Hannity, Limbaugh, O'Reilly and Savage
All Wear Asbestos Pants!

By: John F. Borowski

Children often use the limerick: "Liar, liar pants on fire!" when they believe a playmate has exaggerated the truth or done the unthinkable: lied. Talk show pundits who pontificate their "truth" to millions of citizens per day via television and radio apparently are receiving a free pass on their distortions, fabrications, omissions, and downright lies: and America is allowing it. The question is: why?

The air waves are filled with the likes of Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Bill O'Reilly while their brethren, Cal Thomas, Mona Charen, Linda Chavez, and countless other pompous windbags litter our daily newspapers. The common threads are easy to distinguish: continual use of terms like leftist, socialists, "the liberal press", "heavy-handed government", and radical environmentalists. These daily diatribes of specious "facts" often enrage their audience, whose fluency in everyday issues runs a mile wide and often a micron deep. In the absence of a counter message or attempt to provide guests that would question the lack of objectivity on their shows, our "air wave prophets" fill the air with hate, misinformation, and a zealous desire to shape the world according to their morals: or lack thereof.

But this is not a new trend, just a more dangerous trend in American history because the voices of these "purveyors of truth" are controlled by fewer entities and owned by even fewer powerbrokers. In an 1807 letter to Thomas Seymour, Thomas Jefferson stated: "The press is impotent when it abandons itself to falsehood." And sometimes it seems that all the Viagra in the world cannot help the captains of the yellow press to regain their integrity.

First, Clarify Some Myths

Before any serious discussion on the shortcomings of the press can be addressed, there are some myths to dispel of and set the record straight:

• The issue of the "liberal press" is a favorite target of the "righteous spinmeisters". When in fact, an objective press is long dead and far from liberal. In her book, Global Spin, Sharon Beder sheds light on the demise of the free press and the creation of a PR press bought and owned by corporate America. "In 1995 a study of major newspapers, radio and television transcripts found the media referred to the Heritage Foundation (an ultra conservative think-tank) more than any other think-tank. Altogether there were 7,792 citations of conservative think-tanks, 6,361 of centrist think-tanks and 1,152 of progressive think-tanks." The editor of the Heritage Foundation's own journal concluded that by the end of the 1980's, editorial pages were dominated: by conservatives! Or to quote former VP Dan Qualye: "One of the strengths of democracy is diversity, but there is an amazing lack of it at the top levels of the national media." He is right: top journalists and talk show hosts receive high pay, are rich, travel in elite circles, and often share a common ideology. To quote Beder: " Journalistic objectivity discourages a search for evidence: the balancing of opinions often replaces journalistic investigation altogether." If the Limbaugh show claims that volcanoes create ozone loss, naturally he leaves listeners with this lie, because he will never have a single one of the 1000's of scientists who know that CFC's have destroyed ozone on his show.
  
  
• Is there a free press? No. And to those who say: "Simply change the channel" if you are disgusted with those who look to lead the sheep of the nation, it isn't that simple. Much of the "news" outlets ranging from talk radio to magazines are advertising vehicles, searching for more corporate advertisers and desperately holding onto those who pay top dollar. Editorial content is held hostage to advertising. If we hear enough of the corporate message that democracy and government are not working: we lose interest. Isn't it ironic that Robert Putnam found a direct link to the rise of talk radio and media and the decline in voting!
  
  
• If the media is liberal, why don't we see or hear Ralph Nader, William Daly, Noam Chomsky, David Korten, or other progressive voices in the media? We must endure Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell, Bill Bennett and liars and adulterers like Oliver North and Newt Gingrich.
  
  
• The press isn't corporate? Basically Sony, General Electric, Seagrams, Viacom, Disney, Time Warner, AT&T, and Newscorporation own the media.
  
  
• If the media is liberal and leans towards Democrats why have the Republican presidential candidates receive most of the daily newspaper endorsements in 16 out of the 18 last elections?
  

Time for Redemption or Do Talk Show Hosts Have Intestinal Fortitude?

The time is ripe for the 130 million Americans who didn't vote in the last election to hold our "talk show circus" and their collective feet to the fire. They must be called on their outrageous claims. Michael Savage of the Savage Nation last week asked the question if we should allow "small tactical nuclear warheads" to be used in the war on terrorism! Rush Limbaugh last week called those who care about the environment: socialists. Alan Caruba has penned a piece referring to environmentalists as the "Green Taliban". The bigger question is will the corporate owned channels have the courage to open a dialogue rather than ranting monologues from nothing less than transparent demagogues? Will the corporate owned channels take on issues sure to upset their advertisers? Or will they put the profit over truth and stock earnings over honest debate?

Yes, we are slipping into a "Sodom and Gomorrah" but the guardians of moral fitness shouldn't be Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity. For they refuse to tell the American people the whole story, they look to protect their pimps and they lack the backbone to tell the "the whole truth and nothing but the truth". Searching for a case in point? You do not have to go far:

• Our radio show hosts lament the decline of morality in this country. Yet, why aren't they doing shows on the some the biggest providers of pornography? Marriot, Westin, and Hilton all offer in room X-rated movies. AT&T is the biggest American company engaged in the seedy pornography business. Its cable division AT&T Broadband distributes the explicit porn channel: The Hot Network. Ma Bell obviously believes that the debasement of women should be added to their stock earnings? But, other American icons like General Motors are making cash from porn. Their service, DirecTV channels porn right into the homes of good Americans. When is the last time you heard this discussion on Hannity or the Limbaugh show? Where is Bill Bennett discussing the moral abyss of corporations selling thongs for 8 year olds and targeting the youngest citizens in an all out commercial blitzkrieg?
  
  
• Talk show hosts lament "big government" and welfare mothers and their spawn. Yet, has Caruba written about Green Scissors? This report documents the incredible dining of corporate pigs at the trough of citizens' tax money. Defenders of "Darwinian Capitalism" lament school to work funding, extra taxes for public schools or worker training programs. But, why do they give a free ride to corporate welfare carpetbaggers by their tacit silence on the airwaves? The conservative Cato Institute states that over $87 billion dollars are spent on programs that provide subsidies to private businesses. Not only does this give corporations the edge over smaller competitors, it gives cause to our politicians to deny tax relief to the bottom 75% of taxpayers. If we eliminated corporate welfare, according to Cato, that alone would allow for the income tax to be reduced by nearly 50% for those making between $26,415 and $52,695 and abolish it entirely for those making under $26,415!
  
  
• Who is discussing the Export-Import Bank a government institution doling away taxpayers money, while we have a $6 trillion dollar debt and we continue to raid the Social Security Fund? Yet, General Motors received $500 million in loan guarantees as they reduced their work force. Enron only received $514 million for projects here and in India. The World Bank would not finance this India project calling it "not economically viable". When has Bill O'Reilly brought William Daly or David Suzuki or John Stauber to enlighten his audience to the corporate scandals that rob America's piggybank?
  
  
• When will Limbaugh scream and when will Mona Charen and George Will lament over the abuse of our public lands? We must now pay a "user-fee" to hike and fish our own lands. But, the 1872 Mining Law continues to give away $1 billion worth of minerals a year without any royalty payments to taxpayers. A 1994 mineral lease of $10,000 for a multinational gold company only yielded them $10 billion dollars worth of gold! This archaic law has cost over $250 billion since its conception. Talk show pundits praise President Bush's "cut the forest to make it healthy" policies, but where is the outcry over a task force that was dropped while investigating timber giant Weyerhaeuser's apparent trend of cutting public timber illegally on national forest lands? When did Sean Hannity explain the fact that federal timber sales lose money every year, that massive clearcut logging actually led to more fierce fires and that alternatives like hemp or kenaf could easily replace the cutting of trees for paper?
  
  
• The public has paid over $110 million dollars to advertise agricultural products abroad. Direct subsidies to oil companies range from $7-10 billion dollars a year. Why isn't Donald Rumsfeld on the Michael Medved show discussing his contact with Saddam Hussein and the American support for Iraq during the 1980's? Why isn't ex-President Bush asked to explain his betrayal of Iraq patriots who rebelled against Saddam after the Gulf War to be left hanging by lies and deceit? Only recently have we cut back our oil imports from Iraq, down from a high of 1.1 million barrels a day, is it common practice to do business with a "Hitler type"?
  

Will the American Public Stand Up and Be Heard?

If the radio and newspaper pundits are going to point fingers and call environmentalists "terrorists" or those who question the fascist like tactics of Attorney General John Ashcroft as "aiding and abetting terrorism" or sanctimonious references to the Bible to plug their agenda: then now is the time to turn the tables.

First step, it is high time for the American public to reclaim the moral high ground and demand that these charlatans walk the walk if they: "talk the talk". Call Michael Medved, Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, or Bill O'Reilly shows and demand that they take on the tough questions. No more free rides for corporate welfare cheats, abusers of governmental power, destroyers of the creation, and no more polarized obfuscations and half-truths.

Second, clean up the verbiage and start using words for what they mean. Liberal: tolerant and broadminded, one who favors progress or reform. Conservative: tending to conserve, moderate, and cautious. The drone of the radio and newspaper shills is neither liberal nor conservative. No, their monologues and columns are self-serving, they are servants to a corporate master, where the truth is for sale and the public is damned.

Lastly, we must speak out. Demand our newspapers carry various opinions. We must write opinion pieces and dear editor spots. We must boycott those sponsors who use angry forums as a vehicle for their own profits. Schools must teach that economics has a down side, where "true costs" are hidden, where ecological damage is recorded as positive growth, and that the gap between the haves and have nots is greater than any time in our history. The cherished backbone of democracy, the free press, must be returned to its' original roots. The airwaves of the country are not to be owned by massive multinationals, they were not given that right by the American public. Large monopolies must be broken apart, equal time to all issues must be made available, more public broadcasting stations must be funded to provide a counter to the drumbeat of lies and omissions now filling the airwaves and filling the columns of the editorial pages.

No, Hannity, Limbaugh, Savage, and company is neither the "right" nor earned the right to be labeled: "conservative". They are a sad phenomenon that hopefully will be looked upon with disdain in future history books: an uncharacteristically un-American time when money and power was almost able to buy democracy and freedom. And despite the spin, the deep pockets of the corporate puppet-masters and the manufacturing of content, the lies ultimately generated a temperature their "pants of deceit" could not put out.