Transcript
BOB GARFIELD: This is On the Media. I'm Bob Garfield.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: And I'm Brooke Gladstone with a few of your letters. My talk with Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank about political slogans like "cut and run" prompted this from Matt Price of Los Angeles. Quote: "In your discussion, I noticed that most of the slogans, or shorthand sound bites, were from Republicans – amnesty, cut and run, tax and spend. All of these are obviously negative campaigns. The one Democratic message you mentioned was 'Save Social security,' a clearly positive spin on their message. What about 'culture of corruption?' Democrats have been using that phrase over and over for the past several months. You make it appear as if the Republicans are the only ones doing the attacking."
BOB GARFIELD: Elizabeth Nowak writes in to ask, "What has happened to your show? Today's show sounds like it was suddenly taken over by the Republican party. I will never listen to your program again after listening to your story on presidential speechwriter Michael Gerson being, quote, 'one of the greatest speechwriters of our time.' Michael Gerson is one of the worst speechwriters of our time. I cannot believe how you right-wingers can justify your mediocrity. It's shameful."
BROOKE GLADSTONE: George Kay of Sylvania, Ohio, says I provided a fair tribute to Dan Rather's career, but, quote: "You failed to give him the credit he really deserves. Dan Rather, more than any of the liberal network news readers, helped spawn the conservative movement in broadcast media. Without his openly left-wing biased reporting, perhaps the right wing could not have come of age with the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. So let's give Dan the credit he deserves, or, as Dan might say, 'That dog can hunt.'"
BOB GARFIELD: Last week, Mike Pesca interviewed outgoing NPR ombudsman Jeffrey Dvorkin. Listeners wrote in to suggest that Dvorkin seemed a little too sensitive in matters of taste. For instance, he was concerned about Scott Simon's interview with director John Waters and a Morning Edition piece in which someone made a comment about the Easter bunny and a mother wrote in to say her child cried. Quote: "Mr. Dvorkin must live in an ivory tower," writes Terence McKenna in Dover, New Jersey, "or perhaps he never raised kids. When he expressed concerned about the John Waters interview done by Scott Simon, he expressed concerns about, among other things, that kids may be listening. Well, they're not. But if a few of them are, I suspect they understood the body function references better than the cultural references, and I bet they giggled." And Sherman L. Greene of New York City gets the last word on this. He writes: "What's the difference between an ombudsman and an English nanny? Now that Dvorkin is leaving, perhaps Mary Poppins is available."
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Keep those comments and observations coming to onthemedia@wnyc.org, and don't forget to tell us where you're from and how to pronounce your name