Fox News’ Sean Hannity (who must have a very bad back due to all the water he carries for GWB) had a no-holds barred segment with Republican Rep. Ron Paul, who attracted lots of attention — gaining some support and outraging many — for what some took as an insinuation by him that the U.S. was to blame for 911.
But judge for yourself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZ4IW0Y_7WY
FOOTNOTE: Those interested in media criticism may wish to watch this several times.
Note at the end how Hannity’s liberal counterpart Alan Colmes seems pleased by the two guys to his left shouting over each other. This shows, once again, that ideology and politics mean little in America’s 21st century media culture where yelling, interrupting, accusing, and getting angry while discussing politics is what is considered (a) REAL political debate and (b) just great television.
The problem: it creates a political context that becomes the norm for young people growing up — and they feel this is the ONLY WAY to passionately debate issues. WRONG. (But what is TMV to criticize with our modest but usually-non-screeching readership?)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.