Tossing & Turning All Night?
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Extra, Extra, Read All About It - We Got The News & We're Gonna Shout IT!
Syndicated Radio Talk Show Art Bell specializes in alleged tales of the supernatural, the paranormal and weird.
I get my important news from Comedy Central's Jon Stewart Monday through Thursday at 11:00 pm on Charter Cable Channel 50.
OK! Maybe that's not really "NEWS." But I understand Stewart's politics and perspective - even if I don't agree.
But Late-night "Talk Radio" is where I learn the best stuff. Between midnight and 5:00 in the morning, there's a stream of non-stop information. Maybe it's not NEWS either . . . but . . . it is entertaining.
NEWS, as we defined it in the 1950's and 1960's, no longer actually exists. News is now, mostly presented from the point of view of the network that we're currently watching . . . or the newspaper/magazine that we're reading.
Wikipedia defines NEWS as "any new information or information on current events which is relayed by print, broadcast, Internet or word of mouth to a third party or mass audience. The reporting and investigation of news falls within the profession of journalism."
But NEWS has changed . . . evolved . . . or, more appropriately, DE-volved.
In place of NEWS, we now are more likely to encounter "SPIN."
"SPIN" implies that the NEWS presenter selectively presents only facts and quotes that support one (and only one) position. All national news is delivered via a news service that has a political agenda.
In some respects, all NEWS has begun to resemble "SPIN."
EXAMPLE: News on Sixty Minutes is very different than News on Fox is very different than News on the O'Reilly Factor is very different than News on Rush Limbaugh, etc, etc. (You get the idea.)
NEWS is everywhere anytime, anyplace, any channel . . . There's news and more news. News. News. News. News.
While I'm watching "House" on Fox (Tuesday night - 9:00 pm), there's a "crawl" across the bottom of my TV screen advising me of school closings, telling how bad weather is going to be tonight and reminding me that TV-5's First Warning Weather can be seen later that night.
News at the local level too often has become more entertainment than informative. It's entertainment because the local television "Promo" ads for News are exactly the same as the network "Promo" ads for shows like "Twenty-Four."
Jack Bauer Shot! Will He Survive? -- See "Twenty-Four" tonight at 9:00 pm.
"Three dead on I-75 just South of Bay City -- Rats found in a local restaurant. Film at 11." Get the idea?
Since I'm a computer-kinda guy, I get most of my information during the day from the Internet. By 11:00 pm, I'm hardly interested anymore in the Dow Jones Industrial Average or local political budgetary issues.
I already know that the potholes are bad on Fifth Street. And I know that Bay City Central won their game earlier in the evening. Weather? -- I can get weather anytime on my desktop or my cell phone and I already know how high the water is on the Pere Marquette River compared to a 30-year average.
I do admit to reading the Bay City Times every night after work. But I think I'm only there for who died, how much raw sewage got dumped into the Saginaw River, what Crystal Harmon wrote and what's going on with Dilbert. And . . . oh yeah, . . . The Last Word.
So by 11:00 pm, I'm pretty much ready for the irreverence of Jon Stewart and I regularly hold on for another half-hour to watch the Steven Colbert Report (Pronounced: Kole-Bare Ree-Pore.) You should watch, too.
And then, it's off to bed and late night "Talk Radio."
 Art Bell |
 Jim Bohannon |
 George Noory |
 Michael Savage |
It's The Jim Bohannon Show! -- America's Premier Late Night Radio Talk Program. Bohannon is on WSGW (News radio 790AM)'til 1:00 am.
Opposite Bohannon, on WSGW's sister station (100.5 FM, formerly The FOX) is Michael Savage - and his flamboyant "Savage Nation." Savage is a controversial American conservative talk radio host in the same flavor as Rush Limbaugh. Depending on your mood, either Savage or Bohannon will get you through the early part of late-night and onto the Main Event - Coast To Coast with George Noory or Art Bell.
Art Bell is the originator of Coast To Coast. Noory has replaced Bell as the current featured star of Coast To Coast. Nobody in talk radio quite compares to Bell/Noory when it comes to entertaining the masses with notions of UFOlogists, psychics and conspiracy theorists. Bell and Noory specialize in alleged tales of the supernatural, the paranormal and weird. By now, you might be asking . . . What's the point of all this?
Simple. It's my honest opinion (and why would I lie) that there is much to be learned from late-night "Talk Radio." For Example:
Here are the three things I learned last night.
(1) - Louis Semerano, a tuberculosis patient whose drug-resistant TB illness has defied months of treatment at a Denver hospital, was barred today from returning to his home in Ohio.
With the cooperation of Mr. Semerano's wife (Palmina,) Geauga County officials went to court last week to prevent Semerano from returning to Chardon, about 45 miles east of Cleveland, saying his disease was contagious.
Judge Frank Lavrich of Probate Court placed Mr. Semerano under the care of the Ohio Department of Health until the authorities decide where to send him.
This Makes Total Sense To Me. Semerano's got incurable TB. Semerano could infect us all. Semerano doesn't care. Semerano needs to be locked up.
But noooooooo . . . Seems I got it all wrong. A very upset lady caller into George Noory at Coast To Coast found it "unbelievable" that this man, infected with incurable TB - that endangers the lives of everyone on the planet - was being held in confinement because he was incurable and TB contagious.
She wants him released.
Here's My Thought: Let's let Semerano out of jail and send him to the lady caller's house. I'm sure she would be willing to put the guy up for a few weeks. Wouldn't everyone?
(2) - I have also learned by listening that most late-night "Talk Radio" listeners must be either terribly in debt or must owe the IRS a bunch of moola. This must be the case because almost every ad during the early morning hours seems to deal with with debt reduction and various legal ways to not pay your taxes.
(3) - And lastly, right in the middle of George Noory's program last night, I finally realized what I want to be when I grow up. (NO! - Not a Toys-'R-Us Kid.)
I wanna be an Illuminati.
A WHAT? You heard me right - an Illuminati.
I know you've probably had the same thoughts. What with all the attention that Illuminati got during the recent showing of Dan Brown's DaVinci Code movie.
Illuminati got it made. In the realm of conspiracy theory, Illuminati are the shadowy conspiratorial guys/gals who secretly control world affairs.
How cool would that be?
Unfortunately, I've been searching all day for a web site with an Illuminati application form.
Maybe Mike Seward's got one down at the Chamber of Commerce. Or Shirley at The Convention & Visitor's Bureau? Or Belleman at the City Manager's Office? Or the Bay Community Foundation? Or Bay Future? Or . . .
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O. J. Cunningham |
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