perverse

Aired 11/17/06 The Imp of the Perverse

What on earth is OJ thinking? What makes him want to give what clearly everybody is going to regard as a detailed confession? It reminded me of a short story from Edgar Allen Poe, sort of a more intellectual version of The Telltale Heart. called The Imp of the Perverse.

In the meantime there are just so many great possibilities for this new genre, the Hypothetical Tell-All Expose. And there are a lot of other recent newsmakers with potential hypothetical blockbusters in the making.

Tags: OJ Simpson, Media, Mark Foley, Jack Abramhoff, Ted Haggard, Podcast
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Catching the Car

Aired 11/17/06 Catching the Car

While the War in Iraq is certainly the big picture issue of the midterm elections there will certainly be no easy solution and no obviously good one. So I believe that an important thing will be for the Democrats to quickly validate to voters that things are different because they were voted in. That is not so easy because there are still President Bush's veto and the Republicans' veto power to get around. In this podcast I suggest three things that the Democrats could possibly pass in the first hundred days after being sworn in that would validate themselves to the voters.

Tags: Guest Workers, Media, Minimum Wage, Stem Cell, Podcast

Clark or Melvin

Aired 11/10/06 Clark or Melvin

The resignation of Donald Rumsfeld was a big story, but perhaps the real question is what does Bush expect from his successor? I example this question using the two men who held the position of Secretary of Defense in the later days of the Vietnam War.

Tags: Donald Rumsfeld, media, Clark Clifford, Melvin Laird, podcast

Riding the Swing

Aired 11/10/06 Riding the Swing
What to make of the Democratic takeover in the midterm election? There will undoubtedly be as many answers as there are pundits. My initial take; It shows that despite all the massive efforts to force them into extinction the swing voter still exists.
Tags: Swing Voter, media, 2006 Election, Democrats, podcast

Sin

Aired 11/3/06 Sin

The story of Ted Haggard captures the media and audiences because nothing quite grabs the public like an ironic comeuppance. But the whole coverage, and people's reaction, maked it sound like his big sin is homosexuality. I disagree.

Tags: Ted Haggard, media, Sin, Homosexuality, podcast

What I'm Tired Of.

Aired 11/3/06 What I'm Tired Of

As this midterm election drags itself toward a 2.6 billion dollar finish line I thought I would sum up with a bit of a rant about what I find most annoying about the entire state of american politics.

Tags: Idiot, media, fear, Election, podcast