American Idiots

Whenever I talk about Air America's hapless Minnesota outlet, I frequently ask "are there any radio grownups in the building?"

The same question holds for the national shows; Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo and the late Lizzz Winstad are all terrible hosts running awful shows.

I've never heard more than a few minutes of Randi Rhodes' show; Rhodes, who sounds a bit like Harvey Firestein, is at least a long-term radio pro who's paid some dues in the business. You'd think she'd be a little bit savvy about how you do and don't do a show.

You'd be wrong:

Government officials are reviewing a skit which aired on the network Monday evening -- a skit featuring an apparent gunshot warning to the president!

The announcer: "A spoiled child is telling us our Social Security isn't safe anymore, so he is going to fix it for us. Well, here's your answer, you ungrateful whelp: [audio sound of 4 gunshots being fired.] Just try it, you little bastard. [audio of gun being cocked]."

The audio production at the center of the controversy aired during opening minutes of The Randi Rhodes Show.

"What is with all the killing?" Rhodes said, laughing, after the clip aired.

Now, everyone in the business has pushed the line. Sometimes, many lines. Or course, you don't need to be a rocket scientist to know that threatening the president, even as a joke, is stupid.

Still, radio draws idiots (as well as quite a few brilliant people); the fact that a shock tawker like Rhodes stepped on things like this isn't remarkable.

No, the part that caught my eye was this:

AIR AMERICA President of Programming and co-COO Jon Sinton said in a release: "We regret that a produced comedy bit that was in bad taste slipped through our normal vetting process.

Vetting process?

I don't know what's more absurd; the notion that there's some internal bureaucrat at FrankenNet that "vets" production bits before they air...

...or that that same "vetting" allows an inept like Janeane Garofalo, or a genuinely insane man like Mike Malloy, on the air at all.

Posted by Mitch at April 28, 2005 06:02 AM | TrackBack